Stochastic Dog Fountain is an animatronic device that imitates the slow motion action of a large dog drying itself after being in water.

Set the timer on random, so that you never know when it's going to start up, spraying water in every direction.
-- xenzag, Jan 04 2008

Shaking Dog http://video.google...pe=search&plindex=2
slow mo, short clip [xenzag, Jan 04 2008]

Coffee fountain airbag Coffee_20fountain_20airbag
Essential ... [8th of 7, Jan 04 2008]

Thank you very much. Unintentional wet newspaper, shirt and one can only presume characteristic wet dog smell [-].
-- vincevincevince, Jan 04 2008


Do you read in the shower wearing a shirt and tie?
-- xenzag, Jan 04 2008


No. But I might just be walking in a public area, passing a statue of a dog standing in water, when it suddenly and unexpectedly erupts into violent shaking, spraying me with water. You might know about the dog, but I'm a visitor and you didn't allow the town council to erect barriers and red warning signs.
-- vincevincevince, Jan 04 2008


Not a fountain which occasionally showers passers-by with dogs?
-- hippo, Jan 04 2008


//I'm a visitor// you need to stay at home where you can be safe and dry.
-- xenzag, Jan 04 2008


Bun. It should be implemented exactly as [vince] suggests.
-- david_scothern, Jan 04 2008


Perhaps the need for charmless joykill signage could be avoided by placing a large number of such fountains together (perhaps in typical dog-poses: this one sniffing that one's bum, one looking forlorn, another playing poker), and program the shakefountains so that almost always at least one dog is shoogling itself dry. Also, add one statue of a cat, perched to one side, sneering at the canine stupidity.
-- calum, Jan 04 2008


//typical dog-poses//

Next to a tree?
-- Jinbish, Jan 04 2008


Behind another dog?
-- skinflaps, Jan 04 2008


//How do you slow the water down ?// You could use honey.
-- zen_tom, Jan 04 2008


[bigsleep] Good point, how are you going to do this slowly, animate each hair?
-- MisterQED, Jan 04 2008


// mopping up my coffee.//

Then you need one of these ... <link>
-- 8th of 7, Jan 04 2008


If the fountain in question had little fishies swimming in the pool underneath, the timing of the dog outbursts could be made to follow a Poisson process...
-- Jinbish, Jan 07 2008


<Basil Brush>...ha ha - boom boom!</bb>
-- zen_tom, Jan 07 2008


I like it. At rest the fountain would just be a dog. Water would drip from its lolling tongue. When activated, the fountains would spring to life and spray the dog. The fountains would end and the dog would then shake. It could be an every 10 minutes sort of thing.

I am trying to think of how to sidestep the problem of kids playing in the fountain and climbing on the dog, then being dislodged when it shakes. Of course any right-minded kid would attempt to be aboard the dog when the shaking commenced.
-- bungston, Jan 07 2008


Got it: the dog is not a robot. It is an internally hinged sculpture. A kid can seize the dog by the collar and move it to and fro. Levers in the sculpture augment the motion and the dog is shaken. Someone still might be aboard, but this is now on the level of playground equipment, and the specter of kid-harming malign robot dogs is further distant.

But ever present.
-- bungston, Jan 07 2008


I should add that a seperate mechanism connects ear to tail. Little kids not strong enough to shake the whole dog can grab the ear to make the wet moplike tail wag, spraying bystanders or at least slapping them with the soggy tail.
-- bungston, Jan 07 2008


Or they could grab the tail, so that it wags the dog. *Only available in Uncertain States of Agitation*
-- 4whom, Jan 07 2008


Heh. Bungston's annos conjure up a vision of a Buckaroo style variant, sending plastic shovels, guitars, and dynamite in all directions.
-- egbert, Jan 07 2008



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