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If you think about it, this is actually rather sensible. Even super heroes and heroines aren't going to be fighting for their lives every single minute of every day, and in most cases [[Power Incontinence|the powers won't shut off]]. If it's more convenient, then why ''not'' make your life a little simpler? Call it "[[Wax On, Wax Off|practice]]" if you have to justify it (or just ask them "[[Mundane Made Awesome|What do you mean, it's not awesome?]]").
Failure to see possible uses other than this one is a form of [[Misapplied Phlebotinum]]. Overpowered characters with a job description like this become [[Super-Powered Robot Meter Maids]]. Characters who are outright [[A God Am I|omnipotent]] who fall to this trope are [[All
[[Martial Arts and Crafts]] is a subset of this trope, for when martial arts abilities are used for reasons other than fighting. Also an opposite of sorts to [[Cut Lex Luthor a Check]], [[Inverse Law of Utility and Lethality]], [[Reed Richards Is Useless]] and [[Useless Superpowers]]. If this is applied to killing someone (such as, say, a gigantic nuke against a feeble human), it may become [[There Is No Kill Like Overkill]].
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** In one of the novels, Shinra is restrained for several hours after accidentally getting caught in one of Celty's shadow webs. He managed to pass the time by [[Power Perversion Potential|thinking of ways that they could]] [[Nightmare Fetishist|use said webs for S&M]].
* V1046-R MAHORO and other characters from ''[[Mahoromatic]]'' stop being combat robots yet they still use their powers to cook, clean and search for ecchi (to trash it) because "Ecchi na no wa ikenai to omoimasu" (roughly "I think that dirty thoughts are bad").
* The world of ''[[Pokémon (anime)|Pokémon]]'' has various examples of these fantastic creatures being put to mundane uses:
*
** Brock's Croagunk is an impressive fighter, all right
**
** In ''Get Along, Little Pokémon'' a Trainer uses his pack of Magnemite as a power supply for nearby cities, and his Jolteon acts as their watchdog.
** In "Hypno's Naptime", the Pokemon Lover's Club is made up of businessmen who use a Hypno to help them get some rest from their stressful insomnia-inducing jobs.
** The city of Palmpona uses the Squirtle Squad (which includes Ash's Squirtle) as firefighters.
** The Charcoal Maker and his son outside of Azalea Town use a Farfetch'd to cut wood and a Magmar to power their forge.
* In ''[[Axis Powers Hetalia]]'', it's established that America has super strength. However, the only times we see this are when he's a kid and he swings a full grown buffalo over his head, and later when he drags a full sized SUV with ease in order to ask if he could borrow it.
* One of the omake [[Yonkoma]] in the ''[[Inazuma Eleven]] Special'' manga has Endou using his God Hand technique to smack a fly, and again in a game of [[Rock-Paper-Scissors]] to throw a ''really'' big "Paper".
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* The title character of ''[[My Lovely Ghost Kana]]'' has discovered she can produce [[Ghostly Chill]] '''to cool cans of beer''' by tucking them into her cleavage for a minute or so. Her living boyfriend notices that area isn't especially cold at other times.
* In the [[Beach Episode]] of ''[[A Certain Scientific Railgun]]'', Mikoto Misaka (the third-most-powerful esper in a city of two million people) uses her electrokinetic powers to... cook rice. By induction. It requires her complete concentration so that the rice doesn't boil over.
* ''[[My Hero Academia]]''; during the Forest Training arc, Todoroki uses his fire powers to light a barbecue grill.
== [[Comic Books]] ==
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*** Superman has ''also'' manufactured a ton of diamonds in ''Superman: True Brit''. [[You Fail Economics Forever|Unfortunately, he made WAY too many...]]
** [[The Silver Age of Comic Books]] basically turned him into a ''full-bore doormat'' with this; flying dinosaur skeletons into the Metropolis Museum (with a specially-designed removable roof, no less!), smoothing out a ship's transport for Lois Lane by lifting it over his head...
** [https://web.archive.org/web/20140408215516/http://superdickery.com/index.php?option=com_content&view=article&id=685:superlandscaping&catid=36:stupor-powers-index&Itemid=38 Super-Landscaping].
** Does Clark Kent "interviewing" Superman to get his job at the Daily Planet count?
*** It does if one accepts the "super hypnosis" explanation for [[Clark Kenting]].
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* ''[[Touhou]]'' fans love to depict various powers used for mundane or silly reasons. Even beyond all those mentioned below, Suika using her manipulation of density to collect small things - and growing to giant size to easily collect lumber ''by plucking whole trees as though they were carrots'' - Aya using her [[Super Speed]] to aid in her role as the local [[Intrepid Reporter]], [[An Ice Person|Cirno]] being used as [http://danbooru.donmai.us/pool/show/1787 air conditioning], [[Reality Warper|Yukari]] using her gaps for [[It Amused Me|pranks]], and many, many other variations exist.
* The mundane utility of most things from ''[[Lyrical Nanoha]]'' is explored in ''[[In the Service]]'', from using flight magic letting someone avoid pressure-based traps to telepathy being used for privacy or in loud environments. Some of the more worrisome aspects are also examined, like being able to cauterize the wounds your [[Flaming Sword]] causes ''while it is causing them'' being handy for cutting off people's bits as a torture technique.
* [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zUH2frxHfpc This comic/animatic] based on ''[[The Owl House]]''; Amity builds an abomination-powered [[Magitech]] [[Kill Sat]] in order to bake pies.
== [[Film]] ==
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** Shaving is excellent training for controlling the wild magic. Considering he couldn't use it in the first series at all, and when it did activate, it had a tendency to blow up everything around him, that sounds perfectly reasonable.
** It's also his own (morbid) personal self-mastery ritual. Being a leper he doesn't have the feeling of presure in his fingertips to have perfect control. Also as a leper he is very prone to infection. Tom being the [[Sarcasm Mode|cheerful]] character that he is uses a cutthroat razor, in his left hand, that's missing two fingers, and he still slips up with.
* ''[[Discworld]]'':
** The mighty weapon of ''[[
*** On a similar note, Susan, Death's granddaughter, has inherited The Grim Reaper's many talents, among them the ability to exist outside of time. She uses this talent to grade papers (largely due to her suffering a heavy case of [[I Just Want to Be Normal]]).
**** However, Susan's classes do take quite interesting, Disc-travelling unscheduled field trips during her lessons.
** There's some mundane uses of magic-derived technology on the Discworld, such as using tiny summoned imps to paint pictures (essentially a photo camera), or as (dis)organizers. However, magic on the Disc is likened to nuclear power
** On a related note, many nobles in ''[[Discworld]]'' send their children to the Assassin's Guild of Ankh Morpork. There are two main reasons for this: 1: Knowing how to assassinate people teaches their children how to guard against assassination, and 2: it actually is one of the best formal education schools in the world.
** Unseen University's omniscopes are powerful scrying devices that can see anywhere and anywhen. Because of this it's extremely hard to get them to show anywhere and anywhen ''in particular'', so they usually show the blackness of empty space (that being what most of the universe consists of). The wizards mostly use them as shaving mirrors.
** In a world in which technology to make clockwork is rare, how does one keep track time? Trap tiny demons in watches of course! They aren't dangerous, but the clocks aren't very reliable, which makes mechanic ones far better.
** Swamp dragons, dog-sized and
** On the other side of the fence, Discworld witches are trained to avert this trope (which doesn't necessarily mean they do it 100%, just that they're trained not to rely on magic as much as possible). Most of them seem to take it as a point of pride how far they can go using only hard work and completely nonmagical things like herbalism and headology.
*** [[Lampshaded]] in ''[[
{{quote|'''Nanny''': But only when there ain't no alternative.▼
▲'''Nanny''': But only when there ain't no alternative.
'''Mrs Googol''': Sure. When there ain't no alternative.
'''Nanny''': When ... you know ... people ain't showing respect, like.
'''Mrs Googol''': When the house needs paintin'.}}
* The [[Animorphs]] frequently use their powers for mundane things, despite the risk that it would blow their cover and lead to the enslavement of the entire planet. For example, doing a science project and watching concerts for free (twice!). They technically have a rule against this, which [[Team Dad]] Jake is miserable at
* [[Keith Laumer]] has written a series of stories about "[[Bolo]]" tanks, super sized military tanks. In one of the stories, it is mentioned that after a war an attempt was made to use them for peaceful purposes, including attaching a blade for demolition work to one and calling it a "tractor". The half-megaton/second firepower still available on it tended to belay the "peaceful" status.
** A later scheme was to use an obsolete Bolo's massively powerful AI and large hull space to create an automated tractor/bulldozer/genetics lab for adapting crops to survive on newly settled colonies. While those responsible were smart enough to remove the [[Frickin' Laser Beams]] this time, they made a really shoddy job of adapting the AI's programming: the result being that when the colony was invaded by hostile aliens it kicked into combat mode and exterminated them all with customised bioweapons, all while thinking they were just a particularly large type of crop pest.
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** Ekaterin's own point of view regarding this scene:
{{quote|''Yes, she realized enviously, he could just wave all ordinary problems out of his path. Leaving only the extraordinary ones... her envy ebbed.''}}
* In ''[[Harry Potter]]'' magic is used for nearly everything imaginable. From making animated Chocolate Frogs, to the various practical joke items, transport, Quidditch, enchanted items that do household chores for you, self stirring cauldrons, semi-sentient owls, radio (no muggle radio for them, which works out fine since wizards apparently get better radios), the list goes on. It's stated that high levels of magic such as at Hogwarts cause Muggle technology more advanced than a wristwatch to fail to work.
** [[Justified Trope]] in that, if Arthur Weasley is any example, the magical population of the world hasn't a clue how Muggle technology ''works''. If the wizarding world ever gets hit with an [[Anti-Magic]] Field or something, they'd die of starvation surrounded by filth.
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* In one episode of ''[[Home Improvement (TV series)|Home Improvement]]'', Tim Taylor got NASA to send him a tank of rocket fuel, which he uses to light a barbecue. He ends up accidentally launching the whole barbecue grill into low orbit.
* One episode of ''[[House (TV series)|House]]'' had House using a highly advanced and very expensive surgical robot to...cut a button on Cuddy's blouse, make a very shallow incision on her face and blow air on her. It is a demo of the machine's precision, after all. Not that she isn't a little aroused...
*
* ''[[The Lost Room]]'' features a number of [[Capital Letters Are Magic|Objects]] with seemingly-random supernatural powers. The one thing they all have in common is that they're indestructible. This makes The Coat useful as a bulletproof vest, despite it's actual ability being unknown.
** However, though The Comb can stop time, it cannot be effectively used to comb hair.
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* ''[[The Perry Bible Fellowship]]'' proves [http://img130.imageshack.us/img130/998/caffeinatorse8.jpg here] that useless superpowers with this can win by sheer rarity value.
* The title character of ''Magical Mina'', part of the ''[[Tsunami Channel]]'' ...uh, franchise?... does this sometimes, with [http://www.tsunamichannel.com/index.php?date=2002-09-16&comic=MaMi this] being a particularly good example. She's also adapted her Sword magic for a scalpel. Of course, she was written to be an exceedingly clever and intelligent [[Magical Girl]]. Also, [http://www.tsunamichannel.com/index.php?date=2003-10-17&comic=MaMi here].
* [https://web.archive.org/web/20100626101220/http://www.adventurers-comic.com/d/20030430.html This strip] of ''[[Adventurers!]]'' makes you wish you had an [[Kill Sat|orbital laser]] for just this purpose.
** There's also Ardam using a lightning spell to recharge the batteries in Drecker's Walkman.
* Dave in ''[[CRFH]]'' has used his laser vision to make popcorn.
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** Post-Trans-Uranium alloys are used almost exclusively to make annihilation plants, due to being so energy-expensive to produce that availability of this stuff is one of the main factors defining exact place of a space civilisation on [[Kardashev Scale]]. The ancient Oafans used this material for spaceship hulls - not only ''warship'' hulls, but all of them, down to small boats.
*** Chinook used an ancient Oafan super-freighter as "a pair of mountain-sized, armored [[Improvised Umbrella|umbrellas]]".
* ''[[Eerie Cuties]]''/''[[Magick Chicks]]'' has magic and other powers used in many and frivolous ways. Jacqui, for one, uses her skill with glamour as instant cosmetics. Melissa once convinced her coven to summon their goddess because her lip gloss was the wrong color - we [[Noodle Incident|didn't get to see that one]], but it earned her a condescending remark from Hekate the next time. Layla's mother can cure drunkenness by drinking the intoxicated person's blood, and has to do so to all the guests at Layla's slumber party after Layla gives them all liquor, maybe not very "frivolous" there...
* ''[[League Of Super Redundant Heroes]]'': The government [http://superredundant.com/?comic=948-civic-duty recruits a heroine named Gale] (an obvious expy of [[Storm]]) to reverse climate change.
== [[Web Original]] ==
* Some of the ''[[Whateley Universe]]'' characters have used their powers to dry off after a shower (Phase and Chaka both), dry her hair (Fey), shave her legs (Verdant), unpack suitcases (Bugs), keep her clothes clean (Pristine), have [[Snowball Fight]]s (a lot of Poe cottage), mop floors and fold laundry (Chaka), paint a room (Plastic Girl), move furniture, shop, and on and on.
** Jade's main trick is to split off independent telekinetic extra 'copies' of herself by 'charging' them into objects; when the charge runs out, the copy re-merges with her and both sets of memories integrate. So what does she quite naturally do? Attend two sets of classes at once and use the same trick to study/do homework/clean her room that much faster. Also, be able to go to the smelly parts of the sewers without danger (Copies can't smell!), work a neat costume, be able to keep an eye out for bullies, not need to use anesthetic...Jade is the
* In ''[[
** No, he
** In the prequel comics, Johnny Snow uses his ice beam to chill a six-pack of beer/soda.
* [http://qntm.org/?ed Ed], the man who subconsciously received his brain from the future, built a fleet of [[Humongous Mecha]]s to save the world from invading aliens, and accidentally erased the Andromeda Galaxy by ''hacking the universe''... [http://qntm.org/?bread puts a time machine to very unorthodox purposes].
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* [[5-Second Films]] gives us the "[http://5secondfilms.com/watch/death_ray_from_space Death Ray From Space]"; a [[Kill Sat]] used to puzzle a kitten.
* [http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RRltwX49Gzw This sketch] from Carpe Clunes depicts a [[Public Service Announcement]] warning the viewer of [[Mind Over Matter|psychics']] tendency to ruin games of pictionary.
* If it's large enough and got a thin, but strong waterproof case, you know someone ''will'' turn it into a boat. [https://web.archive.org/web/20150706233242/http://www.inertord.com/j10.html See the second picture.]
* In ''[[Red vs. Blue]]'', members of the Blue Team have used the scopes of their sniper rifles as binoculars to spy upon the Reds from a distance. Also, in the later seasons, Tucker's sword also counts. It is debatable as to whether or not it was primarily created to be a sword or a key. Quoth Caboose: "Or maybe it's a key all the time, and it when you stick it in people, it unlocks their death."
* Abounds in ''[[Tales of MU]]''.
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== [[Western Animation]] ==
* The title characters of ''[[The Powerpuff Girls]]'' frequently use their powers for other things when they're not fighting crime or monsters, such as cleaning their room.
* In one episode of ''[[Superman: The Animated Series]]'', Clark accidentally drops his pencil under his desk and, after making sure no one's looking, retrieves it by lifting the entire desk in the air. In another instance, he uses his heat vision that can melt any form of metal... to shave. [[Justified Trope|Justified]] given that his hair is probably stronger than any earth metal (''that's'' why he's always so well coiffed).
* Coop from ''[[Megas XLR]]'' abused his mecha's abilities at every possible opportunity, usually just for rather mundane things. And that's not counting all the times he's just showing off because he's bored.
** It's also continually subverted. Even though he's in a giant mech with enough firepower to destroy planets and can ''fly at interstellar speeds'', he still has to deal with things like traffic and annoying drivers. In one episode, Megas got ''towed''. Coop had to jump through all the hoops, including retaking the driver's exam, to get back a giant robot that could smite the world with the press of a button.
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* In ''[[Jackie Chan Adventures]]'', the Pig Talisman is found in Bavaria, where its Eye Beam power was used to melt chocolate.
** Jade often used the Talismans for normal problems, such as using the Rabbit Talisman to get to school on time.
* A crossover episode between ''[[Codename: Kids Next Door]]'' and ''[[The Grim Adventures of Billy
* In ''[[My Little Pony: Friendship Is Magic]],'' all unicorns can use their magic for simple telekinesis which effectively gives them an extra pair of hands. This is especially useful since ponies don't ''have'' hands. This makes tasks like turning pages, writing letters, and eating sandwiches much easier for them than they are for other ponies. Twilight Sparkle in particular [[Red Mage|can learn any magical spell]], and of course being the universe this is, a lot of what she has learned is mundane utility spells. That doesn't stop her from being a one-pony magical arsenal of destruction as well, though.
** Pegasi can also use their wings to be able to hold light things underarm. Rainbow Dash once held a ball with her wing this way.
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* [[Jem]]'s earrings are holographic projectors, they also function as flashlights in a pinch.
* In ''[[She-Ra and the Princesses of Power]]'', many of the Princesses use their powers frivolously. Glimmer is likely the worst offender, using her [[Teleport Spam]] to give Adora a quick tour of the guest room. Her ''own'' bedroom has a bed suspended by gilded chains from the ceiling, about fifteen feet off the floor, put there simply because she's so proud of her powers. Unfortunately, she quickly sees a downside of this when stress from the worsening crisis starts causing her powers to malfunction, and needs help simply to reach it.
* Inverted in one episode of ''[[The Smurfs]]''; Jokey Smurf usually uses his exploding presents to play jokes on the other Smurfs, but in one episode, when he and the others are trapped in a dungeon, he uses them to blast open the locked door that prevents their escape.
* ''[[He-Man and the Masters of the Universe]]''; Evil-Lynn seems rather fond of her helmet, because in "The Price of Deceit" (from the 2002 version) she uses her magic simply to recover it.
* ''[[The Owl House]]'' does this a lot. Emira and Edric use magic items called Concealment Stones to cover their acne, Eda brings vegetables to life so they'll cook themselves (it doesn't work), and there is practically ''nothing'' Amity cannot craft out of Abomination slime. And of course, there is Grudgby, a sport where players are allowed to use magic in various ways.
* In ''[[Little Demon]]'', Chrissy is supposed to be [[The Antichrist]] and help her father bring about [[Hell on Earth]], but she'd much rather use her evil powers to play pranks and have fun - like possessing people to make them act stupid, or stealing from vending machines at school (she is more than willing to share with the other students). Her mother does give her the [[You Could Have Used Your Powers for Good|You Could Try to Use Your Powers for Good]] speech, while warning her that such frivolous use of them could cause it to spread inside her and tempt her to evil - though also admitting she could make a good CEO as a adult. For now, it seems both the role of an Anti-Christ ''and'' that of [[Anti-Anti-Christ]] are both open to her.
* ''[[DC Super Hero Girls]]''; in "#HappyBirthdayZee", Zatara (Zee's father, and both a [[Stage Magician]] and her mentor in actual magic) uses his magic wand as a sparkling candle for his daughter's birthday cake. Good thing too, as he has to use it quickly when her zombified friends break in to chase after her.
* Ironically, this isn't used in ''[[Harley Quinn]]'' as much as one would expect (seeing as it is a [[Widget Series]] with [[DC Comics]] characters) but one example, [[Supergirl]] is an optometrist who uses her heat vision to perform [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/LASIK laser vision corrective surgery].
== Other Media ==
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** The same thing happens with off duty bus drivers, to buy lunch.
* Firefighters, police and ambulance drivers (especially the latter for obvious reasons) will often unabashedly clear gridlocks with their sirens. [[Double Standard|People are not half as amused]].
* Another (and more amusing) real-life example: reportedly, a few Russian soldiers
* In [[World War I]], water cooled machine guns were occasionally fired just so that the resulting hot water in their cooling jackets could be used to make cups of tea.
** A more recent example is soldiers doing their washing over a long offroad trip by putting dirty fatigues, water and soap flakes in a sealed container and stashing the whole thing in the back of their jeep. It was even used to advertise the vehicle at one point.
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*** Forty-five percent of the nuclear material used in the 104 nuclear power plants in the US comes from old Russian Nuclear weapons. The electricity produced from repurposed Russian nuclear missiles accounts for about five percent of the electricity generated in the US.
** Same goes for Geothermic power. When people hear this word, they tend to think of '''harnessing the powers of a volcano!''' When you really get down to it, it's more or less sticking a giant cooking pot low enough into the earth so that it produces steam. For all it's uses, Electricity is pretty mundane.
*
** The soldiers had been taught to think of the robot as a [[Companion Cube|team-member]], given that it worked to save their lives (and their superior officers wanted them to take care of it), so when they took a day off, they felt the robot needed to come too.
* What do you get when you take a captured Iraqi tank and stick a pair of jet engines on it? The world's most [[Awesome Yet Practical|awesome]] [http://www.darkroastedblend.com/2009/08/jet-engines-on-trucks-for-fun-and.html fire extinguisher].
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* Bayonets are often used for wire-cutting, opening cans, basically almost anything except impaling people which surprisingly has not been often done historically (usually when one side challenges a bayonet fight the other refuses; the fact that armor did not make a comeback in fashion until quite recently and one of the two sides was so battered by firepower that it's courage is knocked out affects that). Because of this recent bayonets have added features until they are really utility knives that incidentally can be fitted on a bayonet mount.
* The Prussians were the first in Europe to make proper use of troop trains. One use they got out of them was obscure but interesting. Because of them they could use reserve units in battle far away from home. This was important because until then [[New Meat|unseasoned troops]] wouldn't know how to carry their knapsacks and muskets and would be too tired to fight by the time they got to battle. By inserting them close to the front they could have a shorter march.
* The Soviet Tupolev Tu-22 had a reputation for being dangerous, unreliable, and difficult to fly, yet had volunteers line up for even the most arduous duties involving the craft. Why? Well, because being part of the crew let one join in on stealing the remaining coolant from its pilot air conditioning system after every flight and writing it off as expended. That mixture was valuable because it was essentially just ''drinkable alcohol'' (a mixture of 60% distilled water, and 40% pure alcohol, which couldn't be replaced with a toxic mixture because of danger to the pilot), [[Vodka Drunkenski|one of the most valuable commodities in Soviet times]].
{{reflist}}
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