Editing 1092: Michael Phelps

Jump to: navigation, search

Warning: You are not logged in. Your IP address will be publicly visible if you make any edits. If you log in or create an account, your edits will be attributed to your username, along with other benefits.

The edit can be undone. Please check the comparison below to verify that this is what you want to do, and then save the changes below to finish undoing the edit.
Latest revision Your text
Line 8: Line 8:
  
 
==Explanation==
 
==Explanation==
{{w|Michael Phelps}} is an American {{w|Olympics|Olympic}} swimmer, who could easily be considered the best swimmer worldwide: he is the most decorated Olympic athlete of all time, with 28 medals, 23 of them gold (won in the 2004, 2008, 2012 and 2016 summer Olympics, so it would have been 18 Olympic gold medals at the time the comic was published). He was most dominant in the 2008 Beijing Olympics where he won gold in all of the eight events in which he competed, the record for a single games.
+
{{w|Michael Phelps}} is an American {{w|Olympics|Olympic}} swimmer, who could easily be considered the best swimmer worldwide: he is the most decorated Olympic athlete of all time, with 22 medals, 18 of them gold (won in the 2004, 2008 and 2012 summer Olympics). He was most dominant in the 2008 Beijing Olympics where he won gold in all of the eight events in which he competed, the record for a single games.
  
[[Cueball]] and [[Megan]] find that the Olympic medalist is in Megan's pool. He refuses to leave, and is too fast to be caught. Cueball brings in boxes of {{w|Jello}} Mix to fill the pool with, thereby gelifying the pool and trapping Phelps or forcing him to leave.
+
This comic is a take on the idea that, Michael Phelps being (irritatingly) fast and uncatchable in a pool, a quirky yet simple trick one might imagine to nullify his pool supremacy would be to turn the water into {{w|Jello}}, a gelatine product, by simply dropping a huge quantity of Jello powder in the pool.
  
However, according to the title text, after having waited the time necessary for the water to gelify (roughly 2 to 4 hours), Cueball realizes that Phelps has eaten all of the resulting Jello. This adds yet another level of absurdity to the situation. This may be a reference to Phelps being used to eating [https://web.archive.org/web/20101113024452/http://www.michaelphelps.net/michael-phelps-diet/ impressive food quantities (about 10,000 calories daily)], to keep up with his strenuous exercise regimen; or it may be a reference to pictures of Phelps smoking from a bong that arose after the 2008 Olympics in Beijing, as marijuana use is often associated with an increased appetite. Otherwise, the text may simply be a reference to Phelps being capable of achieving super-human feats, such as devouring an entire pool full of Jello.
+
In the comic, [[Cueball]] and [[Megan]] try to get rid of Michael Phelps (as if he were a common pest like an animal) who is swimming in Megan's pool. As they can't catch him since he swims too fast (and he taunts them about it), Cueball resorts to the Jello trick, bringing big boxes of Jello powder, to stop and catch him.
  
Interestingly enough, just pouring Jello powder into a pool would not solidify the water into Jello. The water would have to be boiled, then quickly chilled, for the Jello to set correctly. As Randall is a scientist, he should have known this; therefore, it's possible that he purposefully ignored this fact in favor of the humor. Michael Phelps' top speed is also only around 2.3 m/s, which can easily be outrun by anyone on land.
+
However, according to the title text, after having waited the time necessary for the water to solidify, Cueball realizes that Phelps has eaten all of the resulting Jello. This may be a reference to Phelps being used to eating impressive food quantities (about 12,000 calories daily), to keep up with his strenuous exercise regimen;<sup>[http://www.michaelphelps.net/michael-phelps-diet/]</sup> or it may be a reference to pictures of Phelps smoking from a bong that arose after the 2008 Olympics in Beijing, China, as Marijuana use is often associated with an increased appetite. Otherwise, the text may simply be a reference to Phelps being capable of achieving super-human feats, such as devouring an entire pool full of Jello.
 
 
The title text may be referenced by [[1628: Magnus]], where people are thrown into strange contests with others, for example a hot dog-eating contest against the championship race horse Secretariat.
 
  
 
==Transcript==
 
==Transcript==

Please note that all contributions to explain xkcd may be edited, altered, or removed by other contributors. If you do not want your writing to be edited mercilessly, then do not submit it here.
You are also promising us that you wrote this yourself, or copied it from a public domain or similar free resource (see explain xkcd:Copyrights for details). Do not submit copyrighted work without permission!

To protect the wiki against automated edit spam, we kindly ask you to solve the following CAPTCHA:

Cancel | Editing help (opens in new window)