Silly Putty

Today my professor was talking about visco-elastic properties of polymers in conjunction with polysaccharides (since they are polymers). He used silly putty as a non-food example of a visco-elastic polymer for demonstration purposes in class. First he demonstrated the elastic properties by bouncing it. Then he demonstrated the viscous properties by stretching it. Next was his big mistake. He bounced the silly putty again to re-demonstrate the elastic properties. Since the silly putty was no longer a spherical shape it did not bounce as he had planned. Luckily he has good reflexes or his groin would still be hurting.