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Where Knowledge Junkies Get Their Fix
THEIR ANSWER: The store’s maintenance man brought a vaccum cleaner with a long “wand” attachment. They plugged it in, turned it on, and he reached up with the attachment. It drew the ribbon in just slightly, and he gently lowered the balloon just enough to reach it - smoothly, like he’d done it a thousand times before.
How would you have gotten the balloon down without risking damage to the balloon or the person retrieving it?
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As of the moment, they devised three six letter words containing only two letters. A fun mental game, but not sure how it got the balloon down. :-)
posted by EMStoveken on 7-18-2008 at 6:59 am
The link takes you to yesterday’s Brain Game solution. The solution to today’s problem that they use at work is they stick a piece of tape to another balloon with a long string and send it up to attach itself to the lost one and then bring them down together.
posted by Megan on 7-18-2008 at 7:11 am
All fixed, folks. Sorry ’bout that. Sometimes, when I change that link for the next Brain Game, it just doesn’t “take.” I’ll keep a closer eye on it from now on.
posted by Sandy on 7-18-2008 at 7:40 am
The high school I attended sold balloons every day on Valentine’s day. People would preorder, but we’d also make a decent haul off the ones we would sell after school, too. In order to save money, a group of people would go around and pluck the stray balloons (usually a couple hundred) off the ceiling using 1 or 2 attached broom sticks and duct tape. Worked like a charm.
posted by Madi on 7-18-2008 at 7:51 am
How effective would turning the heat way up be?
posted by Jake Le Master on 7-18-2008 at 8:26 am
Tape on a broom handle is brilliant. It might have worked in this case, too, except the balloon itself was probably beyond reach of the broom. The vacuum attachment just barely reached the bottom of the ribbon.
You might have been able to get the tape to stick to the ribbon, but that would’ve been tricky. It would have to be some good tape… none of that 99-cent-store stuff.
posted by Sandy on 7-18-2008 at 8:29 am
Good question, Jake. But as it was 93 degrees here yesterday anyway, I’m not sure if it would have made much of a difference!
posted by Sandy on 7-18-2008 at 8:30 am
I’d turn the heat up or attach a hairdryer to the end of a broom.
posted by Nate on 7-18-2008 at 8:35 am
In high school, my part-time job was for a retail store and this came up quite a bit. The solution we used was to stick some tape to the end of a long pole (i.e. broom stick or other long reaching pole) and use it to retrieve the baloons. This happened so often we actually had a pole with tape in the back entirely dedicated to this practice…lol
Cheers,
posted by michael on 7-18-2008 at 8:50 am
I would have stood on a chair and used “the grabber” (remember the old infomercial??) to grasp the end of the string and bring down the balloon. I’ve found that if you use shipping tape on a balloon and then try to peal the tape off, the balloon will burst. So “the grabber” is oviously the best choice…..haha.
posted by Angela on 7-18-2008 at 9:16 am
How about a water gun? The water will stick to the balloon and since its heavier than the helium, it should cause it to drop.
posted by Jim on 7-18-2008 at 9:33 am
turn on the AC, turn on a fan, get newspaper or cardboard to make a fan, then push it into a corner then blow air above and it will push it down enough to grab it
posted by drHoward on 7-18-2008 at 9:41 am
Stand on a chair and spray it with a C02 fire extinguisher. Not cost effective, but fun.
posted by HunterJay on 7-18-2008 at 9:44 am
I agree with Megan. I used to work for a grocery store and that is the way we would always get balloons down. The vacuum seems like too much work.
posted by Jabryel on 7-18-2008 at 11:12 am
Red Green solution: Completely seal the store with duct tape. Replace air inside with hydrogen. Helium being heavier than hydrogen, the balloon will fall to the floor. Send least popular employee armed with candle inside to retrieve balloon. (Note: you could also try creating a complete vacuum within the store — because Nothing is lighter than helium — but that would result in the balloon expanding and popping.)
posted by loomis on 7-18-2008 at 11:12 am
Wait it out. Go play a few rounds of golf and come back the next day when the balloon has solved the problem for you.
posted by cj on 7-18-2008 at 12:12 pm
I worked at Best Buy through college and we’d have helium balloons at various places through out the store. The ceiling here was at least 20′ high. Balloons on the ceiling would set the alarm off overnight, so we have to get them down. Best way? Put double-sided tape on another helium balloon and attach it to the ROLL of string. Fish that baby up there like a kite, pluck down the other one, and pull them both down.
reCAPTCHA: unlimited chafing
posted by Kevin H on 7-18-2008 at 12:49 pm
I work at a party store, so we usually just use the tape and another balloon method; the ceiling is too high to use any sort of stick. Sometimes though, I’ve been known to crawl on the counter and tape a boxcutter to a stick to ‘kill’ long lasting balloons (they’re harder to bring down).
posted by Sarah on 7-18-2008 at 1:31 pm
Gosh…you keep walking or dreaming into puzzles!
Can a vacuum cleaner’s suction pull them down?
posted by septer on 7-18-2008 at 1:31 pm
Turn off the A/C and open up the valve on the tank you used to fill the helium balloon.
posted by Rob on 7-18-2008 at 4:30 pm
Pfft…just grab the closest five year old and toss ‘em up there till they grab it. That’ll teach you to hold on to the **** string.
posted by Jason on 7-18-2008 at 4:47 pm
I did this just the other night…get another helium balloon, with a string on it, mind you. Fold a piece of tape (I prefer duct tape) back upon itself, so that it’s sticky on both sides, and place it on top of the balloon. Then, guide the tethered balloon up until it sticks to the bottom of the errant balloon…then, retrieve it by slowly and steadily pulling the string.
posted by Mikerizer on 7-18-2008 at 6:10 pm
I’d use a toy dart gun with a string tied to the dart. Get some good target practice in…..
posted by Stephen on 7-23-2008 at 10:34 am