Thursday, November 10, 2005

X-rays and Sugar Tolerance

This was Overheard in a New York Office:
Boss: Those cupcakes are delicious. What a sugar rush!
Intern: I broke out in hives.
Boss: In hives?
Intern: A rash. My skin is very sensitive.
Boss: To sugar?
Intern: Yup.
Boss: That's amazing.
Intern: When I was a kid I got sick and I had to have, like, ten X-rays a day. Literally, five X-rays a day. And I think that messed up my photons.
Boss: Your photons?
Intern: Yeah, that's how X-rays work, you know? They reverse your photons. That's how they get the image.
Boss: Oh.
Intern: That's why my skin is so sensitive, because they messed up the photons. They won't admit it, because they don't want me to sue them. But I know what's up.


No kidding. "They" won't admit it? Gee. I wonder why...

You know, as a physicist, I'm always curious to see how x-rays and...photons...are understood in society at large. Prayerfully, this is not at all how society at large understands x-rays and photons.