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#14456 01/03/01 08:16 PM
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All of the meals I cook have instructions in relatively small print that say "Microwave on high for three minutes; stir; then microwave for another five minutes on low" or similar words. It would never have occurred to me that microwave wasn't a verb, but my at-work dictionary does not have it as a verb. Interesting.





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#14457 01/03/01 08:17 PM
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while the US government is kind enough to call me an engineer (Sr. Network Engineer) i learned most of my math and physics as general reading--
so waves start out big-- (low frequency sound-- that we can't hear-- then move on to audible waves-- higher frequency is is radio-- and at the far, far far away end of the spectrum is light (Einstein's unified theory? is light a wave or a particle-- and (don't let the smoke bother you-- i am firing up my steam powered brain here--) since a dopple effect it to more something into a higher frequency, and when you travel close to the speed of light, every thing get Red shifted-- I'd say, ultra violet is a lower frequency than infra red-- where light is moving past the visible sprectum.. and can only be "seen" as heat.

So since we don't know yet if light is a extremely high ( or micro nano? wave) wave... or if its particles.. An infra red oven would be totally different technology than Micro waves-- but 500 MHZ sound about right for microwave oven range--

Lots of places still use infra red lights to keep food warm, and the new GE advantix oven combines infra red (for one sourse of heat), with microwaves-- so on some level they are different...

and why DC tech for 5 to 10 Mhz range? (from low voltage systems?) I worked with everything from 5vDC to 3000vDC-- (you really want to be carefull with 3000 vDC! but it looks so pretty! the wires glow almost ulta violet with a corona...)


#14458 01/03/01 09:17 PM
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She of the magnetic personality asks: why DC tech for 5 to 10 Mhz range?

Low voltage had nothing to do with it. With our lowest frequency radar being 500MHz we considered 5-10 MHz low frequency and hyperbolized it to DC


#14459 01/04/01 03:10 AM
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Thanks for all of the information on microwave. I'm not sure that I followed the history. I, too, nuke or zap my food. I hadn't heard mike before. I loved nukrowave and will add it to my vocabulary immediately. So, I guess that microwave is an adjective as in microwave oven, a noun as in clean up that spill in the microwave and a verb, microwave on high for 3 minutes. My popcorn has been microwaved, so I must go open the bag and enjoy!!


#14460 01/04/01 10:59 AM
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My original answer to this was "what else" under two posts, as if to read either "microwave it, what else" or "nuke it, what else". I meant microwave it.[cheesy grin]

Nuke it is good, I like nuke. Zap could be confusing because zapping is what you do with one of those long black things that people who watch television point at television sets to make cretins go away. You could do this till when you went blue in the face without noticeably heating up the bits of dead animal.


#14461 01/04/01 11:14 AM
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so waves start out big-- (low frequency sound-- that we can't hear-- then move on to audible waves-- higher frequency is is radio-- and at the far, far far away end of the spectrum is light

I'm not wanting to be pernickety and off-topic, I'm just bored with being a "journeyman" and want to move onto a higher and non-sexist plane of expertise: so I shall just point out that raise sound waves to ever so high a pitch as you please, they don't form themselves into radio programmes.

The optical spectrum goes from red to violet. "Below" red is infrared, then microwave, then television, then radio. "Beyond" violet is ultraviolet, then x rays, then gamma rays.

Richard Dawkins doesn't mind confessing that he can never remember whether red is higher or lower than violet, so I am honourably accompanied. My mnemonic is to remember that radio waves can be "long wave", metres long, from which I work out they must be low frequency, and all the rest follow.

Thought. If an infrared device keeps food warm, and a microwave device cooks it, a television oven ought to reduce it to charcoal and sufficiently vigorous radioing should compress it to neutron matter.


#14462 01/04/01 01:00 PM
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NicholasW contributes: Zap could be confusing because zapping is what you do with one of those long black things that people who watch television point at television sets to make cretins go away

Mike it probably never happened because that's what they do to the cretins so that other people can zap them.


#14463 01/04/01 05:29 PM
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I'm afraid that "microwave" has established itself as a verb. I guess now I can start saying to my wife, "Do we have to icebox these leftovers?"


#14464 01/04/01 06:35 PM
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bob--

Be a good guy and get your wife something newer than a Icebox--(not that some of the nice old ones, made of quartered golden oak aren't beautiful) There are these new electric refrigerator..and yes then you can ask," Do we refrigerate these leftovers?"



#14465 01/04/01 08:56 PM
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I grew up with a Frigidaire, myself. A lot of my Southern friends used the brand-name Kelvinator to describe any old fridge. Don't think they Kelvinated their leftovers though.


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