Terras

I'm taking a lab course over the summer, and I think I'd like to ask out my lab partner. I think she's into me (I guess I'm about 65% sure). Normally I could deal with it if she said no, but the fact that we've been assigned as lab partners would make things really awkward. We'll be working together for 9 hours a week until this class ends. If she says no, we can't change partners; we still have to work together.

I'm thinking I should just wait until the lab is over and then ask her out. That way if she says no then it's no big deal. On the other hand, timing is everything. She's single now, and who knows if she will be by the time this lab's over? I should note that the lab will be over in a month so it's not like it's a long time to wait.

Anyone else been in a similar situation? What did you do and how did it turn out?

Reading through this classic Twain novel, I've seen several mentions of an item known as a miller-gun, but there's no explanation given as to exactly what this thing is. Is there another name for it? There's no Wikipedia entry for it.

Is there a particular word for someone who can lie without remorse or guilt? I used to think that it was a pathological liar, but that's really more of a psychological condition, and the person usually believes that their lies are fact.

My buddy in high school is trying to decide what he wants to do in college. Ultimately, he wants to be a novelist, but he's not sure what degree he should take to do that. Just a generic English degree? Something more specific? He came to me, and now I come before you: any suggestions?

One of my hobbies is building scale models from scratch, and I intend next to build a scale model of a caravel, a rather popular ship during the late Middle Ages, with a cutaway of the hull. However, before I do this, I require some information about the layout of a caravel. Anyone know where I might find a diagram of such a ship? I'd perfer, if possible, a sort of blueprint, with each deck displayed from above. The more detail, the better. Also (to satisfy my own personal curiousity,) how many people would be required to pilot such a vessel, and how long would it be capable of staying at sea?

I heard a story about one of the times Rome was sacked, that at the center of one of the largest fires, it became so hot that the mortar (or stone, not sure which) began to ignite, and from that point there was no chance of putting the fire out.

My question is: is this feasible? What temperature would, say, marble, have to be before it would ignite? Which would catch first, mortar or stone? Could a city fire stoked primarily with wood conceivably get that hot?

I heard from a fairly reliable source that the original dollar sign, an "S" with two vertical lines through it, was really an "S" with a "U" superimposed, standing for the two initials of the United States. Is this information accurate? If it isn't, where did the symbol really originate?

Seriously, I've got nothing.