You know that “Great Stuff” that they sell at Home Depot? I just went through a bottle of it. You know how it expands? (As pictured here)?
Totally reminds me of a science-fiction weapon I read about as a kid; one that completely creeped me out and kind of frightened me to think about a bit.
The story was about a society that basically had two sides, the “suppressionists” and the “freedom lovers” (for lack of better description). The free people were basically trying to escape society. There was telepathy involved, I think. Eventually, “the man” came in the form of helicopters. The fired their weapons upon the people trying to escape. The weapon was basically like “spider web goo”. It was possibly a bioweapon based on actual spider DNA; I don’t remember.
The point was, it stuck to you and there was no getting off. In the space of 60 seconds it expanded. A LOT. Basically, as it stuck to your skin and expanded, it ripped your skin and such right off you, essentially killing you in a very painful way.
Plus it had the added benefit that it could be deployed like naplam and just thrown all over everybody without aiming, thus making it that much scarier. (By comparison, guns are almost humane — You know who you’re killing, you have a good chance of missing, you need to be really sure of what you’re doing and trained to do it right, and if done right you kill someone instantly in a way where the family can still have an open-casket funeral.)
ANYWAY, the Home Depot “Great Stuff” also sticks to your skin and expands. It’s hurting me. Right now. As I type this. And reminding me of this sci-fi weapon I read about as a child.
I’m glad this stuff takes an hour to expand.
P.S. I don’t even remember who the story is by, or what it was called. (Can somebody please tell me if this rings a bell?) It was from a hardback anthology of science fiction stories that my Dad owned, which I read through. Could have been Asimov; who knows.
UPDATE: A better foam gun to use “Great Stuff”-like foam without having the gun self-seal after periods of non-use:
http://www.kk.org/cooltools/archives/004096.php
Mood: victorious over evil raccoons
Music: Gwar – Bloody Mary
November 19, 2008 at 8:12 AM
Best I could find was the Loogie Gun:
http://www.technovelgy.com/ct/content.asp?Bnum=119
November 19, 2008 at 9:02 AM
haha, nice. But no. It wasn’t Snow Crash. But that does contain many of the same words I mentioned! :) Hail google!
November 19, 2008 at 11:14 AM
I read a ton of Asimov back in the day, and that doesn’t sound familiar at all to me. Of course, that doesn’t mean it couldn’t be Asimov…
Mick Jones, former frontman/guitarist of the Clash was a huge fan of Snow Crash…he wrote a song about that book recently. I’ve never read it, I just get the reference :)
November 19, 2008 at 11:16 AM
And since I read it in a hardback anthology that may or may not have been some, all, or no Asimove — who knows.
I wonder if Dad still has that book.
November 19, 2008 at 3:55 PM
It couldn’t be Henry Kutner(?), could it? Probably not, since he’s old-school–more imagination than technology. Anyway, you’re welcome to look through our books. We’ve kept a lot of them, but gotten rid of a lot too. There’s really no way to know.
November 19, 2008 at 3:56 PM
The name unfortunately doesn’t even ring a bell…
November 19, 2008 at 7:49 PM
Well, I THINK you read some of his stuff. Whatever, maybe you can browse through some of our books on Thanksgiving? Something might look familiar.
Btw, as a teenager I recalled a movie that scared me to death when I was a kid. The mystery was solved when it turned out to be Invasion of the Body Snatchers, ’56 version, which I finally saw again on TV! :)
November 23, 2008 at 10:08 AM
I used two cases of this stuff sealing my house. It’s freakin’ awesome. I love the sci-fi analogy. Just don’t get any on your shirt, ’cause it will never come out. : )
December 4, 2008 at 8:52 PM
@Ryan:
…or on your leather jacket, apparently. (Fortunately it’s only a tiny tiny bit, and I got the jacket for free from Shehab many years ago.)
Anyway… it appears that someone has used Great Stuff to form a computer case:
http://halbot.haluze.sk/?id=2529
December 5, 2008 at 2:14 PM
I’d be really worried about heat dissipation in that thing.
December 10, 2009 at 11:58 AM
Me too!