Where do pencils go?

[DavidG]

You swipe er borrow some pencils from the kids.
Place them on the work bench.
Do some work and reach for a pencil.
They are all gone.

Nobody has been near the workshop but the pencils can not be found.

Do pencils :
-- Transfom in to some other entity?
-- Slip into another dimension?
-- Evolve into a higher life form?
-- Dematerialize?

Where do they go?????????????

[DaveInOz]

They are used by the one sock from each pair that goes missing in the wash.
Scientists that study the place the socks go (the sockosphere) speculate that the workshop pencils may act as a tool to allow the socks to overcome the initial momentum requirments needed to enter the sockosphere, much like a mini pole used by a pole vaulter. (...mmmmmm..... tatiana)

[Sir Stinkalot]

Don’t they get used for paint stirrers, and then when the paint dries they no longer fit into the sharpener, so they get flung across the garage never to be seen again? Or is that just me?

[Rowan]

You sure the lead in your pencil didnt go soft and just soak into your workbench??

[arose62]

The high carbon content of the "lead", in its typical long, thin configuration acts as an electrical conductor, and creates a distinct polarisation between the two ends.

This is susceptible to activation by alternating application of static electricity (as produced by rubbing, buffing, sanding, polishing etc. motions) and EMF (output by typical electric motors).

The triggering seems to be caused by causing the activated pencil to rotate across lines of a low-strength large-size magnetic field (supplied courtesy of the Earth). A pencil is typically used in a predominantly upright position, then rotated 90 degrees to be laid down in a horizontal orientation. This is enough to initiate a gradual release of the accumulated stressors, causing a gradual phase shift into the aforementioned sockoverse.

The "pole-vaulter" theory, whilst lauded in it's day, is now widely regarded as somewhat simplistic. The new theory explains why pencils stored upright (eg: in pockets, or pencil holders) don't seem to vanish with anything like the frequency of pencils laid down on a bench.

Cheers,
Andrew

[oges]

I usually find its not just the pencils, anytime I go to the shed to find something I can never find it without a good search. If im not needing it it can be found quite easily!

Then again it could be that my shed is messy and unorganised or a case of the C-Nile virus.

[Wood Borer]

I suspect SWMBO goes into my workshop when I am at work and "tidies up" or puts things away "in a safe place".

It doesn't explain the missing pencils when I am in the shed though. The C-Nile virus might also have some influence. Does it affect people under 50 yrs old (not IQ).

- Wood Borer

[AlexS]

They're in my pencil box, mate!

[oges]

with that many pencils scattered around the shed you'd be bound to find one of them!

C-Nile virus can affect any age I think Wood Borer

[Kerf]

All you ever wanted to know about pencils is on the Pencil Pages http://www.pencilpages.com/
and in the book "The Pencil" by Henry Petroski

... except where they disappear to.

[Keith Jeeves]

I thought it was only me.

I buy the 12 packs of pencils from the supermarket and have half a dozen or so at each machine in the shop plus a couple of hundred scattered around.

Still can't find one when I need one.

The place is full of socks though.

[Iain]

For me the answer is simple, I cannot find my pencils so I go out and buy a pack, take one out and put the rest in the drawer next to the ones I couldn't find.
Next week, repeat scenario.....
Now what about the bloody knife I can't find to sharpen the missing pencils......

[journeyman Mick]

All you pencil losers need to start wearing nail bags or sawyers aprons with a pencil pocket!

Mick

[fxst]

WAT!!!!!!!!!!!! and lose a nailbag too??

[soundman]

I am sure you must all be a bunch of T shirt wearers.

thats what pockets are for.

how are people suposed to know that you are a wood geek without a square pencil fixed about your body.

Propper wood geeks should not be seen with a square pencil behind the ear as you might be mistaken for a fruiterer on his day off.