waving android

I am currently a software engineer at Google, where as a member of the Android platform team I build frameworks and user interfaces.

The blog here at is mostly historical; you can find more recent posts on .

Archive for October 30th, 2001

I posted a short guide to champagne-sabreing technique to MetaFilter.

October 30th, 2001

I posted a short guide to champagne-sabreing
technique
to MetaFilter.
You just never know when a skill like that will come in handy.

Dan’s champagne-slicing quick reference

  1. Hold the bottle (in your non-dominant hand) pointing away from
    you and tilted upward about 30°.

  2. Hold the knife in your
    dominant hand, level with the horizon, blade away from you. Place the
    flat of the knife on the surface of the bottle (on or around the
    label).

  3. In one smooth, firm, confident motion (believe
    me, this helps), sweep the knife down the length of the bottle,
    maintaining bottle contact the entire way. Imagine that you will slice
    cleanly through the neck of the bottle, because this is what will
    (hopefully) occur.

The pressure of the champagne is
focused on a weak point in the glass of the neck of the bottle, and it
(the neck) will split along invisible lines of cleavage. You’ll be
left with some champagne on the ground, the bottle neck somewhere
across the room, and a bottle of champagne ending in an elliptical
conic section, ready to be poured out to your admiring friends.

Thermodynamics entertainment for the day:

October 30th, 2001

Thermodynamics entertainment for the day:

  1. Start with an empty ceramic mug.
  2. Use the water valve on an espresso machine to fill it with
    about two ounces of boiling water. Swirl for 5-10 seconds. (This is
    ostensibly to flash-clean the inside of the mug.) Empty into sink.

  3. Fill mug with cold water from water cooler.
  4. Hold the mug in both your hands; over the course of about
    20 seconds, the hot ceramic will be palpably overcome with cold.

It’s a unique sensation.

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