There was this guy when I was in school back when dinosaurs smoked and people watched the same channel on television because they didn’t have a remote and didn’t want to get up to change the channel.
Yeah, that long ago. Seriously.
Anyway, there this kid got sick and they rushed him to the doctor who said he had an infection. We didn’t know what an infection was (we were in second grade for pete’s sake.) The doc (honestly named Good Old Doc Welles) gave him some penicillin. All the kids at school were like “Woooo. I want some penicillin too.”
But you see, it was an accident that penicillin was actually ever invented. I’ve always thought it was interesting to see how stuff is brought into mainstream society, but many of the things that we take for granted were made completely by accident. The Slinky, microwaves (can you imagine living without one of those. As the world’s worst cook, I would have been dead six years ago without it) as well as other sundry items that are used daily in our world.
Who knew that Post-It notes, a staple in my office, were a big Oops? Not I.
Pocket Gadget has a list which is pretty surprising about commonly used items that came out of potential failure. It’s pretty good.
I saw that kid, now a middle-aged man, at the grocery store recently.
No worries, he’s fine.
