@#52

The "seat" on a bicycle has been referred to as a "saddle" for a very long time: saddle really is the standard term, among bicyclists at least. Consider for instance, H. G. Wells' terrific novel, "Wheels of Chance", from 1895, which contains such sentences as

"...but his pocket handkerchief might have been in California for any good it was to him while he was in the saddle."

"He struck this with a terrific impact and shot forward off his saddle into a clumsy entanglement."

and

"A neat packet of American cloth behind the saddle contained his change of raiment, and the bell and the handle–bar and the hubs and lamp, albeit a trifle freckled by wear, glittered blindingly in the rising sunlight."

Do they really have four significant digits for the weight of a bunch of hash spread over "an area the size of two football pitches"? Seems unlikely.

@6: To avoid the issue of what happens "at the edges", CGoL has often been represented in software on what I believe is topologically equivalent to a torus (like an old game of Asteroids). Non-euclidean happens all the time.

@#15: I've always remembered the phrase as "gas, grass or ass..". Google hits of the six permutations:

gas grass ass 24400
gas ass grass 863
ass gas grass 21800
ass grass gas 4000
grass gas ass 1220
grass ass gas 147

Curious.

Scott Snyder has done a bit with beany babies along these lines:
http://www.culturalcoroner.com/Site/51BBC8A4-665E-11DC-90B4-000D934B11A6.html