Noise. You don’t eat it, but something that’s too loud can actually kill you. A noise of more than 200 decibels heard up close produces enough air pressure to create a fatal arterial blockage—or embolism—in the brain. (The loudest sound ever recorded: a NASA Saturn V rocket. It reached 204 decibels.)
VOTING FOR DUMMIES
In 1993 the City of San Francisco voted on a ballot measure over whether or not a city police officer named Bob Geary would be allowed to take his ventriloquist dummy, “Brendan O’Smarty,” on his patrol. By a squeaker of a 51 to 49 percent vote, Geary won the right to carry his doll around.
Sorry, but it’s the law: In 2009 the Canadian government passed the Apology Act, which states that an apology is not an admission of guilt.
“IT’S A SITUATIONSHIP”
More social media dating terms to help the newly single turn their leads into accounts without getting ghosted.
Sliding into DMs: Moving from public social media posts, which everyone can see, to direct messages, which are private and (hopefully) more intimate.
Stashing: When someone dates you but doesn’t introduce you to their friends or family, or post about you on social media.
Tinstagramming: When you see someone on Tinder and you’re not a match, so you contact them through their Instagram account instead.
Deep liking: Scrolling back months or even years to click “like” on someone’s old posts to impress them.
Leads and accounts: Inspired by sales and marketing terms. “Leads” are people you hope to date, and “accounts” are people you’ve already scheduled dates with.
Textlationship: A relationship that never moves beyond the texting stage.
Situationship: A relationship that’s more than a friendship…but less than a relationship.
DTR conversation: What you have when you’ve been seeing someone long enough to “define the relationship.” Are you officially a couple, or something else?
FBO: If your DTR conversation goes well, you can update your online status and make it “Facebook Official.”
Ghosting: Disappearing from someone’s life by not responding to their texts and calls.
Slow fade: A gradual form of ghosting.
Ghostbusting: Continuing to text or message someone who’s ghosting you.
Haunting/zombie-ing/submarining: When someone you were seeing disappears out of your life, only to suddenly return “from the dead” and pretend that there’s nothing out of the ordinary going on.
Breadcrumbing: When someone seems to be pursuing you, but things never move forward. They’re just leaving an occasional online breadcrumb to keep you from moving on.
Roaching: Hiding from a new love interest the fact that you’re still seeing other people. (If they catch you with one of your cockroaches, they can assume there are others.)
Code 143: When someone you’ve started dating moves too quickly to the “I love you” stage. (The digits represent the number of letters in each word.)
IRL: When you move past online communicating to dating “in real life.”
DFMO: Dance floor makeout (self-explanatory).
Talking: When you’re dating someone but not ready to admit it. (“We’re just talking.”)
Hang up! There is 18 times more bacteria on your smartphone than on a toilet handle.
ODD-TIME RADIO
Television doesn’t have a monopoly on bizarre premises. My Mother the Car? The Six Million Dollar Man? Charlie’s Angels? Before there was TV, there were old-time radio shows with concepts that were just as weird as anything television had to offer…if not weirder.
It Pays to Be Ignorant (1942–1951)
Game shows on the radio—which set the style and standard for TV game shows—were so entrenched and familiar by 1942 that this game show parody became a huge (and long-running) hit. Spoofing highbrow, academic games of the era, such as Information Please and Doctor I.Q., the show’s panel of comedians aimed to give the funniest answer possible to the common knowledge questions posed. For example, quizmaster Tom Howard might ask, “Do married people live longer than those that don’t marry?” and a panelist would answer, “No, but it seems longer.”
Yours Truly, Johnny Dollar (1949–1962)
Private investigator stories have thrilled and delighted audiences over various media: books, movies, television, and radio. When Yours Truly, Johnny Dollar premiered, it was about a hard-boiled P.I. named Johnny Dollar (played by Charles Russell). That show ran for almost six years, but in 1954, it went off the air for a few months and then returned as a show about…an insurance investigator. That’s a decidedly less exciting premise, but the show’s announcer did his best to drum up audience interest, boasting of Johnny Dollar’s “action-packed expense account.” What’s even more odd: the Yours Truly, Johnny Dollar reboot ran for another eight years and is considered by old-time radio enthusiasts to be a classic series.
Life with Luigi (1948–1953)
This CBS Radio series will probably never be rebooted as a TV series. Reason: it is “politically incorrect,” and that’s putting it lightly. This sitcom was about a recently arrived immigrant from Italy named Luigi Basco, and the night school citizenship classes he attended with other people who had just arrived in Chicago from around the world. Every character spoke in the broad, stereotypical accent of their home nation. (Luigi, for example, “talked a-like a-this.”) When he wasn’t in school, Luigi had to delicately fight off attempts by his citizenship sponsor Pasquale to get Luigi to marry his daughter—whom Luigi was not interested in because she was overweight. Another slap at Italian Americans: Luigi was played by Irish American character actor J. Carrol Naish. (Pasquale was played by Alan Reed, who later became the voice of Fred Flintstone.)
A cluster of bananas is called a hand. (It kind of looks like one.)
The Whisperer (1951)
A lawyer named Philip Gault (played by Carleton G. Young) decides to take down “the Syndicate,” an organized crime ring that terrorizes his hometown of Central City. He poses as a gangster and destroys the Syndicate from the inside…even though he can only speak in a whisper due to an old college football injury.
The Gibson Family / Uncle Charlie’s Tent Show (1934–1935)
For the first nine months of its life, The Gibson Family was a very ambitious soap opera about a musically talented family—parents Bob and Dot Gibson, daughter Sally Gibson, and their butler (named Awful). Each episode included a few original songs written for the show. But it wasn’t a hit, so NBC tried to save it by revamping it as Uncle Charlie’s Tent Show. Under the new format (which only lasted three months), a character named Uncle Charlie befriended the Gibsons in order to take them on a theatrical tour. But then, most of the Gibsons disappeared and the show became a variety series set inside a touring tent.
The Bickersons (1946–1951)
It starred Don Ameche and Frances Langford as a married couple actually named John and Blanche Bickerson. Their unusual name was the entire plot of the show: most of every episode consisted of the couple loudly (and hilariously) arguing—and often about the same things they were arguing about in the previous episode.
Crime Doctor (1940–1947)
The plot: A petty thug criminal named Benjamin Ordway (played by Ray Collins) got knocked on the head and suffered from that old fictional plot device of “amnesia.” He later recovered and renounced his criminal ways…and then became a psychiatrist. Using his firsthand and academic knowledge of “the criminal mind,” he served on a parole board and helped police solve crimes. Two years into the show’s run, producers added in a new element. Instead of the parole board determining the fates of the criminals, Dr. Ordway would consult with a “jury,” made up of members of the studio audience.
Various Edgar Bergen shows (1937–1956)
Bergen was one of the most popular and enduring stars of the Golden Age of Radio, one half of two “comedy teams” with Mortimer Snerd and Charlie McCarthy. It should be noted that both of those partners were d
ummies. Yes—Bergen carved out a successful career as a ventriloquist, voicing and operating puppets without moving his lips…on the radio, where nobody could see whether his lips were moving.
Zookeepers get panda breeding pairs “in the mood” by showing them videos of other pandas mating.
TURN LEFT ON UGLEY
We recently sent a scout on a tour of the UK and Ireland to find the naughtiest street and village names. We were certain he made these up…but they’re all real.
East Breast
Greenock, Scotland
Pratt’s Bottom
Orpington, England
No Place
Durham, England
Toot Hill Butts
Oxford, England
Effin
Limerick, Ireland
Gravelly Bottom Road
Kent, England
Bonar Bridge
Ardgay, Scotland
Matching Tye
Harlow, England
Kilmacow
Kilkenny, Ireland
Blubberhouses
Otley, England
Crapstone
Devon, England
Horney Common
Uckfield, England
Scratchy Bottom
Dorset, England
Catbrain Lane
Bristol, England
Ballinamallard
Fermanagh, Ireland
Brokenwind
Aberdeenshire, England
Crazies Hill
Reading, England
Bladda Lane
Paisley, Scotland
Great Snoring
Fakenham, England
Butt of Lewis
Western Isles, Scotland
Beer Beach
Seaton, England
Nut Tree Close
Orpington, England
Stepaside
Dublin, Ireland
Fattiehead
Banffshire, Scotland
Snotsdale Wood
Orpington, England
Thong
Kent, England
Sandy Balls
Hampshire, England
Lordsleaze Lane
Chard, England
Piddle River
Dorset, England
Wigginton Bottom
Tring, England
Nasty
Ware, England
Crackpot
North Yorkshire, England
Ugley
Essex, England
Fanny Barks
Durham, England
Bury Old Road
Manchester, England
Blue Ball Lane
Egham, England
Winkle Street
Southampton, England
Doody’s Bottoms
Wicklow, Ireland
Hospital
Limerick, Ireland
Emo
County Laois, Ireland
Spittal of Glen Muick
Ballater, Scotland
Upton Snodsbury
Worcestershire, England
Jack in the Box sells an average of 1,000 tacos every minute.
THE FORCE IS NOT VERY
STRONG WITH THIS ONE
Lots of people have run afoul of the law at least once in their lives (Uncle John spent a few hours in the Disneyland jail in the 1970s, but that’s a story for another time). So it stands to reason that in some cases, the Star Wars movie franchise will tie in with the lawbreaking in some way.
Stormtrooper: George Cross, 40, of Lynn, Massachusetts
(Not Such) A Long Time Ago: In 2015 Cross bought a pricey stormtrooper costume—one that looks just like the ones in the movies. He put it on and went for a walk around his neighborhood. (Unfortunately for him, he also decided to take his toy stormtrooper laser gun with him.) Brickett Elementary School is nearby, and the school day was just about over. According to police, Cross said he went there and “was hanging around in front of the Brickett School because he thought the children would like the costume.”
The children might have liked it had they gotten a chance to see it, but school administrators and parents picking up their kids were alarmed at the sight of a man with a mask and a gun hanging around in front of the school, even if he was dressed as a stormtrooper. The principal locked down the school and called the police.
Aftermath: Cross was arrested and charged with disturbing a school and loitering within 1,000 yards in front of the school. He was released on his own recognizance after pleading not guilty to the charges; at last report the case was still pending. “I bought a costume. I was walking through the neighborhood showing friends,” he told Boston’s Channel 7 News. “Like I’m a some kind of weirdo or something?”
Cross said he went there and “was hanging around in front of the Brickett School because he thought the children would like the costume.”
Jedi Knights: Two armed robbers who pulled their heists while wearing rubber Kylo Ren masks.
(Not Such) A Long Time Ago: In March 2016, the two robbers held up a pharmacy in West Deer, Pennsylvania. In April they struck again, hitting a drug store in New Alexandria, Pennsylvania. They wore different masks this time, but their methods were so similar that the police were convinced that the two robberies were committed by the same crooks. The combined haul from the two crimes was $2,000 in cash and $325,000 worth of prescription drugs.
Pick a random spot in the ocean, and it’s probably about 2.3 miles deep.
Here’s a tip for people considering a life of crime: If you and your partner plan to wear the same kind of mask, don’t buy your masks at the same time. And if you do buy them at the same time, don’t do it in a store with security cameras. When police investigators learned that the rubber Kylo Ren masks used in the pharmacy heists were sold at Target, they visited stores in the area and reviewed security camera footage shot in the days leading up to the first robbery.
If you and your partner plan to wear the same kind of mask, don’t buy your masks at the same time.
Sure enough, they found footage of a man buying two Kylo Ren masks. Police recognized him as Stephan E. Corrick, 66, who’d recently been arrested for buying drugs from an undercover officer at a local playground. Officers went to Corrick’s home, where he confessed and identified his accomplice as a man named Dana L. Shipley.
Aftermath: When Shipley was picked up, he was carrying a backpack containing pills stolen from both robberies, the gun used in the robberies…and both Kylo Ren masks. The men pled guilty to felony robbery, conspiracy, firearm, and drug charges. In January 2018, Shipley was sentenced to 18 years in federal prison; Corrick was still awaiting sentencing.
Jedi: Arthur C. Roy, 18, of Helena, Montana
(Not Such) A Long Time Ago: In December 2015, Roy was Facebook friends with another young man, not named in police reports. No word on whether Roy is still friends with this guy, but probably not, because on the opening weekend of Star Wars: The Force Awakens, the friend went and saw the movie before Roy did, then revealed a key plot twist in a Facebook post. “______dies in the new Star Wars. Told you I would do it!” it reads.
Roy was so enraged by his friend’s post that he threatened online to go to the friend’s high school and shoot him there. He backed up the threat with a photo of himself holding a handgun that he identified as a Colt 1911 semiautomatic. (It was actually a BB gun.) The other young man was frightened enough to report the incident to the school. They locked down the school and notified the police, who went to Roy’s house and arrested him.
Aftermath: Roy was charged with felony assault with a deadly weapon and lodged in jail on $10,000 bail. Prosecutors later dropped the charges as part of a deal in which the 18-year-old pled guilty to having sex with three underage girls (in an unrelated case).
Wookiee: An unidentified Ukrainian man dressed as Chewbacca
(Not Such) A Long Time Ago: Politics can get pretty tense in Ukraine, where public officials are notoriously corrupt and where Russian troops back a militant separatist movement
in the eastern part of the country. Apparently, one of the ways the locals protest the sad state of affairs is by running for office dressed as Star Wars characters. In 2014, for example, 16 different Darth Vaders ran for seats in the national parliament. (They all lost.)
Game of Thrones films on a soundstage in Northern Ireland built on the former shipyard where the RMS Titanic was constructed.
In October 2015, another Darth Vader ran for mayor of Odessa. On election day, he was driven to the polls by a man dressed as Chewbacca. There they were stopped by the police, and when Chewie was unable to produce a driver’s license, he was arrested and taken away in a police car. Several people filmed the arrest with cellphone cameras; by the end of the day video clips of a handcuffed Chewbacca being loaded into the back of a police car were circulating all over the internet. (Darth Vader lost the mayor’s race, but Emperor Palpatine won a seat on the Odessa city council with 54 percent of the vote.)
Aftermath: Chewbacca was fined 170 hryvinia (about $6) for the “administrative offense” of not carrying an ID card. That’s not a very big fine, but Chewbacca said he was unable to pay because his money is “in an intergalactic bank that has no branches on this planet.” Besides, as the Ukrainian police said on their official Instagram account, “Darth Vader…has already claimed this [arrest] was illegal as Chewbacca is his pet and general servant and does not require documents.”
Darth Vader lost the mayor’s race, but Emperor Palpatine won a seat on the Odessa city council with 54 percent of the vote.
Jedi Knights: Members of the Star Wars Club of Norwich, England
(Not Such) A Long Time Ago: In May 2013, the club held its annual convention at the University of East Anglia. But the good times turned sour when Jim Poole, treasurer of the rival Norwich Sci-Fi Club, and three other members tried to crash the party. As soon as the members of the Star Wars Club recognized Poole, they told him and his friends to leave. But Poole refused to go, and that’s when the argument got so heated that someone called the police to report that a fight had broken out. “There has been a longstanding feud between the two clubs,” Poole explained to the Daily Mail newspaper. “We got miffed when they decided to rename their event and call it a convention.”
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