The Four Dimensional Hole Punch
A company in California is about to launch what it calls the first 'four dimensional hole punch'. Avatar Office Solutions, a firm specialising in 'new and innovative office management solutions', as it says on its website, claims that this new development will revolutionise the world of filing and set the stationery industry on the road to a whole new era of multi-dimensional paperwork.
In layman's terms, the hole punch works by using an array of precisely calibrated lasers to burn not one, but two holes - one of which is superimposed over the other. The effect of both holes trying to occupy the same space results in an unstable matter vacuum which can only resolve itself by punching a quantum tunnel through to another dimension.
"It's very complicated," said research and development director Jackie Paper. "But basically it means that your average ring binder will be able to store ten times its usual capacity."
The 4D hole punch weighs slightly less than two tons, requires its own nuclear generator to power it and is housed in a modestly sized concrete blockhouse in Fresno. The company hope to have a smaller, battery operated model on the market by Christmas.
Catching Shadows
Doctors Nathan Porridge and Sally Trouble have achieved a world first, becoming the only people to have captured a live shadow in the laboratory. Publishing their findings in last week's Take a Break, one of the scientific world's more colourful journals, the pair explained how they achieved this feat using a Van de Graaff generator, a nine volt battery, two bits of Blu-Tack and a shoebox.
The shadow in question was that of a cat, a three year old American Shorthair called Percy, but that's not important right now. Doctors Porridge and Trouble's initial experiments in isolating shadows began in 2012, when they established the basic lighting conditions necessary to create shadows substantial enough to respond to weak manipulation. However, the shadows always disintegrated before they could be successfully quarantined.
It wasn't until earlier this year that they made the breakthrough. After trying a bigger shoebox, Porridge and Trouble were able to trap the shadow and store it for several minutes, finally proving the predictions made by Wolfgang Pauli in 1926 in his Matrix Theory of Umbral Density.
Obviously it was not possible to directly observe the cat's shadow inside the box, since the admission of light into the container would instantly cause it to collapse. But Porridge and Trouble were nevertheless able to make audio recordings of the shadow scratching and padding back and forth, entirely independent of the actual cat itself.
One thing that the team found surprising was how short-lived the shadow proved to be. Evidently, for some as yet unknown reason, shadows rapidly decay once they have been separated from the objects that have cast them. However, this hasn't prevented some forward thinking individuals from speculating on the possible commercial applications of the technique, such as using portable shadows in place of sunshades.
Blast proof Furniture
Is there really a demand for blast-proof furniture? The good people at Comfystuff Furniture Stores seem to think so, which is why they now stock an extensive selection of chairs, sofas and tables that are capable of withstanding major explosions.
"The new Snuggledown three seater will survive anything short of a direct hit," marketing director Terry Pine told us. "Anyone sheltering beneath it has absolutely no worries about being wounded by shrapnel. And that's guaranteed. We also have a wide range of footstools that have been pounded by artillery fire at close range and have come through without displaying any signs of distress. Even our occasional tables have been subjected to prolonged machinegun fire, with the only symptoms of trauma being a few small scratches. And they will polish out fairly easily - guaranteed."
Mr Pine went on to say that the company's furniture was available with interest-free credit, and customers would need to pay nothing until next March. This, of course, is all very well but we still couldn't understand why anyone would need a chest of drawers capable of resisting an airstrike. Mr Pine's only response to this query was to fix us with a long, pained and forlorn stare and mutter, "You don't have kids, do you?"
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