There’s a diner in West LA called “Café 50’s.” It’s a very cool retro eatery plastered with posters and memorabilia from the last time we hated Russia. They also hand out a monthly newsletter that has fun trivia and reprints old ads from the era. (Buy a GIANT TALKING CLOWN for only $1 that’s a whopping 42” tall!)
One feature they have is “Interesting & Useless Facts!”
And they are, except who knows if they’re accurate? But, for fun purposes, I thought I’d share some of them with you. You are welcome to take them at face value or do the fact-checking yourself. The parentheticals are me.
Men get hiccups more often than women. (does this have anything to do with drinking?)
Men can read smaller print than women; women can hear better.
Chances that an American lives within 50 miles where he/she grew up: 1 in 2. (numbers probably vary in Hawaii)
State with the highest percentage of people who walk to work: Alaska. (Makes sense, the weather is always great.)
Percentage of American men who say they would marry the same woman if they had to do it all over again: 80. (My wife guessed 30.)
Chances that a burglary in the US will be solved: 1 in 7.(And it's probably the same idiot multiple times.)
Only first lady to carry a loaded revolver: Eleanor Roosevelt. (Melania is not allowed because she’s on suicide watch.)
Iceland consumes more Coca-Cola per capita than any other nation. (There are rednecks in Iceland?)
The phone book in Iceland is alphabetic… by first name.
In the Caribbean there are oysters that can climb trees. (usually right before Happy Hour)
And there you have ‘em. Feel free to impress your friends at parties, unless these nuggets are all bullshit, in which case – what are you quoting a stupid blog for in the first place?
According to the Poughkeepsie Journal, Eleanor Roosevelt was indeed a pistol packing First Lady -
ReplyDeletehttps://www.poughkeepsiejournal.com/story/news/2015/07/12/eleanor-roosevelt-gun-owner/29953377/
I just saw Yesterday, so I must ask: What is Coca-Cola?
ReplyDeleteCan only comment on the Iceland ones, having been there quite a few times...
ReplyDeleteRednecks? Yes, but the coke consumption might also have something to do with the cost of alcohol in Iceland. It is expensive.
The phone book? True. But they have quite a small population and their naming tradition is that your surname is based on your father's name, rather than a family name - so your dad's name was Thor, your surname's usually be Thorsson or Thorsdottir.
I would quote a stupid blog but instead I quote yours, Ken.
ReplyDeleteI saw the square watermelons on the Simpsons episode when they go to Japan. Never knew it was a real thing.
ReplyDeleteCurious if you are familiar with a 1995 Designing Women spinoff called “Women of The House?” (Currently on Amazon Prime). A political setting, featuring the character of Suzanne Sugarbaker. Episode 2 is entitled, ‘Who’s sleeping in Lincoln’s bed.” (If you enjoy the character of Suzanne, there are some hilarious moments.) Jamie Farr plays himself in a brief cameo and dresses in drag as Klinger. Teri Garr’s character, as it pertains to Farr’s visit, expresses what a great show MASH was, including the great writing and acting. What a nice tribute. Upon further “googling” I realized that Linda Bloodworth-Thomason also wrote for MASH, hence the joke. Anyhoo, maybe it was really a nice tribute to all involved.
ReplyDeleteKen, here's something right in your territory -- 84 minutes of LA Top 40 radio from Oct. 16, 1965 (a Saturday), courtesy of someone's tape recorder. It begins with a few minutes of KFWB, then shifts to KHJ (five months into its Bill Drake "Boss Radio" format that would dominate the market) and concludes with Bob Eubanks at KRLA. And the music! Some Beatles, of course, including the brilliant B-side "I'm Down"; soul, both Motown and southern (over the course of the tape, Otis Redding's "Respect" is heard twice!) and vintage commercials. The Byrds, with live dates on the Sunset Strip, were to appear Monday in the record department of a local department store, and there's a spot for the then-popular menswear brand h.i.s. (ads I, as a 10-year-old, recall hearing late at night on the other side of the country at New York's WABC). On the news, we learn there already were anti-war rallies over Vietnam; at one held in Berkeley, protesters were attacked by members of Hell's Angels. A fascinating aural snapshot for both anyone around at the time and others who hadn't yet arrived but curious about what America was like in this transitional year.
ReplyDeletehttps://pastdaily.com/2015/10/16/if-you-were-a-teenager-and-you-lived-in-l-a-october-16-1965-sounded-like-this/
Back in the days when I used to drink Apple Snapple (it was my Grape Nehi), I would collect the bottle caps for the "Real Facts" on the insides of them, eventually filling up two cigar boxes with them; I forget exactly, but I think I've got like 180 something bottle caps I collected over the course of nearly five years (and that's not counting doubles I discards).
ReplyDeleteUnfortunately, in 2009, Snapple started using different ingredients, and I couldn't drink the stuff anymore: it was like it went from tasting like actually biting into a fresh apple (as they still claim in their advertising) to tasting like apple-flavored Jolly Rancher (horrid stuff). But what makes me really mad was back when I drank the stuff, Apple Snapple was very hard to find, usually Walmart was the only place that had it, and I'd have to hoard the stuff because of it . . . fast-forward to today, you can find it almost everywhere - even in cases, and large-sized bottles (stuff I used to dream about).
I was at Cafe 50s Friday and as soon as I sat down the waitress asked me if I wanted the same order I'd had last time. I said I had no wish to experiment and she brought me exactly what I had in mind. Let's see McDonald's top that.
ReplyDeleteThere's conflicting data when you google for global per capita Coca-Cola consumption. Some results do say Iceland but the majority say Mexico. In terms of overall soda consumption, Argentina ranks top.
ReplyDeleteThe Iceland thing is quite plausible because they don't use last names
ReplyDeletebut just first names and patronymics. If you run across a woman who
uses "Martinsdottir" as a last name, for example, she is probably Icelandic
and has a father named Martin.
Iceland is old school Scandinavian. They still use the old namimg conventions where the child's surname is the father's first name plus son or daughter. Their World Cup soccer team lineup was Magnusson, Ingason, Arnason, and so on and so on. Plus the Icelandic language is downright medieval- it hasn't changed too much from Leif Erickson's time, and other Scandinavians find it a very difficult language to learn.
ReplyDeleteAbout small print ....
ReplyDeleteAbout 30-40 years ago, the family optometrist told my mother that women need glasses before men do. She said, "You're a sexist pig." He replied, "Well, I am, but that's not why I say that." She said, "Prove it." He told her to put her arm out in front of her. She did. He leaned right over her shoulder and put his arm out. He was bigger, as men on average are, and his arm went out farther. He laughed and said, "Women can't hold the book out as far as men can, so they need glasses sooner."
1. While you don't need compliments from anonymous jerks, that was a good run of jokes.
ReplyDelete2. Hiccups can be subdued if the sufferer swallows a dry teaspoon of sugar- or, I guess, something equally granular and edible
"Men can read smaller print than women; women can hear better"
ReplyDeleteI have hyper-sensitive hearing (musician here) and have had perfect pitch since age 13. My wife has astigmatism and sometimes has difficulty making things out, yet is a talented photographer and computer scientist. Weird how these things shake out sometimes.
"Percentage of American men who say they would marry the same woman if they had to do it all over again: 80"
I think the operative word here is "say". I kid, because I totally would mean it.
Iceland, as far as I know, is the only modern nation to hold onto the traditional patronymic system that was common across northern Europe for centuries. Even Björk Guðmundsdóttir is down wid it.
ReplyDeleteAs an academic librarian, one of the first places I go to factcheck is Snopes. ANd, as it turns out, the Japanese do have square watermelons: https://www.snopes.com/fact-check/square-watermelon/
ReplyDeleteAbout fact checking and reality.
ReplyDelete1) On recent streaming movie/show I saw they had a cop fire at a newer sedan speeding away. They showed a "spark" where the bullet supposedly hit the bumper. All the bumpers these days are rubber, foam, plastic combinations what would cause a spark? petty but irritating.
2) As for facts that are weird. In the '80's the place that supposedly sold more Budweiser per capita was Chu'uck ( Truk) state of the FSM. At the time the law in Chu'uck was that it was illegal to drink alcohol but it was OK to buy it and own it. Same type of thing with Singapore having the lowest warrnty claims on Johnson outboards as any where in the world. Most of those outboards were smuggled into Indonesia in an (illegal) trade for shrimp and fish from government owned fishing vessels.
Ps Singapores "recorded" catch of shrimp and fish in those years also jumped dramatically.
Rednecks drink Coke? I would've guessed Mountain Dew or Pepsi.
ReplyDeleteBjörk Guðmundsdóttir ia Icelandic.
ReplyDeleteIceland is extremely protective of its language as well as its naming conventions. Recall reading an article about how, rather than adopt foreign words for new technologies and concepts, official authorities would find some archaic Icelandic word that might be allegorically linked. For monitor (as in computer component), the official translation was a word that once described a certain kind of window on a hut.
ReplyDeleteWell, according to Wild Singapore (my favorite kind of Singapore, by the way), "Tree oysters belong to the Family Pteriidae. They were previously in Family Isognomonidae. They are NOT true oysters which belong to Family Ostreidae." Now that we have cleared that up, they are found on the roots of the mangrove trees, which probably does not require much climbing on their part.
ReplyDeleteBoth Herbert Hoover and his wife Lou carried loaded handguns in 1932, when the Bonus Marchers terrified everyone in official Washington. No war, just a lot of hungry, desperate veterans and their families. Eventually Hoover sent troops (led by Douglas MacArthur) to burn their few possessions and run them out of town.
ReplyDeleteRed Necks drink RC Cola, not Coke...or Big Red. The only place I have seen Big Red outside of the South is Southern California. My assumption is that a market developed for Big Red and RD in Southern California because of all the people from Texas and Arkansas who moved there to work in defense industry factories during WWII. After the war, their kids and grandkids kept the market going.
ReplyDeleteAs someone who used to live in Japan, I can tell you it's a good bet that any weird fact you hear about Japan is usually true.
ReplyDeleteThey have square melons. And it's also possible to pay over 100 dollars for a regular cantaloupe. Usually just because they're pretty. I'm sure they taste good but no melon tastes that good. They're meant to be gifts for people who want to show off and come in fancy gift boxes.
Melania on suicide watch? Gosh, I hope not. If she's that unhappy (understandable), maybe she'd be better to "go back to where she came from" (can't stand the bull?) instead.
ReplyDelete1. There’s something grimly amusing about Hoover- the last Republican President standing after their Depression-causing decade of thievery (Teapot Dome) and lack of regulations- packing heat, with his wife riding shotgun. More unsettling is the thought that if the Crash had fallen in 1932, instead of 1929, FDR would’ve been soon enough taking the unearned blame just as Obama was for the GOP lack of regulations Depression of 2008.
ReplyDelete2. If I recall correctly, in one of his two highly amusing memoirs, editor/director Robert Parrish tells the WWII story of MacArthur, ever the man of the people, using soldier-intended space on an evacuating ship for his furniture. Please correct me if I have the wrong source.
@ buttermilk sky
ReplyDeleteActually dugout doug was flagrently disobeying orders from hoover to not use force across the bridge ( where the Bonus Marchers camp was0 but he couldn't resist using tanks and troops against unarmed veterans and their families.
Hence why this incompetent publicity hound is such a hero to thuglicans.
Hoover felt politically he couldn't reprimand corncob doug becuse of support from press and the party for murderous actions.
Amusing. Of course, they are from the 50s, and were probably more true, or more apt to be believed, at the time.
ReplyDeleteRe Melania, no pity from me. She knew what she wanted; and the price was one she was willing to pay. She can always follow advice and go back where she came from if necessary.
Btw, saw Yesterday and liked it a lot, so thanks for the recommendation. It was fun and refreshing. Didn't have a problem with Kate McKinnon's character because I think there was a point to that portrayal - the hard and fake world of fame.
For years, The Hollywood Squares used 'Factoids' such as these as questions, usually in True Or False form.
ReplyDeleteThe suits at NBC always insisted that the sources for all such questions have some form of verification, which the writing staff diligently provided.
Thing was, they went through an ungodly number of factoids as the years went by; often, the question source cited was WMIU.
When the Suits asked what that meant, they eventually received this explanation:
WE MADE IT UP.
Something to think about …
The word "factoid" in fact refers to an inaccurate piece of information, not a trivial but correct one.
DeleteMy mother is becoming deaf as a haddock...
ReplyDelete.
ReplyDelete"The phone book in Iceland is alphabetic… by first name."
Can somebody PLEASE explain when, why, and how this became a "thing" here in America too, for any big lists that include both the first and last names of people?
Who, in their right mind, would think this is a GOOD idea ?? But even MORE important, WHY is this now becoming the norm.....if it hasn't already ??
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