Warning, this is in no way related to pianos. Them what's bummed by such, needs best pass. Them what's still curious about other things can hang and ponder. Operating on the premise that most of us in this field either failed, or escaped into it from another field, and thus have a lot of otherwise disconnected and useless accumulated technical information knocking around in their heads to no obvious use or end. I have a question about an atmospheric optical phenomenon that some other alternately qualified piano geek may be able to answer for me. Flying home at 30,000+ feet, and all through final descent, with the sun on the horizon at about the 1:30 position (compass direction, not azimuth) I am looking out the port side at about 9:30 or 10:00 direction, and about 60° down. Whenever a pond or river passed by in that very narrow directional vector, it lit up with a reflection that didn't seem to have a source in the direction the light should have been coming from. There was a light stratus overcast, and no cumulus clouds to catch sunlight and supply a bright light source opposite the reflective surface of the water. It's apparently a refraction thing, since the viewing angle was so narrow and definite. This really intrigues me, since it isn't obvious to me how it works, and is, indeed, downright wrong by what I think I know but is, at the same time, obviously real. Do any of you out there in Pianotech land have any reasonably lucid explanation(s) to plug this hole in my education before any more of my brains leak out? For the benefit and possible reassurance of the paranoid or conceptually challenged, this is a real, actual, no fault, low risk, honest, nothing up my sleeve request for whatever pertinent factual information may be extant among the remaining readership. We now return you to your regularly scheduled program. Ron N
This PTG archive page provided courtesy of Moy Piano Service, LLC