I recently looked on the back of the microwave popcorn I was eating to check out the nutritional information.  This was more out of sheer boredom than healthy curiosity.  It stated that each 3 tablespoons of unpopped kernels makes about 3 cups of popped popcorn.  It also stated that 3 tablespoons of unpopped popcorn had 170 Calories and that each cup of popped popcorn had 45 calories.  So 3 cups of popped popcorn would be 45 times 3, or 135 calories.

The law of conservation of energy states that the total amount of energy in an isolated system can neither be created nor be destroyed: it can be transformed from one form to another or transferred from one place to another.  This is disturbing.

The reason.  I have disproved a law of physics.  This will surely eclipse this whole E=MC² thingy.  And I am certain that I will be asked by collegiate professors, lab people in white coats and funny accents, and people who play with gluons and quarks and things like this, to repeat said experiment.  I can see every household in the world with their TV’s turned to the Cartoon Network (it’s my discovery and I can make history on any channel I damn well please) as my bag of movie theatre, extra butter popcorn swells, and the microwave concludes the epic experiment with a succinct DING! that reverberates through a new universe of chaos, where ‘laws’ of physics no longer apply.

Just to make sure you understand that this is 2001 Space Odyssey monolith big, once I get finished popping the popcorn, there are 35 Calories that have been annihilated.  They have met up with an anti-Calorie or something and passed into nothingness.  In the space of 2 minutes, human time, the laws of physics as we know them have broken down.  This is not happening at the quantum level people.  This is occurring right before our eyes.

I have contacted the proper authorities numerous times and they assure me that all is well.  I offered to perform the experiment right in front of them and they said ‘No.’  I didn’t take no for an answer.  Some government goons, dressed up like normal cops, came and removed me from the university’s cafeteria.  The fact that they are trying to cover this up only reinforces my theory.  The manufacturers of microwave popcorn are attempting to shrink our universe.

I know what you are thinking; the universe is expanding, so maybe shrinking it will balance things out.  Maybe the manufacturers are on our side.  This couldn’t be further from the truth.  Unsuspecting consumers and movie goers eat 17.3 billion quarts, or 69.2 billion cups of popcorn every year.  If we lose 35 calories for every 3 cups, that’s 807,333,334,500 Calories that are sucked into oblivion.  But it doesn’t just go away.  That’s 807 billion Calories we are carelessly dumping into another universe.  Every year.  Through some sort of miniature black hole in our microwaves, we are contributing to another universe’s obesity by spreading billions of Calories haphazardly throughout their Universe.  We are cosmic enablers.

I implore you, dear reader, to stop eating away our universe.  I do my part.  When the imposter at the concession stand offers me a large bag of popcorn, I pull out a large cobb of freshly boiled corn from a Ziploc in my wife’s purse, dripping in butter and still steaming from the pot (I’m looking into a correlation between my use of the microwave and my own weight, so for now I would recommend not using the microwave at all until my studies are complete).  I hold it right up in front of everybody and exclaim, loud enough for all their victims to hear me, “Do not shrink our universe!  Do not contribute to multiverse obesity!  Keep it on the cobb and out of the microwave!”

I stare at the undercover concession worker.  I let him know that I know.

For further information on how to keep your universe from shrinking, go to http://www.keepitonthekernel/government-archives/area52/shrinking-universe/movie-night.net.