at work today, we opened with a thought exercise: is a hot dog a sandwich or a taco? I thought very fondly of you as I argued passionately that if a hot dog needed to be classified as anything, it was more of a sandwich. (then I argued that technically a taco can be considered a sandwich because if I have to get up at the crack of dawn for a training day at work, I'm gonna stir some shit)
I suppose as icebreakers go it's a fun one! Although depending on the group it could lead to violence. People get weirdly intense about food taxonomy :D
My favorite thing to do is toss out questions that seem nonsensical at first, because people go "What a ludicrous idea, why would you -- " and then the actual question hits their brain and they pause and go "Well, but there IS a correct answer" and dive into the debate. "Is a hot dog a sandwich" is getting a little old, I often get rolled eyes when I ask that one, so I've gone on to:
-- Just saying the phrase "dibs chairs" (you have to be in a region where dibs chairs or parking chairs are used, although if you're with a bunch of people who live where it never snows it gets even funnier after you explain it)
-- If you're amongst Jewish people or people familiar with Jewish food, you can bring up the Latke vs Hamantaschen debate, which is surprisingly not well known outside of Chicago, where we have a famous one every year. This one is great because they aren't even the same kind of foodstuff, so people really dig into it.
-- Is soup a meal, or does it require the presence of other food to be considered a meal? (And its companion, if soup on its own is NOT a meal, is it a beverage or a snack?)
-- During an "is soup a meal" discussion I was witness to, someone brought up bisque, and someone else said "Well, bisque isn't a soup, it's a bisque" and the can of worms that opened, good lord.
-- Bear vs. Shark: in an environment with enough water for a shark to thrive but enough dry land/shallow water that a bear wouldn't drown, who would win in a fight? (Answer: the moose watching them and biding his time.)
Basically "It's time for weird conversational gambits with Sam" is a regular feature at most parties where I'm in attendance.
