Years ago, a box of indoor fireworks would always feature as the post prandial entertainment at the annual Buggeridge Christmas dinner.
Now that those miserable health and safety scrooges have declared them illegal, we have had to come up with other forms of diversion but a chance meeting with an old chum at the Cock and Bottle last night has given me an idea of how to recreate those indoor pyrotechnics of Buggeridge Christmases past.
You see, according to my pal, all one needs is a box of ameretti biscuits or, more precisely, the wax paper wrappers in which they are enclosed.
Take one of these wrappers, flatten it out and form a cylinder. Stand the paper cylinder on the dining table, and set light to the top of it with a match.
Before the flames reach the bottom of the cylinder, the whole thing will lift off and form a floating "ring of fire" just like those indoor fireworks of yesteryear.
(A similar effect can be achieved by setting light to a paper party hat and is all the more amusing when said paper hat is perched atop the head of your great aunt).
Now that those miserable health and safety scrooges have declared them illegal, we have had to come up with other forms of diversion but a chance meeting with an old chum at the Cock and Bottle last night has given me an idea of how to recreate those indoor pyrotechnics of Buggeridge Christmases past.
You see, according to my pal, all one needs is a box of ameretti biscuits or, more precisely, the wax paper wrappers in which they are enclosed.
Take one of these wrappers, flatten it out and form a cylinder. Stand the paper cylinder on the dining table, and set light to the top of it with a match.
Before the flames reach the bottom of the cylinder, the whole thing will lift off and form a floating "ring of fire" just like those indoor fireworks of yesteryear.
(A similar effect can be achieved by setting light to a paper party hat and is all the more amusing when said paper hat is perched atop the head of your great aunt).
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