balloon vs softball

balloon

noun
  • An inflatable buoyant object, often (but not necessarily) round and flexible. 

  • Such an object designed to transport people or equipment through the air. 

  • A bomb or shell. 

  • The outline enclosing words represented as coming from the mouth of a pictured figure. 

  • A round vessel, usually with a short neck, to hold or receive whatever is distilled; a glass vessel of a spherical form. 

  • A type of glass cup, sometimes used for brandy. 

  • A woman's breast. 

  • A small container for illicit drugs made from a condom or the finger of a latex glove, etc. 

  • A speech bubble. 

  • Synonym of balloon payment 

  • Such an object as a child’s toy or party decoration. 

  • A sac inserted into part of the body for therapeutic reasons; such as angioplasty. 

  • A ball or globe on the top of a pillar, church, etc. 

verb
  • Of an aircraft: to plunge alternately up and down. 

  • To go up or voyage in a balloon. 

  • To inflate like a balloon. 

  • To strike (a ball) so that it flies high in the air. 

  • To take up in, or as if in, a balloon. 

  • To increase or expand rapidly. 

softball

noun
  • A game similar to baseball but played with a larger and softer ball which can be thrown overhand or underhand. 

  • A question designed to be easy to answer. 

  • The ball used to play the sport. 

How often have the words balloon and softball occurred in a corpus of books? (source: Google Ngram Viewer )