Yes, welcome to another fun fact file day when the fasab archives are opened up to reveal a startling array of random facts that you probably didn’t know and didn’t need to.
But here they are anyhow.
I hope you enjoy.
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During your lifetime,
you will eat about 60,000 pounds of food,
that’s the weight of about 6 elephants.
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Einstein couldn’t speak fluently when he was nine.
His parents thought he might be retarded.
But he turned out to be relatively smart!
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Gilligan of Gilligan’s Island had a first name
that was only used once, on the never-aired pilot show.
His first name was Willy.
The skipper’s real name on Gilligan’s Island is Jonas Grumby.
It was mentioned once in the first episode
on their radio’s newscast about the wreck.
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If you toss a penny 10,000 times,
it will not be heads 5,000 times, but more like 4,950.
The heads picture weighs more, so it ends up on the bottom.
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In 1983, a Japanese artist made a copy of the Mona Lisa
completely out of toast.
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Penguins can jump as high as 6 feet in the air.
(But only when you really surprise them!)
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The average bank teller loses about $250 every year.
The average bank CEO loses at least $1 billion – and gets a bonus for doing it!)
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The Earth weighs around
6,588,000,000,000,000,000,000,000 tons.
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The name for Oz in the “Wizard of Oz”
was thought up when the creator, Frank Baum,
looked at his filing cabinet and saw A-N, and O-Z,
hence “Oz.”
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The reason firehouses have circular stairways
is from the days of yore when the engines were pulled by horses.
The horses were stabled on the ground floor
and figured out how to walk up straight staircases.
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The Sanskrit word for “war” means “desire for more cows.”
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The word “Checkmate” in chess
comes from the Persian phrase “Shah Mat,”
which means “the king is dead”.
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The word “modem” is a contraction
of the words “modulate, demodulate.”
(MOdulate DEModulate)
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Thomas Edison, lightbulb inventor,
was afraid of the dark.
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Two-thirds of the world’s eggplant is grown in New Jersey.
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Wilma Flintstone’s maiden name was Wilma Slaghoopal,
and Betty Rubble’s maiden name was Betty Jean Mcbricker.
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Mars is the home of Olympus Mons,
the largest known volcano in our solar system
Size comparison – Olympus Mons v Everest
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There are six million parts in the Boeing 747-400.
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Japanese research has concluded that
moderate drinking can boost IQ levels
(Sometimes you just know when scientific results are accurate.)
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In 1960 there were 16,067 gambling slots in Nevada.
By the end of the century, 1999, this number rose to 205,726 slots
which would be one slot for every 10 people residing there.
This week’s significant number is fifty, perhaps one of the most used numbers of them all. Maybe we are so used to having it around that we don’t pay it much attention at all.
Until now.
Enjoy.
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The Number 50
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In religion
The 50th word of the King James Version of the Bible’s Old Testament, Book of Genesis is “light”;
There are 50 chapters in the book of Genesis in the Old Testament;
Noah’s Ark was 50 cubits in width. “The length of the ark shall be 300 cubits, the breadth of it 50 cubits, and the height of it 30 cubits.” (Genesis, VI.15);
Pentecost in Greek means “50th”;
Pentecost is a Jewish summer feast held on the 50th day after the Passover;
Pentecost is also called Whitsunday, a Christian feast, which commemorates the Descent of the Holy Ghost upon the Apostles, 50 days after Easter (Resurrection of Christ);
50 is also said to be one of the holiest numbers, being the sum of the squares of the sacred Pythagorean 3-4-5 triangle, i.e., 9 + 16 + 25 = 50;
In Kabbalah, there are 50 Gates of Wisdom (or Understanding) and 50 Gates of Impurity;
The traditional number of years in a jubilee period.
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In science and technology
50 is the Atomic Number of Tin (Sn) (one of the seven metals of the alchemists).
50 is the fifth magic number in nuclear physics.
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In space
Open star cluster Messier 50
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50th Space Wing
The 50th Space Wing (50 SW) is a wing of the United States Air Force under the major command of Air Force Space Command (AFSPC). It was activated on 30 January 1992, replacing the 2nd Space Wing, which was inactivated on the same date.
The unit is the host wing at Schriever Air Force Base, located east of Colorado Springs, Colorado. Their primary responsibility is to track and maintain the command and control, warning, navigational, and communications satellites for AFSPC. The 50th Space Wing also manages the Global Positioning System.
Typical satellite monitoring tasks such as tracking and telemetry are the main part of their mission, and in so doing, they employ more than 5600 personnel (active duty military, guard and reserve, contractors, and DoD civilians.)
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In politics
Hawaii was the 50th state to enter the union in 1960;
There are now 50 stars on the flag of the United States of America, each representing one of the 50 states. The stars are arranged in 9 rows staggered horizontally and 11 rows staggered vertically. Diagonally they are: 1 + 3 + 5 + 7 + 9 + 9 + 7 + 5 + 3 + 1 = 50.
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In sport
The jersey number 50 has been retired by a number of North American sports teams in honor of past playing greats or other figures.
In Major League Baseball: the Los Angeles Angels of Anaheim, for coach Jimmie Reese, who served with the team when it was known as the California Angels.
coach Jimmie Reese California Angels
In the NBA: the San Antonio Spurs, for Hall of Famer David Robinson.
San Antonio Spurs Hall of Famer David Robinson
In the NFL: the New York Giants, for Hall of Famer Ken Strong.
New York Giants Hall of Famer Ken Strong
No NHL team has retired the number, which is not frequently issued.
Bill Barilko, was a hockey player whose final goal won the Toronto Maple Leafs the Stanley Cup. Four months and 5 days after he scored the winning goal to clinch Toronto’s seventh Stanley Cup, Barilko boarded a Fairchild 24, single-engine plane piloted by his friend Henry Hudson. He was returning home to Timmins from a fishing trip on James Bay. The plane vanished between Rupert House and Timmins. No trace of Hudson, Barilko or the Fairchild was discovered for 11 years, despite massive search efforts. The Maple Leafs were so distraught and unwilling to accept the tragedy that Barilko’s equipment remained in his usual locker room stall at the opening of the 1951 fall training camp. Rumors began circulating that Barilko, of Russian decent, had defected to the Soviet Union to teach his skills to young Soviet players. Finally on June 9, 1962, bush pilot Gary Fields came upon the wreck of a Fairchild 24, approximately 100 kilometers north of Cochrane, Ontario. Barilko was finally laid to rest in Timmins; the year that the Leafs won their first Stanley Cup since his disappearance 11 years earlier.
The story of Barilko’s 1951 Stanley Cup heroics and his mysterious disappearance were the inspiration for The Tragically Hip song “Fifty Mission Cap”. The song appeared on the Canadian band’s third full-length album Fully Completely, and is often credited with reintroducing Barilko’s story to a younger generation.
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In militaria
Sukhoi T-50
The Sukhoi PAK FA is a twin-engine jet fighter being developed by Sukhoi for the Russian Air Force. The Sukhoi T-50 is the prototype for PAK FA.
The PAK FA is one of only a handful of stealth jet programs globally.
The PAK FA, a fifth generation jet fighter, is intended to be the successor to the MiG-29 and Su-27 in the Russian inventory and serve as the basis of the Sukhoi/HAL FGFA being developed with India.
The T-50 prototype performed its first flight 29 January 2010.
By 31 August 2010, it had made 17 flights and by mid-November, 40 in total. The second T-50 was to start its flight test by the end of 2010, but this was delayed until March 2011.
The Russian Defence Ministry will purchase the first 10 evaluation example aircraft after 2012 and then 60 production standard aircraft after 2016.
The first batch of fighters will be delivered with current technology engines.
The PAK-FA is expected to have a service life of about 30–35 years.
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T-50 light infantry tank
The T-50 light infantry tank was built by the Soviet Union at the beginning of World War II. However it was complicated and expensive, and only a short production run of 69 tanks was completed. Furthermore, even before it was ready for mass-production wartime experience invalidated the underlying concept of light tanks.
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MKE T 50
The HK33 is a 5.56mm assault rifle developed in the 1960s by West German armament manufacturer Heckler & Koch GmbH (H&K), primarily for export.
Capitalizing on the success of their G3 design, the company developed a family of small arms (all using the G3 operating principle and basic design concept) consisting of four types of firearms: the first type, chambered in 7.62x51mm NATO, the second—using the Soviet 7.62x39mm M43 round, third—the intermediate 5.56x45mm caliber and the fourth type—chambered for the 9x19mm Parabellum pistol cartridge.
The HK33 series of rifles were adopted by the Brazilian Air Force (Força Aérea Brasileira or FAB), the armed forces of Thailand and Malaysia where they were produced under a license agreement. The rifle was also license-built in France by MAS and in Turkey by MKEK. The HK33 is no longer manufactured or marketed by Heckler & Koch.
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M107
The M107, with a family of ammunition, enables sniper teams to employ greater destructive force at greater ranges and complements the anti-personnel precision fire capability of the M24 (7.62mm, bolt action) Sniper Weapon System (SWS).
The primary mission of this rifle is to engage and defeat materiel targets at extended ranges to include parked aircraft; command, control, communications, computers, and intelligence (C4I) sites; radar sites; ammunition; petroleum, oil and lubricants; and various other thin skinned (lightly armored) materiel targets out to 2000 meters.
The M107 can also be used in a counter sniper role taking advantage of the longer stand off range and increased terminal effect when opposing snipers armed with smaller caliber weapons out to 1000 meters.
It is a semi-automatic, air-cooled, box magazine-fed rifle chambered for .50 caliber ammunition and with a 10-round removable magazine. This rifle operates by means of the short recoil principle, rather than gas.
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Browning M2 .50 caliber (12.7mm) Machine Gun
The Browning M2 .50 caliber (12.7mm) Machine Gun, is an iconic World War II era automatic, belt-fed, recoil operated, air-cooled, crew-operated machine gun. It is currently fielded by 20 different militaries around the world.
The M2 machine gun is crew transportable with limited amounts of ammunition over short distances. The M2 HB machine gun is used to engage dismounted infantry, crew-served weapons, ATGM teams, light-armor vehicles, and aircraft.
It fires from the closed-bolt position and is belt fed, recoil operated, air cooled, and crew operated. By repositioning some of the component parts, ammunition may be fed from either the left or right side. A disintegrating metallic link-belt is used to feed the ammunition into the weapon. The gun is capable of single-shot (ground M2), as well as automatic fire. The AN/TVS-5 night-vision sight can be used with the M2 machine gun.
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Howdah Hunter
During the first British colony government period in India, starting from 1840, the Howdah pistols were preferred by the army officers detached in the widest territories of the Empire.
It is a classic large caliber double barrel pistol in the English gunsmith school style, used at close range to stop tigers which commonly leaped upon elephants carrying hunters in a Howdah in the far away colonial territories.
It is normally finished with blued barrels, engraved locks featuring wide animals in their natural habitat, and case hardened color finish. The walnut pistol grip stock is checkered and finished with a steel butt cap. Barrel Length 11 1/4″. Weight 4.41 lbs. (20 ga), 5.07 lbs. (.50)
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Desert Eagle
Although an American idea, the “Desert Eagle” was developed in Israel by the IMI (Israel Military Industries) in the early 1980s. The first Desert Eagles were manufactured in Israel and started appearing on gun dealers’ shelves in the US around 1985. Following a problem in meeting demand for the pistols in 1992 (and probably fearful of the prospect of government import limitations), Magnum Research started assembling parts of the gun in the US and currently is working toward full assembly and possibly manufacture of the guns stateside.
Given the fact that the IMI is best known for the Uzi series of submachine guns and the Galil rifles, it isn’t surprising that the Desert Eagle departs radically from many other semi auto pistol designs, though the exterior belays this. The basic layout is like that of most other modern semi auto pistols (with the magazine release on the side of the grip, slide release on the left side of the frame, and a thumb-activated slide safety).
Internally it is different. The pistol is gas-operated with a system that is more like a rifle than the delayed blow-back systems used with most other semi auto hand guns. The gas system employs a fixed, shrouded barrel which stays in position on the frame during firing, with gas coming up a port just ahead of the chamber to operate a three-lug rotating bolt that rides in the slide assembly. The fixed barrel gives the gun a lot of potential accuracy, a potential realized with most of these pistols when fired with quality ammunition.
In addition to .357 Magnum, .41 AE, .41 Magnum, and .44 Magnum chamberings, the Desert Eagle is also available chambered for the .50 AE (Action Express).
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The Smith & Wesson 50 calibre Revolver
Billed by Smith & Wesson as the most Powerful Production Revolver in the World Today, this S&W revolve uses the massive .500 S&W Magnum® Cartridge with 2600 ft/lb. Muzzle Energy.
It is designed as a hunting handgun for any game animal walking.
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In books, tv, movies and music
The TV show Hawaii Five-O and its reimagined version, Hawaii Five-0, are so called because Hawaii is the last (50th) of the states to officially become a state.
From the tv show, the term 5-O (Five-Oh) has become slang for police officers and/or a warning that police are approaching. Derived from the television show Hawaii Five-O
50 First Dates. A Groundhog Day type of movie starring Adam Sandler as Henry Roth, a man afraid of commitment up until he meets the beautiful Lucy. They hit it off and Henry think he’s finally found the girl of his dreams, until he discovers she has short-term memory loss and forgets him the very next day.
50/50. Inspired by a true story, a comedy centered on a 27-year-old guy who learns of his cancer diagnosis, and his subsequent struggle to beat the disease.
Fifty shades of grey, the mummy-porn novel that became a huge seller in 2012
Nickname of famous hip hop / rap legend 50 Cent.
Paul Simon 50 ways to leave your lover
50 Ways To Say Goodbye by Train
Train frontman Pat Monahan penned this song with Espionage, the Norwegian production duo that helped pen “Hey Soul Sister.”
Espionage is made up of Espen Lind and Amund Bjørklund and amongst their other credits are Beyoncé’s “Irreplaceable” and Chris Brown’s “With You.”
The song follows a similar theme to Paul Simon’s “50 Ways To Leave Your Lover,” though in this instance it’s the narrator’s pride that has been hurt as he looks for excuses to tell his friends why she’s disappeared from his life.
50 Words For Snow Kate Bush
50 Words For Snow comprises seven songs “set against a background of falling snow.” The album was released through the singer’s personal imprint, Fish People.
Speaking to American radio station KCRW, Bush said that the idea for this song came from thinking about the myth that the Inuit Eskimos have 50 words for snow. She then decided to make up increasingly fantastical words herself, and recruited actor and writer Stephen Fry to recite the 50 synonyms. They include such words/phrases as “spangladasha,” “mountain-sob, “blown from Polar fur,” and “shimmer-glisten.”
Whilst the Inuit did have about as many words for snow as the English (and now a lot less after Bush’s verbal creations for the frozen precipitation), the Sami in Finland have in excess of 50.
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In other stuff
Cities located on latitude 50 degrees north include Cologne and Frankfurt, Germany; Brussels, Belgium; Maastricht, Netherlands; Portsmouth, Exeter, Plymouth and Brighton & Hove, England; Regina, Saskatchewan, and Kamloops, British Columbia, Canada; Kiev, Ukraine; Prague, Czech Republic; Kraków, Poland; and Kharkov, Ukraine.
Cities located on longitude 50 degrees west include Assis, São Paulo, Brazil.
Cities located on longitude 50 degrees east include Dammam, Saudi Arabia; Samara, Russia; and Manama, Bahrain.
The percentage (50%) equivalent to one half, so that the phrase “fifty-fifty” commonly expresses something divided equally in two; in business this is often denoted as being the ultimate in equal partnership.
In millimeters, the focal length of the normal lens in 35 mm photography.
Gold wedding anniversary celebrates 50 years of marriage.
The Roman numeral for 50 is L.
A Canadian brand of beer called 50 Ale created in 1950 by Labatt breweries to commemorate 50 years of partnership. It is a popular brand still sold today.
The speed limit, in kilometers per hour, of Australian roads with unspecified limits.
Jason and 50 Argonauts sailed on the ship Argo on a quest for the Golden Fleece in Colchis (Black Sea).
Tineke Hybrid Tea Rose has 50 double broad petals.
The answer to the question in the title is, of course, you can’t. Bollocks is bollocks no matter from which race, religion, continent or country it comes from, or in what language.
I tried, and tried hard, but I couldn’t let Friday’s non-event go by without a word or several about the Mayans and particularly about the dipsticks who thought they had interpreted the Mayan calendar.
By the way “the Mayan Calendar” is an anagram of “deny earth almanac” so that in itself should have told them something.
But no, in the best bollocks-brain tradition that also brought us ‘the Y2K crisis that never was’ and that never made any sense either, we have been subjected for months and years now to all this end of the world malarkey from so-called learned scholars who knew such a lot about such a little they might as well have known nothing about anything at all. Plus, they have not an atom of common sense between them!
There’s a fasab rule that there are none so dumb as those who think they are smart. I suppose that’s my take on “a little knowledge is a dangerous thing”. Happily I have been blessed with the ability to recognize that there are at least a trillion things that I don’t know for every little thing that I do know. I have also learned not to jump to conclusions when there is precious little evidence to support them.
So here’s the story.
We all know by now that the Mayans carved a calendar into a big round stone and that some self-important smart asses tried to decipher it and came to the conclusion that, because the calendar apparently stops at Dec 21, 2012, that is the date when the world must end.
That’s a bit like munching your way through a bar of chocolate, looking at the empty wrapper and deciding that there will be no more bars of chocolate ever! (Now THAT would be the end of the world!)
There could have been lots of reasons why the Mayan calendar ended on that date (if indeed it did) but they were either dismissed or, much more likely, never even considered. None of them fit with dipstick logic.
For example,
the wee-calendar-carver-man-person may have keeled over and died without passing on his ‘magic formula’ to a successor.
he may just have got pissed off with the job and stopped.
he could have broken his chisel.
he might have whacked himself on the thumb with his hammer.
he could have continued his work on a second stone that nobody has found yet.
or he may have been the Mayan equivalent of the modern day dipsticks who tried to interpret it and really did think the world was going to end on that date.
It’s not the fact that we have these ‘end of the world’ morons and their equally moronic pronouncements about the apocalypse that annoys me. It’s the utterly depressing fact that no matter how insanely stupid their ideas are there are always hoards of other morons willing to believe them.
How sad is that?
And it has been going on for thousands of years.
A Roman priest and theologian in the second and third centuries, predicted Christ would return in A.D. 500. His calculations were based on the dimensions of Noah’s ark!
In the year 999, despite the fact that there weren’t any of the events required by the Bible transpiring at that time, there was almost hysteria over the return of Christ with all members of society seemingly affected by the prediction that it would happen on January 1, 1000 AD.
In 1186 the “Letter of Toledo” warned everyone to hide in the caves and mountains. The world would be destroyed and only a few would be spared.
In 1420 the Taborites of Czechoslovakia predicted every city would be annihilated by fire. Only five mountain strongholds would be saved.
Also around the same time someone called ‘Mother Shipton’ claimed the world would end 400 years later in 1881.
In 1666 the bubonic plague outbreak killed 100,000 Londoners and, along with the Great Fire of London during the same year, made the world ending likely to most. The fact that the year ended with the Beast’s number (666), didn’t help sanity to prevail either.
By 1809 things were getting really silly. A woman fortune teller, named Mary Bateman, had a magic chicken that laid eggs with end time messages on them. However the uproar she created was ended abruptly when an unannounced visitor caught her forcing a magic egg up the hen’s ass! She was later was hanged for poisoning a wealthy client.
William Miller founded an end-times movement that became known as ‘Millerism’. He determined that the second coming would happen sometime between 1843-1844. A spectacular meteor shower in 1833 gave the movement a good push forward and the anticipation continued to build up until March 21, 1844, when Miller’s one year time table ran out.
In 1874 the Jehovah’s Witnesses were getting in on the fun, but failed. They also struck out in 1878 and 1881. Charles Taze Russell then predicted the Rapture in 1910, followed by the ‘End of the World’ in 1914. He later reinterpreted this as the ‘invisible’ return of Christ when the world ignored him and continued. The Witnesses had no better luck with predictions for 1918, or 1925, or 1957, or 1975, or 1994. Amazingly, the failure of every one of their forecasts has not affected the growth of the movement, the Watchtower magazine, a major Witness periodical, having apparently over 13 million subscribers worldwide.
Then the revisit of Haley’s comet was, for many, an indication of the Lord’s second coming. The earth actually passed through the gaseous tail of the comet. One of the few sane people of the time was enterprising enough to sell ‘comet pills’ to people for protection against the effects of the toxic gases.
1960 was the date chosen by Piazzi Smyth, a past astronomer royal of Scotland, whose 1860 book titled “Our Inheritance in the Great Pyramid” both predicted that year as the date of the new millennium and was responsible for spreading the belief in pyramidology throughout the world.
1962 saw Pope John XXIII contributing to the madness, predicting that visitors from outer space would arrive in chariots of flaming steel and would share their advanced knowledge with humanity. Our life span would be increased to 150 years or longer and most diseases would be wiped out.
In 1967 when the city of Jerusalem was reclaimed by the Jews, prophecy watchers declared that the ‘Time of the Gentiles’ had come to an end.
By the mid 1970s it was the turn of the late Moses David (formerly David Berg) founder of ‘The Children of God’ to predict that a comet would hit the earth, and destroy all life in the United States.
Then a group called the ‘Tara Centers’ placed full-page advertisements in many major newspapers for the weekend of April 24-25, 1982, announcing “The Christ is Now Here!” and predicting that he would make himself known “within the next two months.” After the date passed, they said that the delay was only because the “consciousness of the human race was not quite right…” in other words, all our fault, not theirs!
In 1983, Bhagwan Shree Rajneesh, Guru of the Rajneesh movement also predicted massive destruction on earth, including natural disasters and man-made catastrophes. Floods larger than any since Noah, extreme earthquakes, very destructive volcano eruptions, nuclear wars etc. would be experienced. Tokyo, New York, San Francisco, Los Angeles, Bombay would all disappear. To the best of my knowledge they are all still around although Bombay did have a makeover name change. .
In 1991 Nation of Islam Leader, Louis Farrakhan, proclaimed the Gulf War would to be “the War of Armageddon … the final War.” Wrong!
In 1992, we had the whacko in Waco. David Koresh and his Branch Davidian group change the name of their commune from Mt. Carmel to Ranch Apocalypse, because of his belief that the final all-encompassing battle of Armageddon mentioned in the Bible would start at the Branch Davidian compound. They had calculated that the end would occur in 1995. After a 51-day standoff, on April 10,1993, they did have their own mini apocalypse when 76 members died as a result of a deliberately set fire.
Also in 1992 Lee Jang Rim started a church called, “Mission For The Coming Days”. Using numerology as the basis for his chosen date, the cult (no spelling error) looked forward to the Second Coming believing that Jesus would return through Sydney Harbour! An hour after the appointed prediction time the cult leaders ran for it, hiding their faces from reporters. One reporter was punched. Some disappointed members committed suicide, probably because they had given all their worldly assets to Lee Jang Rim who was later jailed for two years for embezzling 4.4 million dollars from 10,000 of his cult followers. Ironically Lee Jang Rim had used the money to buy bonds that matured AFTER the end of the world! You gotta laugh!
Pastor John Hinkle of Christ Church Los Angels also caused quite a stir when he announced he had received a vision from God that warned of an apocalyptic event on June 9th, 1994. Hinkle, quoting God, said, “On Thursday June the 9th, I will rip the evil out of this world.” Nope, didn’t happen either.
Then Harold Camping in his book “Are You Ready?” predicted the Lord’s return in September 1994. The book was full of methods that added up Bible numbers up to 1994 as the date of Christ’s return. Of course it was nonsense, but proving that you can’t keep a good man down, he was at it again in 2011, when he pronounced that May 21 that year would be ‘Judgment day’. Needless to say he was wrong again!
In 1993, when Rabin and Arafat signed their peace pact on the White House lawn on September 13, some saw the events as the beginning of the tribulation. With the signing of the peace agreement Daniel’s 1260 day countdown was underway and by adding 1260 days to September, 1993 they came to February 24, 1997 as the fateful day.
The July 29, 1997 an issue of the ‘Weekly World News’ carried a statement by a spokesperson of the ‘International Association of Psychics’ which said that 92% of their 120,000 members had had the same “end time” vision. War, pestilence, and a worldwide plague were among the predicted events which would see the end of mankind by around the year 2001. So much for psychics!
Also around 1997 a group called the ‘Sacerdotal Knights of National Security’ reported that “A space alien captured at a UFO landing site in eastern Missouri cracked under interrogation by the CIA and admitted that an extraterrestrial army will attack Earth on November 27 with the express purpose of stripping our planet of every natural resource they can find a use for — and making slaves of every man, woman and child in the world!”
Then, because 666 times three equals 1998, that year saw another spasm of end of the world predictions. For example, a Taiwanese cult operating out of Garland Texas predicted Christ would return on March 31, 1998. The group’s leader, Heng-ming Chen, announced God would return, and then invite the cult members aboard a UFO. However, the group had to abandon their second coming prediction when a precursor event failed to take place. The cult’s leader said God would appear on every channel 18 of every TV in the world, but as one commentator concluded, perhaps God realized at the last minute that the Playboy Network was channel 18 on several cable systems, and he didn’t want to have Christians watching a porn channel.
Also in 1998 the famous psychic, Edgar Cayce, predicted that a secret, underground chamber would be discovered between the paws of the Great Sphinx and that inside there would be documents revealing the history of Atlantis. This revelation would trigger the Second Coming of Christ. This prediction is more interesting than most because two independent studies have revealed that there is in fact an underground structure just where Cayce said it would be!
The wonderfully and appropriately named ‘Church of the Subgenius’ predicted that on “X Day”, July 5, 1998, the end of the world would occur. At that time, “the Men from Planet X, or XISTS, will arrive on Earth, close a deal with “Bob,” rapture the card-carrying Ordained SubGenii up to the Escape Vessels of the Sex Goddesses, and destroy the remaining population of Earth, VERY VERY SLOWLY.” In case you are wondering, ‘Bob’ is J.R. Dobbs, leader and High Epopt of the Church of the SubGenius, Living Avatar of Slack, the Saint of Sales. You couldn’t make it up!
The new millennium year of 2000 produced an upsurge in end of the world predictions. When none of that came true some of them regrouped and hit on the ‘no year zero’ excuse, pushing their doomsday date out to 2001. Nope. Wrong again!
A few years later, Shelby Corbett, of Bradenton, Florida put up benches throughout the town advertising that the rapture will happen in 2007! She had little Biblical knowledge but conveniently had a book out pushing the same information.
Then Arnie Stanton noted on September 16, 1997 that that evening was the fourth Jewish festival since April 3, 1996 when a lunar eclipse had occurred. He quoted Luke 21:25-26 which mentions “signs in the sun, in the moon and in the stars and on the earth distress of nations” and decided that “these recent lunar eclipses are the last known astronomical signs that will precede a 7 year (360 day/year) countdown to Armageddon/Christ’s return to the Earth.” Arnie expected that Christ’s return would occur within a few months of September 29, 2004 when Asteroid Toutatis made a very close approach to the Earth. Afraid not Arnie.
On April 17, 2008 Ronald Weinland travelled to Jerusalem and announced that he and his wife were the two witnesses of Revelation. The title of his book, “If it doesn’t come to pass…starting in April, then I’m nothing but a false prophet…” said it all.
And then we had the Mayan calendar nonsense, which brings me back to where this post started. It turned out to be a bit longer than I had intended, but I wanted to give you a flavor of the idiots that are out there, all with equally idiotic followers. And this is just a few of many, many more examples.
So is there an answer?
Well yes there is. And it’s pretty simple. Just do three things, (a) don’t listen to self-important academics and scientists who clearly don’t know what they are talking about. (b) treat others the way you like to be treated yourself, and providing you are reasonably normal and not some kind of kinky masochist, then that yardstick should do fine; and (c) don’t worry about the end of the world, you can’t do anything about it anyway, I mean where are you going to go?
It’s not absolutely necessary, but readers who can remember this era may enjoy this the most…
It was a hot Saturday evening in the summer of 1960 and Fred had a date with Peggy Sue.
He arrived at her house and rang the bell.
“Oh, come on in!” Peggy Sue’s mother said as she welcomed Fred in. “Have a seat in the living room. Would you like something to drink? Lemonade? Iced tea?”
“I’ll have an Iced tea, please,” Fred said.
Mom brought the iced tea.
“So, what are you and Peggy planning to do tonight?” she asked.
“Oh, probably catch a movie, and then maybe grab a bite to eat at the malt shop, maybe take a walk on the beach…”
“Peggy likes to screw, you know,” Mom informed him.
“What???” Fred spluttered, his mouthful of iced tea almost launching itself across the room.
“Uh…really?” he continued, eyebrows raised, as he tried to gather his wits about him. He wasn’t at all used to this type of liberal parenting, which was very progressive for the early 1960s.
“Oh, yes!” the mother continued very matter-of-factly. “When she goes out with her friends, that’s all they do!”
“Is that so?” asked Fred, incredulous.
“Yes,” the mother continued. “As a matter of fact, she’d screw all night if we let her, but of course we don’t!”
“Er no, I suppose not,” Fred answered, still surprised that Peggy Sue’s parents would countenance such a thing at all.
“Well, thanks for the tip,” he continued as he quickly began thinking about alternate plans for the evening.
A wicked smile began to play on his lips.
A moment later, Peggy Sue came down the stairs looking pretty as a picture. She was wearing a pink blouse and full circle skirt, and had her long hair tied back in a bouncy ponytail. She greeted Fred.
“Have fun, kids,” the mother said as they left.
Fred was sure that they would.
Half an hour later, a completely disheveled Peggy Sue burst into the house and slammed the front door behind her.
“Whatever is wrong, darling?” her puzzled mother inquired.
“The Twist, Mom! It’s the twist!!” Peggy Sue angrily yelled at her mother.
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