Occasionally I just think about how weirdly dangerous it is to dismantle a microwave
@Felthry unplug it first
@yaodema there's still actual metallic beryllium in there! aka the stuff that causes the incurable, invariably fatal lung disease berylliosis
@Felthry well. It's beryllium oxide, in the insulators, as far as I can find. And in both cases they're basically inert as long as you don't break and powder them.
@yaodema huh, you're right, dunno where I got the idea that it was metallic beryllium. still, it's not hard to accidentally break it and BeO powders easily, so it's still not a good idea
magnetrons are pretty fascinating though, just in how they work
@Felthry they're some of the weirdest vacuum tube tech in existence and most people don't even know that's what they are.
@yaodema vacuum tubes are generally fascinating but cavity magnetrons, travelling wave tubes, and beam tetrodes are some of the best
also the krytron is pretty neat but that's mostly because of things unrelated to the krytron itself, just the history of it and how it's illegal
other weird things I occasionally think about:
the fact that two very influential ancient greek philosophers, pythagoras and socrates, may well not have existed at all
the way the electromagnetic interaction and the weak interaction merge into one interaction at high energies
the fact that the helium flash involves rate terms proportional to Θ⁴⁰
the fact that a ton of people is really only like a dozen people
how (insert random historical figure here) had a neat name