A watched pot does, indeed, boil.
I have proof.
I sat there and watched it boil.
And then someone told me it didn't counted if it was already boiling when I sat down to observe.
So I dumped the water out, filled it up again, with cold water, turned off that one burner (I'd learned my lesson the last time I'd forgotten to turn a burner off.), turned on another (Left Rear), and put the pot on, with the fresh water. The sink began making some odd noises, apparently reacting to the litre or two of water I'd just poured down the drain, and it gurgled and burped, but I didn't look, I kept a diligent watch over the pot.
And I kept watch, while the aforementioned naysayer wandered through the kitchen, getting things out of the fridge, asking me what I was doing, throwing tiny carrots at me, trying to get me to look away. Sooner or later, little bubbles began forming along the bottom and sides of the pot, which is when I got really excited. A little too excited, as I accidentally hit the handle of the pot, and spilled it all over the back of the stove, water sloshing off the clock and the dials for the stove and then back forward, over the burners, hissing to no end, and burning (both the actual water and it's evaporated, rather warm other incarnation from off the burner) quite a good deal of hair off my left forearm.
So I re-filled the pot, which was now essentially empty, turned the still hissing burner off, and turned on another one (the Left Front, which gave me brief pause to think about social movements and radical change organisations), and put the pot on, yet again.
Once again, sooner or later, the bubbles appeared along the edges and the bottom, and I felt so very very close to my goal of disproving a fairly widely held theory.
A brief skirmish broke out with the aforementioned naysayer and carrot-thrower to protect my near-boiling pot of water, which was difficult, considering I was keeping my eye on the pot, and my adversary was making unfair use of a pair of teriyaki sticks until I managed to break one of them with a lucky grasp, though I was left with the tip embedded in the meaty part of my hand, below my thumb. And the pot remained unspoilt, and on it's way towards boiling.
The teriyaki attacker gone, I was able to settle in, taking a brief look at my hand for blood (there was some, but it was a minor wound), and finish out my quest.
Approximately twenty-six minutes after I'd put it on, the pot boiled, seething great big torrents of bubbles thrashing about in the pot, and I could swear the room grew brighter, a soft golden glow permeating the misty air. It was beautiful, the most beautiful thing I have ever seen.
I have done it. I have done the impossible.
disclaimer:
The spirit of scientific enquiry has always been very near and dear to our hearts, especially in the case of the recent cryogenics experimentation we sponsored. Though they did fail quite miserably, and we were left to eat all that liver in the span of the following 36 hours.
From the youngest toddlers, experimenting with the feasability of dirt as a nutritious alternative to vegetables, to the most stark raving mad inmate, teaching us invaluable lessons about the various hiding places for hair pins, paper clips, and bugs in those straight jackets, we salute thee.
See you next week.
Yer Weekly Horoscopes. hello, hello, we have your reservation, ma'am.