Honey Pot part 1...

This entry is a departure from the norm. It even offers a practical experiment for you to try in the comfort of your home. The aim is to help the reader think and rethink some of the promises usually made around the New Year mark.  Stick with me on this one…

Oh, and it’s a two-parter.

The Context

Imagine the following:

A table supporting only one object – a wooden bowl.

The wooden bowl has some uneaten soup still left at the bottom.

The bowl is then filled with water.

The contents of water and left-over soup are stirred.  Leaving you with a murky and altogether unappealing liquid.

The bowl is then further topped with water.  Most importantly; it is filled to the point that you can almost feel the tension resting at the rim.  The water doesn’t quite breach the lip of the bowl, but, you know from experience, it is so full that a simple knock of the table would leave a mess.

With the bowl set; two further objects are added to the table:

a)       A spoon – no; you are not expected to eat the gloopy mess.

b)      A pot of honey - life is always stronger with some honey (unless you are allergic to the stuff; in which case your life will be better without honey and you can discount the last statement)

The Challenge

You are tasked with changing the contents of the bowl with the aim of arriving at something more engaging than the gloopyness.  What would you do?

Aside:  Yes, this entry may be coming across a bit exam question like – can you tell I spent a large degree of my life sitting the damn things?!  I can now tell you that, with no great surprise, it is much nicer to write the question than try to answer it!

The Options

Alternative 1 - A quick and almost knee jerk response could be to spoon out the murky bits. Thus leaving the water in the bowl.

Although simple and seemingly effective, the challenge with this approach is that you may well get a clearer bowl, however, it will take a degree of time and patience.  In addition, no matter how much you try there will always be some gloop left.

Alternative 2 – “Well it’s obvious”, I recall a friend saying.  “All you do is take the bowl over to the sink, empty out the crap and replace with tap water.”  Technically my friend had achieved the task, and you could not fault him for thinking outside the box.

However, this option feels a bit ‘baby and the bath water’ like.  So, yes on one hand you do get the desired result – but, (it’s a subtle but), you may also be loosing some of the good bits in the gloop, the bits that if possible, you would want to keep. One could also argue that you have not used all the available tools to the fullest. In addition, what if there was no sink available?

Alternative 3 – The one that I hope will lead the reader to “ah, yes Mr TaT, you Da Man” nod of approval. The third option, use the honey.  Take the honey and simply pour a good helping into the already full bowl.

What you will find is that gradually the honey starts adding to the tension at the surface but sits at the bottom of the bowl.

Now let it rest, eventually the tension in the bowl will give way. There will be a break in the ‘skin’ of the surface water and out will start to pour the gloopy mess. In fact, the last time I tried this, you could actually see soup bits almost leaping out of the bowl. All the while, the golden honey sits at the bottom.

Right; so you may well be thinking what the heck the impromptu Blue Peter task has to do with you? Well, I say to you as I said to my friend, I would not be my father's son if I could not present a ‘lessons learned’ from all of this.  However, as the title suggests, this is a 2 parter and you will have to wait until the next entry.

Audience participation

I would encourage you to do a version of the above at home.  Based on earlier iterations I would offer the following tips:

a) For the honey, use a runny variant – for instance, I used the bear shaped squeezy bottle.  The one you usually see at the breakfast table in the movies.

b) For goodness sake do not use your Manuka best for this experiment. Save that stuff for actual eating.

c) Any bowl will do – you do not need a special Buddha inspired bamboo bowl, hand made in Cambodia; you know who you are!