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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Tuesday 22nd September 2015 12:35 GMT Yugguy
Re: @Khaptain Darwin Awards Equivalant
Trouble is old son if we take your viewpoint to its ultimate end, ALL human activity is pointless as we are all going to die.
In the words of Solomon...
Vanity of vanities, saith the Preacher, vanity of vanities; all is vanity.
What profit hath a man of all his labour which he taketh under the sun?
One generation passeth away, and another generation cometh: but the earth abideth for ever.
I have seen all the works that are done under the sun; and, behold, all is vanity and vexation of spirit.
I kind of like the book of Ecclesiastes. You don't have to be religious to agree with his central viewpoint that it's all pointless bollocks.
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Tuesday 22nd September 2015 15:59 GMT Geoffrey W
Re: Darwin Awards Equivalant
@Khaptain
You accused someone of being a daily mail reader, but to be honest, you're the one who sounds more like a daily mail reader. As for the pointlessness of painting a ball, how about the pointlessness of getting outraged in internet forums about something pointless.
Foolish boy!
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Friday 16th October 2015 12:45 GMT Anonymous Coward
Re: Darwin Awards Equivalant
He's a Guardian reader, I'm guessing.
They are exactly the same as Daily Mail readers except for a couple of minor points: they complain about the Daily Mail rather than the Guardia and they believe themselves to be the most righteous, generous, loving people in the world ( yet believe that anybody who doesn't agree with them should be brutally murdered ).
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Tuesday 22nd September 2015 17:28 GMT Anonymous Coward
Re: Darwin Awards Equivalant
Well, given time, he exponentially threatens to exhaust the resources of the Universe!
That makes me wonder how long it would take him to lay enough paint on it to cause a gravitational collapse and end up with a black hole, taking into account that the sheer size will slow him down a bit unless he hires Santa to help.
Sorry. Must be something I ate :)
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Thursday 24th September 2015 20:32 GMT zen1
@ Ralph B
> Is he hurting anyone?
"Well, given time, he exponentially threatens to exhaust the resources of the Universe!"
Given your question, I'm wondering at what point the baseball's gravity become so strong that the entire sphere would collapse on itself, forming a black hole in Indianapolis?
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Tuesday 22nd September 2015 08:24 GMT Anonymous Coward
Re: Darwin Awards Equivalant
> "Should I judge from the 3 downvotes that there are 3 El Reg readers that actually think that kind of hobby is interesting ?"
No you should not. I didn't downvote you, yet I find the hobby in question interesting, so that makes at least 4.
I would guess that your distate for this hobby is coloured by a too-serious view of the subject. After all, the Universe as a whole is pretty absurd, so this guy's paintball project fits right in, IMHO.
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Tuesday 22nd September 2015 08:59 GMT Anonymous Coward
Re: Darwin Awards Equivalant
"This would easilly be classed way up high, along with growing long finger nails, collecting snail saliva and
measuring the ovality of chicken eggs.."
Climbing a mounting only to come back down again; kicking a ball into a net, only to have it put back into the middle; turning cards over to go snap; making a cake that costs 10x the price of one from a shop; writing a program to run on a bit of hardware you built, that performs worse than an off the shelf one for half the price.
If he enjoys it and does no harm to others, why not?
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Wednesday 23rd September 2015 16:56 GMT MrT
Re: wha?
So many unintentional URLs out there...
abaresearch.co.uk
oldmanshaven.com
dicksonweb.com
powergenitalia.com
swissbit.ch
choosespain.com
La Drape, Les Bocages, Speed of Art and America's Pan King also made that mistake. I'm not sure whether the Turbomachinery Institute of Technology & Sciences (an academic institute in Hyderabad, India) isn't just a clever ruse to use tits.ac.in... maybe the Swissbit and Choose Spain people know the truth...?
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Tuesday 22nd September 2015 11:05 GMT Anonymous Coward
I have a question . . .
Presumably when this started life as a baseball it didn't weigh *any* thousands of pounds but may have been supported by a bit of string. Or did he REALLY plan ahead?
How/when did he drill into it to affix a line capable of supporting this weight and is a baseball capable of supporting this?
If he has a mirror underneath to ensure he doesn't miss a bit then he probably hasn't gone all the way through and attached a washer at the bottom, so how?
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Tuesday 22nd September 2015 13:20 GMT Interceptor
Carmichael continued to paint. Day after day, week after week, month after month, year after year. Soon his hands became to palsied and his back became too weak to continue the work. His grandchildren enthusiastically carried on their eccentric grandsire's life work.
By 2077, the paint sphere was large enough to provide their ancestral home with a considerable amount of shade. Several companies offered to buy the mighty pigment planetoid for various tidy sums. DuPont wanted to cross-section it and place it in front of their factory that produced it's popular Valspar paint line, Rawlings wanted to hire a group of miners to extract the baseball within and webcast the entire event. But the family demurred, continuing to add layer upon layer.
In August of 2239 (Holy Year 8 as now reckoned by the Post-Fall calendar), the Sphere could be seen on the horizon as far away as Sheboygan, Wisconsin. The provisional government of the Midwest AmeriCanada begged the family to stop; records show there were plans to bombard the Sphere from the air using the Commemorative Air Force's restored B-2 bomber, but the resources couldn't be allocated due to the deteriorating conditions on the western front fighting the New Oregonian Caliphate.
By 3055, the Sphere was interfering with orbital traffic. The Chinese Co-Prosperity Collective of Canada and the People's Republic of Alaska attempted multiple paint embargoes and direct antimatter weapon attacks on the Sphere to slow the rate of growth; the various allied factions of Brotherhood of Kar-Myk'al ignored these pinprick assaults and continued to paint. While it is popularly believed that the work was still being done by hand, as we now know, some time in the 2800s a chromospecific nanogel had been spread over the surface which simply leached the elements required to create paint from the air itself, converted them, and then in a von Neumann fashion assembled the paint and new nanomachines from those.
Late in the 75th century, paintEarth's inhabited surface (the former Earth had been considered lost and officially engulfed in paint in the year 6801) was a uniform yellow-grey; the Painters (as "Humanity" now called itself) living in anti-gravity cities hovering over the surface of the planet, applied layer after layer of pigment consisting of the mass of Jupiter and Saturn. Neptune's exposed core of rapidly solidifying diamond liquid seas merited little more than a disinterested shrug before the bulk of its makeup was stripped and applied as primer for the coming Oort Cloud enamel coating.
In what was estimated to be 23016 (the Sun, while unsuitable for use as paint, was in the way of the Sphere and consequently extinguished by The Painters), a coalition of silicon-metal beings from Vega, a purely thought-based race from somewhere just outside our own galaxy and a plant race whose appearance was disturbingly similar to that of a primitive type of Terran gibbon formed and pleaded with Paintmanity to cease the Great Work. Estimations put that as PaintEarth consumed more and more galactic resources, the next few layers would reach the tipping point and simply collapse the entirety of the Milky Way upon itself and shatter the supermassive black hole at the center. This had troubling implications for the stability of the universe itself.
[Year unknown] In the cold void of space, little matter exists any longer that is not adhered as paint to the surface of The Sphere any longer. Whether or not It was even a sphere in shape was the matter of some debate a mere billion or two years prior; no-one had the resources to adequately measure its surface or estimate its mass. Since, however, efforts to cover it uniformly with more layers continued onward and unabated the general consensus was that yes, it was still a sphere. But all matter was gone, now. There was nothing further to add. The machine intelligence that balefully crawled over the surface of the titanic Sphere, sputtering out the last few 10^6 tons of previously free matter in the universe in a thin layer of coloration considered its work as the final atoms adhered and dried. There was nothing else to be done. Space itself had no meaning, all had turned inward to the painting of the Sphere. The Last Painter considered this, and spent an unknown amount of time contemplating the fate of worlds that had been long converted into brush-on semigloss, and, ultimately, considered the storied Base-Ball, some (10^6 ^10^6 ^10^6)^10^100 kilometers beneath the surface of The Sphere.
With the untranslatable mechanical equivalent of a sigh, the Last Painter activated the Turpentine Protocol and, in the moment before apotheosis, when the Sphere compressed itself into a potentiality, a new singular monobloc, cried out: LET THERE BE LIGHT BLUE!
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Wednesday 23rd September 2015 21:23 GMT Interceptor
Yes but would anyone read a novel about the collapse of the universe due to a giant paint ball! I can see the critiques now "Reading this book was literally about as much fun as watching paint dry."
Well, maybe I'll jot down a few ideas regardless. But then, how would you all know if I did? :)
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Thursday 24th September 2015 10:00 GMT Anonymous Coward
Reading this book was literally about as much fun as watching paint dry.
Don't be afraid of that - AIM for it. I found that the most fun way to deal with worries about adversity: turn it into a goal in itself. Not only does that make your life easier, it also seriously upsets the critics because their usual aim of lazy lofty elevation over the hard work of an author by dissing it where possible suddenly becomes a trap.
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Wednesday 23rd September 2015 00:33 GMT harmjschoonhoven
The other ball
Someone should take a large gobstopper and give it a daily sugar coating for 40 years. Smells better too.
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Thursday 8th October 2015 10:44 GMT Chris Harrison
Used to be a wrapper
Reminds me of something we did when the company I worked for decided we needed a shrink wrapping machine to send out our 3.5inch disks a little more professionally.
Discovering your credit cards have been wrapping in plastic individually, then all together, then in your wallet is no fun. As for answering the phone...
Biting the hand that feeds IT
