So I'm watching this week's episode of Bullshit!, and it's on NASA. And at one point, they decide to show, I guess it's called "parabolic weightlessness"?
So Penn Jillette went on one of these parabolic flights. He's floating around the inside of the plane, when he starts undressing, and, before I could turn my eyes--wham! He's floating around the cockpit naked as the day he was born.
We get Penn from the back. We get him from the front. ...floating, he was floating, and a more frightful sight I can scarcely imagine. ...except for that episode with the Brazilian wax, yikes!
I can't say I've never wondered what it might be like, you know, to do it in a weightless environment. No one on the top or the bottom. No arms in the way. I guess you'd want to have padded walls or like a really big space. ...like a geodesic dome.
Never mind. That dream is ruined forever. Ever had that thought? Want to hold on to it?
Then don't watch this week's episode of Penn & Teller: Bullshit!
Re: Penn & Teller: Bullshit!
I think there is a Girls Gone Wild DVD where some naked coeds are floating naked in that plane or an airplane very much like it.
I only know this because I watch a lot of late-night TV, and after 1 a.m. some networks are financially supported almost entirely by Girls Gone Wild commercials/infomercials.
So if you ever have the opportunity to Get It On in free-fall, and you don't want a naked Jillette to be the image that is called to mind unbidden as you float toward your loved one, you might want to get that DVD first and watch it as a sorbet to cleanse your mental palate.
"My intellect is gigantic, monstrous, terrifying."
Re: Penn & Teller: Bullshit!
I will look for that.
And my idea wasn't to do it in free fall. More like in an orbiting hotel.
I bet that'll be a big selling point, actually. ...for the trip up. I think Virgin Galactic is quoting $200,000 if you book now. Once they get a hotel up, a destination where you can spend a few days. Sure it'll be expensive initially...
But who's gonna be laying on their death bed regretting having spent the money for zero g romance?
No one, that's who. No one.
Re: Penn & Teller: Bullshit!
seriously though, i think you're crazy on this. and you think i'm crazy. everybody wins! - dhex
Re: Penn & Teller: Bullshit!
Yeah, that's actually what I meant -- in orbit. Not in the upsy-downsy plane. But I guess that was unclear in context, sorry.
Actually, I almost said "in zero gee" instead of "free fall" -- but I was afraid some smart-ass would point out that you aren't actually free of the pull of gravity, but "falling free" in orbit (around whatever body you are orbiting). Since we have plenty of smart-asses around here, plus also one bonafide professional physicist, I couldn't take that risk. Therefore I used the more accurate but (in this context) misleading term instead of the more clear colloquial term, which in retrospect was a boo-boo.
PS: But I think you are right -- exotic weightless sex might possibly do for space tourism what porn did for the Internet -- create a lot of interest and possibly help spur the pioneering of useful technology for cheaper/better access.
"My intellect is gigantic, monstrous, terrifying."
Re: Penn & Teller: Bullshit!
You just call it microgravity and are done with it.
Also, there would have to be strong gripping and you'd have to do it while stuffed up, since your blood would be equally distributed to your head as to your feet.
Sounds like work.
This is a personal problem. There are very few personal problems that cannot be solved through a suitable use of high explosives. This is not one of those exceptions.
Re: Penn & Teller: Bullshit!
"Microgravity" sounds too technical jargonish to me. If most of the people in my office and my family wouldn't understand it, I tend to avoid it.
In retrospect, maybe I just should have gone with "zero gee" and put scare quotes around it.
"My intellect is gigantic, monstrous, terrifying."
Re: Penn & Teller: Bullshit!
What chu talkin' about, Sandy!?
Re: Penn & Teller: Bullshit!
I use "freefall", but I prefer "zero gee" over "microgravity". The latter sounds like it means really, really small - but still present - acceleration, like on an asteroid.
Re: Penn & Teller: Bullshit!
You know, in thinking about doing this, it's not one of those things where you think about it by working out the physics or anything. But we can have zero g in a pressurized environment, right?
The guys on the shuttle aren't wearing their space suits all the time.
So, okay, maybe for a couple of months before we go up, we eat lots of steak and spinach and take lots of iron. ...and a guy should be good, right?
Re: Penn & Teller: Bullshit!
I think Sandy means that in ... "zero gee" ... all the blood and fluids that normally pool down in the lower regions of your body when you're in normal gravity ... don't. It's as if the blood and fluids are rushing toward your head, comparatively speaking, because there's no gravity pulling it down. Astronauts often complain of head congestion and feeling "stuffy in the head". (And they tend to lose some of their senses of smell and taste as a result, just as an aside.)
"My intellect is gigantic, monstrous, terrifying."
Re: Penn & Teller: Bullshit!
So when he says "you'd have to do it when stuffed up"...
...see I'm havin' a hard time finding the pony in that one!
Re: Penn & Teller: Bullshit!
Well that works out well then, because that's exactly what it means.
seriously though, i think you're crazy on this. and you think i'm crazy. everybody wins! - dhex
Re: Penn & Teller: Bullshit!
If I were a man, I wouldn't want terms like "micro" bandied about during discussions of sexual mechanics.
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I mean: "really, really small, but still present?" Ouch. Dude. Harsh.
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But in the context of this conversation, that's not what the speaker is trying to focus on. He wants to emphasize the apparent total absence of weight, not the teeny tiny eeny weeny gravitational acceleration that is there but can't be perceived. So I can see why someone would want to avoid using "microgravity" and prefer the less accurate, but more evocative, "zero gee."
"My intellect is gigantic, monstrous, terrifying."
Re: Penn & Teller: Bullshit!
Exactly.
Re: Penn & Teller: Bullshit!
What happened to the very useful word weightless?
The sun is barely up and the streets are already filled with drunken Scots. That can't be good. - mk
Re: Penn & Teller: Bullshit!
That's my point. Not that fun, actually. Not as bad as doing it upside down at 1G, but...stuffy. Plus Newton means that there must be gripping, and probably some bouncing. Just 'cuz you're weightless doesn't mean you're massless.
This is a personal problem. There are very few personal problems that cannot be solved through a suitable use of high explosives. This is not one of those exceptions.
Re: Penn & Teller: Bullshit!
Like a bucking bronco.
Re: Penn & Teller: Bullshit!
oh my.
"Yeah, but my character would be all swav and deboner." - Warren
Re: Penn & Teller: Bullshit!
That's why you have to use your space cowboy lariat!
"My intellect is gigantic, monstrous, terrifying."