The March of Science
I realize most people don’t come to sweasel.com for the latest breakthroughs in science and technology, but sometimes a generalist blogger is lucky enough to find herself perfectly positioned to break a story the specialists blogs have missed.
Such a lucky find is the self-inflating miniature whoopee cushion.
How is this possible? In my lifetime? you ask. The secret is a light polyester sponge inside the cushion.
To operate, place your thumb over the grommet and squeeze, making the expected poo, poo sound. When the cushion is subsequently released, the sponge expands, pulling air in through the vent hole and refilling the item for immediate use.
Whatever little yellow genius at the Ho Lee Fuk Toy and Novelty Company of Shanghai came up with that one, I owe him a beer.
Have a good weekend, everyone. And remember — adult supervision is required. I don’t know what kind of dimwitted rug monkeys y’all are breeding out there, but I bet one of them could put out an eye with a whoopee cushion.
Posted: May 7th, 2010 under engineering, personal, science, technology.
Comments: 36
Comments
Comment from S. Weasel
Time: May 7, 2010, 9:55 pm
You have to hand it to the French — gonfler excessivement is a pretty spectacular way to say “overinflate.”
And you won’t be surprised to learn that the German word for “whoopee cushion” doesn’t sound as dirty a the German word for “keychain.” And if I had the package in here, I’d tell you what that is.
Comment from David Gillies
Time: May 7, 2010, 11:54 pm
Glad to see your impending half-century is not making your sense of humour turn too high-brow.
I’m hardly one to talk. I remember my mother yelling at our poor confused Labrador after my father placed a startlingly realistic fake turd in the middle of her freshly-mopped kitchen floor. She felt so guilty. Thirty-five years later and I’m still laughing. Ah, the simple things in life.
Comment from Can’t hark my cry
Time: May 8, 2010, 1:45 am
You know, there is a certain elegance about that mechanism. I’ve never felt a need for a keychain whoopee-cushion, but I’m glad to know that if I were to acquire one, it would be functionally so efficient.
Gonfler is a charming word. . .
And it is good to see that the influence of the American Plaintiff’s Personal Injury Bar has extended so far. I’m still trying to figure out what the adult needs to supervise–did the packaging involve large plastic bags one might wrap around one’s head?
Comment from Hotrodelectric
Time: May 8, 2010, 3:04 am
You have to hand it to the French — gonfler excessivement is a pretty spectacular way to say “overinflate.”
But just HOW can you overinflate it? I mean, does it come with it’s own compressor or something? Also, just what is overinflated? 32psi? 50? 100? Will I need one of those cages
that heavy rig tires are assembled in? You know, that seems to be a lot of expensive equipment to own a whoopie cushion. I think I would just rather blow it out my ass naturally…
Comment from Oldcat
Time: May 8, 2010, 4:59 am
HOW can you overinflate it? It’s a whoopie cushion – so it has a hole in it already to make the fart noise. That’s a safety pressure release valve, in effect.
Comment from Og
Time: May 8, 2010, 6:57 am
Oldcat raises a good point. Maybe there are other, shall we say, unorthodox uses we are not aware of but HLFT&N Co. legal knows about.
Comment from scubafreak
Time: May 8, 2010, 7:27 am
Oh God. I just HAD to indulge my curiosity…….
Comment from Bill (still the .00358% of your traffic that’s from Iraq) T
Time: May 8, 2010, 8:35 am
Maybe there are other, shall we say, unorthodox uses we are not aware of…
Hence, the tab and the keychain.
I foresee a re-labeling as gerbil leashes in San Francisco…
Comment from Bill (still the .00358% of your traffic that’s from Iraq) T
Time: May 8, 2010, 10:56 am
And you won’t be surprised to learn that the German word for “whoopee cushion” doesn’t sound as dirty a the German word for “keychain.”
Well, considering the German word for “keychain” is “schlüsselkette” and the word for “whoopee cushion” is “*mumble-mumble* kissen,” you’re spot on.
Okay, I have *no* idea what the German word for “whoopee” is, at least in that particular context. Closest word I know would be “geräuschschöpfer” — which sounds more like something you’d find cavorting in your petunias…
Comment from Og
Time: May 8, 2010, 4:42 pm
Well, come to think of it, you could pour polyester solvent down the grommet hole, plug said hole with a pressure cooker overpressure plug, carefully fold the bag into a neat package, fabricate a trigger mechanism from a hat pin wrapped in copper wire and torus-shaped fridge magnets, attach that to the artificial anus on the cushion along with a CO2 canister for a pellet gun and a sensing circuit made from an accelerometer chip and a microprocessor and Voila! You would have a teeny, tiny airbag for your Barbie Jeep. HOWEVER, if you don’t heed the overinflation warning you may inadvertently launch the heads of Barbie and Ken across the playroom. Just sayin….
Comment from S. Weasel
Time: May 8, 2010, 5:43 pm
There. Per the label, the German for “whoopee cushion” is Juchhu-Kissen and “keychain” is Schlüßelhänger.
Comment from Mrs. Compton
Time: May 8, 2010, 9:01 pm
When I first saw the picture I was wondering what a whoopee cushion was doing with a piercing.
Comment from Bill (still the .00358% of your traffic that’s from Iraq) T
Time: May 8, 2010, 9:13 pm
Ewwwwww.
Comment from Warm Mountain
Time: May 8, 2010, 9:44 pm
I have “adopted” some Texas National Guard guys in Afghanistan, and one of these toys was sent in their last care package! Can’t wait to hear about the mischief they cause.
Comment from Can’t hark my cry
Time: May 8, 2010, 10:45 pm
I have “adopted” some Texas National Guard guys in Afghanistan, and one of these toys was sent in their last care package! Can’t wait to hear about the mischief they cause.
So, as you have adopted them, that makes you in some sense their parent, yes? Do you truly believe you are exercising an adequate degree of parental supervision by sending such a dangerous object to them? Did you make sure to impress upon them that it is essential not to over-inflate (and to remind them not to take any of the steps suggested by Og to overcome the built-in safeguards against overinflation), and that under no circumstances should they use any plastic bag from the packaging as a toy? You have assumed a grave and fearsome responsibility to the fighting forces of our nation; we can only trust that you have discharged it in a worthy manner.
And can we assume that package contained neither cobwebs nor plaster of paris?
Comment from Warm Mountain
Time: May 8, 2010, 11:02 pm
Heck no! I’m a racist teabagger so I don’t care about minorities! I sent them some picante sauce, taco chips, chili, and the whoopee cushion. Don’t know what’s going to get overinflated first, the medics or the whoopee cushion.
Comment from Can’t hark my cry
Time: May 8, 2010, 11:07 pm
Well, it sounds like they have the necessities for a good time. . .alcohol being, in the circumstances, contraindicated.
Comment from David Gillies
Time: May 9, 2010, 6:33 am
Christ alive! This country! It’s half-past midnight and some gang of heathens has decided to launch a firework display that sounds like the siege of Stalingrad. Yeah, fine, we just got a new president, and a it’s a woman to boot, yay fenimism, but for God’s sake, 0030? Are you serious?
Sorry, had to vent. Thank God I’m still awake, and drunk, otherwise I would be annoyed.
Comment from David Gillies
Time: May 9, 2010, 6:42 am
feminism.
I’m not as think as you drunk I am.
Comment from Hotrodelectric
Time: May 9, 2010, 6:55 am
Comment from David Gillies
Time: May 9, 2010, 6:42 am
feminism.
I’m not as think as you drunk I am.
If I can remember this right, it brings to mind the old story about Sir Churchill and Lady Astor:
“Sir Winston , you are drunk!!”
“That may be, Madam, but tomorrow, I shall be sober, while you will still be (insert favored insult here).”
Comment from Hotrodelectric
Time: May 9, 2010, 7:11 am
Oh God. I just HAD to indulge my curiosity…….
http://www.gasmasterflash.com/
Scoobie, this is for you.
It was taken with an FLIR infrared camera that detects gaseous leaks. The second “shot” looks like an out-of-tune Peugeot diesel.
Comment from David Gillies
Time: May 9, 2010, 7:21 am
Hotrod:
Close: the Lady Astor quip was
Nancy Astor : “Winston, if you were my husband I’d poison your tea!”
Churchill: “Madam, if I were your husband, I’d drink it!”
It was Bessie Braddock with whom the immortal “Winston, you’re drunk…” quote is associated. The full quote (due, therefore unreliably, to Nancy Astor herself) is simultaneously funnier while being horribly ungentlemanly:
Braddock: “Winston, you are drunk, and what’s more you are disgustingly drunk.”
Churchill: “Bessie, my dear, you are ugly, and what’s more, you are disgustingly ugly. But tomorrow I shall be sober and you will still be disgustingly ugly.”
Of course both of the above are sufficiently apocryphal as to attain the status of urban legend, and thus merit being cited more for rhetorical effect than historical verisimilitude.
Comment from Pavel
Time: May 9, 2010, 1:42 pm
gizmodo has nothing on sweasel so far as technological advances are concerned.
Gasmasterflash is a hoot, scubafreak. Best song title: Butler’s Revenge.
Comment from Pavel
Time: May 9, 2010, 1:48 pm
In addition to keeping up with technology, I also read this place to avoid improper conflation of apocryphal Churchillian vignettes.
Comment from Can’t hark my cry
Time: May 9, 2010, 2:20 pm
It is an educational site, isn’t it? I learn the most fascinating stuff here. . .
Comment from Og
Time: May 9, 2010, 2:49 pm
Is improper conflation the same thang as over inflatin’ a whoppee cushion?
Comment from Hotrodelectric
Time: May 9, 2010, 4:32 pm
Of course both of the above are sufficiently apocryphal as to attain the status of urban legend, and thus merit being cited more for rhetorical effect than historical verisimilitude.
Thanks for the correction. I knew Astor was involved somewhere, I just wasn’t sure where. Urban legend or not, that is one hell of a retort.
Is improper conflation the same thang as over inflatin’ a whoppee cushion?
Og, I think improper conflation could be a problem. Underinflation is probably more dangerous, because much as a tire, if you underinflate you can cause severe overheating and eventual seperation of the material layers causing a blowout. I mean, think of the carnage, guests at your next party skidding all about out of control, crashing into the china cabinet, death and destruction, all because of an underinflated whoopie cushion.
Comment from Muslihoon
Time: May 10, 2010, 1:07 am
Your Grace, Lady Weasel of Allsex, your blog and associated commenters never fail to deliver the chuckles.
I was stewing over the great predicament The United States are in on so many levels, but this blog lifted my spirits right away. Cheers to you for being a beacon of light! Or maybe you’re a flame of light and we’re all moths flocking to Your Grace’s Illuminousness. In any case, better fana fi-llaah through fana fika than fana fi-l-khawf (hah! look at me! I made a Sufi pun!).
Comment from Nina from GCP
Time: May 10, 2010, 1:53 am
Man, I hope one of my kids gets me one of these for Mother’s Day…
Comment from porknbean
Time: May 10, 2010, 1:59 am
Muslihoon, how the heck are you?
Comment from Muslihoon
Time: May 10, 2010, 2:24 am
Alive. 🙂 Between work, family, and church, I’m lucky to have any time for me now. But I ought not to complain.
Although I am royally, seriously teed off at Afpaki terrorists. If I had a wand, I wouldn’t waste it on world peace. I’d wave it and make the whole Afpak area simply disappear. Poof. Or, boom. Boom would be funner.
Seriously, my blood pressure is rising just thinking about them jerks. I’m having a very hard time keeping to my Puritanical Standards of Language and Expression.
So, in short, to answer your question: alive, and pissed. 🙂
How have you all been holding up? Has anyone seen Gibby Haynes lately?
Comment from EW1(SG)
Time: May 10, 2010, 3:00 am
Hey, Muslihoon! Er, porknbean already asked, so I won’t repeat. But good to see you, and no, now that you mention it, I don’t remember seeing Gibby for awhile either.
Comment from porknbean
Time: May 10, 2010, 4:50 pm
How have you all been holding up
Just trying to keep the noggin above water. And pissed too, not only at the Afpakis, but the enemies of the state in D.C..
You need to drop in more often, at least to wave. Good to see you.
Comment from Greg
Time: May 10, 2010, 9:01 pm
Let’s not get too down on the “adult supervision” clause. Lawyers have to bloodsuck off of someone to stay alive. So, in order for their friends to no sue you, you have to pay them to come up with crap like these clauses to cover your butt! Pun intended …
Comment from Uncle Badger
Time: May 10, 2010, 11:04 pm
Good to see you again, Muslihoon 🙂
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