Uncle John's Ahh-Inspiring Bathroom Reader (4 page)

—
U.K. Mirror

“A plaque intended to honor deep-voiced actor James Earl Jones at Lauderhill, Florida's 2002 celebration of Martin Luther King Day, caused city officials incredible embarrassment. Somehow the plaque's maker inscribed this extremely incorrect message:

‘Thank you James Earl Ray for keeping the dream alive.'

“Ray was the man convicted of assassinating King in Memphis, Tennessee, in 1968.”

—
ABCNews.com

“A married couple in Beijing, China, ended up brawling after realizing they had unwittingly courted each other over the Internet. After a month of secret online flirting, the man arranged to meet up with his mystery girlfriend, only to discover it was actually his wife. He had known only her user name, I Want You.

“They each agreed to carry a certain newspaper to identify themselves, but were shocked when they came face to face and started fighting in the street. Passersby eventually alerted security guards, who had to separate the two.”

—
Ananova.com

“In 1986 an Orion Airways chartered jetliner took off from Birmingham, England, carrying 100 passengers to the Greek island of Crete. A few minutes into the flight the captain announced the
plane had to return to the Birmingham Airport. Technical difficulties? No, they forgot the luggage.”

—Kickers: All the News That Didn't Fit

“It was the law in the ancient Greek city of Amyclae to hold one's tongue. The Amyclaeans had often panicked when they heard rumors that the powerful Spartan army was coming, so to put an end to defeatism, a law was passed forbidding rumors. Violators were to be executed.

“When the Spartans actually did appear, no one had the courage to report it, and the city was overcome without a fight.”

—Amazing Lost History

“Eager to spread the word of the Bush administration's $1.3 trillion tax cut in 2001, the IRS sent more than half a million notices to taxpayers informing them they were going to receive the maximum possible tax cut refund check…when in fact they weren't.

“Officials placed the blame on a computer program. ‘What we're doing now,' the IRS announced when the goof was discovered, ‘is working to get a corrected notice out to the taxpayers—all 523,000 of them.'”

—The Denver Post

“A man trying to warn sleeping relatives about a fire in their garage at 4:00 in the morning was mistaken for a burglar and beaten with an aluminum baseball bat. Police said Joe Leavitt of Florence, Alabama, who was visiting his parents, suffered bruises to the back and a gash to the head that required stitches.”

—
MSNBC

“According to British researchers, five years of studying sheep brains to determine if mad cow disease may have jumped species must now be thrown out because someone mislabeled the brains. They were studying cow brains the whole time.”

—“The Edge,”
The Oregonian

Let's face it: English can be pretty tough to grasp, especially if it's not your first language. Uncle John gives the authors of these signs and labels an “A” for affort.

In an Austrian ski lodge:

Not to perambulate the corridors in the house of repose in the boots of ascension.

In a Japanese hotel room:

Please to Bathe inside the tub.

From a chopstick wrapper in a Chinese restaurant:

Can you eat with chopsticks Doctor told us / Be intell / eat by using chopsticks / Lots of people use chopsticks / So try eat your chopsticks / Right Now!

Air conditioner directions in a Japanese hotel room:

Cooles and Heates: If you want just condition of warm in your room, please control yourself.

Outside a Russian monastery
:

You are welcome to visit the cemetery where famous Russian and Soviet composers, artists, and writers are buried daily except Thursday.

In a Finland hostel:

If you cannot reach a fire exit, close the door and expose yourself at the window.

In a Copenhagen airport
:

We take your bags and send them in all directions.

From a Majorcan (Spain) shop entrance
:

Here speeching American.

Warning label on Chinese lint-cleaning roller:

1.
Do not use this roller to the floorings that made of wood and plastic.

2.
Do not use this roller to clean the stuffs that dangerous to your hands such as glass and chinaware.

3.
Do not use the roller to people's head, it is dangerous that hair could be sticked up to cause unexpected suffering.

In a Nairobi restaurant
:

Customers who find our waitresses rude ought to see the manager.

We're back with one of our regular features. Here are the origins of some common phrases.

Meaning:
To dance

Origin:
“Coined by English author John Milton, best known for his 1667 masterpiece,
Paradise Lost
. Milton's poem ‘L'Allegro'—which means the cheerful or merry one—was written in 1631. He writes: ‘
come, and trip it as ye go / On the light fantastic toe
.'” (From
Inventing English,
by Dale Corey)

Meaning:
To feel dazed

Origin:
“This phrase originally referred to drunkenness, and got its name from the ration of rum, known as ‘grog,' which was issued to sailors in the Royal Navy until 1971.” (From
Everyday Phrases,
by Neil Ewart)

Meaning:
Assured success

Origin:
“This is often assumed to refer to Errol Flynn's notorious sexual exploits. The earliest example of the phrase, however, in a glossary of air force terms from WWII, claims that the allusion is to the ease with which Flynn accomplished his swashbuckling cinematic feats.” (From
Jesse's Word of the Day,
by Jesse Sheidlower)

Meaning:
To have plenty of money or be well-to-do

Origin:
“It might be assumed that
well-heeled
originally alluded to the condition of a rich person's shoes. But that is not the case. In the 18th century, it was a fighting cock that was ‘well-heeled,' that is, fitted with an artificial spur before facing an opponent in the pit. From that, men began to ‘heel' themselves, to carry a gun, before entering a trouble zone. Perhaps because most troubles can be alleviated by money, the expression took on its present financial aspect.” (From
Heavens to Betsy!
, by Charles Earle Funk)

When a company wants to drum up new business, they sometimes sponsor special promotions…but things don't always work out as planned. Here are two promos that these companies wish they could take back.

P
romotion:
Disco Demolition Night

What Happened:
In 1979, Chicago DJ Steve Dahl came up with this idea to get fans to a Chicago White Sox doubleheader, and the team's promotional director, Mike Veeck, thought it was great: any fan who brought a disco record to the stadium would get in for 98¢. Then, between games the disco records would be blown up. Veeck announced it for the July 12 games against Detroit and told the security crew to be ready for about 35,000 fans.

The Backfire:
Sixty thousand
fans showed up…ready for destruction. They were drinking, burning effigies of John Travolta, and throwing disco records at opposing players throughout the first game. When Dahl dynamited over 1,000 disco records after the first game, the crowd went crazy. Thousands of fans mobbed the diamond. They ripped up the pitcher's mound, tore down fences, and started a bonfire in center field, causing thousands of dollars in damage. Riot police were finally called in and they got the crowd off the field, but it was too late. The White Sox had to forfeit the second game—only the fourth time that's happened in Major League history.

What happened to Mike Veeck? He was forced to resign. He developed a drinking problem and didn't work in baseball again for 10 years. “I went down the sewer,” he said.

Promotion:
“Monday Night Winning Lineup” scratch-off game

What Happened:
Chicago-based food giant Beatrice Inc. came up with this campaign in 1985. The cards were given away at grocery stores around the country and players had to scratch off tiny footballs on the cards to pick the correct number of touchdowns in eight NFL games. Prizes ranged from food coupons and TV sets to the Grand Prize: a trip to the Super Bowl or the cash equivalent—$5,500.
Frank Maggio of Atlanta got 50 of the cards off a store display rack and played them. And he noticed a pattern. Turns out there were only 320 different cards. He kept getting more cards until he had a complete set. That meant he could scratch off the top row of numbers on a new card, match it up to a master, and know what the rest of the numbers would be. “It was like picking off sitting ducks,” he said.

He and a friend, Jim Curl, started grabbing all the cards they could get their hands on, in stores, from sales representatives, and even in the mail directly from the company. They started scratching.

The Backfire:
Three weeks later, Maggio and Curl turned in their tickets—worth several million dollars. Beatrice immediately canceled the contest and refused to pay, even though the men had offered to show them their mistake and take a measly $1 million for their trouble.

The two men went home…and
really
started scratching. “That weekend cost Beatrice about $10 million,” said Maggio. In 1988 the legal battle was finally over, and Beatrice paid out $2 million in a class-action settlement to 2,400 other winners and settled separately with Maggio and Curl for an undisclosed sum (estimated to be about $12 million). Maggio's friends reported that the 25-year-old salesman left town and retired.

•
Saturday Night Live
always airs live…almost. Twice the show was broadcast on a seven-second delay. NBC demanded it so that censors would have a chance to bleep out swearing. Who was too risky for live TV? Richard Pryor (December 13, 1975) and Andrew Dice Clay (May 12, 1990). Nora Dunn boycotted Clay's show; so did scheduled music guest Sinead O'Connor.

• Two years later, O'Connor stirred up controversy when she ripped up a picture of Pope John Paul II after her second song. NBC received 4,484 complaints. But the most severe complaint came from the Vatican, which used its clout to force NBC to edit out the ripping in reruns. O'Connor has since been ordained as a minister.