Uncle John’s 24-Karat Gold Bathroom Reader® (4 page)

DAMN THE TORPY...D’OH!

How much does Eric Torpy admire NBA legend Larry Bird? So much that when Torpy was sentenced to 30 years in prison for armed robbery and attempted murder in 2005, he said to the judge, “Why not make it 33?” (That was Bird’s jersey number.) Equally bizarre: The judge granted Torpy’s request. However, after serving the first few years of his sentence, Torpy wasn’t happy with the situation anymore. “Now I wish that I had 30 years instead of 33,” he said in 2011. “I’ve wisened up.” Adding insult to injury, the story made the rounds in the press and Torpy was made fun of on
The Tonight Show
...which means that Larry Bird himself has most likely heard about it. “He must think I’m an idiot,” said Torpy, who will be eligible for parole in 2033.

THE SAD HATTER

For Halloween 2010 a young British man named Shawn Merter decided that he would complete his costume by wearing a sequinned top hat at an angle on his head. But instead of attaching the hat to his head with a string, Merter decided to glue it on. He tried fabric glue. That didn’t work, so he used Super Glue. Good news: The hat stayed on. Bad news: It wouldn’t come off. After unsuccessfully trying soap and warm water, Merter went to the emergency room. “Super Glue is actually quite strong,” the ER doctor told him. “If I rip the hat off, it will tear your scalp and could lead to an infection.” So a nurse cut it off with scissors. “I cut off the top of the hat, leaving only the brim,” she told reporters, “so he won’t look like that much of an idiot.” (The brim finally did come off, but only after Merter soaked his head in warm water for 12 hours.)

Finnish scissors-maker Fiskars has been in business since 1649—it originally made steam engines.

SALT IN HIS WOUNDS

In the panic that followed the March 2011 Japanese tsunami and nuclear catastrophe, people all over the world began buying iodine tablets—or anything containing iodine, such as iodized salt—in the belief that it would protect them from radiation. Seeing that salt prices were rising, a Chinese entrepreneur named Guo purchased 4.5 tons of iodized salt, and had it trucked to his home. Not long after he had filled up nearly every room in his house with bags (and bags) of salt, news reports reassured the public that iodine was unnecessary in this type of disaster. Almost immediately, the price of salt dropped to pre-disaster levels. Guo couldn’t return the salt because he didn’t have the proper documentation. He also couldn’t sell it, because he had no license to do so. At last report, Guo’s house was still filled with salt.

A FABULOUS MISTAKE

A 2011 English-language booklet issued by the German tourism board to promote a music-awareness campaign in Düsseldorf city schools was marred by a typo that no one caught until two-thirds of the 90,000 booklets had been printed. The cause of the typo was a spelling error in the original German version of the booklet: The phrase
der Schulen
, meaning “of the schools,” was misspelled as
der
S
chwulen
, which is a disparaging way of saying “of the homosexuals.” The English text should have read “School’s Day of Action,” but read “Gay’s Day of Action” instead. Result: Officials had to print 65,000 stickers with the correct word and then place each one over the typo by hand.

Unlike most big cats, which go for the throat, jaguars kill their prey by biting through the skull.

SIMPSONS
STORES

Over 20+ seasons
, The Simpsons
has shown hundreds of these blink-and-you-miss-’em sight gags: funny business names. Here are a few favorites
.

Something Wicker This Way Comes

Donner’s Party Supplies

Ah, Fudge (chocolate factory)

Eastside Ruff-Form School (dog obedience school)

Tokyo Roe’s Sushi Bar

The Three Seasons Motel

All Creatures Great and Cheap (pet store)

Miscellaneous, Etc.

Wee Monsieur (kids clothing store)

Restoration Software

Dr. Zitofsky’s Dermatology Clinic

King Toot’s Music Store

Louvre: American Style (museum)

Kentucky Fried Panda

General Chang’s Taco Italiano

I Can’t Believe It’s a Law Firm!

Red Rash Inn

Rubber Baby Buggy Bumpers

Hillside Wrangler Steakhouse

Goody New Shoes

The Frying Dutchman (seafood restaurant)

Texas Cheesecake Depository

Much Ado About Muffins

International House of Answering Machines

Taj Mah-All-You-Can-Eat

The Sole Provider (shoe store)

Pudding on the Ritz

The Brushes Are Coming, The Brushes Are Coming

T.G.I. Fried Eggs

Call Me Delish-Mael (candy store)

The Buzzing Sign Diner

You can eat ’em, but only once: More than 2,000 plant species contain cyanide.

BASEBALL BIZARRE

Assorted weirdness from around the baseball diamond
.

• Cleveland Indians pitcher Bob Feller and Minnesota Twins outfielder Denard Span have something odd in common: Both hit their mothers in the stands with a foul ball. Feller hit his mom in 1939 (he broke her collarbone);Span hit his during a spring training game in 2010. Both moms made full recoveries.

• On September 30, 1934, Charley O’Leary of the St.Louis Browns became the oldest big leaguer to get a hit and score a run. He was 51.

• In Japan, catchers learn to crouch by having spiked boards placed under their behinds.

• From 1936 to ’46, Hall-of-Famer Joe “Flash” Gordon played exactly 1,000 games for the Yankees. In that time, he had exactly 1,000 hits.

• Breaking Babe Ruth’s home-run record will never be 4-gotten: It happened in the 4th inning of the 4th game of ’74, when the Braves’ Hank Aaron, #44, hit a homer off the Dodgers’ Al Downing, #44.

• In the 1960s, Kansas City A’s owner Charlie Finley installed a mechanical rabbit that popped up out of the ground behind home plate to deliver new baseballs to the umpire. Finley wanted the rest of the owners to install rabbits too, but none did.

• What minor leaguer—who never played in the majors—made a $4 million salary? Michael Jordan. In 1994 he played for a Chicago White Sox farm team. Jerry Reinsdorf, who owned the Sox and the Chicago Bulls, honored Jordan’s basketball contract even as Jordan fizzled out as a baseball player.

• In 1989 the Reds’ temperamental outfielder Paul O’Neill dropped a fly ball. He angrily kicked the ball. It went directly to the cutoff man and stopped a runner from scoring.

• In 1957 the Phillies’ Richie Ashburn fouled a ball that hit a fan named Alice Roth. As she was being taken away on a stretcher, Ashburn fouled off another...and hit her again.

Hot running water: The Nile River has frozen only twice in recorded history.

THE GOLD WATCH
AWARDS

Uncle John has been at the BRI for 24 golden years. If he keeps it up for another 30, maybe he’ll qualify to be in an article like this one
.

A
WARD WINNER:
Mike Ryterski, of St. Louis, Missouri
POSITION:
Master grease maker
YEARS ON THE JOB:
71

STORY:
Mike Ryterski was a 20-year-old Illinois farmboy when he went to Schaeffer Manufacturing, a St. Louis company specializing in industrial lubricants, and asked for a job. That was 1940, and as of 2011 he’s still working there. The 91-year-old is down to three days a week, but he’s still the “master grease maker” (one of only a few left in the world today, according to the company), overseeing the company’s production of new grease products. Ryterski, who personally hired nearly every person who works at the plant today—including the person who is now his own boss—said in 2010 that he’d be on the job “as long as my health permits.” (Sounds like it could be a long time.)

AWARD WINNER:
Jack Ingram, of Manchester, England

POSITION:
Columnist

YEARS ON THE JOB:
71

STORY:
In December 29, 1933, 14-year-old Jack Ingram wrote his first newspaper column for the
Heywood Advertiser
, a local paper in northwest England. Titled “Scouts and Scouting,” it was about Ingram’s local Boy Scouts troop. The column, which ran under the byline “White Eagle,” Ingram’s scout nickname, appeared every week (with a break when Ingram served during World War II)—for the next 71 years. Ingram retired the column in 2004, at the age of 85—and was recognized by
Guinness World Records
as the longest-serving newspaper columnist in history. (Ingram died in November 2004.)

AWARD WINNER:
Mary Whitehead, of Watkinsville, Georgia

POSITION:
Church pianist

YEARS ON THE JOB:
75

STORY:
Mary Whitehead started playing piano at the Winterville United Methodist Church in 1936 at the age of 15. She liked it so much that she came back every week for the next 75 years. When she finally decided to call it quits in February 2011, the congregation organized a “Mary Whitehead Day,” just so she could play for them one more time. “I think it’s awful nice of them to put on a special day for me,” she said. “But I’m 91 years old. It’s not so easy for me to get around as it used to be.”

Tallest Miss America contestant: 6'2" Jeanne Robertson, Miss N. Carolina, 1963. (She lost.)

AWARD WINNER:
Mavis Blakey, of Durban, South Africa

POSITION:
Secretary of Durban’s Central Gymnastics Club

YEARS ON THE JOB:
73

STORY:
Blakely began studying gymnastics in Durban in 1926 at the age of 13. Ten years later, in 1936, she became secretary of the local gymnastics club. She was still organizing fundraising drives, helping set up competitions, and even coaching kids—all part of her duties as secretary—seven decades later. “Marvelous Mavis,” as she was known, remained the club’s secretary for nearly 73 years, until shortly before her death in 2009 at the age of 96.

AWARD WINNER:
John Netherland Heiskell

POSITION:
Editor-in-Chief, the
Arkansas Gazette

YEARS ON THE JOB:
70

STORY:
Heiskell graduated from the University of Knoxville in 1893, and for the next nine years worked as a reporter for various newspapers in Tennessee and Kentucky. Then in 1902 his family bought the
Arkansas Gazette
, a paper based in Little Rock, and Heiskell—29 at the time—was appointed editor-in-chief, a position he retained...for a very long time. Among the stories covered during his tenure: the first successful sustained flight of an airplane (by the Wright Brothers), the sinking of the
Titanic
, World War I, the Great Depression, World War II, the Korean War, desegregation, the Vietnam War, and the Apollo moon landing. Heiskell never retired: Although he stopped actually going to the office when he was 99, he remained the paper’s editor-in-chief until December 1972...and only stopped then because he died. He was 100 years old.

Okapi, a species of antelope, are the only mammals whose females are taller than the males.

FAMOUS FOR 15 MINUTES

It’s our latest installment based on Andy Warhol’s observation, “In the future, everyone will be famous for 15 minutes.” Here’s how some people have used their allotted quarter hour
.

T
HE STAR:
Samuel Joseph Wurzelbacher, 35, a plumber from Holland, Ohio

THE HEADLINE:
Plumber Makes Waves in Presidential Race

WHAT HAPPENED:
On October 12, 2008, Wurzelbacher was playing catch with his son in his front yard when Senator Barack Obama’s campaign bus rolled through the neighborhood. While cameras rolled, the bald, brawny plumber asked Obama, “I’m getting ready to buy a company that makes $250,000 to $280,000 a year. Your new tax plan’s going to tax me more, isn’t it?” Obama explained the nuances of his proposed tax plan, and how it wouldn’t affect 90 percent of small businesses. But the media repeatedly ran a comment that Obama made at the end of his answer: “I think when you spread the wealth around, it’s good for everybody.” Three days later during the presidential debate, Obama’s Republican rival, Senator John McCain, equated the statement with socialism, and mentioned “Joe the Plumber” 20 times, at one point referring to him as “my old buddy.”

AFTERMATH:
Many pundits on the left accused Wurzelbacher of being a plant for the right (he wasn’t); many on the right tried to turn him into a folk hero. McCain’s camp asked him to appear at rallies, and an Ohio Young Republicans chapter tried to recruit him to run for Congress. But when the press went digging into Wurzelbacher’s personal life, they discovered that he didn’t have a valid Ohio plumbing license, that he owed back taxes, and that he really didn’t plan to buy the company he worked for. (And he goes by Sam, not Joe.) For his part, Wurzelbacher didn’t have many nice things to say about
either
candidate. Obama, he said, doesn’t hold true to American values, and he thought McCain tried to use him for his political gain, calling him “the lesser of two evils.” After the election, Wurzelbacher wrote a book about his experiences and became a public speaker, appearing at several Tea Party political rallies. (And he still hasn’t ruled out a run for office.)

Highest legal drinking age in the world: 21, in the United States.

THE STAR:
Steven Slater, 38, a flight attendant from New York