Wouldn't have another 40 years, if each coat applied each time was the same thickness, each new coat would be slightly heavier than the last as the amount needed per coat increases. So the rate the ball is increasing in weight is increasing.
Indianapolis man paints his ball every day – for FORTY YEARS
Some men are born great, some have greatness thrust upon them and others achieve greatness by painting a baseball every day for four decades until it weighs 5,000 pounds. Mike Carmichael from Indianapolis embarked on the journey that would become his life's work when he first slapped a coat of blue paint on the ball in 1977. …
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Tuesday 22nd September 2015 12:53 GMT Crazy Operations Guy
Re: Well, a hobby is a hobby
Given that paint goes bad after 10 years, the last time he;d be able to use lead-based paint would be around 1987 (lead paint was banned in 1977), so that gives use 28 years worth of paint, or 10,227 layers. I think its safe to say that you'd be safe even if you took a bite or two out of it... Well, safe from lead poisoning, at least.
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Tuesday 22nd September 2015 06:51 GMT Michael H.F. Wilkinson
I'll raise a glass to eccentricity
Brilliant case of doing something "just because". More of this kind of harmless weirdness can make the world a better place (in a small way), simply by putting a smile on peoples' faces.
I wonder if he has photographs of the increase as a function of time. Could be publishable in Annals of Improbable Research. Might even be a candidate for an Ig Nobel Prize.
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Tuesday 22nd September 2015 07:06 GMT skeptical i
Re: I'll raise a glass to eccentricity
Ditto -- less Disneyworld, more quirky roadside attractions.
It'd be cool if he had a camera mounted to take a piccie of the newly-painted ball every day, so he could string the pix together for a time-lapse film of the growing baseball. Next time .... ;^)
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Tuesday 22nd September 2015 08:50 GMT Chemist
Re: I'll raise a glass to eccentricity
@Michael H.F. Wilkinson
I seem to remember there was a publication "Journal of Irreproducible Results" where the title font tailed off into a wastebin. You seem to be the sort of chap that might remember it.
This ball wouldn't qualify, of course, as no-one is likely to try to reproduce it ! It also gives a whole new meaning to paint-balling of course.
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Tuesday 22nd September 2015 10:44 GMT Ralph B
Re: I'll raise a glass to eccentricity
> I seem to remember there was a publication "Journal of Irreproducible Results"
Ah, yes, the Journal of Irreproducible Results ... not to be confused with the Annals of Improbable Research.
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Tuesday 22nd September 2015 22:06 GMT Nolveys
Re: I'll raise a glass to eccentricity
Indeed the oddballs make the world go round. How else would something like this be possible?
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Friday 25th September 2015 06:51 GMT Sarah Balfour
Re: Darwin Awards Equivalant
To qualify for a Darwin, your stupidity DOES NOT have to lead to your demise, the main criterion is that your genes are removed from the gene pool, which can quite easily happen (more so for men) without death, e.g. if you happened to get your sack caught in such a way that all blood supply to your veg was cut off for long enough that Jaffaring was the result. Or, in the case of one fucktard I saw writhing in agony on a trolley in the A&E at Manchester Royal, you decided to nail gun your jewels to a 2x4. Pretty certain he wasn't going to be furthering humanity after it was removed.
All the rules state is that you have to be rendered unable to breed and, whilst death is the only way that can be achieved with surety, Awards have been given to men (because, obviously, it's pretty impossible for a lass to remove her seed from the gene pool without fatality) who've survived, but been left Jaffared. There's nothing to say all awards have to be posthumous, just that your junk needs to be junk.
So, as we're talking Oz, if you're baiting a croc and it rips your sack off and eats it, but you survive, you'd qualify. Talking of dangerous reptiles and nuts, there was the man awarded because he decided it'd be an excellent idea to shove a rattler into his undies. There's a whole RWNJ sect - cult - in the Deep South which believes that God only wants those who are willing to sleep with venomous snakes. If you're bitten - which obviously is likely - and you survive, then God rejected you, summat like that. Whole shit-tonne of potential Awards there.
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Tuesday 22nd September 2015 09:56 GMT Khaptain
Re: Darwin Awards Equivalant
I honestly couldn't care less for what anyone does in the privacy of their own home, that's their problem.
What I do not care for is the fact that the media, in this case El Reg, pump this crap onto the screens/newspapers/medium of their readers.
Society is being dumbed down to a level the leaves me in complete despair.. and what do I see, people on a tech site that defend this kind of thing.
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Tuesday 22nd September 2015 13:42 GMT Khaptain
Re: @ Khaptain
"The media has being doing stories like this since Ugg said to Oog "You'll never guess what that crazy guy in the next cave has painted on the wall". So I guess we must have been dumbing down ever since then."
@Just Enough
And you think that that is acceptable ? It is one of the reasons for which I gave up television about 15 years ago.
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Tuesday 22nd September 2015 14:24 GMT Just Enough
Re: @ Khaptain
Good to see you're spending your time more profitably raging at the world on internet forums. I'm sure everyone will sit up and take notice one day. Then we'll carry you shoulder-high through the streets of every capital city and songs will be written about how you were right all along, and we should all have wised up ages ago.
And then someone will write an awe-struck article about your 15 year collection of green pens (you keep them in a cardboard box where your TV used to be).. ... and the cycle of life will be complete.
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Tuesday 22nd September 2015 14:50 GMT Khaptain
Re: @ Khaptain
@Just Enough
That's very poetic and I thank you for your kind sentiments.
I understand that some people find great joy in looking at painted baseballs. That's fine, continue as usual.
I understand also that these kind of icons are very important to a large part of the population. Whether it be white crosses or white baseballs the difference to me is irrelevant. That's fine, continue as usual.
Surprising how upset some people can get over such trivialities.
All hail the baseball....
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Tuesday 22nd September 2015 11:38 GMT Jimmy2Cows
@Khaptain Re: Darwin Awards Equivalant
I honestly couldn't care less for what anyone does in the privacy of their own home, that's their problem.
What I do not care for is the fact that the media, in this case El Reg, pump this crap onto the screens/newspapers/medium of their readers.
Society is being dumbed down to a level the leaves me in complete despair.. and what do I see, people on a tech site that defend this kind of thing.
Ummm... yeah... so you know this is Bootnotes, right?
In other words - expect inane bollocks just like this, which is a welcome relief to the overwhelming seriousness in the world. Seriousness that seems to have sucked you into it's clammy, graping maw...
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Tuesday 22nd September 2015 12:22 GMT Khaptain
Re: @Khaptain Darwin Awards Equivalant
"Ummm... yeah... so you know this is Bootnotes, right?"
Don't worry I have got more downvotes than the majority have got upvotes, yes, I klnow that we are in the bootnotes and it also seems that I have touched a nerve on our more "sensitive" readership..
Obviously painting baseballs is higher up in the ranks of other people's "list of things I dream to do" than it is on my mine..
Carry on James....take the exit where it reads "welcome back to sanity"... because it seems we may have strayed from the route..
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Biting the hand that feeds IT
