A physics demonstration is worth a thousand words.

This past weekend, we went to the Rutgers Faraday Christmas Children's Lecture presented by the University’s Department of Physics and Astronomy. My wife had read some good reviews, but I was a little apprehensive that it would be mostly lecture with some visuals thrown in. Kinda like blah blah blah blah…[insert technical terms] blah blah…wish we could show you, but safety…etc, etc. Boy, did I underestimate them. (Similar to how everyone underestimated the football team this fall.)

It was a spectacular demonstration that was fun to watch, educating, and kept you wondering what was going to be next. Professor Mark Croft, Dave Maiullo, and those who assisted did an absolutely, excellent job. They exploded a hydrogen balloon, shattered a beaker using vibration, worked with liquid nitrogen, blew smoke rings, and kept us entertained for an hour & a half. My five year old daughter kept turning to my wife after each demonstration and whispering, with wonder in her eyes, “How did he do that?”

Perhaps the best line of the evening was, at the end of the lecture, from my teenage daughter who said “Now I want to go and take a college physics class.” That too was priceless.