"Ahhh! My hand!"
Earlier today (well, yesterday, now), the eldest kid and I made a nerd road trip up to the new digital-tv transmitter shack up in the hills.
All afternoon, I had been brooding about standing at the foot of the broadcast tower while it was radiating a few megawatts of radio energy into space.
So, come sunset, I went down to the basement and dug out a couple of 48" fluorescent bulbs, and threw them and the family into the car. We drove over to the nearest high-voltage power line, and we watched the fireflies while we waited for full dark, and then we played light sabers in the gloaming.
ADDENDUM: Here's a guy who did an artistic installation of hundreds of fluorescent tubes under his local power line:
http://www.boxyit.com/r/index.htm
Better pictures here:
http://stopgeek.com/richard-boxs-light-field.html
.
.
Labels: cheap entertainment, experiments, Geekery, parenting, Science

