Good News/Bad News: Nobel Edition

The good news about winning the Nobel Prize: you get better parking on campus.

The bad news: Sheldon Cooper makes fun of you on national TV.

Of course you don’t need to watch the ceremonies to learn what all the scientists are wearing this year. I am reliably informed that a regular tuxedo is not good enough; you need to go full white tie and tails. (Interestingly, the Peace Prize is more casual; black tie or “national costume” is perfectly acceptable.)

19 Comments

19 thoughts on “Good News/Bad News: Nobel Edition”

  1. Yeah, I remember the Nobel Laureate parking spots on the Berkeley campus. Does anyone else do that?

  2. A few technical comments:

    Members of the High-Z Team all sent our (metric) dimensions to the Swedish Tuxedo Warehouse (actually a very posh shop called Hans Allde) and were fitted on arrival.

    These are frock coats, not tuxedos. Don’t try to outfit a wedding party in Stockholm during Nobel week — they are sold out!

    Women can choose their own outfits. It would be a good thing, and not just from the fashion point of view, if there were more women winning these prizes.

  3. I still get the rock pile at the top of the hill which my Subaru with good clearance comfortably clears. Feel a little left out not being derided by Sheldon though….

  4. “…while ladies should be dressed in an evening gown.”

    I see the sexist dress code is still in full swing. If I ever win a Nobel, I’m going in a suit, not a fucking dress.

  5. Good question, Douglas. I wonder if it would be possible to convince them that it’s a T-shirt and jeans. Or maybe a Revolutionary War uniform complete with a tricorn hat?

  6. I’m with Anne C. Hanna above: “If I ever win a Nobel, I’m going in a suit, not a fucking dress.”

  7. JR, that tie looks to me like it’s some kind of iridescent red/blue combo, color-distorted by the low quality of that photograph. I suspect it probably would look more normal in person.

  8. A national costume is perfectly acceptable also in Stockholm, and was used e.g. by Abdus Salam (watch). A military gala uniform is also ok.

  9. “I am reliably informed that a regular tuxedo is not good enough; you need to go full white tie and tails. (Interestingly, the Peace Prize is more casual; black tie or “national costume” is perfectly acceptable.)”

    I don’t know if this is the reason, but Norway is a bit more laid back than Sweden. Sweden was (and to some extent still is) a major industrial country (especially in relation to its small population) while Norway was a poor neighbour living mainly from fishing until oil was discovered in the North Sea. (As a result, it has a negative national debt, i.e. a surplus of about 50 billion (for a population of 4 million). Most of the oil money goes into a national pension fund.) Also, the fact that Sweden hasn’t had a war in a couple of hundred years means that more traditions have held on. In other countries, as a reaction to the (bad) past, there was a tendency to get rid of everything associated with it, whether or not it was bad in itself.

  10. A national costume is perfectly acceptable also in Stockholm, and was used e.g. by Abdus Salam

    IIRC, Salam created some problems for the protocol folks when he showed up with more than one wife.

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