Comments on: Happy Yb, Dad!

Question: Happy Yb, Dad!

Nathanial Hörnblowér — Tue, 24 Feb 2009 11:19:57 -0800

My dad is turning 70 and is a retired professor/scientist. What can I put on his birthday cake to represent 70 in some scientific way?

I thought about the Periodic Table of Elements (Yb for Ytterbium) but he may be too removed from that at this point to get it. He was a soil scientist, so anything having to do with agronomy would be great.

By: mismatched

mismatched — Tue, 24 Feb 2009 11:21:01 -0800

Well, 70 in scientific notation is 7.0 x 10^1... Could be cute.

By: fearnothing

fearnothing — Tue, 24 Feb 2009 11:27:54 -0800

Ytterbium, atomic weight 70.

By: damn dirty ape

damn dirty ape — Tue, 24 Feb 2009 11:29:17 -0800

In binary:

1000110

By: fearnothing

fearnothing — Tue, 24 Feb 2009 11:30:17 -0800

I am so asleep today, my bad. I'd be surprised if he didn't get Ytterbium, especially if you laid out the full little card it gets in the table with the weight, proton number and symbol... I don't know about the states but in the UK learning about the periodic table was done in far more detail 50 years ago than it is today, you actually had to memorize sections of it.

By: GuyZero

GuyZero — Tue, 24 Feb 2009 11:31:33 -0800

You'd write 70 in scientific notation as 7e1 normally, as opposed to spelling out the whole thing. Or at least, calculators do it that way. Maybe a photo cake with a picture of a calculator, but maybe soil scientists don't spend all day punching their HPs.

By: FatherDagon

FatherDagon — Tue, 24 Feb 2009 11:31:40 -0800

You could say he's turning 294.26, in Kelvin (343.15 if you're in a celsius-using country).

By: world b free

world b free — Tue, 24 Feb 2009 11:35:23 -0800

I'm not positive you could use this for the 70 bit, but maybe you could use a Munsell soil chart somehow. Depending on how good the cake-maker is, maybe you could give them specific colors on it to use for the frosting/lettering. Or just replicate some of the chart?

Of course, you'd probably have to get a second cake that explains the first one, like written out in icing lettering, because it's probably going to be complicated.

By: 517

517 — Tue, 24 Feb 2009 11:39:00 -0800

Exponential growth, e^^{0.3 *14.159} pretty much equal 70 and kind of has pi in it.

By: padraigin

padraigin — Tue, 24 Feb 2009 11:42:38 -0800

You could do the little square as it appears on the periodic table for Ytterbium, in black icing.

Outside the square, you could write HAPP irthday. So the "Yb" in the periodic table square would complete the sentiment.

By: Iteki

Iteki — Tue, 24 Feb 2009 11:45:00 -0800

There's a page of stuff on wiki for the number 70, something might take your fancy.

By: kittyprecious

kittyprecious — Tue, 24 Feb 2009 11:48:34 -0800

I'm not saying anything that results from this will be either edible or comprehensible, but for sheer geekdom you could prepare a tableau of one part luvisol and two parts xerosol. If he gets it, L+X+X = 70.

By: cobaltnine

cobaltnine — Tue, 24 Feb 2009 11:49:22 -0800

If it wasn't on top of the cake, I'd suggest making the cake with various strata colors, ala the Rainbow Cakes that made the rounds a while back. (Admittedly, more browns and tans, though.) Then frost with grass, maybe the sides with stones.

By: aeighty

aeighty — Tue, 24 Feb 2009 12:04:19 -0800

70 dec = 46 hex

Happy birthday! :)

By: exogenous

exogenous — Tue, 24 Feb 2009 12:23:28 -0800

2⁶+6 (or 4³+6)

These numbers are small enough that you could conceivably use a number of individual candles for each digit (maybe really small ones for the exponent).

By: Electric Dragon

Electric Dragon — Tue, 24 Feb 2009 12:50:16 -0800

70 is the smallest weird number.

By: mandymanwasregistered

mandymanwasregistered — Tue, 24 Feb 2009 13:10:03 -0800

This is a bit of a stretch, but how a cake in the shape of a tree stump (trees need soil to grow, amirite?) with 70 frosting rings? You could get detailed with the rings if you wanted to somehow mark the banner years.

By: gully

gully — Tue, 24 Feb 2009 13:13:09 -0800

why not make him feel younger and get two cakes with 35 each?

By: electroboy

electroboy — Tue, 24 Feb 2009 13:36:37 -0800

Definitely a strata cake. If he was a soil scientist, Ytterbium doesn't have much to do with his job.

By: fantabulous timewaster

fantabulous timewaster — Tue, 24 Feb 2009 14:51:33 -0800

You'd write 70 in scientific notation as 7e1 normally, as opposed to spelling out the whole thing. Or at least, calculators do it that way.

This is "computer notation," an ugly kludge for systems where × and superscripts aren't available for technical reasons. Not converting to 7×10¹ smells like amateur hour (which might be okay for birthday cake).

I like HAPP|⁷⁰Yb|IRTHDAY, as others have suggested.

By: wryly

wryly — Tue, 24 Feb 2009 17:37:02 -0800

Make a round cake, and then cut out a 70 degree "slice" or wedge... a hair more than 1/5 of the circle. Or make a big rectangular layer, and cut away cake to leave a big 70 degree wedge.

If you're ordering from a bakery, you could give them a template so they can make the cut before decorating.

By: a robot made out of meat

a robot made out of meat — Wed, 25 Feb 2009 05:45:56 -0800

Cross the seven

By: Nathanial Hörnblowér

Nathanial Hörnblowér — Wed, 25 Feb 2009 08:55:57 -0800

Thanks to everyone for your suggestions. I like the HAPP|Yb|irthday idea and may go with that, if the consensus with the family is that Dad would get it. I marked the other answer as best simply because it made me laugh.