I really hate to admit this, I’ve turned into a raging paranoic. I’ve blogged many times about fake and biased news and while it’s being addressed nationally these days, a lot of everyday folks love believing everything they read or hear. Today’s blog is a list of random nonsense being spoken of by good old ordinary Americans who obviously don’t know what the hell they’re talking about. It scares me a little because the more you tell a lie the more likely it is that some of the boneheads you’re telling believe it without question. I can’t do anything to stop that but I’ll certainly point out some strange shit that I’ve been seeing and hearing recently.
More than 1% of the US population is currently in jail. FALSE
Aspirin was originally invented to treat erectile dysfunction. FALSE
Left-handed people live an average of nine years longer than right-handed people. FALSE
Legendary children’s show host Mr. Rogers was once a Marine sniper with thousands of killed under his belt. FALSE
Despite being a common joke today, Robin never actually says Holy Cow (or Toledo)Batman during any episodes. FALSE
The planet Mercury is the hottest planet in the solar system. FALSE
If we removed every boat, ship, and submarine from the oceans, sea level would fall about 6 inches. FALSE
The popular online rumor suggests that hippopotamus milk is pink. FALSE
The word FUCK was once said over 1000 times in one movie. FALSE
Humans are the only animals on earth to perform oral sex on each other. FALSE
I thought today since its rather comfortable and cool I should leisurely look through my archives for a few dirty jokes to make you smile. We are expecting a rather nasty heat wave heading our way and I won’t be smiling much longer. Also, these are really just off-color jokes rather than the plain old filthy and dirty jokes I’ve posted previously.
A boy was walking down the street when he noticed his grandpa sitting on his porch in his favorite rocking chair with nothing on from the waist down. “Grandpa, what the hell are you doing?”, he asked. The old man looked off in the distance and didn’t answer him. “Grandpa, what are you doing sitting here naked below the waist?, he asked once again. The old man slowly looked at him and said, “Well, last week I sat out here with no shirt on, and I got a really stiff neck. This was your grandma’s idea.”
Q. What’s the difference between your wages and a penis? A. You don’t have to beg your girlfriend to blow your wages.
A wife went to see her therapist and said, “I’ve got a big problem, Doctor.” Every time we’re in bed and my husband has an orgasm, he lets out an earsplitting yell.” My dear, the shrink said, “that’s completely natural. I don’t see what the problem is.” The problem is dammit, it keeps waking me up.”
There are three girls, and their boyfriends who all have the same name. So in order to keep them from getting confused, they decided to give their boyfriends nicknames. The first stated, “I call my man Seven Up.” They asked her, “Why do you call your man that?” She says, “Because he has 7 inches and it’s always up.” They then asked the second girl what she calls her man. She says, “I call my man Mountain Dew.” Why on earth do you call him that?” She says, Because he likes to mount and do me.” They then asked the third girl the same question and she replied, “I like to call my man Jack Daniels.” They look at her in a puzzled way, Why do you call your man that? Jack Daniels is a hard liquor!” She stated emphatically, “EXACTLY!”
Games and gamers seen to be all the rage these days and I absolutely love it. I’ve been a computer gamer for more than twenty-five years and have enjoyed every minute of it. I became quite proficient at almost every gaming system I could find. This quiz will address everyone’s knowledge about games, so lets see how we do. The answers are listed below.
Which property represented as a railroad on the Monopoly gameboard was not actually a railroad?
What is the standard width of the bowling alley-gutters not included?
In what game do you find taws, bowlers, reelers, and monnies?
Fred Cox, former Minnesota Viking kicker, holds the patent on what athletic toy?
The popular board game did New Yorker Alfred Butta invent in 1931 and finally send to market in 1948?
What game featured ghosts named Inky, Blinky, Pinky and Clyde?
How many bills does each player gets at the beginning of a game of Monopoly?
How did the French game known as hazards come to be called craps in the United States?
Where were the first outdoor miniature golf courses in the United States built?
In what sport is a battledore used?
ANSWERS
Short Line. It was really a bus company, 41 1/2 inches, Marbles, The Nerf ball, Scrabble, Pac-Man, 27, The game was introduced in New Orleans in 1813 by a Creole man named Johnny Crapaud and it later became known as “Craps”, On rooftops in New York City in 1926, In badminton, it’s the racket used to hit the shuttlecock.
As a rule I try to keep the people in my life unnamed in this blog. I’ve had a few family members get upset in the early days and after the bitching and complaining was over I set a new policy. No family members names or photographs will ever be used. I’ve managed to follow that policy religiously for years until today. I appreciate poetry and try to experience as much of it as I can from a variety of poets. Today I’m going to reproduce a letter written by Kahlil Gibran from his collection of love letters. It is titled “To Mary”. It touched me deeply. I hope you enjoy it.
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I love the valley in winter, Mary, when we sit by the fire, with the fragrance of burnt evergreen cypress filling the house and snow falling outside, the wind blowing [it], the ice-lamps hanging outside the window-panes, and the distant sound of the river and the voice of the white storm uniting in our ears.
But if my little loved-one were not near me there would be no valley, no snow, no fragrance of cypress bough, no crystal lamps of ice, no river song, no awe inspiring storm . . . Let all these things vanish if my blessed little one be far from them and from me.
I’m happy to share this little bit of emotion from a superb writer.
The heatwave continues making all of us suffer for another week with no end in sight. I’m recuperating from recent cataract surgery and I’m somewhat limited to certain activities. Fortunately, writing the blog and working on my paintings has been approved without consequences. I thought today we’d have a little trivia test on the early years of cinema. As always the answers will be listed below.
For what two films did Elizabeth Taylor win best actress Oscars?
What American actress once described herself as “pure as the driven slush”?
Who was Gene Kelly’s unusual dancing partner in the imaginative 1945 film, Anchors Away?
Whose lengthy Oscar acceptance speech prompted the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences to set a time limit for later award ceremonies?
In the 1968 film 2001: A Space Odyssey, what song did HAL, the computer, learn to sing?
What was the movie mogul Samuel Goldwyn’s real name?
In what film did the star *proposed by saying, “Marry me and I’ll never look at another horse”?
What film star won a special Oscar as “the most outstanding personality of 1934”?
Or which Alfred Hitchcock film did artist Salvador Dali designed the graphics?
Who did Fred Astaire name as his favorite dance partner?
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The Answers
Butterfield 8 and Who’s Afraid of Virginia Woolf, Tallulah Bankhead, Jerry the animated mouse from the cartoon show, Greer Garson who spent 5 1/2 min. at the 1943 ceremonies for the film, were Mrs. Miniver, A Bicycle Built For Two, Samuel Goldfish, A Day at the Races with Groucho Marx, Shirley Temple, Spellbound in 1945, Gene Kelly.
It’s another gray and rainy day here in Maine which always gives me a terrible case of the blahs. So, this is the perfect day for me to return to my easel and complete some art projects that I’ve had going on for some weeks now. I can just relax and get into “the zone” while working on these projects which helps me forget what a really crappy day it is. With that thought in mind, I dug into my archives of old limericks for a selection dated in the late 1960’s and early 1970’s. Maybe one or more of them will make you smile a bit, who knows? For the most part they are rated PG.
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A virgin emerged from her bath In a state of righteous wrath, For she had been deflowered When she bent as she showered, And the handle was right in the path.
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A born again Christian named Claire Was having her first love affair. As she climbed into bed She reverently said, “I wish to be opened with prayer.”
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A penny-less colleague named Cy, Remark to a lass passing by, “I’ve never adjusted To being flat busted.” Said she, with a sigh, “Nor have I.”
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There was a young fellow named Dice Who remarked, ‘They say bigamy’s nice. Even two is a bore I prefer three or four, For the plural of spouse, it is spice.”
I thought I’d try something a little different today. I usually have lists of trivia facts about all sorts of topics and at times they can be interesting, funny, and every so often downright weird. Today’s trivia is a little more on the darker side but still interesting. Here are ten bits of trivia that’ll make you think and possibly shudder a little.
Howard Hughes at times wore empty tissue boxes as shoes. He also blew his nose in his socks.
Napoleon Bonaparte was afraid of cats, but he wasn’t alone: other ailurophobe’s included Adolf Hitler, Benito Mussolini, and Julius Caesar.
Actress Cybill Shepherd dated Elvis Presley in the early 1970s and once hinted on the Oprah Winfrey show that she had to teach the singer how to perform cunnilingus.
And here are two Osbourne family tidbits. Kelly Osbourne once expressed interest in posing nude for Playboy, but said that her breasts would need “some airbrushing.” Playboy founder Hugh Hefner later replied, “We don’t airbrush to that extent.”
Sharon Osbourne, wife of the late great Ozzy Osbourne, once admitted to sending her own excrement wrapped in Tiffany boxes to several people who criticized her family. When a journalist criticized her teenage children, Jack and Kelly, Ms. Osborne sent a box of excrement with a note that read, “I heard you got an eating disorder. Eat this.“
After his death in 1955, Elbert Einstein’s brain was removed and kept in a jar by Thomas Stoltz Harvey, the pathologist who conducted Einstein’s autopsy. Harvey was later fired from his job at Princeton Hospital for refusing to relinquish the organ.
Once upon a time an Italian stripper suffocated to death after waiting an hour to jump out of a sealed cake at a bachelor party.
The Cannibal Killer, Dorangel Vargas, The Hannibal Lector of the Andes, told the press that he preferred the taste of men to women, and never ate hands, feet, or testicles. “I have standards, you know”, said Vargas.
The FBI estimates that more than half a million pedophiles are online every day.
Television remote controls are the worst carriers of bacteria in hospital rooms; they spread antibiotic resistant Staphylococcus, which contributes to the 90,000 annual deaths from infection acquired in hospitals.
Today is a good day for a little innocent and harmless pop culture trivia. Whenever I find something odd or strange that catches my interest I make note of it and today is the day that I’m going to publish some of those notes. Some are interesting and some not so much. You decide.
Although Sean Connery played Harrison Ford’s father in Indiana Jones and the Last Crusade, Connery is just 12 years older than Ford.
Among the actors who auditioned for the Han Solo role in the original Star Wars were Kurt Russell, Robert Englund, and even Sylvester Stallone.
The state of Maine is really a popular state for fictional murders. It has been used as the setting for a surprising number of mysteries and thrillers by Stephen King.
According to legend, hard rocking band Alice Cooper chose their name after using a Ouija board to communicate with a spirit named Alice Cooper.
Yoda from Star Wars, the cookie monster from Sesame Street, and Miss Piggy from the Muppet Show were all voiced by the same person, Frank Oz.
Sir Paul McCartney once released an album under the name Thrills Thrillington.
Sean Connery turned down the role of Gandalf in the Lord of the Rings because he didn’t understand the script.
In the Wizard of Oz movie, the dog playing Toto was paid an actual salary of $125 a week. Ironically this was more money than many of the film actors were paid.
The first interracial kiss in television history happened on Star Trek.
And last but not least . . . .
Actor Nicolas Cage was named after the comic book hero Luke Cage. Oddly enough my youngest grandson was named Cage after Nicolas Cage.
I’ve spend a great deal of my life investigating matters which required me to become well versed in verbal gymnastics by people who were skilled in the art of lying. I’ve interviewed and interrogated thousands of individuals, suspects, criminals of all types, and just plain evil people. Many were well skilled at lying and confusing the facts and had to be verbally dissected by me to get at the truth. I actually had a company send me to a school in Chicago where I was thoroughly trained to become a human polygraph. Learning body language and advanced interrogation techniques helped me immensely in identifying and dealing with those sneaking folks who used more silent and damaging techniques through the use of rumor and innuendo. I met and was constantly challenged by some truly smart but dishonest and dangerous people. Was I always successful? No! To this day I still look back on some that got away and it still angers me.
Years ago I stumbled upon a book that I later came to cherish. It was written in the 1960’s and was titled The Gentle Art of Verbal Self Defense compiled by Suzette Haden Elgin. She published an excellent book that organized and defined the subject of verbal abuse. She explained how to identify verbal attacks and how to defend against them. This post will contain a number of quotes from that book that may help us all to better understand the problem and the possible defenses against it.
The Four Basic Principals
Know that you are under attack.
Know what kind of attack you are facing.
Know how to make your defense fit the attack.
Know how to follow through.
There is a well know therapist, Virginia Satir who in her books has developed a set of terms for common verbal behaviors. These five patterns are called the Five Satir Modes and identify the types of people to look out for. It’s much easier to defend yourself if you can identify the type of person who is creating your difficulties.
Five Satir Identifiers
The Placater
The Placater is frightened that other people will become angry, will go away, and never come back.
The Blamer
The Blamer feels that nobody cares about him/her, that there is no respect or affection for him/her and that people are indifferent to his/her needs and feelings.
The Computer
The Computer is analytical. He/she is terrified that someone will find out what his/her feelings really are. If possible the Computer will give the impression that he/she has no feelings whatsoever.
The Distracter
The Distrater is a tricky one to keep up with, because her/she does not hold to any of the other previous patterns. He/she cycles rapidly between modes, with an underlying feeling of panic with surface behavior being a chaotic mix.
The Leveler
The true Leveler does just what the name implies; this person levels with you. A phony Leveler, however, is more dangerous than all the other categories combined, and hard to spot. If you assume you are discussing the genuine article, what the Leveler is actually saying is only what he/she is feeling.
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Needless to say this is just a bare-bones summary of what could always be a difficult and dangerous situation. Maybe it will help.
I’m quite the fan of word games, puns, and almost anything related to the written or spoken word. The English language is a real minefield for immigrants to navigate and truthfully it’s just as tough for some of us home grown types. Todays quiz will test your knowledge of our language with trivia on words and phrases and how they came to be. As always the answers will be listed below.
What is the measurement of “one foot’ based on?
Who invented word “carport”?
What ails you if your suffering from a bilateral preorbital hematoma?
What are you afraid of if you have ergophobia?
In Japan, what automobile part is known as a bakkumira?
What is poliosis?
What is the chief symptom of someone suffering from oniomania?
What is the origin of the word hoax?
What does Iwo Jima mean in Japanese?
How did the common airgun become known as a BB gun?
How did “bloomers”, ladies pantaloons, get their name?
Answers
One third of the length of King Henry I’s arm, Frank Lloyd Wright, A black eye, Work, A rearview mirror, Graying of the hair, Uncontrollable urge to buy things, Its a contraction from hocus pocus, Sulfur Island, From it’s Ball Bearing ammunition, From suffragette Amelia Bloomer.
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