The space race pacesetter and general trailblazer has been flogging $500 flamethrowers on his website – but guns that shoot fire may not be as legal as he seems to think

Name: Flamethrowers.

Age: Brand new! New cool thing! Cool! New!

Appearance: Stormtrooper’s Nerf gun.

Flamethrowers? Is this a new name for extreme Brexiters? Or radical remoaners? No. It’s the name for flamethrowers. Inventor Elon Musk claims his Boring Company just sold 10,000 of them in 48 hours.

Why? Because he can.

But why? Because he promised he would start if his company sold 50,000 baseball caps emblazoned with the logo of the company he started last year.

And it did? Yes. 50,000 people parted with $20 and lo, the Elon Musk Boring Company Flamethrower went on sale, at $500 (£354) a pop.

So – he’s made $1m from the caps and $5m so far from ... flamethrowers? Chump change to the gazillionaire tech mogul, who will earn a $55bn bonus if his electric car company, Tesla, increases its market valuation tenfold in the next decade.

I feel I still haven’t had a fully satisfactory answer to the question of why Elon Musk is selling a flamethrower? He says they are guaranteed to liven up any party. A post on Instagram has him running towards the camera with one alight, saying: “I want to be clear that a flamethrower is a super-terrible idea. Definitely don’t buy one. Unless you like fun.”

But – and correct me if I’m wrong – aren’t flamethrowers just ... guns that shoot fire? Aren’t there laws against this sort of thing? In the land of the free, not only does a man have a right to bear arms, but he also has a right to bear ones that shoot fire up to a distance of 10ft. Or so Musk reckons.

I really have to have words with the US. Take heart. The Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives has disavowed Musk’s claim that they are “A-OK” with his new product – saying they don’t even regulate flamethrowers – and a state legislator in California, home of Boring Company’s HQ, says he plans to block their sale.

Will that work? Depends. Musk may just buy California and turn it into one big laboratory.

Driverless cars dodging robots and flames in a race to the space ladder to Mars? It’s basically Musk’s world now. We just live in it. And besides – have you got any better, more visionary ideas? Have you? Have you?

Do say: “Got any change, sir?”

Don’t say: “Elon Musk? Is that an anagram or a new Lynx fragrance?”