Crazy Patents

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Hello, and welcome to Citation Needed, the podcast where we choose a subject, read a single article about it on Wikipedia, and pretend we're experts because it's the internet and that's how it works now.

I'm Noah and I'm going to be filing the application on this episode, but for that I'm going to need a couple of comedy engineers.

First up, two men whose tirades against modern technology, they can't just fucking work puts the vent in invention, Heath and Cecil.

Okay, why does Bluetooth have a pump fake for connecting every

single time?

Just connect right.

Are you edging me?

What's happening?

My favorite part about Windows 11 is that I can open a folder and it tells me it's working on it and it's been working on it for a really long time.

So like a slow reader can make sure that they can read it like twice or three times

in that time.

Sure.

And also joining us, two guys so bad at using new tech, they almost count as outventors, Eli and Todd.

Yeah, ChatGPT is getting rude about when I ask what I'm forgetting when I walk in a room.

I'm going to say we should have stopped at the light bulb.

It's been downhill ever since.

I want to argue with you so bad.

And before we get to the essay proper, I want to take a minute to remind our listeners that there really was a funny opening sketch on this episode, the beginning, and Eli will almost certainly reference it at some point, either on this show or another.

And if you were a patron, you would stand some chance of getting all of his future jokes.

If you'd like to know what Eli is talking about, be sure to stick around to the end of the show.

And with that out of the way, tell us, Cecil, what person plays Think Concept Phenomenon or Event will be talking about today?

Today, we're going to be talking about...

Crazy patents.

All right.

And Tom, you perused a listicle probably.

Are you ready to elaborate on its bullet points?

Okay, I perused several listicles.

I don't want to sell you short.

There are triple the work I do on my essay.

Outrageous.

Listicle of listicles.

All right, with apologies.

So what are some crazy patents?

And more importantly, how are they akin to the last leaf clinging to an autumn tree under an ash-gray sky?

Not today, Noah.

No.

He met his word count, so so he doesn't have to backfill the beginning.

Right, I didn't have to go backfilling

out the best part.

Florid touches.

All right, in October of this year, one week after Hurricane Helene ravaged the southeastern states of America, Marjorie Taylor Greene, being a duly elected representative of Congress for Georgia's 14th district, she took up the mantle of leadership.

to advocate for her constituents in the only way she knew how by being aggressively, violently, catastrophically stupid.

She did 10 kipping pull-ups.

That's how she does it.

And she invented a cattle prod that clips in under your body during those pull-ups.

Did she invent something for that?

Now she's unburdened from her previous marriage.

She no longer openly has to cheat with polyamorous CrossFit Tentric sex gurus.

And MTG now has time.

I feel like we're being judgy about MTG.

There's so many other ways we could talk about her problematic nature.

And cheating on your spouse.

Thank you, Heath.

And MTG now has time for the important work of leading by tweeting.

And in this case, she tweeted out a dumbass meme with the heading, they can't control the weather, followed by a list of what the meme describes as weather modification patents.

Okay, so they can.

I think you mean they shan't, Budge.

In that great American moment that combined civic leadership with a failed middle school science education, MTG pushed two categorically wrong ideas that we can create hurricanes and that patents are evidence of anything other than

well, the existence of a patent.

100 bucks to the person who submits a patent that shows a cross-section of Marjorie Taylor Greene piloted like a mech by a lizard alien.

$100, it's all yours.

Okay, I feel like the Rothschilds have plenty of money already.

So you're not

offering a lot more than $100.

MTG RV.

Now, we are going to discuss some truly wonderfully unhinged patents today, but first, it would behoove us all to take a moment to understand what a patent actually is.

If you were to invent a better mousetrap, you would want some way to make money on that idea.

But without a patent, huge companies would just say, great mousetrap, and then have it built for less than you in bulk in China and then put you out of business.

A patent protects the inventor of something for a period of time by giving them the exclusive right to that idea or invention.

And in exchange, exchange, the patent itself is made public.

Right.

In theory.

Yeah, right.

Yeah.

Yeah.

Tell that to the guy who patented mailing cassette tapes to people and tried to claim decades later that meant podcasters owed him money.

He did.

He did.

Now, technically speaking, the patented invention is supposed to actually work.

That's actually one of the basic criteria you're supposed to meet to get a patent, except that it's also not.

The patent office can't, as a matter of practicality, actually test every patent application or ask for a working model for every application.

So instead, what often happens is that cranks and crackpots file wonderfully insane patents with wildly terrible drawings of the sort that a not particularly precocious third grader might produce.

And then certain representatives of the United States Congress use those drawings as evidence of weather weapons and other bullshit when she is not busy showing stolen revenge porn of private citizens on the floor of top.

Oh, Jesus Christ.

Okay, Tom, if we're going to dismiss patent trolls and irrelevant cranks, what's the point of me even trying to do a Nicola Tesla essay?

Like, if you're just...

It's meta?

It'll be meta, right?

That's a fun fact.

When Einstein was a patent clerk, people would turn in their patents and because he was Einstein, he'd be like, hey, this doesn't work.

But he didn't know that patent offices were for crazy retirees to deposit their mental illness into the United States mailbox so they'd be like

and then he got yelled at by his boss like stop cracking people's patents

all right so let's take a look at some of the weather patents that mtg was so proud to tweet out now we're not going to be able to take a look at all of them because a good deal of the writing on the meme she posted isn't actually even legible but one of the earliest of the patents she cited as proof of weather weapons was filed in 1914 It expired in 1931, and it's for a rain-making balloon.

Or rather, rather, balloons.

It actually appears from the drawings to be a bunch of big-ass balloons just carrying a box filled with powder.

That's it.

Just powder.

A congresswoman tweeted this.

Well, counterpoint, ass balloons filled with powder making people say crazy shit isn't that abnormal.

Yeah, kind of hard for the course.

You guys remember balloon fight?

I'm pretty sure the Illuminati are doing that.

I'm a sitting U.S.

Congresswoman.

You're talking shit right now, but cut to MTG furiously releasing lightning-filled balloons at you guys.

Oh, yeah.

She knows.

She's read the pad.

She's rubbing it on her hair and just letting it go.

We don't have the monkeys to take her down, guys.

We don't.

Where'd you get those buzzers?

Another, all the young people in our audience have no fucking idea what we're referencing, and it's impossible to communicate the 2D nightmare that took up hundreds of hours of our life.

Balloon Fight is such a good game, though.

I don't want to revisit it.

Come on.

Now, another, filed in 1917, floated not balloons, but the idea of burning highly combustible fuel as a way of protecting troops from poisonous gas in warfare.

You melt them first?

What?

I think from the photos that the idea is to line the front of the trenches with canisters that when you light will burn up all the poisonous gas that drifts toward the trench.

But I don't have a fucking clue if that would work.

But two things here are worth noting.

One, no, that would not work.

That's just stupid.

And two,

nothing about any of that has anything to do with weather or hurricanes.

Now, Tom, as an East Coaster who was told several times last year it was poison gassy out, I do have to beg to share it.

And there's a few others that just have nothing to do with anything.

And really, I mean, who fucking cares?

Because what if the lizard people Illuminati overlords have a secret, publicly filed patent for a working hurricane gun?

What if, in fact, there were some way to create the 1.5 trillion watts of power that the winds alone in a hurricane possess?

And then, like, pew-pew those trillions of watts of energy precisely in the general direction of roughly the coastal area you want to destroy?

Oh, we're about to drive a DeLorean past a courthouse really fast, aren't we?

All right.

Enter US 20030085296A1,

which abstract is described as affecting the formation of low atmospheric systems by using big fucking speakers and blasting sound waves at specific frequencies.

until a hurricane happens.

Okay, listener, Tom has included a link to this patent in our notes.

And while it might not be practical to demand a working model for every invention, the solution to that impracticality is definitely not whatever these drawings represent.

We've gone too far in the other direction.

My favorite part is that they show the path of what should be a hurricane.

That's thousands of miles because of the curves involved.

And this thing is just pointed out into the ocean with trunk thumping base.

Like you might as well just line Himalayan salt lamps on the shore to start one it's so silly it looks like the original application was just some guy going to the patent office with like a picture of a cloud in crayon that he drew being like look at this look at this

and they were like you have to draw a little bit more stuff than that right and so he did right we just write out the speakers we got one speaker facing one way and then another to go the other way so that it'll go in a circle that's to make it go in a circle he said so the guy walked in there he's like okay you know how you can get everybody to walk around the pool together and then you get a little whirlpool going.

Okay, you guys know the Gulf of Mexico, right?

Now, hear me out.

Have you seen Back to the Future?

If you're walking at 88 miles an hour, that's a lot of water.

Do you know what's actually gigawatts and not gigawatts?

But I think it's basically the same idea.

Other people don't know that.

Kara says gigawatts.

Come on.

All right, but what if you don't want to create a hurricane, but rather stop one?

You could, of course, as Trump suggested on more than one occasion, drop a nuclear bomb into it, but what if that was actually a dangerously, radioactively insane idea?

What then?

Well, then you could turn to another patent filed in 2009, which suggested the best way to disrupt or control a hurricane is to raise the temperature in the eye of the hurricane by flying scores of jet planes into the eye, and then they turn on their afterburners to heat up the whole system and cause the hurricane to collapse from an overdose of awesomeness.

Yeah, I feel like that happened in the original ending of Twisters, but the writers went dumber.

All right, clearly, not all amazing patents are hurricane-related, but sometimes awesomeness doesn't come easily.

Patent 5,885,614 aims to cure impotence without boner pills, but with cloths or sprays imbued with sexy, sexy smells.

Sexy smells such as pumpkin pie and donut.

Go on.

That's the invention.

That actually tells us more than anyone should be comfortable with about the inventor.

Actually, okay, I feel like you're being a little judgy, man.

I mean, worst case scenario.

for him is sending me a pumpkin pie and some donuts.

Don't listen to Tom on this one, Heath.

If pumpkin pie and donuts weren't universal aphrodisiacs, the pie wouldn't need to be so soft and the donuts wouldn't have to have holes in them.

Obviously.

All coming together.

I think.

Look at you.

Supported.

Held in the light.

Thriving.

Free.

Hard.

Now you're like

grandma's house.

No, the fuck you didn't.

Thank you again.

Now, there's an amazing patent filed in 1923 described as a head exerciser for, I guess, working out your lazy fucking face.

Now, I'm going to tell you how this one works, and you can tell me if you think it's even possible for anything to go wrong.

Quote, each user gripped a metal plate between their teeth.

I think it's possible for it to go wrong.

The plates were attached to each other via a spring device.

Okay.

Each other shirts.

Each person then pulls away from the other, sort of like a tug of war.

Perfect invention.

No notes.

Great.

Slaps it.

We call this baby American representative democracy.

Okay, I have one note.

Lose the plates, lose the spring, get a toy for your dog.

So perfect.

Also, I think I already invented this and it fucking rules.

You just wrestle a dog for an object.

It's so fun.

Some inventions solve problems we've all struggled with and we've been too ashamed to discuss.

Take the urinal headrest.

Patented in 2004, the urinal headrest finally solves the problem of where to rest your head while you're taking a piss.

Clearly, standing up straight while peeing is stupid and leaning your head against a cold tile wall is uncomfortable.

Uncomfortable.

Yeah.

Until the urinal headrest came along, men had no choice but to mash our faces against the bathroom wall without even a touch of comfort padding.

And the world was clearly a bleaker place for us all to live.

I like where their heads are, but I like to lean back when I'm doing that.

I want the head rest behind me, you know what I mean?

Not as much as the guy at the next urinal wants that for you, but yeah,

right now I have to go like over the top in a big arc over myself.

And like, sure, yeah,

imagine how often you have to be in the second half of a Cohen brothers movie, head pressed against the tile of a strange bathroom that you think to yourself,

be a pillow.

Like, what if instead you just went to rehab, man?

How about that?

Yeah, you know, we need in bathrooms more things to touch.

That's what we need in bathrooms.

I'm surprised we don't actually have those in Vegas now.

They have a massive drink rest.

So fucking nasty.

Fuck, they do.

Jesus Christ.

The high, high roller suite.

And here we have the ball rest that you could set your balls on as you pee.

Does it adjust?

I've gotten a little older.

I need a lower one.

Because that is where the pee comes from.

It comes out of the ball.

Yeah, so they got to be in the right position.

And they retract as you empty.

Yeah, exactly.

Yeah.

All right, now let's take a quick look at the rodent blaster patent.

Ball of hater.

When varmints can't be controlled by tiny women wielding their hammers, it might be time to turn to the rodent blaster.

Now, all you have to do is take a simple, everyday handgun, anyone you have laying about will do, and insert it into the rodent blaster.

I already don't like it.

Then you place the combo at the opening of the critter's burrow.

And when the unlucky beast

emerges from its hiding hole,

the gun fires

somehow.

There's no indication at all of any triggering mechanism, but a good old-fashioned American bullet will solve the critter problem.

Okay, well, Tom, you didn't pay attention because there's a second patent on how to make a mouse state corporate.

Hold up, fuck.

You got to see it in the context.

No.

Context.

I don't understand what the invention is.

It's just the same as putting a gun in front of the hole.

The gun that you put in a hole.

It probably holds the gun up.

It's like holding your thumb over the hose

for a bullet.

Yes.

Now, some of us on this very show have a hard time waking up, and some of us have turned to electrifying solutions, but there are other options

for heavy sleepers.

This patent involves suspending wooden blocks over the sleeper's head on some sort of apparatus attached to a quick release connected to an alarm.

And when the alarm goes off, the sleeper is gently roused from their slumber by a series of wooden blocks falling onto their face.

It is, you're laughing, you're laughing.

It is suggested to use wooden pieces that are light enough to awaken the sleeper without causing them serious harm.

But that is just a suggestion.

I am laughing, but I do think this would sell with a catchier name like the clock block.

Absolutely.

Also, I feel like they're making it a little harder than it has to be.

You can set like an echo dot to just yell Jenga at you if you want.

Okay.

All right, but realistically, though, nobody on this call thinks this would be a less pleasant way to wake up than the way Tom wakes up.

I was going to say,

it seems really weird for Tom to be making jokes about.

Thank you, yes.

The zapping is on my wrist, not on my face.

That's better somehow.

Oh, okay.

Oh, well, in that case.

We're going to get to the electrified Jenga block soon, I'm sure.

Just drops hellraiser blocks on top.

Bats them away, turns over.

Yeah.

Pulls his flash off.

He's like, snooze.

Fuck it.

Do you guys remember habit trails?

Habit trails?

For the uninitiated, a habit trail is a series of nauseatingly colored plastic tubes for hamsters to run around and piss and shit in, and which are basically impossible to keep clean.

But as much fun as shit-filled hamster tubes are, they do have one fatal flaw.

They have not been wearable until now.

Patent 5,901,666 contains a delightful drawing of an absolutely ecstatic wearer just fucking covered in shit-filled hamster tubes and grinning the satisfied grin of a young man finding himself for the first time.

Okay, it might not be in the picture, but one of these tubes definitely goes up this guy's ass.

Yeah, no, the most plausible explanation for the vacuum ass.

Yeah, everybody's already got a shit-filled hamster tube ready to go.

You want.

You want it.

I wear glasses.

Your butthole.

Yeah, no, it's your butt.

I wear glasses, and I will admit it can be pretty annoying.

On hot, sweaty days, which are pretty much all days for me, my glasses have a tendency to slip down my face.

If only there was a better way to secure glasses to your face that was more secure.

Enter the patent for pierced glasses.

This revolution in eyewear technology eschews the traditional arms for eyeglasses and instead works by literally running a metal bar through the bridge of your nose.

All right.

I'm down.

Now properly moored into the soft flesh of your face.

The glasses then are affixed securely to the metal stud you've permanently inserted into your flesh, and the problem is finally solved.

You can maybe double up these patents.

The piercing mechanism is just you playing mouth tug-of-war with someone with that thing earlier.

Whoever loses has to wear these glasses.

These inventors need to get together about ideas for sure.

I like it, Cecil.

But my question on this one is because like glasses are already generally moored to the where people generally get piercing.

So, like, what doesn't this seem like we're trying to do the wrong

man?

What if we moor it to the eyeball?

Oh, Jesus.

Yeah, right.

D, right.

Look, for generations, women have been telling us that giving birth is hard, and it sure looks to be.

But what if there were an alternative to all that pushing and screaming that marks the banal everyday miracle of birth?

What if we replaced midwives with the awesome power of centrifugal force?

Oh, God.

A patent filed in 1953 called, quote, Apparatus for facilitating the birth of a child by centrifugal force

suggests that maybe the dream of strapping a pregnant woman down and salad spinning the next generation of young inventors

into the world may be only moments away.

And in case you were wondering, a net is placed between mom's legs to catch the little scamp before they careen off into a wall because

safety number.

If you

put up a canvas, you also get a pollock out of it, too.

Yeah.

All right, we've been trying to do the thing with the, you know, you tie a string and you slam the door.

Oh, God.

If the doula is a dropper, it's a big problem.

I'm glad they invented this.

Look at net, especially.

Podcast listener, Thomas included a link to this patent in our show notes as well.

And the mismatch of the highly technical drawing and the crane scroll that is the idea of this patent, very upsetting to me.

Very upsetting.

I was struck by the same thing.

Like the only explanation is that the dude paid a professional to draft that for him.

And I would so buy that guy a beer to hear his story.

All right.

Yeah.

All right.

A car theft.

can be a real problem and stopping thieves can endanger the public.

But what if there were a way to scan cars to see if they were stolen and then catastrophically damage those cars so they couldn't drive off enter the quote method of stopping a stolen car without a high-speed chase utilizing a barcode

now for this one automakers would need to install into every car a barcode implanted between the glass the windshield and then when a car is stolen that car's barcode is input into the stolen car's database.

And all the cops have to do now is scan every car in America.

And when they come across one with a barcode that indicates that it's been stolen, the cops have a trick up their sleeve because it's not just a barcode that's been installed.

There would now also be a short-barreled loaded gun installed in the wheel well of each tire.

And upon triggering the stolen barcode, a signal is then beamed to the wheel guns, which shoot out the tires of the stolen car.

so it can't drive away.

Oh, an alternative solution in the same plan was to trigger something described as quote anchor knives

rather than shooting out the tires.

Either way, a simple and elegant solution.

All right.

Well, now I need to take a minute to shit on Tom's idea for how to stop a stolen car because apparently it's so much fucking better than that one.

So we're going to take a quick break for a little apropos of nothing.

Um,

excuse me, I was told to come down here.

Oh, yeah, welcome to the Department of Government Time Suck.

How can I help you?

Uh, time suck?

Yeah.

So, you know how the problem with the government is that it has to be the government for time-wasting idiots as well as everybody else?

Uh, I don't really know that.

Oh, no, right, of course you don't.

Yeah, so, but that is a problem, and here at the DOGTS or doggets, we sort of hold that bag for the rest of the government so they can do their jobs.

But I have a patent for a legitimate invention.

Oh, I bet you do.

Let me see.

Oh, yep, you drew the blueprints yourself, I see.

Yeah,

it's a time machine.

A time machine.

Wow.

All right.

Well, let's jump in.

Do you have a working model?

No, but as soon as the government grants my request for dilithium crystals, I'll probably...

Say no more.

Say no more.

Supplies needed.

And would you say that you created this on your own, or did you have a co-inventor?

Well, actually, the forward projection of Nikola Tesla came to me in a dream with these planes.

Dream?

Dream, Tesla.

Yeah, no, that's actually just a box we can check.

All right.

Well, I'll tell you what.

You go ahead and finish filling this out, and then I'll put it right here in our document processor, and we'll get back to you.

That looks like a shredder.

No?

No?

Document processor.

Trust me, I have a patent on it and everything.

Oh, okay.

Got it.

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And we're back when we last left off.

Tom was giving Eli all kinds of ideas I wasn't fond of.

Tom, please tell me the name of this next one.

Isn't also something Eli could accidentally kill people with.

Probably going to disappoint you.

All right, everyone loves a picnic, but nobody likes getting hassled by the bugs.

And the best solution one man came up with was the electrified tablecloth.

Damn it, Tom.

What did I just say?

So imagine you're a typical picnic tablecloth, but rather than just being a stupid, boring tablecloth full of ants and bees and praying mantises eating all your hoagies, this one is an electrified tablecloth, which is way better and not at all dangerous.

Han, can you set this down by you?

I'm cooking bacon on my side right now.

I don't know.

Well, I'm so sorry, Stacey, but what about clear?

Doesn't your idiot toddler understand?

Jesus, I

also, now I'm pretty sure Tom's beating beating up a praying mantis during a picnic because his hoagie got taken for a second.

If they take your hoagie, you can fight.

No, that's just

originally just for praying mantises.

The bug-free picnics are not the only solutions that the miracle of electricity provides.

Just imagine a world before the invention of the device for the treatment of hiccups.

This device involves a, quote, metallic cup-like vessel being a first electrode electrode for producing electricity adapted to be applied to the lip of the user.

Now, if that sounds a lot like an electrified drinking glass, you would be wrong.

It is an electrified drinking cup-like vessel.

And it's also an alarm clock.

It's versatile.

I like it.

No more waking up with dry mouth.

No more waking up.

No more waking up.

Hold the cup to your face.

It shoots a block right in your face.

Like, what did that even come from?

Wrong one.

Wrong one.

Now, my day started on the wrong foot.

I am filing a patent now for a cup full of wooden blocks.

Raising kids is hard work, and so is mowing the lawn.

What if, as a busy parent, you could kill two birds and maybe summer all of those kids with one simple invention?

You might then want to consider the pedal-operated mower, which, looking at the picture, is very clearly just a children's tricycle with a lawnmower mounted to the back of it.

A fucking lawnmower on a kid's tricycle.

Blah, blah, blah.

Helicopter parents always med lifting their kids off to emergency care.

Whatever.

Thank you.

Although it is linguistically fitting that the opposite of a helicopter parent just puts the spinning blades on the bottom of the vehicle.

It's all altogether.

Yeah.

Yeah.

It is no secret that smoking is a tough addiction to break.

And even tougher is the smell from all that cigarette smoke.

Up until now, smokers have had to rely on lying to themselves about what they smell like to get by, but no more with the smoker's hat.

Imagine if you could wear on your head a simple metal oven hood at all times.

You would be able to smoke all you want, content with the knowledge that simply by wearing an entire kitchen exhaust hood and power supply on your head, you have solved the problem.

Okay, you laugh, Tom, but if this thing had let Noah and Lucinda smoke in airports back when they were smoking, they would have owned two each.

No, yeah, because you need one when the other one's charging.

You need a different idea.

All right, look, I'm personally not much into video games, but I know that most people on this show and in the world are.

And perhaps the next one will be of particular interest to you guys.

Games offer so many different sensory inputs, but what they don't do is mildly electrocute

until now.

Way too many inventions on this list where some guy being like, okay, how about

plus lightning on whatever?

Some other guy putting down a bong, being like, mind, blow

with light.

The electrostatically enhanced game is basically a booth the player enters that then just shocks the ever-loving shit out of them based on what happens in the game.

It specifically says in the patent that it uses a high voltage current.

But for this one, I have to include the patent image for you guys.

And if anyone can explain to me what the numerical values labeled all over this thing mean, I will deed my house to you right now.

You know, the guy getting shocked and saying Zowie makes this seem a little less real.

Doesn't it?

All right, Tom, I have no idea about the numbers.

I think they just looked at other patents which had numbers and arrows on them and they were like, yeah, we can we could number stuff on this.

I know what arrows are.

It's easy.

But my favorite part is how they drew the friend outside of the video game with electrifying booths, just watching his buddy character executed, being like, Wow, they actually wrote wow in there.

And that guy is labeled as component number 41 outside observer.

Okay.

But to be fair, it does seem like it would be fun to watch someone else play that game.

I know it does

watch.

Keith would say that.

All right, you ever decided to take a bath, but it's just too much work to move the water around over your filthy, filthy parts?

Yeah.

No, no, that's because that's not how baths work.

But that didn't stop someone from inventing the rocking bathtub.

This is a bathtub that oscillates and rocks to splash the bather with water.

And

It's not at all clear why you would want to do this, but it does come with a handy tarp that straps down over the top of the tub and has a hole to poke your head out from so you're safely trapped inside the goddamn thing.

This invention is exclusively because someone realized they couldn't take a bath in a top-loading washing machine and was furious about it.

Okay, look, I will yes and a lot of shit, but I'm not going to sit here and pretend that I don't want a rocking bathtub for the sake of a show.

That's a bridge too far.

So when you're trapped in it, why the fuck would you want to leave if your bathtub rocked you

you're weird guy no illusions weird guy also you can kick a bath in a top-loading washing machine i'm just saying

hey heath they don't have to he's just

kicked out of a lot of laundromats

He's just trying to get my dick ripped off again.

It's a fun game to play.

Phone calls aren't always good news.

And sometimes we need some comfort while having difficult conversations.

The phone hugger masterfully combines the standard house phone with a body pillow, so you can pretend you're hugging your loved ones while talking to them on the other hand.

And now that I've said this, it's clearly an invention so unutterably sad that it makes me want to curl up with the rodent blasting instead.

That is dumb.

If you put a flashlight slot in there and program the speed dial with the time and temp guy, I'm in.

I'm in.

And we invented a fuck robot again.

Again.

Keeps happening.

Okay.

Yeah.

Well, sure, when your definition of fuck robot includes a pumpkin pie, hey, I hope the jacket you don't see it too.

Come on.

I'm sorry.

I love that the most useless element of this patent is the house phone.

I know.

That's why I chose a time and temp guy.

Remind you what you're doing.

Yeah, I know, right?

It's like wistful.

It's like, yeah, it's a lot of memories, you know.

The house fires are no joke, and most deaths occur not from the flames, but from smoke inhalation or asphyxiation.

If there was some way to get quality air in case of a fire, it could be a real lifesaver, which is why the toilet snorkel was invented.

You might not be aware, but inside your toilet.

Behind the water line is a pocket of air.

You would be hard pressed to call it fresh air, but it is air.

And the toilet snorkel lets you run a tube past the water line of your shitter to tap into that sweet, life-giving sewer gas.

I feel like you should wear around the oven hood hat instead of this.

That feels like a better movie.

That'd be way easier.

You could use my spare.

Now, across America, we've all seen the beer can hat, but that is some amateur hour shit for pussy ass lightweights.

To really get your money's worth, it pays to buy in bulk, which is why the beer keg hat was invented.

What?

This is a helmet with an actual entire keg of beer that attaches to it.

A typical keg of beer filled weighs 160 pounds, which, according to my online degree in chiropractic science, is way too much fucking weight to wear on your goddamn head.

Yeah, but you got to get out those neck strengtheners, boys and girls.

Come on.

I feel like if you double stay

from the keg helmet, you should get one of those those half-in it articles they do, like when someone dies of fireworks, you know, should be like

a wacky fun one from the AP.

Babies are stupid.

Your baby's stupid.

They're all stupid.

They wake up all the time when you're trying to sleep.

And when that happens, most parents get up and check to see if their child is in need of anything, like food or a change of diaper or even perhaps some comfort.

But comforting your own baby is boring, and the baby might grow up thinking they're loved.

That's no good.

The better solution is the automatic baby patting machine, which is a mechanical arm that attaches to the crib and then pats the baby back to sweet, neglected sleep.

All right.

Well, he's not going to be able to come without a robot arm in the future.

But

I think we invented another fuck robot.

So maybe that's going to be

a pretty fuck robot, if you will.

Fun fact, this same device serves as an automated baby slapper once she's big enough to roll over.

All right, now finally, and this one is my favorite.

There is actually a patent on being a patent troll.

Seriously, and the patent is owned by fucking Halliburton, and it is called the patent trolling application, and it seeks to own the rights to, quote, patent acquisition and assertion by a non-inventor first party against a second party.

What?

This is a patent patenting patent trolling, and it is peak American legal stupidity.

Okay, I'm filing a patent, patent, patent, troll, patent again.

Obviously,

can't triple stamp a double stamp.

And if you had to summarize what you've learned in one sentence, what would it be?

If you build a better mousetrap, No, you didn't.

Well, you need to make a hurricane and send it at the mouse.

So are you ready for the quiz?

I am indeed.

All right, Tom, which of the following is the best video game that electrocutes the player?

A

Dioshock.

B, fantastic.

Sparkham Asylum.

Or

C.

Socket League.

Amazing.

Socket League so good.

Socket League.

Socket League.

It's big over in South League.

It is correct.

Thank God.

But I'm still going to go with Dioshock.

I kind of told you the answer.

Yeah, yep.

Dioshock nailed it.

Oh, God.

Nailed it.

it yes too awesome it's obviously there is a weather gun that they don't want you to know about what is its name a lightning bolt action b

sig shower c

thunderbus or d

windchester

windchester

oh to toss up between windchester and the thunderbus but i'm uh i'm old school i'm going thunderbuss thunderbuss correct nailed it yes All right, Tom.

I am all the way sold on this baby comforting robot.

What should we call it?

A, the not-so-heavy petter.

B, Rockamy Baby.

That's actually good.

Thank you.

C, the baby bot.

Toll.

No, that's terrible.

Or D,

the iPad.

The iPad.

All right.

Two out of four of these were actually pretty good, which is a record for Eli, but I'm going to go with the iPad.

Ah, that's incorrect, Tom.

Four out of four of them were super dope and funny.

Unfortunately, the format demands that he is correct.

Eli, you are our winner.

All four were funny.

Thank you, Noah, for holding me in the light.

I want an essay from you next week.

Oh, well, lucky me.

All right.

Well, for Tom, Cecil, Heath, and Eli, I'm Noah.

Thank you for hanging out with us today.

We're going to be back next week, and by then, I'll be an expert on something else.

Between now and then, you should listen to Cecil on Lawful Assembly, Tom on Dear Old Dad's Heath on God-Awful Movies, and me on the Scathing atheist yeah actually it works best if you also listen to the other people on those shows like you know when they're talking honestly you just listen to no audio we'll have morgan do like

the new air pods do that

So of course, if you'd like to help keep this show going, you can make a per-episode donation at patreon.com slash citationpod or leave us a five-star review everywhere you can.

Or like, I don't know why it's or.

It could be and.

And if you want to get in touch with us, check out past episodes, connect with us on social media, or check out the show notes.

Be sure to check out citationpod.com.

Okay, so now what happens now that you processed my patent?

Well, we're going to actually send you more paperwork in the mail to do.

Okay, great.

Excuse me, I got a speeding ticket, but I was actually traveling on my own personal property.

Yeah, you want down the hall on the right.

Frank.

Got one for you.

Oh, man, here comes another legal genius.

That room down the hall?

Yep, that one on the the right.

Sure, hope he doesn't know about maritime law, or I'm fucked.

I do know everything about maritime law.

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