Imagine you’re eating dinner. You try to pour some ranch dressing onto your plate to dip your veggies into. You tip the container upside down, but nothing comes out. Seems like a solid. So you shake the bottle up and down, and a big blob of dressing plops out and hits your plate. Seems like a liquid. But the dressing doesn’t spread all over the plate, like milk or any other liquid would if you spilled it. Rather, it maintains some shape, kind of like the veggies on your plate. Seems like a solid.
But every time you plunge your solid carrot or celery into the blob of dressing, it distorts the shape of the blob a bit. You can even smear and spread the blob around, but the shape and stiffness of the celery isn’t affected by this game. Seems like a liquid.
So, is ranch dressing a liquid and a solid? Or is it neither?
“Writer Fuel” is a series of cool real-world stories that might inspire your little writer heart. Check out our Writer Fuel page on the LimFic blog for more inspiration.
