A Silly Question
How long should Silly Putty last?
Apparently, Silly Putty does not cease to exist just because it's been ignored for a few years. Case in point: While rummaging through my old bedroom at my parents' house, I stumbled across a small plastic egg. No doubt what was inside...Silly Putty. Oh, the childhood memories that came flooding back to me.
But before I opened it, I hesitated. Eww. What if it is nasty looking? What if it is even nastier smelling? Eww-eww. This is one egg that should maybe stay "uncracked." Then I told myslef to grow up and just open the darned thing.
To my surprise, the contents looked as though they were new. Yet, this was in fact the very same Silly Putty that had kept me entertained for hours on end roughly 3o years ago. How could this be?
I couldn't help myself. I had to experiment. No one else was around. Why not? I wanted to see for myself that although it might look like new, it certainly wouldn't perform like new. Thirty years of just sitting inside a plastic shell, hidden in a drawer with some old Mork and Mindy posters and Holly Hobbie wordsearch books, was not going to preserve Silly Putty. Here goes...
It stretched. It squooshed. It rolled. It bounced. It bounced even higher. It transferred color ink. Woah. Not the results I was anticipating.
But this leaves me wondering...just how long should this stuff last? It's only rubber. Shouldn't it break down at some point? Silly Putty has been around since the early 1950s. Does that mean that somewhere out there, someone might have Silly Putty that is actually 50 years old? Think of how many hands have probably been fiddling with it. It's not exactly the same as other childrens' toys, like G.I. Joe dolls, Hot Wheels, or even Tinker Toys. Would you want to handle it? Triple eww.
Apparently, Silly Putty does not cease to exist just because it's been ignored for a few years. Case in point: While rummaging through my old bedroom at my parents' house, I stumbled across a small plastic egg. No doubt what was inside...Silly Putty. Oh, the childhood memories that came flooding back to me.
But before I opened it, I hesitated. Eww. What if it is nasty looking? What if it is even nastier smelling? Eww-eww. This is one egg that should maybe stay "uncracked." Then I told myslef to grow up and just open the darned thing.
To my surprise, the contents looked as though they were new. Yet, this was in fact the very same Silly Putty that had kept me entertained for hours on end roughly 3o years ago. How could this be?
I couldn't help myself. I had to experiment. No one else was around. Why not? I wanted to see for myself that although it might look like new, it certainly wouldn't perform like new. Thirty years of just sitting inside a plastic shell, hidden in a drawer with some old Mork and Mindy posters and Holly Hobbie wordsearch books, was not going to preserve Silly Putty. Here goes...
It stretched. It squooshed. It rolled. It bounced. It bounced even higher. It transferred color ink. Woah. Not the results I was anticipating.
But this leaves me wondering...just how long should this stuff last? It's only rubber. Shouldn't it break down at some point? Silly Putty has been around since the early 1950s. Does that mean that somewhere out there, someone might have Silly Putty that is actually 50 years old? Think of how many hands have probably been fiddling with it. It's not exactly the same as other childrens' toys, like G.I. Joe dolls, Hot Wheels, or even Tinker Toys. Would you want to handle it? Triple eww.
Since I knew whose hands had been in this Silly Putty, I stuffed it back into its shell and brought it home for my girls. I wanted them to have the opportunity to enjoy a piece of my past.
This stuff that was created in a lab accidentally by some nutty professor will most likely outlast us all. It will be here, along with cockroaches, long after a nuclear bomb. In a way, that's reassuring.
