Vakko spoils the joke with a real answer - I
Someone had a list of questions phrased to make somewhat common things seem rather silly. But the it's just the phrasing that does it. A little thought about how things probably actually happened defuses the phrases. It spoils the joke, but sometimes a right answer is more useful than a moment of alleged humor. So from time to time I'll post something in this series. I'll start off with a common one:
Q: Why do we drive on a parkway and park on a driveway?
A: This is a case of definitions mixing. While people do park on driveways, they do have to drive on to and off of them. The driveway is what is driven on to the garage, if a person has one and keeps their car there.
A parkway, as originally meant, is a way through a park. Parking a vehicle was not part of the original definition. As an example there is Theodore Wirth Parkway in the Twin Cities. It winds through Theodore Wirth Park.
While I'm at it, I may as well take care of another one before it starts bugging me too much:
Q: Why do toasters always have a setting that burns the toast to a horrible crisp, which no decent human being would eat?
A: The existence of indecent human beings. Well, maybe not quite. How about unreasonable people?
The char setting of the range is for the same reason that toasters have a setting lighter than almost anyone would really want to use. It's a classic user interface problem, really. If you were in the business of building toasters you wouldn't know what setting every person wants and if you decide for people, you will almost always be wrong. So instead of having no settings, or even a few settings, a range is provided.
So far so good. But the question is, "Why such a large range that includes those silly choices?" A narrow range would probably not be enough for some people and they'd be complaining about how they want their toast "just a little lighter" or "just a little darker" and how the manufacturer is being unreasonable for not allowing that. So instead, the range is made excessive. This quietly demonstrates that the manufacturer isn't limiting your choices. Want dark toast? Well, you can set it all the way to "carbonized bread" if you really want to.