Skepticism

AI: The “A is quite impatient, watching a boiling pot” edition

This Thursday, Maria is coming to visit. I’m excited, I won’t lie. Then, on Saturday, Amy & her hubby are coming to join us too! The anticipation is making me head-asplodey.

What do you do when you’re stuck watching a boiling pot?  I need help people!

The Afternoon Inquisition (or AI) is a question posed to you, the Skepchick community. Look for it to appear daily at 3pm ET.

A.real.girl

A B Kovacs is the Director of Døøm at Empty Set Entertainment, a publishing company she co-founded with critical thinker and fiction author Scott Sigler. She considers herself a “Creative Adjacent” — helping creative people be more productive and prolific by managing the logistics of Making for the masses. She's a science nerd, a rabid movie geek, and an unrepentantly voracious reader. She doesn't like chocolate all that much.

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46 Comments

  1. I listen to the rushing sound the water makes as it’s heating up. That’s the sound of thousands of microscopic bubbles forming and collapsing on the hot metal.

    Then as the bubbles grow larger you can actually see them forming, collapsing and reforming. Occasionally one will manage to stay alive long enough to break free and shoot to the surface.

    As you watch you can see more and more bubbles rise to the surface until suddenly you realize that the water is, in fact, boiling

    Sometimes I’ll drop a little salt in early in the process. The grains are nice seeds for bubbles to form on. So you get a nice little rush of bubbles before the salt is quickly dissolved.

    Does that help?

  2. I rarely have that problem as I suffer from an chronic case of ADHLATK – Attention Deficit Hey Look At The Kitty.

  3. Speed up time, alter the harvest, or teleport off this rock…

    Wait that’s what to do if you’re application ot to the Imperial Academy is delayed another season sorry, never mind.

  4. @Zapski: We need progress bars for real-world events. Then a.real.girl could set one up for the time until Maria shows up and another for Amy’s arrival, and then while away the hours watching the pixels tick by. I’m surprised there isn’t “an app for that”.

  5. I do timed assignments. Writing ( 20 minutes) then cleaning (10 minutes), get one thing done from the to do list (20 minutes) have a snack (10 minutes) and suddenly, an hour is gone!

  6. OMG I am so there with you. My problem (and yours too, I suspect) is that I am horrifically busy this week. But I have *no* desire to actually do any work. Just want to GET THERE!

    But, at least work is a distraction. Sort of :)

  7. I have my own soup pot I’m waiting for! A certain someone might come into town for a certain party at the end of this month and I can’t wait to see her!

    Let me know if any of these suggestions actually work for you.

  8. Make macaroni?

    But seriously, I can usually distract myself well enough if I just move (cleaning, walking, chasing my bunnies, pacing).

    @Kaylia_Marie: Ha! I love it.

  9. @Kimbo Jones: Take matters into your own hands.

    Like they did in the old days before some guy wondered what would happen if you stuck an unbalanced axle on an electric motor.

  10. Usually I watch TV.

    Once, though, I went to play World of Warcraft. Six hours later, I smelled something funny, followed my nose to the kitchen, and found the pot empty of water, red-hot on the bottom, and melting and warping in disturbing ways.

    I quit WoW shortly thereafter for entirely unrelated reasons.

  11. Ok, this is it, I’ll be rolling out for vacation at 7:00 PM EDT. I won’t be posting for about 2 weeks. Try to keep the zombie hordes at bay while I’m out.

  12. I’ve been so busy I didn’t even get a chance to read this post. Ha! Can’t wait to visit you A! So super excited. I hope we can find some other San Diego skeptics to pal around with and Smash things! (he he he) … and I have been passing the time by painting tiny, shiny, skeptical things.

  13. This probably sounds dim but, what do the letters “AI” stand for at front of the skepchick articles?

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