Driving home from campus this afternoon, I was finally able to get around a slow van when the road expanded to two lanes on my side. I pulled alongside mister law-abiding, right-at-the-speed-limit. His was a contractor's vehicle with a phone number on the back, metal racks on the roof … and this interesting symbol on the side.I knew it was Greek but I wasn't sure which letter. Theta? No, that has a horizontal bar. Iota? No, that sounded too small which probably wouldn't be blue collar enough. Then I wondered if the electrician was playing some clever game. I know it's pretty rural where we live and I'd almost expect sly intellectual references if I was in Cambridge (notwithstanding being within a horseback ride to the best public university in New England). So I puzzled and puzzled. How do you pronounce phi?
The owner also had his last name on the side. In fact McPhee turns out to kind of a big deal within the electricity industry. Plus, their offices are far from Storrs. Phi was the mystery symbol and some purists argue it is pronounced as a long e sound. To rhyme with McPhee. Wikipedia informs me that this letter represents electrical potential which is an amazing advertising gimmick. I was very impressed and somewhat envious about the confluence of names and professions and symbols.
And I was about to end this entry when I followed a couple links and found that phi also is used to represent fugacity…
Fugacity reflects the tendency of a substance to prefer one phase (liquid, solid, or gas) over another, and can be literally defined as “the tendency to flee or escape.”Last random thought. A friend from Cleveland once told me of a sailing competition among various modest sailing clubs. All the competitors taught sailing during the summer and presumably were ski bums or college students in cooler weather. One team claimed they were descendants of an Indian tribe: the Fugawee. It sounded odd but its significance became clear as they shouted to other boats at each turn "We're the Fugawee?!" I can attest that when scented with beer, the voice that shouts that line sounds as if there is some uncertainty about one's location.
The fugacity coefficient is useful as a measure of the escaping tendency of a substance from a heterogeneous system.
fugacious |fyoōˈgā sh əs|
adjective (esp. poetic/literary)
tending to disappear; fleeting : she was acutely conscious of her fugacious youth.
Turns out if you want footwear authentic to Paul Revere's time, you could obtain them from the Fugawee corporation. Further, there is a type of soil classified as Fugawee
Fugawee soils are on gently sloping plateaus and moderately steep mountains. Elevations are 6,000 to 8,000 feet. Slopes are 2 to 50 percent, but are mainly less than 30 percent. Fugawee soils formed in material weathered from basic volcanic flows, breccias and agglomerates. The average annual precipitation ranges from 35 to 60 inches. Mean annual temperature ranges from 37 degrees to 44 degrees F., mean January temperature is 24 degrees F. and mean July temperature is 59 degrees F. The average frost-free season is 30 to 80 days.Time to flee and disappear. Fugaciously escaping.
