One of my 6th grade students informed me that if a snake managed to successfully eat its tail then an enormous tear in the universe would result, and the former location of the hungry serpent would open into the gaping maw of a black hole. This dark portal, the diameter of which was stated to be about as large as the picnic bench, would pull brave adventurers into a tunnel of time (insert copious black-hole-like sucking noises). Imagine the possibilities for escaping homework!
If that was the case, quipped one of his friends, then a similar result would occur if the precocious young theorist was to successfully eat his own feet right there on the play yard, thereby allowing everyone an escape from the impending bell that would signal their return to the classroom.
But before anyone could get both shoes off, recess was over: swallowed by time.
Image courtesy Wikimedia Commons
