2998: Ravioli-Shaped Objects

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Ravioli-Shaped Objects

Title text: It's a real accomplishment to mess up a ravioli recipe badly enough that the resulting incident touches all four quadrants of the NFPA hazard diamond.

Explanation

Ravioli are a kind of stuffed pasta comprising a filling enveloped in thin pasta dough, commonly square shaped, and serving as the object of this comic's table, which can be seen as a kind of confusion matrix. This comic compares four ravioli-shaped objects (square shaped objects with bulging cross-sections due to their filling) with some common actions associated with them. See the table below.

The title text refers to the NFPA 704 diagram for hazardous materials, a diamond figure put out by the National Fire Protection Association showing four kinds of fire hazards. A raviolo that touched all four quadrants would be a health hazard, fire hazard, and demonstrate (chemical) reactivity, and have some other miscellaneous hazard(s). The NFPA diamond was previously mentioned in 2638: Extended NFPA Hazard Diamond.

Table of ravioli objects

Ravioli-Shaped Objects	Eat with a fork	Rest your head on	Puncture and slurp	Install in your phone
Ravioli	Ravioli pasta would indeed be suitable to be eaten with a fork, as shown.	Ravioli pasta is not structurally strong enough to support the weight of a human head while reclining, and would break and spill its filling over one's head and the object one is resting on. It may also be covered in sauce, adding to the general mess.	If the ravioli filling is fluid enough, one could slurp it out with a straw. This would waste the pasta component, if it were not eaten afterwards.	Phones are not meant to run on ravioli. Stuffing a phone with a raviolo would cause it to break as shown, spilling the filling through the phone, which is a terrible idea. There is a mobile app named Ravioli, but it is quite unlikely that Randall had that in his mind.
Throw pillow	Throw pillows are made of cloth and are inedible, whether one uses a fork or not.	A throw pillow is meant to be used as head support while reclining on furniture.	Throw pillows do not usually have liquids inside them. Hence, Cueball finds, to his dismay, that it's empty.	Throw pillows are significantly bigger than phones and as such can't fit inside them, nor can typical pillows power them. As depicted, the attempt to force a pillow inside the phone has split the latter in half; the top half of the phone is visible on top of the pillow, and a bit of the bottom half can be seen beneath it.
Capri Sun	Eating a pouch of sweetened juice with a fork would most likely simply pierce the pouch and spill the liquid all over Cueball.	A Capri Sun would serve as a waterbed of sorts, and wouldn't be unduly uncomfortable in a pinch. However, it's still possible that the pouch could rupture and leave you with a sticky head and no support.	Capri Suns are meant to be drunk like this, and are enjoyed by many.[citation needed]	The phone shown is surrounded by spilled Capri Sun, implying that the attempt to force the two together punctured the pouch. The resulting spillage would most likely just result in the surface of the phone becoming annoyingly sticky, but if the liquid managed to get inside the phone (especially if the cover had been removed to try to put it in the compartment that usually holds the battery) it could cause a more significant and difficult to clean mess. Once actual power is provided (either an actual battery being subsequently used or the device offered external power by cable or inductance charger), the remaining residue could cause any number of further faults, and perhaps even critical component damage.
Bulging Lithium Battery	Bulging lithium batteries are explosive hazards and should not be punctured lest they explode. Additionally the contents of the battery are toxic if one were to somehow manage to eat the burning bits of the battery.	A lithium battery is a small, hard object, and a bulging one is no exception. Since the bulging comes from a buildup of heat and gas, (the primary gases being hydrogen and carbon dioxide), it would also be a constant fire hazard, which would not be conducive to relaxation.[citation needed] Lithium battery themed throw pillows, which bulge similarly to such batteries, do exist as a novelty item. Notably, these types of batteries are often referred to as "spicy pillows".	Similarly to the 'eat with a fork' example, puncturing a bulging lithium battery is a bad idea.	A bulging lithium battery could be installed in a phone, if one is willing to break the phone a bit (like the screen in the comic) to accommodate the bulging of the battery. More commonly, bulging batteries form inside the phone itself; if you don't usually have reason to charge or store it separately, you might only notice the problem when it causes the case or screen (shown as partly cracked, in the image) to distort significantly. In 1422: My Phone is Dying, Beret Guy's phone is expanding. Although in his case it is not the normal bulging battery that causes this. Upon noticing the bulging of a battery, it is strongly suggested that you uninstall it from the device it is in. It is at least no longer good at holding/delivering its power, and may even become at least as hazardous as when used in all the other scenarios, so you should ignore it at your peril.

Transcript

This transcript is incomplete. Please help editing it! Thanks.

[A 4x4 grid of squares. The columns are labeled: Eat with a fork, rest your head on, puncture and slurp, install in your phone. The rows are: Ravioli, throw pillow, Capri Sun, bulging lithium battery. Each row has an image of each respective item above the title, with the words “Home Sweet Home” on the throw pillow, and “Fruit” on the Capri Sun.]

Top-Left

Ravioli, eat with a fork: [green]

[Cueball sits on a chair in front of a table with a jar of sauce on it. He is eating from a plate from ravioli.]

Cueball: Nom Nom Nom

Top Mid-Left

Ravioli, Rest your head on: [red]

[Cueball is lying down on a couch with ravioli smooshed on his head and the couch. Ravioli bits can be seen on the ground]

Cueball: Eww.

Top Mid-Right

Ravioli, puncture and slurp: [yellow]

[Cueball is slurping from a ravioli through a straw. In front of him is table with two plates, presumably with ravioli on them.]

Slurp

Top-Right

Ravioli, Install in your phone: [red]

[A phone is shown with bits of ravioli sticking out and tomato sauce is dripping out.]

Top-Mid Left

Throw pillow, eat with a fork: [red]

[Cueball sits on a chair in front of a table with a jar of sauce on it. He is poking with a fork at a throw pillow covered in tomato sauce.]

Poke poke

Top-Mid Mid-Left

Throw pillow, rest your head on: [green]

[Cueball is looking at his phone and is lying on a couch. His head is resting on a throw pillow.]

Top-Mid Mid-Right

Throw pillow, puncture and slurp: [red]

[Cueball is sucking on a straw that is inserted in a pillow.]

Cueball: Aw man, this one is empty.

Top-Mid Right

Throw pillow, install in your phone: [red]

[A phone is shown on a throw pillow that has the words “Home Sweet Home” partially obscured.]

Bottom-Mid Left

Capri Sun, eat with a fork: [red]

[Cueball sits on a chair in front of a table with a jar of sauce on it. He has stabbed a Capri Sun on a plate and is now splattered with juice.]

Bottom-Mid Mid-Left

Capri Sun, rest your head on: [yellow]

[Cueball is looking at his phone and is lying on a couch. His head is resting on a Capri Sun.]

Cueball: Honestly kind of comfortable.

Bottom-Mid Mid-Right

Capri Sun, puncture and slurp: [green]

[Cueball is drinking from a Capri Sun through a straw.]

Sluuurp

Bottom-Mid Right

Capri Sun, Install in your phone: [red]

[A phone is shown to be squishing a Capri Sun. Juice is trickling out.]

Bottom Left

Bulging lithium battery, eat with a fork: [red]

[An explosion bordered by 4 skull and crossbones.]

Bottom Mid-Left

Bulging lithium battery, rest your head on: [red]

[Cueball is looking at his phone and lying on his couch. His head is resting on a smoldering battery.]

Cueball: This fire hazard is uncomfortable.

Bottom Mid-Right

Bulging lithium battery, puncture and slurp: [red]

[An explosion bordered by 4 skull and crossbones.]

Bottom Right

Bulging lithium battery, install in your phone: [red]

[A phone with a bulging back, presumably from the bulging lithium battery. The phone’s screen is cracked in the center.]

Trivia

Surprisingly, the bottom right square was initially marked in  green  rather than  red  (or  yellow ) when it was first uploaded. This square may have been marked in green because, although putting a bulging battery in a mobile phone is not normal usage, it is a situation that can arise from normal usage when a "healthy" battery begins to fail. One other suggestion was that this was an xkcd phone, and a dodgy battery is part of a 'feature', such as an 'integrated hand warmer' or 'dynamic expansion').

More likely, it was just because Randall automatically went with the default association of "Row N is appopriate for Column N", as is his usual design for these comics, to which he adds adjustments for other surprises, exceptions and outright jokes.

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Discussion

I think its a missed opportunity not to include the 'bulging lithium battery' themed throw pillow.Xurkitree10 (talk) 22:04, 14 October 2024 (UTC)

Oh, these actually exist--172.64.236.35 12:07, 16 October 2024 (UTC)

Although technically, the pillow itself is normal, it's the overlay / cover which is battery themed. -- Hkmaly (talk) 05:08, 17 October 2024 (UTC)

Missing a trick by not having them be heated. 172.70.90.202 08:49, 17 October 2024 (UTC)

Battery stories. One of my backup batteries has started bulging so much I wrapped it in duct tape to hold the case onto it. It still works if I joggle the connectors well, but I’m worried. Another time, I was trying to repair a cell phone but accidentally pierced the battery with my tiny screw driver. It started sparking and smoking and emitting dense dark noxious smoke. I threw it, it landed on a chair and burst into a small fire. The building filled with the dense noxious smoke, setting off all the alarms, coughing, opening the windows. When the fire calmed down (it didn’t spread) the chair seat was burnt in the shape of the battery, as well as the phone was bent and discolored and unusable in every way. But it still had its electronics in many parts. I want to image that flash chip and get my files! A kid also once told me, they had an old phone they had taken to a very cold event (lithium batteries can hold power in proportion to temperature, so sudden drops could be a problem), and it started emitting s whining nosie. They threw it for safety, and it exploded away from them, according to their story.

Now, people also sell large expanded batteries for cell phones, which don’t fit in the case, and people mod or bend the case to get more power for their phones. Phone hacking, in some areas, has been getting easier and easier as information on it spreads and as design norms for phones stabilise. I used to mismatch phone batteries to save money and waste, but I was young and I would do crazy things like bunching up internal foil from candy wrappers, or bending paperclips, or pulling copper strands from discarded wires, and with my youngster manual dexterity i could measure the right voltages and jam, tape, or solder the disparate batteries to the internal connectors, and forcing the phone back on would then indeed yield things that looked like Randall’s drawings here.

Since traditional lithium batteries stop working after a few years, there’s pressure for people to do home battery mods.

But I bet nowadays you can find all sorts of clear descriptions of how to do these various things much better than I used to all over the internet somewhere, maybe even 3d print designs for parts. Maybe even a robot or drone exoskeleton for your phone, connecting with usb-serial or bluetooth or wifi.

So according to Randall it’s totally safe to use my bulging lithium backup battery (even if a screen is a little cracked)? 172.69.59.66 (talk) 22:29, 14 October 2024 (please sign your comments with ~~~~)

Should we create a group/series for comics containing confusion matrices? This now makes 5, with the other 4 being 2963, 2813, 2420 and 1890. 108.162.250.184 22:50, 14 October 2024 (UTC)

Nevermind I just realised that this group exists, my bad. 172.68.210.124 22:53, 14 October 2024 (UTC)

I wasn't expecting a comic about spicy pillows but I think it's awesome that we got one. I do think there should be mention of or links to how to safely dispose of expanding lithium batteries such as Call2Recycle in the explanation, even if it's just to spread awareness about the dangers of spicy pillows and the proper disposal of them. OmniDoom (talk) 23:36, 14 October 2024 (UTC)

spicy pillows yummy Caliban (talk) 07:41, 15 October 2024 (UTC)

Shouldn’t the bottomright square be yellow or even red? (I see it is mentioned in the explanation already) - - 172.71.103.178 09:26, 15 October 2024 (UTC)

I'm assuming that Randal has the experience in his community of never having an issue with installing an expanded battery. The comic appears to be saying that rumors that this is dangerous are false. But I don't know, maybe he's getting senile. In the "internetizen" or "hacker" spirit of the comic's demographic, trying out alternative approaches than the mainstream is (or was) the celebrated norm, and leads to many new discoveries that are (or were) shared online. There might be more information on irc or twitter. 108.162.245.129 23:17, 15 October 2024 (UTC)

My interpretation is that yellow indicates "weird" rather than safe/practical. Two two yellow-marked squares are no unsafe or impractical, they are merely weird. Having a bulging phone battery is not weird, and because it still functions (despite being dangerous/damaging), it can't be red either. I do think it's an odd choice though, emotionally. Maplestrip (talk) 09:41, 16 October 2024 (UTC)

When I visit https://xkcd.com/2998/ the bottom right cell is red not green as on this page. If something has been update this might warrent a trivia section.162.158.154.92 04:21, 19 October 2024 (UTC)

More importantly, the image here should be replaced by the one Randall now has on his site.162.158.134.224 07:42, 19 October 2024 (UTC)

In the phone/pillow square, we can see an edge under the front of the pillow, so maybe Cueball split the phone opened and placed the pillow between the parts. That would explain the red color. 162.158.127.99 12:43, 15 October 2024 (UTC)

If the intent is to put each battery/non-battery-substitute 'in' the battery compartment, then this makes sense. Given that it's typically a tight-tolerance fit (so that even a slightly 'blown' battery is hard to insert, or at least get the cover back over), anything bigger than the original battery will protrude, or at least distort the case heavily. 172.71.26.55 14:38, 15 October 2024 (UTC)

It seems like Randall forgot to hide the sketch in the bottom left cell. {unsigned ip|162.158.167.83|20:50, 15 October 2024}}

Please do not eat old Samsung batteries. P?sych??otic?pot??at???o (talk) 21:01, 15 October 2024 (UTC)

Nor drink, nor use as headrests. Thank you fandoor your cooperation. 172.68.22.191 23:50, 15 October 2024 (UTC)

Eating a lithium (IIRC) battery is good for one and those about iff one is a zombie in Z Nation ( https://www.imdb.com/title/tt3843168/ ) Otherwise? Yikes.

Aside: I'd advise against thinking that xkcd is an advice column. 172.70.134.213 02:58, 16 October 2024 (UTC)

Please do not eat other brand of lithium batteries either, no matter their age. Do not eat Apple batteries. Do not eat Google Pixel batteries. Do not eat Xiaomi batteries. Do not eat Huawei batteries. Do not eat Honor batteries. Do not eat Motorola batteries. Do not eat rechargable AAA batteries. Actually, do not eat non-rechargable AAA batteries either, although those are not lithium-based. -- Hkmaly (talk) 05:15, 17 October 2024 (UTC)

Nor AAs, CR2032s or PP3s. Although I suspect that D cells are perfectly ok, so long as you don't try to chew them and just swallow them whole... 172.70.90.202 05:45, 17 October 2024 (UTC)

We need a row for cooking them because baked lithium ion batteries are tasty (The Batteries from those old T-mobile keyboard phones are the best kind they have extra flavor) -- TiredQuill281 (talk) 20:13, 18 October 2024 (please sign your comments with ~~~~)

Would someone who has the necessary privileges please update the image file? The bottom-right square has changed colour. BunsenH (talk) 16:01, 19 October 2024 (UTC)

And, when done, it would be good to link the [[original image file]], appropriately, in the text that currently explains the change.

Normally, the picture would be updated and an addendum paragraph and/or Trivia item would be given to explain how it originally was before the 'correction', but the change is documented within the table already.

Although yet another option would be to clean up that (perhaps overlong) cell to be just the "it is red" paragraph, and actually transfer into a Trivia statement the whole extracted "originally it was [color]green[/color], rather than [color]red[/color] or [color]yellow[/color]..." bit, slightly adjusted for Trvica-scope context. 162.158.33.224 18:18, 19 October 2024 (UTC)

Ok, direct followup to the above (162.158.33.224), which was me. I've just done what I suggested. "Originally the image was..." stuff sent into Trivia (with my own little touches and interpretations - feel free to edit as required!) and slightly compressed what was left in the changed tile's table-cell (again, could be refined, but I tried to put both "warnings about fire" in a narratively continuous context, rather than split across paragraphs). 162.158.33.225 19:07, 19 October 2024 (UTC)

I think we need to work on the pillow instalation into phone because the protectors don't work well enough. Maybe it doesn't have to be fully inside. 172.70.126.7 (talk) 15:36, 20 October 2024 (please sign your comments with ~~~~)