The most recent tweet was ~5 hours ago...

Twitter, I need your help. I stacked a ceramic bowl into another one while doing dishes and now they are stuck. How do you remove the smaller bowl without breaking both of them?

Why am I so invested? I've tried to fix this for 2 days, and I cannot give up now.

Things I've tried so far and no dice:

  • warm soapy water

  • hot water on outer bowl, cold water + ice on inner bowl

  • oil on edges

  • microwave

  • aggressive shaking

  • WD-40

Will try next:

  • hair dryer

  • freezer then running hot water

Thank you for being as invested in this as I am.

Update: Bowls are currently in the freezer and thanks to the replies, I will not be running hot water on them!

Still no dice:

  • Freezer, then cold water

  • Freezer, then rubber mallet

  • Passive-aggressive comments to either/both bowls

  • Tap lightly onto the table

Still very stuck:

  • Cards, toothpicks, and straws not getting through to break the seal

  • Water submergence

Up next:

  • Long game of gravity

  • Dishwasher

Update: Still stuck

  • upside down, twisting inner bowl, tapping outer bowl

  • upside down, submerged under water, tapping outer bowl with mallet

  • hot out of the dishwasher

  • googled autoclave

Let us all rest tonight knowing these bowls will still be together tomorrow.

In the last 10 hours:

  • upside down, soap around the edges, overnight submergence

  • made self-deprecating joke about the sunk cost fallacy (not one chuckle)

  • thread, paper, knife around the edges

Still stuck.

Tweet

  • AlyxMS [he/him]
    ·
    2 years ago

    Suction cup and pull. Think the only way to solve this is by applying force.

      • AlyxMS [he/him]
        ·
        edit-2
        2 years ago

        Ceramic is pretty tough, most of the time. And by using a suction cup the force is applied to an area instead of a point. Though one of the bowls might fly off after getting unstuck. Got into a similar situation before, the contact area isn't nearly as big, still takes a huge amount of force.

        Plan B: Oven. Not microwave. Upside down. (My guess: The water trapped between is providing adhesion and vacuum seal. Turning it into steam should solve the problem.)