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           TWO SPEAKERS IN A THREE-DIMENSIONAL BOX
 
 
     The average University dormitory room had a good
probability of being populated by a high-performance stereo
system.  One of the two roommates might bring equipment from
home by himself that would suit the purpose of creating the
proper environment for entertainment or he might combine
components with the other.  C T had been accustomed to the
typical system of the uninspired middle class at home; its
top output of five watts per channel wasn't even acceptable
when faced with the mechanical vibrations of the 10-inch
speaker frames and in the limits of amplifier distortion.  As
a result, he had little taste for any form of music, much
less amplified music.
 
     Room 7504 had been intrinsically quiet for all the first
semester of C T's sophomore year, then, with the only sound
leaking from Franklin and Robinson's room next door on the
occasional Friday or Saturday night when they entertained "at
home."  C T's physics 130 had taught him a little about
standing waves, and he knew they had designed their system
absolutely wrong.  He wished he knew, however, the extent of
audio AC circuit manipulation to go over with a breadboard or
something and teach the two misguided sound polluters how to
keep most of their sound in their room, 7506, and out of his,
7504, a boundary of only a scant 0.20 meters of post-war
rationed building materials.
 
     "Doesn't it ever bother you, Tim, that those guys
bombard us with their noise?" C T asked when "Satellite
Alert" came through the wall with minimal attenuation during
the third week of the winter semester.  Tim usually put up
with things; he wished to become a part of them, not like
C T, who usually questioned such things as auditory
extremity.
 
     "I wish we had a stereo like that, C T.  I like a little
'Ravaging X Chromosomes' every now and then.  My parents are
paying off the new seeder soon.  They might help me out with
a system one of these days."  Tim picked up a book.  Then he
put it back down.
 
     "Ayyyh...shaht a missuhl...frum...th...skah...boom...
boom..." the sound rumbled.  C T wondered about Robinson's
concentration.  Could this be the source of inspiration that
was going to make the President's "Planet Wars" possible?  He
decided that he knew enough about sound; he had heard enough
of its misuse through the wall, after all, to step next door
and see if the two technologists would dare let him tweak the
controls a little.  Maybe not the volume, but certainly they
had a graphic equalizer and spectrum control.
 
     Robinson passed him in the hall on his way to the
shower.  His ample structure upheld his refined chest of
hair.  He held a labware bong that apparently needed new
water.  It looked as if it were full of Irish stout.  "Good
evening, Prime," he intoned, walking measuredly, half in and
half out of a daze.
 
     C T asked, "I'd like to play with your sound system.  I
think I can make it louder in there for you and quieter next
door for me."  He tried not to beam.  Neither of the
"engineers" next door let him get away with that.
 
     "What do you know about stereos, m'man?"  Robinson
clearly implied that C T had not yet become a man and was in
danger of never becoming one.
 
     "I know yours puts a lot of sound through 'our' wall.
Besides, maybe I could get to like 'Satellite Alert.'"
 
     "But then, dear sir, why would you want to tune our
rig?" Conclusion was at hand.  C T moved to go, and Robinson,
surprisingly enough, let him pass.  The hash needed smoking,
apparently.
 
     The vibrations were profound upon C T's recently filled
stomach of dining hall food, not the best of feelings.  He
knew a little about the speed of sound and that the frequency
in Hertz is that speed, 300 meters per second, divided by the
wavelength in meters.  His favorite habit was dimensional
analysis.  The margins of his Holiday and Rustic Elements of
Physics were full of "M's," "L's," "T's," and "Q's."  His aim
was to fill their room with a precise standing waveform of
the sound that bothered him the most.  He spend a rapid
calculating moment, wishing for that moment that he had more
of the concrete skills of an electrical engineer, trying to
decide which sound he hated most and which could most likely
be resonated in a dorm room.  He had tentative answers when
he greeted Franklin, who was using colored pencils to fake an
ID by a judicious birthdate change of minus four years.
 
     "Prime!  Have a couch.  We've been wanting you to party
with us more.  Care for a couple of hits?  Want to join us in
a little buzz?"
 
     "Not really.  I want to stop our wall from buzzing,
actually, and increase your stereo's performance."  C T
looked to the system.  Rack mounted instruments, they even
included a multiple format oscilloscope.  It looked like it
could have been pilfered from the elecrtronics lab.  If I
only were an EE, this would be my day, C T thought.  "You
know, your equalizer can up some frequencies that will really
pound in here.  I have a rough idea."
 
     "Well we'll never stop the great technologal arts and
science man from giving us better jams.  You know what you're
doing, I suppose?"  He blew the pencil dust from his card.
He might actually have grown four years older by that act, it
was so authentic.
 
     "Yes, I've seen this equipment before.  It's a bunch of
bandpass filters and phase shifters.  You look like you might
be sitting right where a good antinode should be.  Let me try
my hand here."
 
     The room went through Fourier frequency domain mode
changes while C T tuned and tweaked.  He had to pound
Robinson's ears, obviously, and create a relative node at the
wall as well.  Finally, Robinson smiled and remarked, "Prime,
you've done it!  Wait until Franklin gets back.  He'll love
it.  Let's crank the system now to see what it'll do."
Robinson advanced the master driver gain control and watched
both the meters and the four traces jump in amplitude.  A
plant on the coffee table in the middle of the room started
to shake with the music:  "Hammer and sickle gunna be inna
pickle...boom boom boom!"  Still, a rum bottle on the window
ledge stood perfectly still.  At this moment Franklin came
in, unnoticed in the din.
 
     "Wow, Prime, what did you do?  I love it!"  As he walked
across the chamber, his bong shook intermittently in his
hand.
 
     C T motioned to Robinson to turn the gain back down.
"Down, down!" he shouted and waved.  The room resident
reluctantly realized something of importance had to be said.
"I think I have a good standing wave set up for you in here,
and it should be quieter next door for me and Tim."
 
     "Quieter--why Prime, we're going to jam full blast all
the time now that you've done this!  You're turning out to be
a truly admirable guy, don't you think, Robinson?"
 
     Robinson just looked at the picture on his I D.  "Do you
think I should grow a mustache?"

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Next Chapter: The 121 Club