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As I was a somewhat introverted kid, I rarely participated in school activities unless required. I always had an interest in science, however, so in high school I decided to join the radio club. This was unusual as clubs go because there wasn't a radio to be found. The teacher was a part time electrician. He wasn't even a radio operator. Go figure. We all worked on our pet projects and had a lot of fun along the way.
Our school required that all clubs sponsor at least one general school activity each year. These were usually debates, field trips, or the ever popular dance. Our teacher told us that he was under pressure to get us more involved in the school community. After meager turn outs for a field trip to a power station and a television station the previous years, we were doing a dance. This was not an obvious choice for us as we were all geeks and nerds. We scratched our heads and eventually got an idea. At the time strobe lights were becoming popular...so that was it, a strobe dance.
The dances were always held in the field house , an enormous space, so, we figured that we would need a very powerful light. We went to a surplus store with our meager budget. It turned out to be an unusual design. We bought a 10,000 watt runway landing light. We cut an opening in the bottom with a spinning disk with a hole in it over the opening which would blink the light. It was incredibly bright, and worked well in the shop.
The night of the dance, the box was hoisted into the rafters. There was a huge turnout. The room blinked from black to piercing bright to the beat of a live band. Everyone was dancing and having a good time. We were pleased with our work, rather prematurely. After about an hour, we noticed various kids going outside briefly, only to return shortly thereafter. When we checked into it, we found that everyone was getting so sick from the contrast of the strobe that they were barfing all over the outside steps! So the radio club had the dubious distinction of a front page article in the school paper. The headline described the dance as "Barfing the Light Fantastic."
Whatever happened to you that backfired?
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| | Posted 4/17/2007 10:38 PM - 57 Views - 12 eProps - 6 comments
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