Make: Online is featuring a number of first-hand accounts of failed projects, big and small. The first in the series is about Sean Michael Ragan's attempt to make a combination light fixture / goldfish bowl. I don't see any failure here. This looks like a big win, especially since Sean used a rubber goldfish, which is probaby impervious to suffering.
First problem: the globe on my porch light was frosted and I sure wasn't going to spend good money to buy a clear one. Clever solution: Etch the frosting off the globe I had using 50% concentrated hydrochloric acid. It worked great! And generated only 1000 mL of toxic chemical waste!
Next problem: I didn't want to use actual water in the globe. This was an electrical device, after all, and as Newton's Third Law teaches us, water + electricity = bad. So I settled on mineral oil. Which is, you know, flammable and stuff, but, hey, at least it wouldn't short anything out or cause rusting. I glued the fish and the plant to some rocks, arranged them tastefully in the bottom of the globe, and poured in the oil.
