5 ms·

> The gun and speeding bullet? Well, that's anyone's guess. Seems like a Superman reference to me.

by batch12 3y ago

qclibre22 3y ago
Fastest gun in the west?
- FirmwareBurner 3y ago
  As an europoor my American geography is rusty but afaik Texas isn't really in the west, but more in the middle-south, no?
  - serf 3y ago
    Texas at one point in history represented the frontier-border for 19th century US expansion.
  - placatedmayhem 3y ago
    "The West" refers to everything west of the Appalachian Mountains or the Mississippi River. It comes from the early eras of the USA when those portions of the country were unexplored and perceived to be "wild". This is related to why the "Midwest" starts at Ohio.
  - quantumfissure 3y ago
    It's arbitrary. We generally refer to "West" as 'West of the Mississippi River'. Mid-West as Ohio-ish to around the Mississippi River (i.e. Midwest (Ohio, Indiana); Upper Midwest (Minnesota, Michigan, Wisconsin, Illinois)). A lot of us still refer to Texas; Iowa; Nebraska; Missouri; etc... as just 'mid-west'. California, Oregon as 'West Coast'; Washington as 'Upper/Northwest Coast'; Arizona/New Mexico as Southwest; and Wyoming/Nevada as West. Goes back to the days of expansionism in the early to mid-1800's, Texas and the Mississippi River were the "East/West" dividing line. Texas, Wyoming, New Mexico, Arizona, and Oklahoma also have the standard 'west' cartoon and movie stereotype (cowboys; saloons; tumbleweed; desert; etc...). In the mid-west it's more field or forest. And freezing cold wind. Lots of freezing cold wind.
    - mulmen 3y ago
      I was born and raised in Idaho and have lived in Seattle for over 10 years and I have never heard anyone say “Upper coast”. Washington is part of the “west coast” or “northwest”.
      - quantumfissure 3y ago
        I didn't mean "Upper Coast", I implied Upper West Coast with my slash, which is a common referral to northern Oregon and Washington around here. Probably not clear in my reply.
        mulmen 3y ago
        Ah, understood. Where is "here"? I have literally never heard "Upper West Coast" in my life.
        quantumfissure 3y ago
        Eastern PA, Upper West Coast is what I've typically learned it's called. Interchangeable with Northwest Coast. To be fair, it's also normal to say redup; youse; jawns; werter; hoagie. Regional dialects are nuts.
  - ubermonkey 3y ago
    I live in Houston. Let me try to frame this for you. Texas as an idea is considered part of the American west, but as with most things it's more complicated than that. Texas is absurdly large -- there's 800+ miles between the Louisiana border and El Paso, at the western edge. Eastern Texas starts out looking like the rest of the southeast -- lush, green, piney. The coastal part, or at least the part closer to Louisiana, is very like Louisiana with plenty of wetlands and live oaks and whatnot. But that thins out quickly, and within a couple hundred miles Texas starts to look more like "movie Texas" and becomes more stereotypically West. (A fun flip side to all this is that a simple majority of Texans -- which is to say, just slightly more than 50% -- live in the metro area of Houston or the combined metro area of Dallas-Ft Worth. The bulk of the rest live in and around Austin or San Antonio. Almost NO ONE lives in Texas between San Antonio and the western side of the state, comparatively speaking.)
    - gottorf 3y ago
      > Texas is absurdly large -- there's 800+ miles between the Louisiana border and El Paso In fact, Austin, the state capital, is farther away from El Paso than it is to any of the states (or country) that Texas borders. Or put another way: El Paso, which is in the middle of a desert, is closer to the Pacific Ocean (via the Gulf of California) than its own state capital. While we're on the subject of the vastness of Texas, Big Bend National Park is a true wonder and definitely worth a visit.
    - emptybits 3y ago
      > Texas is absurdly large I love your state and hope to be there for the 2024 Total Eclipse in April. (RV parking for a night, anyone, lol?) But yeah, driving the great state of Texas takes some time, doesn't it? o_O I was surprised when I started to scroll maps and trip plan .. and I'm saying this as a Canadian -- most of our 10 provinces and all of our 3 territories are bigger in area than Texas but a whole lot less populated. Looking forward to Texas splendour...
      - ubermonkey 3y ago
        I don't think it happens much with North Americans, but it's pretty common for folks from farther away (Europe, Asia) to think they could "day trip" between Texas cities, or out to Big Bend or whatever. It's just not reasonable. The distances are too far. I have done a day trip to Austin before, for a business meeting booked on short notice, but that's 170ish miles one way. It sucked. And no, rail isn't really a usable thing. In 30 years in Texas, I have FLOWN from Houston to Dallas more often than I've driven there.
  - jprete 3y ago
    The other answers are good, but calling Texas part of "the West" can be justified even now on the basis of population density. The median north-south population line has not reached the Mississippi even as of 2020 - it's in southwestern Indiana. https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Median_center_of_the_United_States_population https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Median_center_of_the_United_...
    - nocoiner 3y ago
      Wow! Never seen the Great Migration depicted like that before. Fascinating.
- duskwuff 3y ago
  The reference is to Superman, who was often described in Golden Age comics as "faster than a speeding bullet".

> The gun and speeding bullet? Well, that's anyone's guess. Seems like a Superman reference to me.

qclibre22 3y ago

Fastest gun in the west?

FirmwareBurner 3y ago
As an europoor my American geography is rusty but afaik Texas isn't really in the west, but more in the middle-south, no?
- serf 3y ago
  Texas at one point in history represented the frontier-border for 19th century US expansion.
- placatedmayhem 3y ago
  "The West" refers to everything west of the Appalachian Mountains or the Mississippi River. It comes from the early eras of the USA when those portions of the country were unexplored and perceived to be "wild". This is related to why the "Midwest" starts at Ohio.
- quantumfissure 3y ago
  It's arbitrary. We generally refer to "West" as 'West of the Mississippi River'. Mid-West as Ohio-ish to around the Mississippi River (i.e. Midwest (Ohio, Indiana); Upper Midwest (Minnesota, Michigan, Wisconsin, Illinois)). A lot of us still refer to Texas; Iowa; Nebraska; Missouri; etc... as just 'mid-west'. California, Oregon as 'West Coast'; Washington as 'Upper/Northwest Coast'; Arizona/New Mexico as Southwest; and Wyoming/Nevada as West. Goes back to the days of expansionism in the early to mid-1800's, Texas and the Mississippi River were the "East/West" dividing line. Texas, Wyoming, New Mexico, Arizona, and Oklahoma also have the standard 'west' cartoon and movie stereotype (cowboys; saloons; tumbleweed; desert; etc...). In the mid-west it's more field or forest. And freezing cold wind. Lots of freezing cold wind.
  - mulmen 3y ago
    I was born and raised in Idaho and have lived in Seattle for over 10 years and I have never heard anyone say “Upper coast”. Washington is part of the “west coast” or “northwest”.
    - quantumfissure 3y ago
      I didn't mean "Upper Coast", I implied Upper West Coast with my slash, which is a common referral to northern Oregon and Washington around here. Probably not clear in my reply.
      - mulmen 3y ago
        Ah, understood. Where is "here"? I have literally never heard "Upper West Coast" in my life.
        quantumfissure 3y ago
        Eastern PA, Upper West Coast is what I've typically learned it's called. Interchangeable with Northwest Coast. To be fair, it's also normal to say redup; youse; jawns; werter; hoagie. Regional dialects are nuts.
- ubermonkey 3y ago
  I live in Houston. Let me try to frame this for you. Texas as an idea is considered part of the American west, but as with most things it's more complicated than that. Texas is absurdly large -- there's 800+ miles between the Louisiana border and El Paso, at the western edge. Eastern Texas starts out looking like the rest of the southeast -- lush, green, piney. The coastal part, or at least the part closer to Louisiana, is very like Louisiana with plenty of wetlands and live oaks and whatnot. But that thins out quickly, and within a couple hundred miles Texas starts to look more like "movie Texas" and becomes more stereotypically West. (A fun flip side to all this is that a simple majority of Texans -- which is to say, just slightly more than 50% -- live in the metro area of Houston or the combined metro area of Dallas-Ft Worth. The bulk of the rest live in and around Austin or San Antonio. Almost NO ONE lives in Texas between San Antonio and the western side of the state, comparatively speaking.)
  - gottorf 3y ago
    > Texas is absurdly large -- there's 800+ miles between the Louisiana border and El Paso In fact, Austin, the state capital, is farther away from El Paso than it is to any of the states (or country) that Texas borders. Or put another way: El Paso, which is in the middle of a desert, is closer to the Pacific Ocean (via the Gulf of California) than its own state capital. While we're on the subject of the vastness of Texas, Big Bend National Park is a true wonder and definitely worth a visit.
  - emptybits 3y ago
    > Texas is absurdly large I love your state and hope to be there for the 2024 Total Eclipse in April. (RV parking for a night, anyone, lol?) But yeah, driving the great state of Texas takes some time, doesn't it? o_O I was surprised when I started to scroll maps and trip plan .. and I'm saying this as a Canadian -- most of our 10 provinces and all of our 3 territories are bigger in area than Texas but a whole lot less populated. Looking forward to Texas splendour...
    - ubermonkey 3y ago
      I don't think it happens much with North Americans, but it's pretty common for folks from farther away (Europe, Asia) to think they could "day trip" between Texas cities, or out to Big Bend or whatever. It's just not reasonable. The distances are too far. I have done a day trip to Austin before, for a business meeting booked on short notice, but that's 170ish miles one way. It sucked. And no, rail isn't really a usable thing. In 30 years in Texas, I have FLOWN from Houston to Dallas more often than I've driven there.
- jprete 3y ago
  The other answers are good, but calling Texas part of "the West" can be justified even now on the basis of population density. The median north-south population line has not reached the Mississippi even as of 2020 - it's in southwestern Indiana. https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Median_center_of_the_United_States_population https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Median_center_of_the_United_...
  - nocoiner 3y ago
    Wow! Never seen the Great Migration depicted like that before. Fascinating.
duskwuff 3y ago
The reference is to Superman, who was often described in Golden Age comics as "faster than a speeding bullet".