Non Sequitur by Wiley Miller for January 09, 2025

Marie Curie won two Nobel prizes but died of radiation-induced cancer.

Sounds like a new page being added to the anarchists’ cookbook.

FOOMP – Friends Of Ol’ Marvel (People?)

Maybe she is now black except where the goggles are.

OK, you discovered “FOOMP.” Now you just need to find a market for it.

Maybe she has disappeared. “Foomp” could be an approximation of the sound made when a sudden vacuum is filled by the air surrounding it, or something like that.

Nah, sounds just like my old furnace.

Sounds like she just discovered an accident.

Don’t forget to take notes about procedure. It isn’t a discovery unless you can replicate it.

You should be so lucky.

Some people have made great discoveries by accident.

More people have died by those accidents.

Just wait until Lucy (and the rest of the world) let her know that messing around is not science unless you have detailed documentation for everything so it can be repeated. I anticipate a large ARG.

At least she knows to wear goggles. But the toxic-gas mask is missing…

The first invention of gunpowder was by a Cro-Magnon, who immediately blew himself to smithereens.

It could be worse. The sound effect could be FOOF. Look it up.

This might turn into ‘A Dissertation Upon Roast Kid’.

When I was about 10, I was working with my small chemistry set at the kitchen table. I had mixed something in a test tube and put a stopper on it, then placed it on the test tube stand. A minute later I was surprised to hear a loud “pop”, and saw that the stopper had hit the ceiling. Fortunately my dad was quite tolerant of such experiments.

If you do not document what you are using and doing then you may invent something wonderful only to realize that you don’t recall how you made it.

“I have not failed. I’ve just found 10,000 ways that won’t work.” Thomas Edison.

Every experiment that has a result is successful even if the results are different than expected.

That “FOOMP” was a rude retort.

Discoveries are not the only things that happen by “accident”.

If you have a kid (or kids) and you hear “foomp” from another part of the house, what is the first thing you do? What will you do next time?

FIRE IN THE HOLE!

Feel for you, but afraid not.

Uh, it is “a” furnace, but not “the” furnace. Better check on her…

Gotta love a good “Foomp”.

Mentos & Diet Coke?

been there done that – got yelled at

At Thanksgiving, I pay homage to the millions of our ancestors who experimented, and possibly suffered and died, discovering what we can eat and how to find it, grow it, cook it, and preserve it. The discovery of fire is often hailed as the first great invention. Early man observed it in nature and could study how it spread and how to control it before learning how to start it. But those figuring out which fruits, nuts, vegetables, grains and animals were edible, and how they had to be prepared so they they would be edible, had to experiment first.

That method worked for the “Three Stooges”.

When they did this on Bloom County years ago, Oliver came flying into the living room but first.

More like she’s blowing up her bedroom.

My furnace only goes “foomp” when it turns off. I think he should be more worried about where she got all of those chemicals and that equipment.

Danae shouldn’t have poured the sodium azide solution down the sink and into all that lead plumbing.

The coloring in this arc has been unusual.

“FOOMP” could be worth at least a couple of $million in research grants from congress.

Glad it was a “FOOMP” and not a “FOOM”. “FOOM” usually denotes the start of something big. “FOOMP” and it’s over…

Excellent use of onomatopoeia. As stated above, FOOMP is exactly right. FOOM wouldn’t work as well. FOOMPH might be ok too. Sheesh, I think too much.

She should NOT cut open a D-cell battery, scoop out the insides and mix it with bleach.

See if you still have Eyebrows.

Put the pot in the Elevator.

Everyone knows scientific progress goes “boink”

Of course, there is also a lot of careful preparation and note taking involved but WTH.

I have a strange feeling s he HASN’T just discovered penicillin….

boy he is sooo right… the only time yu want to hear the sound ‘foomp’ is when you’re trying to get your furnace to light…(well and hot water tank too….)

If you were only that lucky. But it is better than a BOOM….

A childhood friend had a chemistry set. We ignored the booklet of experiments and instead tried to concoct something acidy so we could melt stuff. No luck.

Yes – that reminds me too of the supposed brain teaser involving the solvent that would melt literally everything and the problem with it:

(you couldn’t keep it in anything. Lame…)

Again with the newspaper huh? Trouble moving on ??? ;-)

Not a bad idea in general, but 1) you need to know (and write down) what you’re using and how much, and what you’re doing it to it, so you can tell others and do it again. 2) you need more safety equipment in case of explosion or poisonous gas — Kudos on the eye protection at least.

She turned into Ant Danae.

A friend of mine and I tried to extract chlorine from bleach. We failed.

Might want to have her dad go check his redecorating budget after that ‘foomp’…

Speaking of Edison (see dflak far above), I’m reminded of the scene in Young Tom Edison where he’s excited about creating a new compound with nitric acid, sulfuric acid, and glycerin. Wasn’t new – one of the passengers or crew on his train recognized it as nitroglycerin. They veeeerrrrrryyyy carefully lowered it on a string into a stream.

Oh, daddy, famous last words.

Every kid with a chemistry kit used to do this. Mine had sulfur and potassium nitrate. And the basement windows didn’t open. Heck, I couldn’t get them to rattle.

Do I wait or just call 911?

I know our almost 60 year old house makes different noises, and we have a railroad track less than a mile away. Without my hearing aids in, a noise could be anything.