When we think of piano mysteries, we usually imagine a haunting melody or a virtuoso's untold secrets, not bizarre carpet circles. But welcome to 2024: where your inherited piano might be possessed, or under the control of extraterrestrials.
A Threads user, thisgrievinglife, turned to the hive mind to solve the riddle of perfect circles appearing in the carpet under their piano legs. "We put an area rug underneath it and after a few weeks these circles appeared around each leg of it," they wrote. A wave of replies poured in, with theories ranging from plausible to paranormal.
One armchair detective, valerio.paul, speculated, "the sound waves from the body of the piano are being transmitted to the floor through the legs."
"Point loading is stressing the fibers," said mitchardgrinder, even offering a diagram to support his argument.
Meanwhile, shackledmule, who wears both carpet manufacturer and musician hats, assured us this phenomenon is caused by vibrations. "Vibrations cause the rug fibers to separate slightly from each other," they explained.
Missysuebly and others blamed the carpet rings on mischievous visitors from outer space: "Crop circles in the carpet."
Others speculated that the pressure and weight of the piano compressing the carpet fibers created the ring-like appearance.
Several commenters said the circles were probably caused by a robot vacuum navigating around the piano legs. That seems like the most logical, and least fun, reason.
As expected, there were a bunch of grumps who left passive-aggressive and dismissive comments. In response, thisgrievinglife said: "One odd thing was the mean spirited comments from typically men with less than 20 followers. I could probably give a lot of theories on the why that is but I do not get paid for this. Figure your stuff out. Get help. Being vitriolitic on a pretty mundane post about carpet circles is not it. Life is big. Don't miss it. You still have time."
Previously: Jacques Vallee: Of Crop Circles, meme wars and web-based flypaper
