I was cleaning the sinks a few minutes ago and saw myself in the mirror while I did so, and noticed just how pitifully sinister a figure I cut at the moment. Deep, dark spots beneath the eyes; hair that's scruffily outgrown its cut; longish, patchy stubble on the sideburns because I didn't get time to shave them this morning; and a few razorburns and miniscule scabs, again because I didn't take more than a few moments to shave. I can probably chalk up at least half of those to lack of sleep, a topic which I've not been able to purge my mind of for some hours. I really will go to bed soon, just not quite yet.
Part of the reason I didn't have much time to shave was because I was picked up at home today, a little earlier than usual. Amy was driving the trebuchet in, and since I live pretty close by, I rode with her so she wouldn't have to unload it by herself. Ah, the trebuchet...
Yesterday was the day we'd decided on to put on the finishing touches (wheels and a hook) and do practice throws. We put on the hook first and got a few short throws with that - and then our counterweight chain broke. While not insurmountable, this was something of a setback - we had to go pick up a new, heavier chain from Home Depot and figure out a good way of rigging that. The wheels also took substantially longer than expected. As before, Thomas and Chris were both out by nine, and we weren't throwing until about ten last (Thursday) night. Amy and I did about two dozen test throws, and managed to get a good idea of what kind of hook angle and string length worked best - which meant that once the competition started, we had a setup that we knew would work. That night, we measured about 140 feet for the best throw. Today, during the competition, the best of our first set of throws was 138 feet, beating the previous record of 104. Then, later, another group got 145 feet. In a desperate rush for the prize (sic), we gave our arm more torque by lengthening the chain and did a couple more throws. We were lucky enough to get 148 feet - a win by a three-foot hair.
After school, the usual crowd went down to Carmike 15 and saw Pirates of the Carribean, even though very nearly all of us had seen it before. I don't think it was quite as good the second time but it was still a pretty fine movie. We had dinner at this place called Mar y Sol (I think?), obviously a Mexican restaurant, and happily a very good one.
Okay, bed now.
posted on Saturday, September 13, 2003
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