Winners! Round 1 - Grand Prize and Short List

Grand Prize ! A Rustic Wooden Mallet was in the box -

WINNER @arnied: I am guessing there is an "opinion" inside the box due to the clue about the weight being on one side and not shifting. (Oh, how to list all the ways an opinion is like this mallet. You should have your own, if you use it right it will echo, sometimes you should keep it to yourself and not go hitting people over the head with it even if that is tempting, it can be useful and even persuasive, dangerous in the wrong hands, as old as civilization and essential to an ordered life. You should be careful with whom you are sharing either your opinion or your mallet, when times are dangerous.)

Short List for the Grand Prize:

@toddadamson: Jesus bait. (This is a tricky explanation to formulate. Given that a mallet is a primitive kind of hammer, and that Jesus was crucified, there is a connection between mallets and Jesus. One could further argue that much of Jesus’s purpose on earth was to live as a man and to die for all men, and that therefore anything connected with Jesus’s execution could be considered a goal for Jesus, or “Jesus bait.”)

@ereuben: Joystick (Like some of the other guesses, a joystick is a tool for getting things done in a specialized way. However, you don't really get that same sense of heft and possible smashing. Joysticks can be violent – steering missiles or controlling little guys in violent video games, but mallets just aren't digital.)

@jshelly: laptop (I wonder if he or she subscribes to the "wish for something you want" school of gwiitb guessing. A laptop is a tool for getting things done in a specialized way, as is a mallet, and it is also something that might be satisfying to smash somebody over the head with. However, without some further indication of the nature of the laptop guessed, I cannot judge it a winning guess in this round.)

@d_g_: An afternoon of potential fun for the whole family. (It seems likely there are at least a few families out there that could have fun for a whole afternoon all together with this mallet: staking out new landscaping, smashing balsa-wood props, tormenting bound victims, or such-like.)

@AndrewGent: My guess: inflatable bop bag (deflated, with weighted end at one end of the box). (The connection between an inflatable bop bag and a mallet falls in the general category of hitting things and stress relief. A nicely detailed guess, but it can't edge out the winner.)

@The_No_Show: My guess: The box contains the hopes and dreams of a generation. (I could make a very good argument for this guess being the winner. If a particular generation had been specified, that might have clinched it. Certain generations have had hopes and dreams that could impose themselves with sheer bludgeoning force while retaining a decorative charm similar to the cute lathe-work on this mallet.)