Fun_People Archive
16 Jun
Fun With Grapes

Date: Thu, 16 Jun 94 16:33:30 PDT
To: Fun_People
Subject: Fun With Grapes

Forwarded-by: bostic@vangogh.CS.Berkeley.EDU (Keith Bostic)
Forwarded-by: spaf@cs.purdue.edu (Gene "Chief Yuckster" Spafford)
From: mgfrank@erebus.com (Marc G. Frank)

                              FUN WITH GRAPES

Using only cheap, readily-available equipment, you can create a
spectacular lightshow in the comfort of your very own kitchen,
providing hours of fun and excitement for your family, friends,
and pets!

Ordinary grapes, when properly prepared and microwaved, spark
impressively in an extremely entertaining manner.


WHAT YOU NEED
  Green grapes
  Microwave-safe plate
  Knife
  Microwave oven
  No parents


WHAT YOU DO
  1. Drive your parents or anyone else who might say "Hey!  What do you
  think you're doing?  Stop that right now!" out of the room.  This is
  important.  They'll think you're ruining something.

  2. Take a grape and cut it almost in half with the knife, leaving the
  two halves attached by the skin.  Place the grape, sliced side up, on
  the microwave-safe plate.  Squash them down slightly, so the grape
  halves have a flat bottom and stand upright.  See Fig. 1.

                    +-------------------------------------+
                    |          grape  grape  grape        |
                    |           half   skin  half         |
                    |             |     |     |           |
                    |             v     v     v           |
                    |squashed   \    /-----\    /         |
                    | bottom --> \__/       \__/          |
                    |\-----------------------------------/|
                    |                   ^                 |
                    |                   |                 |
                    |          microwave-safe plate       |
                    +-------------------------------------+
                    Figure 1:  Grape-skin-plate arrangement

  3. Place the plate in the microwave.  Microwave on HIGH for 30
  seconds.

  4. Enjoy!

  If microwaving more than one sliced grape at a time, best results can
  be obtained by separating each grape by 1.5cm or more.


WHY IT WORKS

  Don't ask me; I'm a classics major.


WHAT TO DO IF YOUR MICROWAVE EXPLODES

  Don't blame me.  I take no responsibility if your microwave blows up
  or your grapes don't come out crisp and tasty or you lose your job or
  flunk out of school because you do nothing else all day but nuke
  grapes.  In short, just mentally insert that MIT X disclaimer here.
  After repeated sparkings, my microwave is in fine shape.

© 1994 Peter Langston