Things That Should Not Go BOOM!

When I was 12 or 13, a friend and I started making black powder. We researched it in encyclopedias, chemical process volumes at the library, all over the place. But the basics were all in a marvelous book called _The Way Things Work_. This book had everything from ball point pens to rockets. It was a reference book. Being a geek, I read it cover to cover. More than once.

Anyway, we tried a variety of recipes. I don't recall the exact proportions I settled on for mine, but I do recall it working quite well. We started with the usual gunpowder proportions: 75% potassium nitrate (saltpetre), 15% charcoal and 10% sulfur. We made our own fireworks (from very small "bombs" to "fountains"). I tried making rockets, but nothing even close to black powder was suitable. I did manage to make something fly slowly a few feet, but then it blew up. I gave up, used rocket motors for rockets, and went back to kaboomies.

One thing I hadn't realized was that you were supposed to wet the powder, let it dry, then pulverize it again. I had bought a mortar and pestle to do the crumbling right, but I was too impatient to let it air dry (the approved method). There was no way I could bake these things in Mom's oven since we were doing our "research" covertly. Yes, Without Parental Permission. Or Supervision. (Cue ominous music.) Even had Dad gone along with me making gunpowder, he'd never have approved of my baking it...

My sister accidentally came to the rescue by baking me some very tiny cookies and cupcakes in her Easy Bake[tm] oven. I borrowed it many times over the next year or so. I don't recall if I told her why or not. (I expect she'll chime in if she remembers.) I quickly determined how long a pan of powder (the biggest pan that would fit in the oven) took to bake. I'd put it in, set my alarm clock, read until the alarm went off, pop the result out to cool, and start another batch. I don't remember the baking time any more, but it was probably in the twenty to thirty minute range.

One day I set the alarm time and started a new book. After a while I smelled something funny. I realized I was much farther into the book than I expected to be. I glanced at the clock. TWO AND A HALF HOURS? I'd set the time but not the alarm! I leaped out of bed and opened the oven door.

The mixture was bubbling! It had baked dry and then turned to liquid! Terrified, I grabbed the hot pad, pulled the pan from the oven, set it down on the other side of the room, and unplugged the oven. I looked around at the curtains, the bed, the rug, the books and papers, imagining the oven exploding, throwing flaming powder all over the room in a one hundred year old house. I walked, quickly but unsteadily downstairs, outside, and off to my friend's house. I could hardly breathe. I didn't go home until I could face my folks without a guilt, scared rabbit look.

Did I learn my lesson? You bet. I quit making explosives that day.

Ha ha ha! No way! But I made sure I set the alarm, and stuck with short stories while the main course baked. I was, after all, still a bit of a geek, and I still loved things that go BOOM!

Still am, still do.