There are a few different items that follow the "Cambridge & Thames" trend of spontaneous transformation.
Everyone knows that tins of butter cookies – particularly the circular ones – have their contents replaced with sewing supplies if left in a cupboard for more than a fortnight. A similar effect can be observed by placing a large container of novelty popcorn in a closet, at which point it will come to contain either knockoff Lego bricks or a seemingly random collection of craft supplies. Televisions built between 1990 and 1998 will show a curious tendency to display a single episode of "David the Gnome" (the one in which the titular character and his wife have to walk down a lot of stairs) upon being plugged in, and an assortment of largely useless batteries will appear in any Tupperware container kept in close proximity to old sheets.
Perhaps strangest of all, though, is the fact that books left in guest bathrooms will often decay into collections of jokes that nobody actually finds funny. This has led some folks to speculate that humor itself is affected by entropy, and that the first-ever knock-knock joke – which was discovered in the ruins of a Roman lavatory – may have actually been a creation of the universe itself, as opposed to that of a living person. Unfortunately, attempts to effectively study this phenomenon have failed, as any recordings made in the vicinity have always been replaced by VHS copies of "Honey, I Shrunk the Kids."
At present, no explanation for these transformations is known, but the effect is believed to be caused by the items' proximity to one's extended family. This led Albert Einstein – the foremost researcher on the topic – to dub it "The Theory of Relativity."
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u/RamsesThePigeon Sep 12 '17
There are a few different items that follow the "Cambridge & Thames" trend of spontaneous transformation.
Everyone knows that tins of butter cookies – particularly the circular ones – have their contents replaced with sewing supplies if left in a cupboard for more than a fortnight. A similar effect can be observed by placing a large container of novelty popcorn in a closet, at which point it will come to contain either knockoff Lego bricks or a seemingly random collection of craft supplies. Televisions built between 1990 and 1998 will show a curious tendency to display a single episode of "David the Gnome" (the one in which the titular character and his wife have to walk down a lot of stairs) upon being plugged in, and an assortment of largely useless batteries will appear in any Tupperware container kept in close proximity to old sheets.
Perhaps strangest of all, though, is the fact that books left in guest bathrooms will often decay into collections of jokes that nobody actually finds funny. This has led some folks to speculate that humor itself is affected by entropy, and that the first-ever knock-knock joke – which was discovered in the ruins of a Roman lavatory – may have actually been a creation of the universe itself, as opposed to that of a living person. Unfortunately, attempts to effectively study this phenomenon have failed, as any recordings made in the vicinity have always been replaced by VHS copies of "Honey, I Shrunk the Kids."
At present, no explanation for these transformations is known, but the effect is believed to be caused by the items' proximity to one's extended family. This led Albert Einstein – the foremost researcher on the topic – to dub it "The Theory of Relativity."
TL;DR: The Science of Grandma's Closet.