Hoax Museum Blog: Urban Legends

Aliens Made Me Do It — The BBC reports that the staff of the Northumbria Safety Camera Partnership have come up with the 10 stupidest excuses drivers have come up with to explain why they were speeding. Number one is: "I passed out after seeing UFOs." Not only stupid, but illogical (unless you passed out and somehow jammed your foot on the accelerator). A few of the other excuses are:

• A jet over-head, not me, triggered the camera



• I had a severe bout of diarrhoea



• A gust of wind pushed me over the limit



• I had to rush my dying hamster to the vet's.

Do You Believe in Santa Claus? — A British psychiatrist, Lynda Breen, has concluded that belief in Santa Claus is actually good for the moral development of children. Apparently believing in the existence of a jolly red-suited man who "'knows if you've been bad or good' helps teach children the difference between right and wrong." As much as my first inclination is to make a sarcastic remark about this, I think I'm going to hold back since there's a whole slew of fantastic beings whose existence I find myself very reluctant to deny, especially when kids are around: jackalopes, Nessie, Roswell aliens, etc. Of course, none of these creatures offer any kind of moral example, so Dr. Breen would probably say that belief in them is unhealthy.

In the Wake of Grilled Cheese Mary — Following the $28,000 sale of that Virgin Mary Grilled Cheese Sandwich, it seems like it's been loony season on eBay (if it was ever NOT loony season on eBay, that is). Among the more memorable Grilled Cheese Mary Wannabes have been the Jesus Fish Stick, the NutriGrain cereal that looks like ET, and the piece of popcorn that looks like the Virgin Mary holding Baby Jesus. Buck Wolf, in his weekly column on ABC News, points out some miracle foods from years past that have beguiled the public, including the Tennessee Nun Bun (a cinnamon bun that looks like Mother Teresa), the Miracle Tortilla of New Mexico (a tortilla that looks like Jesus), and the Holy Eggplant of India (an eggplant that spells out 'Allah' in urdu script).

Man Boobs Prank — This is stupid and gross, but kind of funny anyway. Here's the set-up: "Penthouse Playmate, Kyli Ryan, came to The Bear studios for a visit and The Bear's Breakfast decided to pull a fast one. Yukon was blindfolded and was then told he would be able to "cop a feel". Bear listener "Man Boobs" was brought in for Yukon to unknowingly feel up." The page showing the images of the prank is safe for work (depending on where you work, I suppose), but potentially not safe for your feeling of mental well being.

Lava Lamp Explodes — I saw this story on the news last night: lava lamp explodes and kills man. It's definitely a candidate for the Darwin Awards, but it also sounds a bit like an urban legend (Big Gary wrote asking 'Can a lava lamp really kill someone? Have I been foolish to turn my back on my lava lamp?') It's been pretty widely reported, so I have to assume the story is true. And I could also imagine that if you heat a lava lamp on top of a stove, it could explode, and if you're really unlucky a shard of glass from that explosion could puncture your heart. The question in my mind is why this guy was heating it on the stove. I bet he thought he could speed up the lava bubbles by cranking up the heat a bit.

Pertannually Insubdurient — EU bureaucrats are a perpetual target for humor. Here's the latest one. Supposedly they decided to remove the word 'pertannually' from the EU constitution, having decided that it was incomprehensible and meaningless. And what did they replace it with? The much clearer term 'insubdurience'. One source for this story is John Humphrys, a political journalist who's just written a book Lost for Words, about "the demise of the language." The tale also pops up in this Guardian article. The story could very well be true, but it also sounds suspiciously like one of those Euromyths that have become so popular. For instance, there's the Euromyth about the supposed new EU law that forbids bananas from being "too excessively curved." Or the one about how the EU has classified kilts as 'womenswear'. To fact check the 'pertannually insubdurient' story I tried to check the EU constitution itself. It's available online, but having looked at it, I'm now not sure how to find "clause 82, paragraph 17, subsection (b)".

Yale to Harvard: You Suck — In a reworking of the Great Rose Bowl Hoax of 1961, Yale students, posing as members of the 'Harvard Pep Squad', managed to trick Harvard fans into holding up flip-cards reading 'WE SUCK' at the Harvard-Yale football game. I guess it's true that the great pranks never go out of style. (Thanks to Mormagli for giving me a heads up about this on the message board)

Victimless Leather — The Tissue Culture & Art (TC&A) Project at University of Western Australia has succeeded in creating Victimless Leather. This is a tiny leather jacket "grown out of immortalised cell lines which cultured and form a living layer of tissue supported by a biodegradable polymer matrix in a form of miniature stich-less coat like shape." It's perfect for a doll's house, or if you have a mouse that needs a leather jacket. I'm guessing this isn't a hoax, since it shouldn't be that hard to grow cells on a scaffold shaped like a jacket. But it would have been cooler if they had grown it large enough to fit a person.

Tank Silencer — Here's another photo that's doing the rounds on the internet. It's captioned 'Tank Silencer'. I have no idea what this device is actually used for, but somehow I don't think it's a tank silencer. So this would be a case of 'real picture, false caption.' Click image for larger version. (via Hell in a Handbasket)

Cup Stacking — I noticed this article about the sport of competitive Cup Stacking in today's issue of the San Diego Union Tribune. That would be plastic cups... stacked up... as a sport. All the internet research I've done indicates this isn't a hoax. The sport of Cup Stacking is real. For instance, here's the site of SpeedStacks.com, the leading manufacturer of cup stacking equipment. But still, I'm having a hard time getting my brain around the concept of it. Maybe it's the testimonials in the Union Trib article that are giving me a hard time. Check out what student Jason Counts says about cup stacking: "It changed my life. Before then, I was kind of going down the wrong path. Since I got into cup stacking, I've changed tremendously." Someone please tell me he's kidding.

Marijuana at Target — This is either a prank by a low-level employee, or some kind of error. Target.com apparently is selling marijuana for only $25.25 (how much do you get for that price?). The link might be dead pretty soon, so here's a screen cap. Of course, Target does have a garden department, so maybe it's real... (via Boing Boing)

Wing Women — Once you get tired of socializing with your imaginary eBay girlfriend, you might want to meet a real woman... in person. But how do you go about doing this? That's where Wing Women comes in. "What we provide at wingwomen.com is an attractive, outgoing and fun spirited Wing Woman who will do her best to introduce you to other women." For only $50 an hour, a wing woman will meet you at a bar, or other public place, and then she'll pretend that she's your friend. In other women's eyes this will seem like a seal of approval (i.e. he's got one female friend, so there must be something okay about him). Soon the women will be flocking around you. Of course, eventually they'll find out that you hired your female friend. Then it'll be back to the imaginary eBay girlfriend.

Cannibalistic Cats — I've recently discovered a good blog named The Rambler that delves into a lot of hoaxy material. Recently Mark (who writes The Rambler) posted a disturbing entry about some relatives of his who let their cats run out of control:

They never cleaned the litterbox so the cats defecated all over the house. They particularly liked shoes and closets so getting dressed must have been like camping in Africa. My wife's cat makes so much noise when he's hungry that I can't imagine anyone not feeding one cat let alone 11, but they frequently let them go without food. The mother cat eventually turned cannibalistic and would wait behind furniture or random piles of crap for a kitten to walk by. When one was unlucky enough to do so, she leapt out, killed and ate it.

A cannibalistic mother cat? I'm assuming Mark isn't pulling our leg, but I've never heard of such a thing. Though I should add that my understanding of cat behavior is mostly shaped by the behavior of the one plump and lazy cat who lives with me.

Mothers Against Videogame Addiction and Violence — Is your child receiving poor grades in school in every subject except Computer Education? Is your child spending a lot of time in their bedroom and at home? Then he or she may be suffering from videogame addiction. Mothers Against Videogame Addiction and Violence (MAVAV) is a group that's trying to educate parents about this growing threat. Check out some of the articles on their site, such as "E3: The Evil Entertainment Expo" or "EverQuest: A Threat to Society?" I could imagine a group like this being real, but it's just a hoax created by David Yoo way back in 2002. On this page Yoo describes why he created it and notes that even after it had been exposed as a hoax on Slashdot, he still continued to receive letters from people who thought it was real.

Crown Jewels on Display — In this picture that's caused quite a sensation in England, Lt. Col. Simon West reveals exactly what's beneath his kilt during a group photograph with the Queen. But is the picture real? Apparently so. According to articles in a variety of British papers, the accidental exposure was witnessed by hundreds of people. It happened on Nov. 9 as the Queen posed with the 1st Battalion of the Argyll and Sutherland Highlanders. This assumes, of course, that the exposure was accidental. Lt. Col West insists that it was. All the papers seem to be running a censored version of the picture, but Snopes has posted what looks like the original version (click the image on the right for the uncensored, nsfw version). They say it's status is undetermined, but it looks legitimate to me. The version that ran in the papers seems too tame to have caused such a fuss.

UK Paperback Edition — The UK publisher of the Museum of Hoaxes just sent me a picture of what the paperback edition of the book will look like when it comes out over there (click image for a larger version). It looks quite colorful and fun. But I'm especially proud of the fact that it has a picture of Hamster Viagra right at the top of it. Nothing says quality non-fiction quite like Hamster Viagra. As for why the UK edition says 'edited by Alex Boese' instead of just 'by Alex Boese,' I have no idea. I'm trying to find out why.

Stunning Ingratitude of De Gaulle — In 1945 did Charles De Gaulle really say to Winston Churchill, in reference to the military aid that the Allies provided to France to defeat Germany, that "We shall stun you with our ingratitude"? Monday, November 22 was the birthday of De Gaulle, and a number of right-leaning blogs marked the occasion by posting this quotation (they seem to have picked it up from an article in the Belfast Telegraph). So did De Gaulle really say this?

Even though the tense verbal exchanges between De Gaulle and Churchill are well known, this particular remark sounded hoaxy to me. A quick google search didn't turn up any source that could verify the remark, though it did pull up an essay noting that Churchill once quoted to De Gaulle a passage from Plutarch: "ingratitude towards great men is the mark of a strong people." So it's possible that De Gaulle responded to this comment by saying that the French would stun Churchill with their ingratitude (in which context, the remark would be a compliment).

However, a second, more thorough google search revealed that the 'stunning ingratitude' quotation has been attributed to a number of other people besides De Gaulle. This 2003 article in theage.com.au attributes it to the prime minister of the Hapsburg Empire: When, in 1848, Tsarist Russia intervened to put down an insurrection in Hungary, thus saving the Hapsburg Empire which was then in deep trouble, the Hapsburg prime minister commented that: "We shall astonish the world with our ingratitude."

But quite a few other people (including the conservative columnists Pat Buchanan and George Will) credit the remark to the Italian statesman Camillo Benso Cavour: The Sardinian minister who guided his country to the unification of Italy in the mid-1800, Cavour, did so with French help in a war with Austria. Without the French Army the Austrians would probably still have been ruling Northern Italy in 1914. Cavour's comment was that someday the Italians would astonish the world with their ingratitude to France.


I suspect that Cavour is the true source of the saying. In which case, it's ironic that a remark originally referring to ingratitude towards France has now come full circle and is being used to demonstrate (supposedly) the ingratitude of France.

Terminal Tours — Terminal Tours provides a service for those who are near death or just thinking about dying, whisking them away on the vacation of their dreams. It gives them a chance to do that one thing they always wanted to do, but never got around to doing. The guide on this 'terminal tour' is Michael Keever. Except Michael Keever doesn't actually exist. He's a character from Tom LeClair's recent novel, Passing On. Nor does Terminal Tours itself exist. LeClair left some comments in the hoax museum message board, noting that the Terminal Tours site "extends the fiction of the novel and parodies 'promise you everything, including eternal life' web sites." He also tells me that in the spirit of the Museum of Hoaxes, his next novel, The Liquidators (due out next fall), features a Museum of Lead. Cool.

Berners Street Redux — First the police showed up at the house on Bristol Ferry Road to investigate a phoned-in report of domestic disturbance and narcotics. Finding nothing, they left. Then three taxicabs showed up, claiming someone had called for a pickup. Then delivery guys from Pizza Hollywood, Steve's Pizza, and Carmella's added to the crowd. It sounds like someone was trying to re-enact the infamous Berners Street Hoax of 1810. Although, of course, I don't think anyone has ever managed to top the crowd at Berners Street.

Notify of New Comments — It was pointed out to me that once people register as a member the 'notify of new comments' button suddenly becomes selected by default whenever they post a comment. That's a little annoying. I've managed to change this for people who register in the future, so that it won't be selected by default. But for existing members, if you don't want that option selected by default, you're going to need to change it yourself in your individual member preferences (you may not have realized there even were individual member preferences). Here's what you do:

• Click login on the menu above.


• Then click on the 'My Account' link at the top-right of the login screen


• Next click 'email settings'


• Finally, unclick the 'enable email notification by default' button

And that'll do it.