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June 23, 2005 4:39 PM

And now an angry rant from Jonathan Tsang on believing everything you see...

Why do we believe everything we see, hear, read? I mean seriously what is it? Should we be doubtful or inquisitive by nature? It almost seems like we're naive by nature and cynicism is a learned behavior.

"Hey Jonathan, did you know that they took the work 'gullible' out of the dictionary?"
Me: "Really?"

Urban legends, photocopier folklore and now mass emails.

Today I got an email from my friend with some urban legends and interesting facts on it. Most of the content from this email can be found on this page.

In the 1400's a law was set forth that a man was not allowed to beat his wife with a stick no thicker than his thumb. Hence we have "the rule of thumb"

When in actuality the Oxford English Dictionary indicates that the phrase has been used for about 300 years to refer to measurements that are based on experience instead of exact science. Source cited from a paper written about this indicating that this is called revisionist history.

Coca-Cola was originally green.

Once again untrue. In fact this urban legend was investigated by the famed Snopes.com urban legend debunking website. Source found here.

Many years ago in Scotland, a new game was invented. It was ruled "Gentlemen Only...Ladies Forbidden"...and thus the word GOLF entered into the English language.

HORSESHIT! *Did I just wake up my neighbors upstairs?* Source: 'taken as an alteration of M.Du. colf, colve "stick, club, bat," '

The best part is that most of these so called FUN FACTS are not provable or are based on something so dynamic, that they could've been plausible at some point in time. Like "How many people are in the air above the US at any given hour... 61000" Shit like that blows my mind. What blows my mind even more is that I was ready to believe all of it!!

In other news... I love snopes.com it's the original Urban Legend reference page. They actually go in and research all this shit.

Oh and did you know Mr. Ed was played by a Zebra, but because it was Black and White television you couldn't see the strips?

Make sure to click the "More information about this page" button in the Additional Information section at the bottom.

In other news... keep on sending me this email shit.. it's GRRRRRRRRREAT!

June 23, 2005 2:18 PM

Well looks like I got a job... kinda nervous... no more sweet sweet unemployment