Calling All Inventors!

So there we were, all gathered at a friend’s home anticipating great food and absorbing conversations as we remembered the fallen. Somehow the conversation among a few of us women turned to inventions. Yeah, I know. The spirit of Thomas Edison just couldn’t wait to butt in. One friend said she had an idea for children’s mittens. She  lamented that snow always creeps into her grandchildren’s mittens – no matter what – and we all nodded.

She described how these miracle mittens would be designed using gestures and her own hands and arms in case we didn’t know where they should go. Doggone – I think it would work. We threw out a few names for them by way of being helpful and then it was my turn.

Mine is an invention for which a prototype is badly needed. Very useful in summer. From a real genius – me. Wait for it . . . kiddy pool stones!

Say what? Hang on, hang on. Let Lucy ‘splain it to you. When we fill the 4 pools, from a small foot pool to a six footer, for the grandkids who are under ten, we use the garden hose. Splish splash, in the water goes and man, oh, man is it cold. So how about hot pool stones that could be placed into the water, bring it up to a swim worthy temp – let’s call it Jamaica Joy – and the kids could hop in twenty minutes later with no miracle mittens needed? Huh? Whaddya think?

My mistake was in calling them pool stones. 

“It would burn a hole in the bottom of the pool,” my son said incredulously. “The kids would burn their feet on it,” said his wife. “You’d get a shock,” said hubby a.k.a. Doubting Thomas on steroids. He didn’t have to screw up his forehead like that. I’d said Nothing about electricity (much to Edison's dismay).

Big sigh. I pointed out how many other things had heating properties like hand warmers and those dealy bobs you can buy at CVS to plaster anywhere on your aching body and last 8 hours. No burning of pool bottoms or kids feet there, you guys. I used my hands, arms, shoulders etc. to get my point across. It’s rough when you have to over-explain your excellent invention and at the top of your voice, too.

My sister, Wendy, had an idea for a brownie cutter whereby you’d push a grid-like device down into the pan of brownies, pull it back up and, voila!, each brownie would be cut exactly the same size. One piece, sharp, keep it away from kids kind of deal. She only had to explain, briefly, that the brownies should already be Baked. Some inventors have it so easy. But I stood up and cheered and I don’t even like brownies that much. I support inventors whenever I can with Big Fist Bumps and music if available.

Our grandson, Sam, won an award at school for his Kernel Destroyer. The kernels are un-popped popcorn, those little teeth breakers that mix with the popped, buttered and salted kernels and surprise the heck out of you as you’re munching away. Ouch! And other creative expressions I can’t note here. Anyway, this invention involved rigging up a microwave popcorn bag with some netting kind of stuff and when you empty the bag the net catches the kernels that stood their ground and refused to give in to the heat and pop. Fist bumps all over the place.

If you could, what would you invent? And what would you name my pool stones that would encapsulate the concept and fend off the doubters? I really want to know.  I can’t pay you, though, just so you know.  

Image: Free Digital Photos