not much going on here these days.. you guys still recovering from Thanksgivng? Or busy preparing Christmas?

@bilbo_pingouin Yes.

@Samuel that's what I call a precise and detailed information ;-)

@bilbo_pingouin For me at least, I'm just trying to get a bunch of stuff nailed down at work before I leave for six weeks. The rest of my time has been taken by SCUBA lessons and Fallout 4...

that's more like it :)

6 weeks of holidays not bad :)

I suppose you'll go somewhere... or do you want to build a few worlds ? ;-)

It's my honeymoon and despite having an excellent engineering job, this is America, so most of that time is unpaid.

oh, right! I forgot about your honeymoon...

My wife and I are going to Hawaii for 1.5 weeks, around New Zealand for two weeks, three days in Tahiti, a week in Bora Bora, three days on Easter Island, and three days in Santiago (Chile).

ok, this is a good opportunity to find a job in Europe, where we CAN take 6 weeks of holidays (with a bit of organisation) :)

@Samuel well that's pretty cool !

@bilbo_pingouin Yeah, tell me about it. My company is largely based in Germany. The germans usually disappear for long periods.

well in Germany, we have typically 25-30 days of holidays per year

but if you do extra hours, you might have a compensation scheme with having extra days

I'm looking forward to it, I haven't had more than a week in a row off since before grad school.

I did a lot of travelling before college, caught the bug, and then got all locked down with life.

yes, tell me about it...

Been itching to do some more. It'll all be new for me besides Hawaii and Santiago.

and enjoy the honeymoon... life typically will ground you around for the next few years ;)

I certainly intend to get the most out of it.

@bilbo_pingouin I've been busy on Health a bit, trying to get folks to answer old questions. I've only been there a few days, but things have been interesting. So that cuts down on WB time a bit. Also, there was some excitement on SO meta yesterday, so I was taking part in some running commentary/discussion in the TL.

the last half-decent holidays I had was 5 years ago...

And I'm looking forward to those next few years. We're planning to grow some humans next year.

@Samuel Oh, right! When do you guys leave?

@HDE226868 In two weeks.

@Samuel yes, that was the reasoning behind the next few years without travel...

@HDE226868 TL?

@Samuel Cool. Nothing like switching from December winter weather to Hawaii sunshine.

@bilbo_pingouin TL = Teachers' Lounge. Network-wide mod chat, where everything from waffles to Monty Python to actual serious stuff is on-topic.

@HDE226868 And from winter to summer in New Zealand.

Those southern hemisphere folks decided to have summer in December. Weirdos.

@Samuel New Zealand's pretty cool. Although most of what I know about it is from information about the filming of The Lord of the Rings.

Oh, we're totally doing the Hobbiton tour. The reviews are all quite positive.

@Samuel Does Santa wear flip-flops in the Southern Hemisphere? I've always wondered what he does with that sled when he goes there. . .

@Samuel yes, spending new years day sun bathing on a beach... it has to be weird for someone used to the Northern Hemisphere

@HDE226868 Or that jacket...

@bilbo_pingouin Well, the Earth is closer to the sun right now, so they picked a better time for summer to inspire scientific misconception.

@bilbo_pingouin Makes sense for an xmas theme.

@Samuel I hate when people mess that up.

@bilbo_pingouin Possibly. Depends on the context.

@bilbo_pingouin Include the surrounding ideas, flying animals, animals with bioluminescent noses, tireless elves, and faster than light sleds and I think we'd have a lot to go on.

well that would certainly be a challenging challenge to find questions related to Santa (or related theme) on-topic

Evolutionary advantage of a glowing nose?

Bioengineered manufacturing elves?

how fast does the sledge have to go to go to all kids in 24 hours?

Time-dilating Santa?

Required number of clone Santas to not violate physics?

A plausible way for a guy that round to fit down chimneys?

how fat is he really if he appears as he does on his sledge with Lorentz transformed image?

How much free coal energy could we get by getting children to behave poorly?

what is the CO2 cost of a toy delivered by Santa?

How much does it cost Santa to make all his toys, and how can that boost the economy?

Sanata suddenly does exist; which global markets fail?

Who pays for the Elves work?

I like all of these.

Could Grandma survive getting run over by a reindeer?

Chimney generators; Santa is going to get in, how much energy can we produce?

do you think it should stay in chat, or it could be interesting to have it, maybe not as the next challenge, but the following (starting on Dec. 21st)?

Santa's Global Surveillance Network; How can I hide naughty deeds?

@bilbo_pingouin Yeah, I think people would have fun with it. Closer to xmas makes sense.

@Samuel I like that. How to Hack Santa for Dummies.

@Samuel that one's great...

I'll be gone by then, so feel free to use any of my suggestions here.

@Samuel That's a fairly simple calculation, really.

@MikeL. Which?

@Samuel The energy harvested from Santa going down the chimney. Provided his mass is known, that is.

@MikeL. Oh, per incident using only gravitation, sure.

@Samuel Well, unless you mean to trap him there, you don't have many alternatives.

@MikeL. There are other factors. Designing higher chimmines, gathering energy from both ingress and egress, requiring Santa to do more than simply drop in, designing a looped chimney, and combining the energy from all the homes he enters. The question could be as simple as you imagine it to be, but I'm thinking a bit bigger than that.

Presumably, energy will be lost when Santa hits the bottom. How could that energy be gathered? Piezoelectric tiles?

@bilbo_pingouin To be honest, I'm seeing fewer and fewer questions being asked that are up my alley. I've decided to stick to what I know best, and recently, those questions are few and far between, especially as some users have been calling to push some of them off the site.

@HDE226868 Piezo would work for hitting bottom. I was thinking the most energy would be gathered with turbines on the way down.

@Samuel I had envisioned something similar.