Home Ec, Tuesday, Period 1
Eliot was actually in the classroom today, which was a marked improvement over last week. The room was set up to use the cooking equipment again, but other than jugs of milk and vinegar, and a wide array of food coloring, there wasn't a whole lot of edible in the classroom.
"So we're going to be cooking again today," Eliot said, nodding to the various pots and pans around the room. "Sort of. I ain't actually a hundred percent sure this is Home Ec-y and not just straight up chemistry class-y, but it's a useful enough thing to know how to do, and I figure it'll be more entertainin' for our resident space rock then making even more stuff she ain't actually gonna use. Today we're makin' plastic. Or recycling it. Y'all can pick which way you wanna go, really." Eliot shrugged. "For those who ain't familiar: plastic is a synthetic material that can be shaped any number of different ways and made to be rigid or flexible or see-through or colorful or really any number of things. What we're doin' today isn't as fancy as industrial plastic manufacturing, but -- well, hopefully it'll be fun anyway. I've got some various shaped molds up here to use for shapin' it, or you can use your imagination. I am gonna make y'all clean up your work stations at the end of class, though, and plastic when soft can get pretty sticky and gross, so try not to ruin anything that's bolted on and/or won't fit in a trashcan."
That was almost even guidance. Good job, Eliot.
"For those of ya who want to make your own plastic from scratch, I've got a couple options for you, complete with pictures to help you figure out what you're doing. You can make a goopy polymer slime stuff to play with using some glue and borax, or try your hand at some not-quite-cheese with the milk and vinegar option. That one will harden right up as it dries, givin' you something brittle, but reasonably functional. You can sand it and paint it after you mold it and all that. For the recycling route, you can either dissolve some styrofoam in acetone and play with it -- wearing protective gear and making full use of your stove's vent hood -- or you can stew some plastic bags. That last one's actually pretty damn functional if you do it right. The plastic in those bags is pretty damn hardy. Anyway, whichever way you go, have fun, try not to burn or poison yourself or your classmates, and if anyone wants bonus points, they can try to figure out how to use homemade plastic to build some sort of anti-gremlin protection device."
"So we're going to be cooking again today," Eliot said, nodding to the various pots and pans around the room. "Sort of. I ain't actually a hundred percent sure this is Home Ec-y and not just straight up chemistry class-y, but it's a useful enough thing to know how to do, and I figure it'll be more entertainin' for our resident space rock then making even more stuff she ain't actually gonna use. Today we're makin' plastic. Or recycling it. Y'all can pick which way you wanna go, really." Eliot shrugged. "For those who ain't familiar: plastic is a synthetic material that can be shaped any number of different ways and made to be rigid or flexible or see-through or colorful or really any number of things. What we're doin' today isn't as fancy as industrial plastic manufacturing, but -- well, hopefully it'll be fun anyway. I've got some various shaped molds up here to use for shapin' it, or you can use your imagination. I am gonna make y'all clean up your work stations at the end of class, though, and plastic when soft can get pretty sticky and gross, so try not to ruin anything that's bolted on and/or won't fit in a trashcan."
That was almost even guidance. Good job, Eliot.
"For those of ya who want to make your own plastic from scratch, I've got a couple options for you, complete with pictures to help you figure out what you're doing. You can make a goopy polymer slime stuff to play with using some glue and borax, or try your hand at some not-quite-cheese with the milk and vinegar option. That one will harden right up as it dries, givin' you something brittle, but reasonably functional. You can sand it and paint it after you mold it and all that. For the recycling route, you can either dissolve some styrofoam in acetone and play with it -- wearing protective gear and making full use of your stove's vent hood -- or you can stew some plastic bags. That last one's actually pretty damn functional if you do it right. The plastic in those bags is pretty damn hardy. Anyway, whichever way you go, have fun, try not to burn or poison yourself or your classmates, and if anyone wants bonus points, they can try to figure out how to use homemade plastic to build some sort of anti-gremlin protection device."