Deep Thought mit Uberreiniger

[uberreiniger]

There's an old trick question which asks "which weighs more, a pound of gold or a pound of feathers?" The trick being that gold is measured differently than other substances, a pound being measured as twelve ounces instead of sixteen. Hence, the pound of feathers weighs more. That got me thinking about weight in general.

How about that old axiom "hit me like a ton of bricks." Why a ton of bricks? Because it's heavier than a ton of gold? Would a ton of feathers not kill you just as dead? I mean, a ton is a ton. We mere humans are inadequate in the face of tonnage. For us, being hit by a ton of anything basically guarantees an instant and gruesome fatalities. But don't despair. If someone is going to use a ton of anything to kill you, it conveys a great deal of respect for you as an adversary. If you're hit by a ton of gold, think of the dozens if not hundreds of miners who spent countless, endless hours risking their lives laboring in the bowels of the earth to accrue that ton. If it's a ton of feathers, then think about the hundreds if not thousands of birds which in all likelihood gave their lives to craft the instrument of your demise. So take pride in that ton slamming into you as it liquifies your precious organs and pulverizes your crucial bones. Take pride in knowing that your death caused somebody a great deal of work, take comfort in knowing that, when all was said and done, you were, in the end, extremely difficult to kill.

Comments

[stitchedsutures.livejournal.com]

while i understand your thoughts on a ton of anyting being able to kill you and i agree... i think the "like a ton of bricks" involves bricks because being hit with even one brick is hard and one of the most rough, solid, painfully angular and unshifting things you could throw at someone. who knows. that probably doesnt make any sense

[uberreiniger.livejournal.com]

Hmm... the realization hits me like a bag of hammers

[stitchedsutures.livejournal.com]

*d'oh!* it's TON of hammers Tyree... a TON.... that's what we're talking about! sheesh.. some people. :)

[uberreiniger.livejournal.com]

I didn't say how BIG the bag was, now did I? Er, wait, I suppose that would be more than a ton of hammers since you'd have the ton of hammers plus the substantial weight of this undoubtably large sack. And you couldn't subtract hammers until the weight of hammers + bag is an even ton because while it is an even ton, it is no longer, in fact, a ton of hammers. It's NEARLY 2,000 pounds of hammers plus however many pounds of bag. Oh man, now I've screwed EVERYTHING up!

[equusk.livejournal.com]

Yes, but being killed by a ton of feathers would have awfully funny irony to it....

[stitchedsutures.livejournal.com]

you know, i thought about this for a bit before i posted the first post i made.. thinking about the feathers at least. i mean, if it is a ton, the feathers on the bottom would no doubt be compacted pretty well. but then again, feathers would maybe have more "give" than bricks. so would it still smash you AS flat as the bricks? or would it sorta just smoosh you and partially conform over your body? or am i just too bored and thinking about it too much to pass the time?

Anyway, yes. ironic indeed. death by bird clothes.

[equusk.livejournal.com]

If they're compacted and bound in some way, then, no, they wouldn't give. A ton of feathers would most definitely kil you. But, if they're loose. That's a lot of feathers hitting you. Somehow, I kind of think the feathers would suffocate you (like a pillow in some cheesy soap opera- only, a giant, uber pillow).

Both of them probably aren't going to completely flatten you ala Loony Toons. But they will get you pretty close...

Although, if the feathers are loose, and tossed from high up, you probably wouldn't be killed at all. On the contrary, it'd probably be a beautiful snow of down the frolic and play in. On the other hand, if the feathers were tossed from a low height, then they wouldn't spread enough, and I'd lean towards the suffocation theory (can it be considered drowning in feathers?)

Definitely an unusual way to die. I think I vote no for either. I'll just remain immortal for the time being, like Hob Gadling in some twisted, Neil Gaiman-esque sense.

This is absolutely the most morbid discussion I've ever had about feathers...

[stitchedsutures.livejournal.com]

well while we're enjoying the morbidity of feathers, i have to add....

i agree that if they are thrown from a low height you would probably die of suffocation, maybe like being smothered with a pillow, or maybe... from trying to breathe but inhaling feathers in the process which i guess would be a sort of suffocations sort of like choking or drowning since the windpipe would be blocked. Dont eat feathers kids.

heh.. hey... nice to see another Zim Fan too btw. i can watch those cartoons all day.. and sometimes i do.

[equusk.livejournal.com]

I love Zim.

"Postulio!"

Wow... I just noticed how much my lack of gorging is making my typing horrible. It's a good thing I hit up the vending machine for my cheetos.

No, kids shouldn't eat feathers.

If the feathers were tossed from very high, it would create a beautiful snow-like effect of fluffy down, and be just beautiful. Which is why I vote we dump a ton of fluffy white feathers off a really tall building by remote so we can all run around and play in the faux-snow. Maybe even make feather angels...

Which would probably hurt a lot less than when my roomies and I tried to make carpet angels when we first moved into our new apartment with the randomly white carpet...

[stitchedsutures.livejournal.com]

I'm up for feather angels. I mean.. they're soft, they dont have the effect on the dermis like carpet angels do, and they don't melt and soak your clothes and make you cold. Now all we have to do is find an appropriate place in which to dispense this "Ton of Feathers"

My favorite Zim is Bolognius Maximus... where they turn into little sausage looking bologna people and are chased by dogs.

[uberreiniger.livejournal.com]

If I keep eating the way I do then in ten years that will be my name: Uberpillow

[stitchedsutures.livejournal.com]

mmm. nothing makes a better pillow than a good guy:)

[uberreiniger.livejournal.com]

So what you're saying is in ten years I'll have a shot? *makes arm-pumping "touchdown!" gesture* YESSS!

[uberreiniger.livejournal.com]

We should ask the members of Strapping Young Lad. They have a bloody feather on their latest album cover. Who knows? Maybe it was at one time part of the selfsame murder weapon described in this scenario.

[yaqui.livejournal.com]

I survived a hit by almost two tons of a '71 Rambler Ambassador :) All I got was a permanent hematoma(sp?) on my right leg.

[uberreiniger.livejournal.com]

Then it would appear yaqui is the hardest to kill of all. This may explain why there have been no further attempts. So does this hemotoma contribute to the disorder you've been getting treatment for?

[yaqui.livejournal.com]

Nope. The hemotoma is just a reminder of "The Day The Bar Blew Up". After 18 years it's almost all gone.
Oh yeah, I probably would have died if that station wagon hadn't hit a Riviera, a Toronado, the east wall of Mike's Bigger Jigger, and my brother's back before it hit me. After it hit me it hit my friend Donny. Minor injuries all around.
Conme to think of it, it may have been a '71 Catalina Wagon. I really don't remember anymore...

[equusk.livejournal.com]

Wow.... :::eek face:::

That sounds exceptionally painful. I don't even know what a hematoma is, but it sounds unhappy. (I have a cartiledge tear in my left knee that was left untended for five years, but hematoma sounds like it hurts real bad)

[yaqui.livejournal.com]

Basically it's just residual scare tissue from the impact of the bumper against my leg. No pain at all after the first month or so. I currently have a medial meniscus tear in my left knee that I refuse to get operated on. I also have severe arthritis in my right knee that may cause me to get a knee replacement later in life. I'm all about knee pain.

[equusk.livejournal.com]

I was all about knee pain, and how I could bone-crushing spills and breakdowns with just a hunt cap on as "protective gear." I used to be all about how I could "take it like a man, take it better than a man." But, y'know what, after five years, I'm spastic.

No one touches my knee, except my orthopedist, who has a nasty habit of squeezing my knee cap, and around the injury, until my face contorts in horrible agony, and has the nerve to ask, "Does this hurt?"

My cousin jumped all over my knee,crushed it, and wrenched it in completely the wrong way a couple of times this weekend. I'm about ready to take an emergency rescue saw and saw off the lower half of my left leg from about two inches above my knee.

[uberreiniger.livejournal.com]

Actually I think a hematoma is just a fancy medical term for a bruise.