...what else? well this morning, I was to decide to carry out a little experiment...one in that 'red book for boys'....rimington had shown me the 'rub the needle against silk to magnetise it' number, so many years ago now....and then held it up on a thread for me to see....

well, I don't need to use 'silk' to magnetise a needle...because I keep all of my needles upon a magnet....(it amuses me to do so - rather than in a box)....and therefore I had a fully charged up needle, to play with - this morning....

anyway, I had a go with the 'put a needle onto a tissue floating in a cup of water'..to find out that the needle did in fact, turn to point due north....and the tissue then sank to the bottom...leaving the needle floating....

... I then did it again...in order to take photos of the process....noting as I did so...that if you tried to make a needle float upon the skin of the water...well, obviously that wasn't possible...it sank to the bottom immediately....however once magnetised and pointing north...it floated....I was reminded of 'UFO technology' etc etc....once magnetised the object can 'fly/float'...as if caught by a tractor beam....

I then noted how the needle's presence upon the skin of the water...distorted the image of the tissue at the bottom of the cup, in my photo...

rimington had had a hand in the design of that M&S 'anti-bacterial' tissue....and so we can say that there is an extended metaphor going on here...beyond that of a simple 'compass' experiment....