Thing 146 Wine Opening

Physics. It's on your side more than you think. Example: Gravity. Mostly, it's your friend. Every day physics secretly helps you without you knowing it. It's like a ninja partner-in-crime, all the time trying to give you a leg-up without you ever realising. Basically like Brain the Dog for Inspector Gadget. Except more mysterious.

Having said that, he was a pretty mysterious dog. But I digress...

For Inspector Gadget nostalgia click here...

I've been getting a hard time, and rightly so, for being a spoiled pampered little princess of a man. I spent 24 hours outdoors, and that effectively meant nothing, since I was so well looked after. Ci Ci Do and Token Northy fed me for crying out loud. It's not like I had to fend for myself. Bear Grylls... not so much. Lloyd Grossman... maybe a little closer.

So the boys have been on to me to try a little more DIY. I've been told that wine's not a man's drink... Nonsense. Good wine is good wine no matter who's drinking it. Good wine is even better if you've opened it with the sole of your shoe. Yep. The sole of my shoe opening a bottle of vino...

For more information keep reading.

What I wanted was a means of opening wine that doesn't involve a proper corkscrew. Everyone has had that moment at their party where they've realised that a nice girl they just met wants her bottle of vino opened, and they've got no corkscrew. Typically the answer is cork the bottle, or break the top off it. I knew plenty of students, male and female who'd drink shards of broken glass so long as they weren't falling behind on the party. What we needed was an alternative to these equally crappy options.

First plan. Hair clips. Straightened out and bent into a U shape. No reason that they couldn't be slid in between the glass and the cork. Twist them, so the clip digs into cork, and then pull. No effect. Paper clips may have worked, but the flat edge of the hair clip worked against me. So that's a fail.

Then Pony Boy obliges with a piece of internet genius.

French people tell us how it's done... (not industrial action related)

If you've watched that and don't believe it's possible, then welcome to my club, if you've not watched it, then think "Two Girls One Cup" and then feel embarrassed that you know what that is.

Now to get back to the point: Physics.

Cork in the bottle can be displaced by repetitive force at the end of the bottle. Basically, you need to create movement inside the bottle, without breaking the bottle. A smooth, flat, hard surface to strike the base of the bottle. Something to absorb the shock, preferably something that will protect you in the event of shattering the glass.

Strike the base of the bottle (carefully contained in it's little shied, in this case, my shoe), against the smooth flat surface. Then your old friend physics comes in, and unsettles the cork, pushing it slowly out of the bottle. No way you say...

Do you think Pony Boy's face would lie to you? Mind you, I fairly made shit of the wine... It's a good thing I'm not fussy...

Genuinely amazed it worked. Everything seemed to indicate that this was a stupid idea, doomed to failure from the word go, but who'd have thunk it - you actually can open a bottle of wine with a shoe. Lads - next time, impress your lady. Screw the corkscrew... A shoe is the way forward.

Pictured: Fail. Fail. Neither one of these is a shoe...