"Did we really conquer space before we put wheels on suitcases?"

[A HERETIC I AM]

Just watching a Scottish stand-up on BBC America who was talking about the advent of wheels on luggage!

Something to the effect;

"I'm 37 and it has just been in my lifetime that luggage manufacturers have begun putting wheels on suitcases. When I was young, you had to carry your luggage. No matter how heavy it was, you had to pick it up and carry it. Why is it that we were able to land a man on the moon before we put fucking wheels on luggage? I would have loved to see the room full of prototypes. 'Well. that one has triangles and it thumps too much!' Think it over again!"

I'm 53 and I can totally relate. My dad worked for the US Government and we traveled extensively when I was young. It was my job in airports to find us a Skycap to deal with the luggage of a family of 6!


This is what I do with my Sundays!

Yes, yes I know,....this is probably lounge material.

But sometimes GD gets WAAAAY too serious.

[barnabas63]

1. It was the walk on the moon that enabled us to put wheels on suitcases....

Nothing to sneeze at, non?

[Schema Thing]

2. just reading your headline gave me a good laugh.

[longship]

3. Plus, we also had to wait for "Tang"!!!

I don't know how humanity lived without it for 200,000 years!

Don't get me started about zero-G ball point pens! (The Soviet Union solved the problem much more cheaply. Their solution was called pencils.)

Don't get me started about excretion in micro gravity.

Read all about it:
Packing for Mars by Mary Roach. (a very fun read)

[clydefrand]

4. this has been around

since right after you were born!

[A HERETIC I AM]

6. By no means do I suggest thi was original, rather that I was watching a stand-up act on telly.

Sure, it's an old joke, but it's still funny.

OK?

[Tierra_y_Libertad]

5. "conquer space".

Reminds of the story about the flea on the elephants forehead who believes he's driving.

[Arugula Latte]

7. That's a good point. In retrospect it seems like the most obvious thing to make 'em wheeled

but it was a relatively recent innovation.

[Liberal In Texas]

8. The space program was done by our government.

Wheels on suitcases had to wait for private enterprise to get around to figuring it out.

[lunatica]

9. That never occurred to me but you're right!

Makes you wonder don't it. What else....?