Uncle John’s Legendary Lost Bathroom Reader (41 page)

A)
The Monster vs. the Maiden
; the studio tried to make it sexier.

B)
The Rockin’ Monster
; rock ’n’ roll movies were hot.

C)
Gigantis
; it was illegal to use the name Godzilla.

3.
In the 1964 flick,
Godzilla vs. Megalon
, Godzilla saves the world from the Seatopians, an evil alien race that plans to take over using two secret weapons—Gaigan and Megalon. How would you describe this evil pair?

A)
A King Kong-like ape and a giant poisonous frog.

B)
A giant cockroach and a robot with a buzz saw in his stomach.

C)
A giant pickle and a Richard Nixon look-alike.

4.
Godzilla vs. the Thing
was released in 1964. What Thing did Godzilla fight?

A)
A giant rabbit.

B)
A giant moth.

C)
A giant spider.

Breakfast treat: In Colonial America, kids ate popcorn with cream and sugar for breakfast.

5.
How did Godzilla celebrate his 20th anniversary in 1974?

A)
He fought a Godzilla robot from outer space.

B)
He saved the world from a giant alien grasshopper.

C)
He made an appearance on the “The Tonight Show.”

6.
Godzilla on Monster Island
was released in 1971. The plot: Earth is invaded again. This time it’s giant cockroaches from outer space, using monsters to do their dirty work. They’ve got Gaigan (the monster in
Godzilla vs. Megalon
) and Ghidrah. Who’s Ghidrah?

A)
Godzilla’s mother-in-law.

B)
A giant anteater.

C)
A three-headed dragon.

7.
In 1972 a scientist discovers a growing mass in a polluted lake. He wonders if it’s a giant tadpole...but no! It’s a new monster named Hedora. What will Godzilla be fighting this time?

A)
The Smog Monster—a 400-foot blob of garbage.

B)
The Phlegm Monster—a 2-ton ball of mucus.

C)
The Sludge Monster—A 60-foot-wide hunk of waste.

8.
In
Godzilla’s Revenge
, released in 1969, Godzilla returns for what purpose?

A)
To settle a score with another monster named Gorgo.

B)
To show a little kid how to fight bullies.

C)
To get revenge on Raymond Burr.

9.
In the 1966 epic,
Godzilla vs. the Sea Monster
, Godzilla fights for the Free World against Red Bamboo, an evil totalitarian group. Their secret weapon is Ebirah. Who is he?

A)
A hypnotist who can brainwash Godzilla.

B)
A mechanical jellyfish.

C)
A giant lobster.

10.
In 1969 Godzilla reappeared with Minya. What was special about this new monster?

A)
It was Godzilla’s mother.

B)
It was Godzilla’s cousin.

C)
It was Godzilla’s son.

Strange legacy: Marietta, Ohio, is named after Marie Antoinette.

People often ask how we find the material for our Bathroom Readers. This one was easy—Uncle John was doing some leisurely bathroom reading one morning, checking out the six newspapers he gets, when he found himself laughing at an article in the Wall Street Journal. That led to more research... and now we’ve got enough silly English names to last a lifetime—or at least a sitting. Here are a few dozen of our favorites
.

R
OADMAP AS COMIC BOOK

“New York has Flushing. Maryland has Boring. Pennsylvania, of course, has Intercourse,” the
Wall Street Journal
reports. “But probably no territory in the English-speaking world can match Britain’s wealth of ludicrous place names: Crackpot, Dorking, Fattahead, Goonbell, Giggleswick, Nether Poppleton, Wormelow Tump, Yornder Bognie. The litany, which swells with each page of the atlas, sounds like a Monty Python gag.”

For example: According to Chris Longhurst, in
Daft Piace Names
, you might already have visited...

•   Foulbog

•   Dull

•   Muck

•   Mold

•   Moss of Barmuckity

•   Belchford

•   Burpham

•   Lickey End

•   Spital in the Street

•   Bug’s Bottom

•   Pratts Botttom

•   Slack Bottom

•   Iron’s Bottom

•   Horsey

•   Bunny

•   Corney

•   Swine Sty

•   Pig Street

•   Dog Village

•   Donkey Town

•   Toad’s Mouth

•   Maggots End

•   Ufton Nervet

•   Crazies Hill

•   Shootup Hill

•   Bat and Ball

•   Pity Me

•   No Place

•   Haltwhistle

•   Slaggyford

•   Nether Wallop

•   Weeford

•   Limpley Stoke

•   Nempnett

•   Thrubwell

•   Butcombe

•   Bell End

•   Great Bulging

•   Eggborough

•   Ham

•   Pill

•   Christmas Pie

•   Furzedown

•   World’s End

Q. How many dimples are there in a regulation golf ball? A. 336.

UPPER AND LOWER

“Over time,” the
Wall Street Journal
continues, “many villages also have subdivided, with silly consequences: Great Snoring and Little Snoring, Middle Wallop and Nether Wallop, Helions Bumpstead and Steeple Bumpstead, Sheepy Magna (Latin for ‘big’) and Sheepy Parva (Latin for ‘small’). Then there is the English habit of designating ‘upper’ and ‘lower’ ends of villages, which may grow into communities of their own. Optimists, for instance, will feel at home in the hamlet of Upperup—which is reached, appropriately, via High Street.

“‘If the hamlet grows any more, we’ll have to call one end of it Upper Upperup,’ jokes Charles Hadfield, a local historian.”

Other pairs:

*   Fetcham and Bookham (too bad there’s no Jail’am)

*   Downham and Turnham Green (in West London)

*   “Piddles and Puddles, leading to Poole. (Or away from Poole, depending which side you start),” writes Longhurst

*   Upper and Lower Peover

HERE AND THERE...

• There’s a river in the south somewhere (Dorset) called the River Piddle,” Longhurst notes in
Daft Place Names
. “Around it are placed called ‘Puddletown’ and ‘Piddlehampton.’ Don’t know why they get puddle from piddle.” He adds: “And there’s a village by the name of Nasty, to the southeast 272 of Leighton Buzzard. I’ve only been past it (never to it) but the idea of the Nasty Village Pub, Nasty Inn, Nasty Bakery, etc. somehow appeal to me.”

• “Goon” is Cornish for “pasture.” As a result, there are plenty of Goons dotting the English countryside. For example: Goonbell, Goongumpus, Goonearl, Goonown and Gooninnis. “It’s true we have a lot of goons here,” says one resident. “but I’ve never thought of that as funny.

• Regarding the village of Piddle: A funny name? “Not if you live there,” writes the
WSJ
. “Ian Curthoy’s, a pig farmer in North Piddle, gripes that passersby often pose for snapshots beside signs for the village—usually while piddling. Other travelers steal the signs, a common nuisance in villages with silly names. Asked about the origin of Piddle’s name, Mr. Curthoys replies: ‘It’s a wet place, isn’t it?’ Sloshing through the mud to feed his sows, he smiles, adding: There was a South Piddle once, but it dried up.’”

The word “checkmate” comes from the Persian
shah mat
, which means “the king is dead.”

• And finally, the town called Ugley. Its most famous civic group: The Ugley Women’s Institute, “a group that meets every month in the Ugley Village Hall and “holds scholarly lectures and afternoon teas.” Members have tried to rename it the Women’s Institute of Ugley, but no one pays attention. When the members have to identify their affiliation at conventions, they wind up announcing: “We’re Ugley.”

SILLY NAMES AROUND THE WORLD

From
Daft Name Places:

• In Newfoundland, Canada, you can find: Heart’s Content, Heart’s Desire, Heart’s Delight, Tickle Harbour, Come By Chance, Goobies, Little Heart’s Ease, Seldom, St. Jones Within, Sop’s Arm, Sheshatsheits and Toogood Arm.

• “There is a village about half an hour’s train ride north of Tromsoe, Norway, on the way to Bodo, called Hell.”

• In Germany, there are two towns near Munich called Grub and Poing.

• There’s a Bavarian mountain (near Garmisch-Partenkirchen to be precise) known as the Wank. You can even take the Wankbahn to the top.

• In Texas, there’s apparently a place called Myass.

• Reportedly, there’s a road near Tucson, Arizona called the Super-chicken Highway.

...And two useful phrases to learn for your next trip to France:

1.
“Excuse me, waiter, but there’s a German Shepherd in my soup.”
Pardon, garçon, mais il y a un berger allemand dans mon potage

2.
“May I have a manicure with my toast, please?”

Est-ce que je peux faire une manicure avec mon pain grillé, s’il vous plaît?

Camel’s hair brushes are made with squirrel hair. They got their name

To most people, all twins are fascinating. Here are three sets of twins who are famous as well

C
HANG AND ENG BUNKER

Claim to Fame:
The original “Siamese twins.”

Background:
Chang and Eng—“left” and “right” in Thai—were born at Meklong, Siam (Thailand) on May 11, 1811, permanently attached at the chest by a band of skin. They were discovered by an American sea captain who put them on display in Europe and America—where P. T. Barnum bought out their contract.

The Bunkers became world-famous as “Siamese twins.” They managed to live relatively normal lives, becoming American citizens, marrying (unattached) sisters Adelaide and Sarah Yates in 1864, and somehow fathering 22 children between them. They spent their entire lives looking for a doctor who’d guarantee they’d both survive an operation to separate them, but never found one. They died hours apart in 1874.

Gossip:
Chang and Eng hated each other—and fought constantly. According to an 1874 article in the
Philadelphia Medical Times
, “Eng was very good-natured, Chang cross and irritable....Chang drank pretty heavily—at times getting drunk; but Eng never drank. They often quarrelled; and, of course, under the circumstances their quarrels were bitter. They sometimes came to blows, and on one occasion came under the jurisdiction of the courts.”

ESTHER PAULINE AND PAULINE FRIEDMAN

Claim to Fame:
The most popular advice columnists in America.

Background:
Esther Pauline (Eppie) and Pauline Esther (Popo) Friedman were born 17 minutes apart on July 4, 1918, in Sioux City, Iowa. They were inseparable throughout their youth; they dressed identically, double-dated, slept in the same bed until their wedding nights, and married on the same day in a double wedding.

Eppie got her start as Ann Landers in 1955 when she entered and won a
Chicago Sun-Times
contest to succeed the original Ann Landers. In the first weeks of the column, Eppie mailed some of the Landers column’s letters to California, where Popo apparently helped answer them. But when the
Sun-Times
editors found out about it, they prohibited her from sending any more letters out of the office. The twins had to stop working together.

from their inventor, whose last name was Keml.

A few weeks later, Popo walked into the office of the
San Francisco
Chronicle
and complained about the paper’s advice columnist. The editor gave her a stack of past columns and told her to fill in her own answers. She did—and the editor hired her the next day. Popo chose Abigail Van Buren as her pen name (from President Martin Van Buren), and her column became Dear Abby.

Gossip:
When Eppie found out about her sister’s column, she was furious. “I got into this work first,” she told a reporter. “She saw what a great time I was having. And she got into it. I felt it was mine, something that I did. It was a serious problem.” They didn’t speak to each other for 8 years, but eventually buried the hatchet.

JOAN AND JANE BOYD

Claim to Fame:
TV’s first “Doublemint Twins.”

Background:
In 1959, the 21-year-old sisters were singing advertising jingles on CBS radio. One day they were asked if they wanted to audition to be the first live Doublemint twins. (Wrigley’s Gum had used illustrated twins since the 1920s.) They were taken to meet the boss—P. K. Wrigley—who hired them on the spot. That was the only time they ever saw him.

The girls became American icons and made Doublemint the #1 gum. But the magic ended in 1963, when Wrigley learned that Joan—recently married—was pregnant...and fired them. (Their contract prohibited pregnancy, even within marriage.) Since then there have been more than 20 different sets of Doublemint twins—but none as popular as the originals.