On Feb 17, 11:17 pm, "Flash" wrote:

Wowie ! 32 whoe gallons of WHAM ! Jim, couldn't you advise him to start
small, like maybe a 16 oz styrofoam cup, then covered over with a sheet of
paper and detonated off the bench? Even that is enough to mimic a minor
blizzard with flakes of the white stuff sixteen feet into the rafters.

The last time I did the oxyacetylene-in-the-bag thing it blew
up in my hand. Either a tiny bit of glowing carbon on or in the tip,
or static electricity between the bag and torch. Anyway, there were a
bunch of us that couldn't hear too good for a week after that. That
was 20 years ago and I haven't done it since.
We used to use a rolled-up paper fuse taped to the tied-off bag
and get well away from it. The concussion is amazing. And we never
used anything larger than maybe a gallon bag.

32 gallons ? I must have been a bit shy in my youth, because I never got
over a gallon lunchbag tied off and dropped on a neighboring workbench -
then do a sudden move to the back of the shop awaiting the fun. But I only
did this to McClintock because he stuffed a piece of turkey skin from HIS
lunch into the nozzle of my mig gun when I wasn't looking.

And the day after that Mac wiped a bunch of peanut butter in the joint where
Jimmy had to start up after lunch.

And Mac also put a cloth soaked in varsol in the half-full 10 gallon
galvanized trash can under my bench while I was up on the bench, inside a
big fit-up . . yeah, it caught.

And the fun continued for a season.

In the shop years ago the practical jokes kept morale up.
Grease--lots of it--in the hearing protectors. Putting a guy's radio
in the cabinet pressure washer (80 degree water with caustic, sprayed
under much pressure), especially if he liked music you didn't.
Bringing an empty chip-dip container and putting Lubriplate in it and
opening it at coffee time with some chips and letting the greedy guys
grab a chip and a big gob of "dip" and scarfing it down. Screwing down
a lunchbox to a bench. Plastic coffee cups: Drill a hole in the bottom
and screw it down. Or drill a tiny hole just underneath the handle so
it pees all over. Or just below the lip so it dribbles down the shirt
when it's tilted. Lots of fun.
The best one: I took some peanut butter to work and clued in all
the guys except the new guy. Went outside into the compound, smeared
some peanut butter on the edge of my boot sole, and went back in. One
of the guys said, "Hey, Dan...you step in something out there?"
I looked at it. "Yeah. Looks like it, huh? Maybe that stupid dog
from the junkyard next door dug under the fence again. Wish he'd poop
in his own yard." I scraped a big gob off with my finger. "Looks like
his." Smelled it. "Think so." Tasted it: "Yup. It's him again." Ate
the rest of it.
The new guy's eyes were the biggest I'd ever seen. "You're
weird! You eat poop! Get away from me!" Took some time for him to
figure it out.

Flash

We had a guy we nicknamed "Flash." Because he was so slow until the
break or quitting time buzzer sounded, whereupon his speed was
amazing.

Dan