Ways to know you have won the Nobel Prize
Hosting the "Late Show with Leon," Nobel laureate Leon Lederman shared with high school students his top fourteen ways to know you have won the Nobel Prize:
14. Your telephone rings at 6 a.m. and someone with a Swedish accent invites you to a party.
13. You meet a lot of important people; some are so rich they have unlisted telephone companies.
12. Your fame makes you such an extrovert that you now stare at other people’s shoes when talking to them.
11. You use your prestige to explain to the judge that you couldn’t possibly have been driving at 60 mph when you’d only been driving for 15 minutes.
10. On the seventh Nobel convocation the Queen greets you as an "old friend."
9. Laureates are arrogant, but they don’t want to be. You overheard one saying, "Lord, please forgive the sin of arrogance, and Lord, by arrogance I mean the following..."
8. Your spouse orders you to take out the garbage. "Woman!" you say, "How dare you!" Then she calls three laureates, and they all take out the garbage!
7. Mysterious but passionate love letters arrive in your mailbox, addressed to "occupant."
6. Testifying in a lawsuit, you claim you are unquestionably the world’s greatest theoretical physicist. When later confronted by colleagues, you explain: "I was under oath."
5. Nobelists are supposed to know everything. You find yourself chairing two advisory committees: one on the prevalence of measles in Guatemala and the other on income tax laws in North Dakota.
4. Physicists have three other prizes they can win: one for physicists who can count and one for physicists who cannot count.
3. Your psychiatrist–all Nobelists have them–diagnosed that you are in love with your umbrella. [Looking up, Leon Lederman said:] How stupid can they get? I like and respect my umbrella, but love?
2. Your Nobel colleagues are excited by the discovery of the original document written by the Greek physicist Democretos heralding his discovery of atoms. It is hand written, signed by Democretos himself, and is clearly dated: Aug. 2, 467 BC.
1. Two atoms are walking down the street when one says, "Help! I think I lost an electron." Asks his friend: "Are you sure?" "Yes, I’m positive!"
Streaming video of the show is at http://vmsstreamer1.fnal.gov/VMS_Site_03/Lectures/LateShow/051201LateShow/index.htm
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