What do handguns and soda containers have in common?
Leave answers in the comments section. (Yes, yes... I realize there's an infinite possible number of correct answers -- they're both tangible, they're both products, etc. -- but in keeping with the convention of puzzles like this, you have to find the relatively narrow and interesting category into which both fall. And besides, as it happens, at least one of them has been in my kitchen.)
Friday, March 07, 2008
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27 comments:
Sometimes you can turn them in for money. And then they get crushed, melted and turned into something else?
Both need to withstand internal pressure.
Governments try (unsuccessfully) to reduce the number in circulation by buying them up: in "buybacks" and deposit refunds respectively.
All clever answers -- but not what I had in mind!
Pop a cap?
Yo.
My first thought was the same as Chip's, but since you've already ruled that out …
- Both need to be modified in order to be used: you need to load a handgun, and open a soda container.
- Both can be used as projectile weapons (one as the projectile itself).
- Both are forbidden on the campuses of many elementary schools.
- Both are the subject of debates over what to call them (though with one it's politically loaded, no pun intended, and with one it's primarily regional).
- Both have warnings on them not to point them at people (maybe? I'm sure I've seen some sort of warning like that before, but maybe that was on champagne?).
I would have said something about how both bring huge profits and kill a lot of Americans, but it's the *cans* so. . . Both are getting thiner? Need oil?
Even more creative answers, but still not what I was thinking. Hints:
It's not a pun.
It's not about how they are used.
It's not about their effects on individuals or society.
I'll give a more explicit hint in a day or two if I still haven't seen the answer.
They both pop.
they shoot when you least expect it
State legislatures spend enormous amounts of time debating petty regulations about both of these, and the regulations vary considerably from state to state in unpredictable ways.
Have both of them been banned in public schools?
Neither can be brought past a security screening point at a U.S. airport.
...unless they are empty (of bullets or of soda, respectively)
Both have "triggers" that have to be pulled?
I thought it might be the energy content, but a .45 ACP bullet has only about 500 J, or 0.12 kcal, while a can of coke has 140 kcal.
But a diet soda has a bit less than a kcal, which would be about the same energy as a fully loaded pistol.
Both are useful because of what they contain.
Both handguns and soda containers have been made out of steel, aluminum, and plastic.
Both are sold in a combination of U.S. & metric units: e.g, .45 [inch] or 9mm caliber, 12 oz. can or 2 liter bottle.
Both have been the target of lawsuits styled in terms of "defective product" under a theory of strict liability.
Both are pressurized by a gas (typically, CO2), though this depends on the handgun of course.
Both have a mouth.
Both are/have a cylinder.
David wins! I was thinking about how both items come in both metric and English units.
Lots of other good answers, though.
What do I win? I suggest a suitable prize might be a Glock and a case of Diet Coke.
Clarification, in reaction to a complaint at the Volokh Conspiracy: they come in both metric and English units in the United States. (Was there really any confusion about that? I hope not.)
I'll go ahead put automobile tires on that list. They're even worse. They're sold with both English and metric units SIMULTANEOUSLY.
Take the tire size 195/55R15, the size on my car.
That means that the width of the tread is 195mm, the sidewall height is 55% of 195mm, and the wheel diameter is 15 inches.
Hmmm. . . Metric and English measurements, yes, ALSO, both are phallic, and with "tips," if you will, that make them highly dangerous as sex toys for female sexual gratification. . .
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