Wednesday, April 27, 2011

Now That's a Photo Op

File this under "What were they thinking?" or "Accidental Google Images results that make me want to stab my eyes out."

While doing some sort of elephantish search for my editor, I came across this playground slide:


How does something like that get designed? The people engineering these things have to be pretty smart, right? What was the conversation like at the office that day?

"Hey, Mortimer, how's the elephant project coming along?"

"Fantastic, Claude! Just finishing up."

"You were able to make the trunk wide enough for the slide?"

"No, I had a better idea. Look, the kids will go on a journey through the elephant's colon!"

"Brilliant!"

Here's the most surprising thing--there's more than one playground with an elephant butt slide.



I do love elephants, but do I love them enough to go through one of these slides? 

Actually, now that I think about it, if I came across one of these I probably wouldn't be able to resist climbing in. Of course I'd first have to hand someone my camera to snap a picture of my glorious exit. 

So where are these slides, does anyone know? Think of the lovely author photos these would make. 

For more horrific playground equipment, see this Huffington Post article and this one from Acid Cow.

And while we're on the subject, what the hell is wrong with this monkey? 

9 comments:

  1. Hilarious. And also, frightening. But mostly hilarious. Except for the monkey, who is made of scary. Why were you doing an elephantish search?

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  2. Hilarious and frightening, for sure.

    I'm working on round 2 of the edits for my midgrade novel that comes out next year; I think I was looking for pictures of the kind of elephant trap that's in the story when I was attacked by this creation.

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  3. Lynne, you're an inspiration to us all! One of these days I'll have to show you my elephant butt drawing. :)

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  4. I just cannot believe someone thought these were a good idea.

    I'm sure kids love coming out of an animals butt, but aren't the parents horrified?

    I would be.

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  5. Okay, that just made my day. I even shared with my husband and we both were laughing our heads off. Good times.

    Made my day.

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  6. Funny post :)

    Gross idea of the elephant playground makers. Hope those children don't have lifelong issues because of this :)

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  7. The monkey is scary and strange.
    However, as a kid I would have loved sliding out of the elephant and going "oh poop!" :)

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