Isaac's Blog

December 2, 2005

One of the questions women in physics get more often than men is "Oh, I'll bet your father is a physicist, right?".  While I know women who are the first scientists in their families, I have to reply that yes my dad is a physicist (shown here with his political scientist daughter).  But in fact, as a family we really didn't talk about physics when I was a kid, we talked much more about language and music and just about anything else.  I obviously have no clue as to what my kids will do when they grow up, but I do wonder how having two physicists as parents is affecting them.   

Rob and I do end up talking about science to my kids, and Isaac (my 8-year-old) is fascinated by the fact that I'm on an experiment with a detector deep underground.  He also is in awe of my having a blog, and the fact that so many pictures of him are on the web. 

One direct consequence of having two physicists as parents is that my kids to go science-dominated Children's Museums a lot.  Since I only have a month of blogging left and I took my kids and nephew to the Dupage Children's Museum last Sunday, I figure this would be a good time to give Isaac the floor since only the really devoted blog readers are still on board here anyway...so the rest of this blog was dictated by Isaac and only minimally edited by me. 

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Isaac's Blog

On the Sunday after Thanksgiving, I went to the Children's Museum with my mom, sister, and cousin, Nicholas.  There is a lot of stuff at the Children's museum.  There are things like building waterways, crafts, and rooms where young children play.  In the building section, we build things with wood.  There are hammers, nails, screwdrivers, and other stuff like that.  I made a little person in the building area.  I also played with Nicholas at an air thing where you could put light balls through tunnels and they go up and down the tunnels, and out to a place where you could get them.  There is also a fan where you put goggles on to put things that air could easily move, like a pinwheel.  I made a track where you put down a golf ball and it rolls on the track. 

     I also made an airplane with flappy (or floppy) wings out of paper towel rolls and colored paper.  Downstairs used to be a place with a lot of exhibits, but they moved it all upstairs.  Instead there was a snack room, where there were vending machines.  We had popcorn and cheddar cheese dolphin crackers. Nicholas took off his shoes and it was hard to get them back on again, and we failed trying to get them on. 

There is a mirrored maze where you can see infinity on each mirror.  Infinity means numbers going on and never ending.   If something goes on a mirror which has a mirror facing it on the other side, it will show what the mirror shows, and that mirror will show what the other mirror shows.  That is infinity.      

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For those of you still reading, thank you for being here! 

Comments

[Pete Markowitz]

I have a 9-year old daughter (Jenny), who is also the product of 2 scientist parents. In our case it is a veterinarian and a nuclear/particle physicist. Jenny frequently comments that the food is better at my work (i.e., the student's "all you can eat" cafeteria) but the entertainment is better at Mom's work (where she pulls up a stool and watches surgeries, plays with puppies and kittens, or helps exercise the boarding animals).

Like you, I suspect Jenny will be seriously influenced by our professions but I have a real curiousity to see what type of career path Jenny will take (and in particular, if she chooses science whether or not it will be a biological science).