452: Mission

Explain xkcd: It's 'cause you're dumb.
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Mission
Don't you know? The chances of a random object being a scone are about one in six.
Title text: Don't you know? The chances of a random object being a scone are about one in six.

Explanation[edit]

Cueball and Beret Guy are on a mission, intending to destroy whatever machine they are in, except that Beret Guy tends to be a bit surreal and brought a bag for holding pastries instead of explosive charges.

This is not the first time he's made such a bakery mistake; see 434: xkcd Goes to the Airport.

He then attempts to eat what Cueball identifies as lug nuts, believing them to be scones. In reality, lug nuts do not look very similar to scones.[citation needed] He bites into them and it hurts him, but as he says, maybe some of them are not lug nuts, and he wishes to test them all.

The title text further emphasizes Beret Guy's obsession with bakery goods, by stating that if a random object is selected, there will be a 1/6 chance that it is a scone, which explains his behavior with the lug nuts. This is, of course, a ridiculous assertion, as if it were true, more than 16% of all things in the universe would have to be scones. (However, Beret Guy's obsession with bakeries and the fact that he doesn't realise he's not in a bakery could make this statement justified from his perspective.)

Beret Guy and scones are also referenced in the title text of both 677: Asshole and 1030: Keyed.

Transcript[edit]

[Beret Guy and Cueball are rappelling down separate ropes into the interior workings of a large machine.]
Cueball: Okay, we're in the belly of the machine. You got the charges?
Beret Guy: The what?
[The two are standing next to some large pieces of machinery.]
Cueball [gesturing]: The explosive charges!
Beret Guy [pulling out a bag]: I just brought this bag for pastries.
Cueball: The hell? We're on a mission here!
Beret Guy [looking around]: This isn't a bakery?
Cueball [head in hand]: Oh, Christ, not this shit again.
Beret Guy [crouching by some lug nuts lying on a piece of machinery]: What about these scones?
Cueball: Those are lug nuts.
Beret Guy [stuffing them in his mouth]: ...Maybe SOME of them aren't. crunch Ow! crunch


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Discussion

maybe it got something to do with the saying, "oh this (heist/mission) will be a piece of cake. one could easily misunderstand that

so "highly likely" means "1 time out of 6" for some people :D 141.101.97.215 12:27, 13 May 2014 (UTC)

Nope, highly likely means (about) two out of three for these people. 141.101.92.221 11:10, 8 July 2014 (UTC)

The title text could also potentially count as a sort of NetHack reference. 173.245.52.138 00:11, 12 May 2015 (UTC)

Reminds me of the "Whose Line Is It Anyway?" improv game "Improbable Mission". 141.101.75.149 01:38, 8 February 2016 (UTC)

"a hypothesis easily disprovable by looking around any room which isn't a bakery", actually it's not that easy to disprove. Maybe the earth is just in a local irregularity inside a universe full of scones. Except the bakeries of course, centers of universal equilibrium. 162.158.88.110 16:20, 9 June 2017 (UTC)

The idea of eating lugnuts may have come from this comic: http://www.buttercupfestival.com/111vol3.htm. 172.68.206.52 04:54, 29 July 2017 (UTC)