Saturday, October 18, 2008

Chinese Finger Trap

After a hiatus, I am back to divulge how a Chinese trick helped me in opening a ketchup bottle. Yesterday, as my cook was on leave, I, accredited with a decent level of proficiency in cooking, decided to cook a sumptuous dinner - bread omelets :-). Except a bit of tussle with the onions which made me weep for chopping them, it was a cakewalk. And finally it was done. All my roommates were quite hungry and ready to grab their piece. But we thought a scoop of ketchup would add more to its taste. Fortunately there was an unopened bottle of ketchup in the house. "How to open it ?" was the question in all our minds. I remembered K having an opener in his nail cutter. Luckily K was aware of its place but the tragedy was it got struck horizontally in a coffee mug. K, wary of not breaking the mug and ready to compromise the ketchup, was quite confident that it's impossible to take the opener out. But D, with marked enthusiasm, tried pulling the opener hard but in vain. I, busy with cooking, paid no attention at that point of time. As hunger pangs was on the rise, we three decided to go without the ketchup!

After sometime, when I, in some totally unrelated context, was surfing the net, came across Dexter's Lab - one of my my favorite cartoon series. Suddenly one particular episode - even now I don't know why I thought of it - came to my mind in which Dexter and his sister will get their fingers struck in a Chinese finger trap. The trick is simple; If you pull your fingers apart the trap contracts and holds tight but when you bring your fingers close it expands and let your fingers free. Eureka! eureka! and that's what I exactly need to take the opener out. If the opener had been in complete horizontal it would have come out of the mug when pulled, but the opener was not exactly horizontal and slightly inclined downwards. Thinking in mind, I rushed to my roomies house. I took the mug and pushed the opened inside. And it got free!

Is this what we call serendipity? or Does our brains cease to function when we are hungry ?

2 comments:

Vignesh Kumar said...

Engala ellam nalla kevalapadithittae la.. huhh..

:) nice post btw..

Unknown said...

Yes. Andha salty scrambled eggsa vayla vekkave mudiyala!!!

good post :)