Well, the boat’s been sold. In a last-minute twist, Deep Thought was bought by Jeff Piller, the owner from All City Towing, which has been housing the boat since it was pulled from the Milwaukee shoreline in May after being stuck there since October of 2024.
Now what? Well, Piller says that he plans to cut the boat into pieces and donate them for charity auctions. But wait! Why destroy this monumental piece of local history when you could instead try one of these incredibly stupid ideas I just came up with a few minutes ago?
Here are just potential future uses for Deep Thought:
1. Make it a Museum
We have a public museum, an art museum, a motorcycle museum – now is the time for a boat museum. Specifically this boat. Step right in and view the tens of thousands of pounds of accumulated mud inside. Peruse the gallery of graffiti on the boat’s port side. Be sure to visit the gift shop by the massive gaping tears in the hull and buy a Deep Thought collectible keychain.
It’s time to pick your Milwaukee favorites for the year!
2. Rent it Out as an AirBnb
Don’t you ever wish you could spend a night under the stars on the very boat that gave the county parks department a nearly yearlong headache? Who wouldn’t line up for this opportunity? Guests can sleep on the filthy deck or inside the thoroughly vandalized interior.
3. Create a Sailor Training Experience
Let’s say hypothetically that you’re a couple from Mississippi planning a major boat trip to celebrate your retirement. What do you do when you hit a storm? How do you avoid washing up on the beach of a lovely Midwestern city? Do any restrictions prevent you from just straight up leaving it there? These and more questions will be answered in the Deep Thought Ultra-Learning Boat Training Course, held on the beautifully refurbished boat.
4. Overcharge at a Deep Thought Escape Room
Bachelor and bachelorette parties, corporate bonding exercises, family reunions – they can all take place within the cramped interior of Deep Thought, transformed into a whimsical escape room meant to entertain people with too much money.
5. Build a Mighty Battering Ram
When we finally rise up to defeat our enemies, Milwaukee will need a worthy battering ram to break down the doors to their strongholds. What better siege weapon than Deep Thought to inspire fear in their hearts? Just imagine that graffitied exterior flying toward your castle doors, and tell me you wouldn’t tremble in terror.
6. Create a Sensory Deprivation Tank
The boat isn’t quite up to snuff as a boat anymore, what with the extensive structural damage. It’s also not the best-looking vessel around. Moving it is super difficult. So why not just cover the thing in soundproof padding and shades and charge people $89.99 for an hour of “sensory deprivation”? Boom. That’s a business plan right there.
7. Possum Zoo
Step one: Possums. Step two: Zoo.
8. Make It A Small Boat Within a Much Larger Boat
Deep Thought may not be seaworthy anymore, but you know what is? A really big boat. So hear me out. We buy a big boat, and then we put Deep Thought in the big boat, and then we have two boats. That’s right.
9. Open a Deep Thought Pop-Up Restaurant
I’m thinking a family-style buffet. Food poisoning cases will be inevitable, but it’ll be fun while it lasts.
10. Honor the Deceased with a Deep Thought Mausoleum
I’m sure someone out there would like to go to their reward while their mortal remains rest in the confines of Deep Thought, respectfully remodeled to serve as a monument to a life well lived.
11. Build a Boat Playground for the Kids
Actually the insurance situation on this would be a disaster. Never mind.
12. Synergize it into a Vibrant Office Space
Just hook some fluorescent lights up there, shove Doug from accounting in a corner and boom you got yourself a nifty little co-working setup. It’s small enough that you can maximize shareholder value while promoting a cohesive in-office culture, but spacious enough that there are still private corners where you can go cry alone.
13. Craft a Beautiful Fountain
Picture this. You’re walking to City Hall. You look up. There’s a majestic new plaza, vast and full of greenery, and at its center, rising like a Phoenix from the ashes is Deep Thought, mounted high above us mere mortals on a marble base, a spigot shooting water from its hull, the sunlight catching this new fountain just perfectly. Doesn’t the thought bring a tear to your eye? Eat your heart out, Trevi. Now this would be a tribute fitting of the one and only Milwaukee Minnow.
14. Set Up A Historic Marker
OK, so what if we just put the boat back? I know, I know, it’s been a huge pain and is costing taxpayers thousands of dollars, etc., etc., etc., but … it would be kind of funny. We could just drop it right where it was on the beach, but this time add a fence and a big bronze historic market. I’ll even volunteer to write the text for it – “Deep Thought. In the year of our lord 2024, this boat landed on Milwaukee’s shore. It brought the people of the city joy and entertainment in a time of misery and division. And, to be fair, it also brought some folks misery. But hey, it was a funny meme for a while.” I bet we could get it declared Wisconsin’s first national park.
15. Launch the Boat Awards
Here’s a blockbuster idea – The Deep Thought Awards. Instead of auctioning pieces of the boat to charities, we give pieces away to Milwaukeeans who best exemplify the boat’s stubborn spirit of persistence. No matter how much we tried to get it out of there, it just would not budge for month after month after month until All City had to spend a whole day dragging it over the rocks. Let’s honor Milwaukeeans who show that same fortitude with a certificate and a dangerously sharp piece of metal.
