Max Hauser wrote:
> "Dick R." in ...
>>. . . In my experience
>> it's always easy to remove the cork on a sparkling wine. Just
>>ease out the cork until you hear a gentle "pop", no explosions,
>>no foam, no wine on the ceiling.
>
> That is one of the good ways, if I may so say. Actually, removing a cork
> offers the same options as LTI System Identification. A hiss, a bang, or a
> chirp. (Those are the three kinds of classic test inputs you use to scope
> out the behavior of many acoustical, electrical, or other contrivances.)
> With Champagne, some situations call for a hiss, some a bang, even a chirp
> (or gentle "pop"). It is easy to select among them, with practice. Many
> times when serving Champagne I have solicitously asked "what would you like
> to hear?"
I dunno, just fill my glass. :-)
> (Wine on the ceiling, also, is nothing if you have ever seen what happens
> when a very slow-cooked stew in a pressure cooker encounters a blocked steam
> outlet and slowly, quietly, inexorably, builds tension, unnoticed,
> unsuspected, relentless, inescapable, till at last the structure can stand
> it no longer and the relief seal explodes and the contents exit under
> cataclysmic pressure -- huge vegetables, pieces of meat, excessively floured
> sauce -- through an orifice less than a centimeter across. _Horribile
> dictu._ But that's another story.)
Sounds tragic. Gives kitchen cleanup a whole new meaning.
> For more on the principles of system identification look at comp.dsp or
> search under "Detection, Estimation and Modulation Theory," à la Harry L.
> Van Trees.
Maybe not, I'll just stick with the "gentle pop".

Thanks, Max, for a :-) for the day.
Dick R.