Miscommunication At Its Best

I've been meaning to tell this story for a while. For his birthday Brig really wanted to get a lava lamp. Grandma and Grandpa Angus sent him one (pictured below) and he loved it. He couldn't wait to turn it on and watch the manic happen. Of course anyone who has owned a lava lamp knows that it takes several hours to heat up and work as it should.
So for the first time we set it up the evening of his party. Occasionally he and his guests would storm the stairs and check it out. But, those visits were few and far between. He failed to really catch the process of the lamp heating up. Well, a night or two later I was sitting on the couch after what felt like a very long day. Needless to say I was tired. Brig was in bed and we had switched on the light just when he went to bed. While sitting on the couch I hear someone moving quickly upstairs and the trampling down the stairs. Brig bursts onto the scene of my relaxation and in a panic stricken voice tells me that something very bad has happened. "My lava lamp blew up!" it was both panic and despair wrenching his little heart and it was pure panic that drove me to hurtle the couch and sprint up stairs. I was envisioning broken glass, spilled hot fluids and possible fire hazards. I feel I'm pretty strong running up stairs but let me tell you I think I cleared the staircase in two steps. Much to my relief I found the lamp intact and in the condition you see below. Brig had seen lava lamps start and when they were going, but not in-between. Well when the lamp first starts the heavy material is in a block at the bottom. As it starts to heat up is basically melts and for a short time looks like this. Then it breaks up and starts flowing. I told Brig this while at the same time trying to shut down the million year old instinct of pure adrenaline pulsing through my veins in the case of emergency. Now every night he looks forward to the lamp "exploding" and tries to pick out shapes in it. Good times.