HDTenEightyP/NetNews huggingface dataset:
From: pratta@rpi.edu (Anthony Edward Prattico)
Subject: Re: Sinking libraries
Organization: Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute
	<PRATTA.92Aug31101601@marcus.rpi.edu>
	<1992Aug31.232228.2499@geovision.gvc.com>
Date: Wed, 2 Sep 1992 01:18:10 GMT

In article <1992Aug31.232228.2499@geovision.gvc.com> pt@geovision.gvc.com (Paul Tomblin) writes:
>>Well, if it helps, RPI has the same problem with its library as well. Along
>>with the engineering center, the student union and a few other buildings that
>>are slowly sinking due to less that stable ground.
>
>   If this were true, there would be incredible cracks in the foundations,
>   walls, and any concrete columns.  Buildings are not built as one monolithic
>   structure that will sink all as one unit.  If something is sinking, there
>   will be parts sinking slower than others - the result is cracks, and
>   eventually failure.  As a guess, I'd say most buildings today couldn't sink
>   more than 4 inches without a catastrophic failure.
>
 
Well..... You haven't heard the rest of the stories. One building, the MRC,
supposedly has a joint in it to prevent cracking and failure if it sinks un-
evenly. Also, the engineering center supposedly has twice as many columns and
footings as it was originally intended because the original footings were found
to have shifted sideways between their pouring and the beginning of construc-
tion. Then there is West Hall, which slid six (or so) inches, before it was 
attached to another building with steel cables (underground). I believe the
story of the civil engineering professor and his surveying class has been post-
ed before. The DCC is built half on solid rock and half on an old stream bed,
which should cause problems, and supposedly does have severe water leakage
during heavy rainstorms. (And the spring thaw)

My point is this is not a serious thread, and it doesn't matter whether the
buildings should experience some form of catastrophic failure. This is UL
territory, remember? 

Besides, if we listened to everything engineers and physicists said, nothing
would ever get built. And bumblebees wouldn't fly, because it's physically
impossible. 

Newsgroups: alt.folklore.urban
From: simon@sco.COM (Simon Tooke)
Subject: re: Chef Boy-Ar-Dee commercial
Organization: SCO Canada, Inc.
Date: Wed, 26 Aug 1992 12:51:55 GMT



> Newsgroups: alt.folklore.urban
> Path: scocan!comspec!censor!utzoo!helios.physics.utoronto.ca!dooley
> From: dooley@helios.physics.utoronto.ca (Kevin Dooley)
> Subject: Chef Boy-Ar-Dee commercial
> Message-ID: <BtGF5s.K17@helios.physics.utoronto.ca>
> Sender: news@helios.physics.utoronto.ca (News Administrator)
> Organization: University of Toronto Physics/Astronomy/CITA
> Date: Sun, 23 Aug 1992 20:49:04 GMT
> 
> Deep in my childhood memories lives a tv commercial for Chef Boy-Ar-Dee
> spaghetti.  I don't know how widely seen this thing was, but it certainly
> aired throughout Canada and (I think) the US too.  The setting was a
> bunch of kids playing jump-rope on the streets of some old European
> (probably Italian) city.  Then the bells in the square start to ring
> and the kids all go running home to eat their canned plastic ravioli,
> or whatever.  Anyway, the puzzle is, what were the lyrics to the song?
> It sounded something like (where words I'm unsure about are marked with
> an asterisk):
> 
>         The bells ring *out loudly*
>         It's lunch-time *already*
>         For you and for me,
>         It's Chef Boy-Ar-Dee.
> 
> Now, I've polled all my friends and my wife and I have racked our brains
> (we have had too many papers to write lately) and come up with the following
> possible permutations.
> 
>         * The bells ring out madly, it's lunch-time already
>         * The bells ring a medley, it's lunch-time all readly
>         * The bells ring Bo Diddly, it's lunch-time for kiddlies
> and my wife insists upon
>         * The bells ring all medmy, it's lunch-time all medmy
> but refuses to explain what this could possibly mean.
> 
> So I am calling upon the net to help us to resolve this puzzle once and
> for all.  I know it isn't really urban folklore, but it might as well be,
> heck I asked friends of friends if they knew the true lyrics...  What
> are the missing words?
> 
> Disclaimer: this is not in any way an endorsement of Chef Boy-Ar-Dee canned
> pasta, which I have tasted and found to be all medmy.

From my memory, partial phrases such as

	we're having Beef-a-roni;
	Cheese and Macaroni!
	Beef-a-roni-getti,
	(mumble mumble something, fade to quiet)

come to mind.  Almost completely different words.

ObUl: (Yes, there is one for this ad!)  I went to Rosedale Public School
when I was a kid (Rosedale is a very well-off Toronto area), and the
father of two twins in my class was supposed to be in the ad agency that did
that ad.  The legend was the twins were supposed to be in it somewhere.
(but _I_ could never see them.  Perhaps they were in another ad - one
with words like "The bells ring *out loudly*, It's lunch-time *already*" that
had almost the same pictures...)

===============================================================================
Simon Tooke                  SCO Canada, Inc.            Voice:  (416) 922-1937
....!scocan!simon             simon@sco.com                Fax:  (416) 922-2704
130 Bloor St. West. Suite 1001, Toronto, Ontario, Canada  M5S 1N5
Newsgroups: alt.folklore.urban
Subject: Re: Mnemonics
From: joltes@husc9.harvard.edu (Richard Joltes)
Date: 2 Sep 92 15:38:23 EDT
Organization: Harvard University Science Center

schroede@bnlux1.bnl.gov (gary l. schroeder) writes:

[stuff about Gilligan's Island characters and Ginger vs. Mary Anne...]

>To the contrary, I always wanted Mary Anne.  Something about those
>wholesome farm girl looks of hers.

I'm glad someone else felt that way too!

I noticed an article (somewhere...may have been one of the rags) last year
on "Whatever happened to Mary Anne?"  Seems that there's still a thriving
"Dawn Wells Fan Club" and she personally responds to as many letters and 
photo requests as she can.  I believe the article said she was out of show
biz and was working in a completely different field, but really appreciated
the fact that so many people still cared.

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Dick "wellspring of useless trivia" Joltes		joltes@husc.harvard.edu
Hardware & Networking Manager, Computer Services 	joltes@husc.bitnet 
Harvard University Science Center

"Mind you, not as bad as the night Archie Pettigrew ate some
sheep's testicles for a bet...God, that bloody sheep kicked him..."
From: grady@btr.BTR.COM (Grady Ward  grady@btr.com)
Newsgroups: alt.folklore.urban
Subject: Thomas Crapper and Spread Spectrum
Date: 28 Aug 92 02:24:45 GMT
Organization: BTR Public Access UNIX, MtnView CA. Contact: Customer Service cs@BTR.COM

Does anyone know the origin of the "Thomas Crapper"
(as in inventor of the toilet) myth?

Also, can anyone verify or debunk the notion
that Hedy Lamarr (the actress) holds the
original Spread Spectrum patent in the 40's?

Thanks!  grady@btr.com
.

Newsgroups: alt.folklore.urban
From: lasner@watsun.cc.columbia.edu (Charles Lasner)
Subject: Re: Flat Earth Society
Reply-To: lasner@watsun.cc.columbia.edu (Charles Lasner)
Organization: Columbia University
Date: Thu, 3 Sep 1992 00:09:17 GMT

In article <1992Aug31.164026.16296@cybernet.cse.fau.edu> michaelb@cse.fau.edu (Michael Rogero Brown) writes:
>"In Your Heart You Know Its Flat!"

I assume they don't believe in geometry either.  Anyone ever ask them, if the
world ain't round or other 3-D figure that connects back to itself, then how
come there's no such place on Earth that you can't take a plane from without
possibility of getting to any other place on Earth without passing the places
in between appropriate for a solid figure.  This doesn't prove roundness, 
merely 3-D figure, as opposed to flatness.  Or why can I fly from their 
headquarters in any direction I chose, and find that as I traverse the world
I come back to the same place, passing over that portion of the rest of the
surface that is consistent with a somewhat round shape?  Or is that "the
Devil's work"?

cjl (I don't believe in the Flat Earth Society, who obviously fell off the
edge)
From: mcirvin@husc8.harvard.edu (Mcirvin)
Newsgroups: alt.folklore.urban
Subject: Re: The Flat Earth Society???
Date: 2 Sep 92 21:37:31 GMT
 <550@texbell.sbc.com> <1992Sep2.160720.27362@cybernet.cse.fau.edu>

michaelb@cse.fau.edu (Michael Rogero Brown) writes:

>John Sladek, in his book _The New Apocrapha_, a sort of British "Fads and 
>Fallacies in the Name of Science_, had a brief item on the Flat Earthers.
>He said that if we ever established a colony on Mars, we would know it was
>going great when someone forms a "Flat Mars Society".

>A great book if you can find it.

Sladek is also a writer of funny, cynical science fiction with a
heavy dose of social satire.  In the novel _Roderick_ he includes a
pseudo-historical digression about a flat-earther religious sect
led by a man named Jorad.  It seems to be a combined parody of
the Flat Earth Society and the cult founded by Cyrus "Koresh" Teed,
which held that the earth was hollow and that we live on the
*inner* surface.
-- 
Matt McIrvin, Cambridge, Massachusetts, USA 
From: rrd@hpfcso.FC.HP.COM (Ray Depew)
Date: Thu, 3 Sep 1992 20:54:12 GMT
Subject: Re: QWERTY
Organization: Hewlett-Packard, Fort Collins, CO, USA
Newsgroups: alt.folklore.urban

> >>ObULInFAQFormat:
> >>   F: The QWERTY keyboard was designed to slow down typists.
> >
> >Well, so what *was* the reason for the design?  I think I was told
> >that it was so that common letter combinations were unlikely to cause
> >the machine to jam.  To me this means that it forces you to type more
> >slowly, since a jam is caused when one key is returning when another
> >one is striking.
>  
> >-carol "hunt & pecker" o
>  
> the accepted reason is to keep it from jamming.  this is not the same

... and don't forget:  so that salesmen of the early machines could type 
out "typewriter" very quickly by keeping their hands on the top row, thus
impressing potential customers.

-- Ray 
rrd@hpfiqa.fc.hp.com
Newsgroups: alt.folklore.urban
From: hucke@ux1.cso.uiuc.edu (Matt Hucke)
Subject: Re: Counterfeiting
Organization: University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign
Date: Mon, 31 Aug 1992 20:29:48 GMT

In article <4978@news.duke.edu> klg@panda.mc.duke.edu (Kim Greer -- rjj) writes:
>"1"'s would be in the corners.  Only on the right hand side there had
>(badly) cellophane taped the corresponding strips of the side "20"'s from a
>20-dollar bill.  

Didn't Monty Python once make a $20 bill with three sides?
-- 
  "It begins here--an army--to bring sense to a world plagued by worse than
   thieves and murderers. This will be a good life... good enough."
             Bruce Wayne, "Batman: The Dark Knight Returns"
hucke@ux1.cso.uiuc.edu             _V_a_l_h_a_l_l_a BBS, 217-352-3682, WWIV4.21, 14.4k
Newsgroups: alt.folklore.urban
From: artn@bert.eecs.uic.edu (Ellyn Sandor)
Subject: Re: Counterfeiting (Was: You are humble and loveable)
Organization: University of Illinois at Chicago
Date: Thu, 27 Aug 1992 21:35:17 GMT


	Two points on counterfeiting

	1) Are there any recent stories about counterfeiters whose work
is so good it totally eludes detection?  If not stories regarding them
getting caught for stupid reasons (like the one repeated recently in
Germany, only more recently), then perhaps some government estimates
about how much counterfeit money passes inspection?

	2) I have known people in the printing industry who have worked
for the federal government and/or private companies on anti-counterfeiting.
Part of their job was to counterfeit money or documents (or credit cards)
to the best of their ability, so that The Powers That Be could figure out
what they were doing right.  What they have not been able to tell me is
how does the government keep track of their hired counterfeiters?  Someone
with that much knowledge could be counterfeiting currency fairly easily.
Are there spot checks? "Hi, I'm from the Treasury office, please remove all
of your clothing so we can examine your currency."  They were never
checked or anything (although I still have one person to ask).  
	(They were, by the way, allowed to cheat i.e. given samples of
the top-secret paper and ink)

		sbm
-- 
--
Stephan Meyers | artn@uicbert.eecs.uic.edu
(Art)^n Laboratories, inventors of the Stealth Negative PHSCologram
(312) 567-3762
Newsgroups: alt.folklore.urban
From: arielle@taronga.com (Stephanie da Silva)
Subject: Re: Clio Awards
Organization: Taronga Park BBS
Date: Fri, 28 Aug 1992 15:44:09 GMT

In article <Btoo7E.8Dt@well.sf.ca.us>, casey@well.sf.ca.us (Kathleen Creighton) writes:
> 
> No, nothing scandalous.  The guy who owned Clio Awards went out of business.

Hm?
Was a big scandal.  The guy spent all the money on frivolous things.
Screwed a lot of people out of their investment.  Then became unavailable 
so nobody knew what was going on.  This after all the arrangements had
been made.  People hired to do things (like cater the affair) were refusing 
to do so unless they were paid up front.  It was a big joke, albeit an 
unfortunate one.

-- 
Stephanie da Silva                                    arielle@taronga.com
  "Isn't it romantic?  When roosters fall in love... they lose
                                     all reason...." -- Peepers the Mouse
From: jtchew@csa3.lbl.gov (JOSEPH T CHEW)
Newsgroups: alt.folklore.urban
Subject: Re: 3 small legands
Date: 3 Sep 92 17:24:00 GMT
Organization: Lawrence Berkeley Laboratory - Berkeley, CA, USA
Reply-To: jtchew@csa3.lbl.gov
NNTP-Posting-Host: 128.3.254.198
News-Software: VAX/VMS VNEWS 1.3-4   

>    I heard last night that Micheal Jackson has an 8 mile by 8 mile square
>concreate pad, painted orange, and is just waiting for aliens to land on it.

If John Allen Paulos wants to write another sequel to _Innumeracy_, this
UL would make an excellent example, as a phone call to your local ready-
mix company and a bit of arithmetic would demonstrate.  He didn't sell
THAT many copies of "Thriller."

Joe "You could see it from the Space Shuttle -- why not from the moon?" Chew
From: kgg@dcs.ed.ac.uk (Kees Goossens)
Newsgroups: alt.folklore.urban
Subject: Re: The Flat Earth Society???
Date: 28 Aug 92 11:36:16 GMT
Reply-To: kgg@dcs.ed.ac.uk (Kees Goossens)
Organization: The Lavatory for the Foundations of Computer Science

In article <l9q3n1INN88p@exodus.Eng.Sun.COM> bls@sector7g.Eng.Sun.COM writes:
>It *is*, in
>fact, a very interesting phenomenon that most of us think that the
>Earth is spherical, and almost none of us have direct experience of its
>roundness, or even know anybody who has direct experience of its
>roundness.

I would say almost everyone has a direct experience of this.
Have you never seen a ship coming over the horizon?
First you see the top bits, sticking out over the horizon.
Gradually you see more and more as less of it is hidden by the curvature
of the earth.

Kees
--
Kees Goossens                       Keep in Touch with the Dutch:
LFCS, Dept. of Computer Science     JANET: kgg@dcs.ed.ac.uk
University of Edinburgh, Scotland   UUCP:  ..!mcsun!uknet!dcs!kgg
Wiskunde is bouwen in de geest.	--- Luitzen Egbertus Jan Brouwer.
From: lasner@watsun.cc.columbia.edu (Charles Lasner)
Newsgroups: alt.folklore.urban
Subject: Re: Metrics (was Peter? What Peter?)
Date: 31 Aug 92 09:03:37 GMT
Reply-To: lasner@watsun.cc.columbia.edu (Charles Lasner)
Organization: Columbia University

In article <1992Aug27.173338.26165@twg.com> nolan@twg.com writes:
>
>In article <BtK4xv.1KG@zorch.SF-Bay.ORG>, phil@zorch.SF-Bay.ORG 
> (Phil Gustafson) answers the Great Question of Life, the Universe, and
>Everything, to wit: Where's the Great net.Peter?

Obviously 42.

He's probably at the Restaurant at the End of the Universe talking to his
next meal that's recommending to him how good the meal will taste when
prepared in various ways.

>
>|>PvdL has chosen to absent himself from a.f.u for the nonce, probably because
>|>the high recycling rate got to him, and partly because he's writing yet
>|>another book.

Sound's like the Peter Principle.

>|>
>|>He did take the time to snipe at hsr4 last week, so there's still hope.
>|>
>|>Phil "How long is a nonce, anyway?" Gustafson
>
>A nonce is just about long enough to reach the ground, if you're headed West
>on cenTral Expressway. otherwise it's about 35 picoseconds.

Years ago, I used APL, so I must have gotten it wrong, because all the time
it would give me "NONCE ERROR" messages.

cjl
Newsgroups: alt.folklore.urban
From: pt@geovision.gvc.com (Paul Tomblin)
Subject: Re: Highest Channel
Reply-To: pt@geovision.gvc.com
Organization: Not officially GeoVision Systems Inc., Ottawa, Ontario
Date: Mon, 31 Aug 1992 12:24:37 GMT

dtasman@dante.nmsu.edu (Dan Tasman) writes:
>stations were from the States, however.  When I went on a ride to Toronto, all  
>the rooftop antennas were pointed toward Buffalo, which gave me some sort of  
>indication about what Canadians thought of CBC and CTV.  

I don't speak for all of Toronto, especially since I don't live there
anymore, but living in the 'death shadow' of the CN tower, I could get CBC
and CTV perfectly well _without_ an antenna, so it's reasonable to assume
that if you _had_ an antenna, you wouldn't waste it trying to get what
you've already got, and you'd go after harder game.

OBUL: The CN Tower will fall down if an airplane flys into it, or we get a
wind as big as Hurricane Hazel again.  The impact will kill thousands of
Toronto residents.

NOBFact: The CN Tower is designed for a much bigger impact than a jumbo jet,
and winds two or three times as high as the highest winds recorded during
Hurricane Hazel.  More's the pity.

-- 
Paul Tomblin, pt@geovision.gvc.com or {uunet,revcan}!geovision!pt
(This is not an official opinion of GeoVision Systems Inc.)
A man is rich in proportion to the number of things he can afford to let alone
  -- Henry David Thoreau.
Xref: sparky alt.folklore.urban:22645 rec.arts.tv:17170
From: das@voodoo.boeing.com (Deb Schwartz)
Newsgroups: alt.folklore.urban,rec.arts.tv
Subject: Re:  Chef Boy-Ar-Dee commercial
Date: 1 Sep 92 19:02:45 GMT
Followup-To: alt.folklore.urban
Organization: Yet Another Graphics Project, Bellevue, WA

>>In article <1992Aug26.145033.19684@awdprime.austin.ibm.com> craigb@ot.austin.ibm.com writes:
>>>
>>
>>>This got me thinking about various&sundry "banned" commercials, ie, 
>>>commercials which got pulled because someone got PO'ed.
>>
There's a local Seattle seafood restaurant chain, Ivars, that delights in
funny and satiric commercials.  They've been doing a series of movie satires,
and did one called 'Dances with Clams' - both billboard and tv spots.  The
tv ad featured a Civil War erea soldier riding up to the beach - to see
giant clams with legs dancing with each other, and he joins in.  Hilarious.
Unfortunately, someone else didn't think so.  I don't know this for a fact,
but I heard that Kosner didn't care, but the "Dances with Wolves" distribution
company got really upset and demanded the commercials be stopped.  

Debbie Schwartz // das@voodoo.boeing.com  // or uunet!bcstec!voodoo!das 
Newsgroups: alt.folklore.urban
From: reay@bnlls1.nsls.bnl.gov (Robert Reay)
Subject: 3 small legands
Organization: Brookhaven National Laboratory, Upton, NY 11973
Date: Tue, 1 Sep 1992 21:16:50 GMT



    Three small quick little urban legands.

    I heard last night that Micheal Jackson has an 8 mile by 8 mile square
concreate pad, painted orange, and is just waiting for aliens to land on it.

   This was told to me in the context of how some people can't grasp that 
NYC does not cover all of NYS.  [Which is true, I've met a couple in Ohio]
Apearently this lady got into a NYC taxi and asked to be tacken to 
Niagra Falls.

    And third.  A lady in California calls the police.  It seems she has locked
her keys in her car.  The police say that they'll send someone over soon and
are about to hangup.  Before they can she asks if they can hurry.  The 
top is down and it looks like it is about to rain. 
    I've also heard this slightly mangled as a joke about politicians.

    Anyone else heard these and know where they've spread?


			-Rob
From: geoffm@purplehaze.Corp.Sun.COM (Val Salva)
Newsgroups: alt.folklore.urban
Subject: Re: Death by sneezing
Date: 26 Aug 92 18:18:50 GMT
Followup-To: alt.folklore.urban
Organization: Sun Microsystems, Menlo Park, Ca.
NNTP-Posting-Host: purplehaze.corp.sun.com



In article <fwlpb8d5@csv.warwick.ac.uk> csuah@warwick.ac.uk (~WISP at CU~) 
writes:

>Well, it's called the Valsalva manoeuvre, and is sometimes used to slow the
>heart (in SVTs etc.). 


Does anyone know the origin of the name of this maneuver?  Was it invented 
by a Dr. Guido Valsalva or something?

Like most people, I learned it as a kid, as a way to make my ears pop.  But 
I didn't know it had a name until I went to the altitude chamber.  



Geoff


-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-
Geoff Miller                    + + + + + + + +        Sun Microsystems
geoffm@purplehaze.Corp.Sun.COM  + + + + + + + +     Menlo Park, California
-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-
From: dternes@duke.cdc.com (David Ternes)
Newsgroups: alt.folklore.urban
Subject: Re: Just One Calorie...?
Date: 28 Aug 92 14:55:39 GMT
Reply-To: dternes@mips.COM (David Ternes)
Organization: Advanced Product Development

Speaking of just one calorie, when I was growing up in a land far away,
there was a story going around that Tab actually had more than one calorie
and they paid huge fines to some unspecified federal agency in order to
continue advertising it that way.

Did Tab bite it during the days when mice mainlined saccharin?

Which brings up the related tale of needing to drink 100 cans of saccharin-
laced soda a day for years if you wanted to be on the same statistical
level as the mice.

-david
E. David J. Ternes                                       dternes@udev.cdc.com
Goal: To live either in obscurity or in competance.
Newsgroups: alt.folklore.urban
From: pratta@rpi.edu (Anthony Edward Prattico)
Subject: Re: Highest Channel
Organization: Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute
	<1992Aug28.184014.21827@news.iastate.edu>
	<1992Aug31.125642.1@hmivax.humgen.upenn.edu> <mcirvin.715294480@husc8>
Date: Tue, 1 Sep 1992 03:02:19 GMT

In article <mcirvin.715294480@husc8> mcirvin@husc8.harvard.edu (Mcirvin) writes:
>zimm@hmivax.humgen.upenn.edu (Laurie Zimmerman, HHMI, Univ. of Pa.) writes:
>
>>well, glitto, in good ol' lancaster county, pa  (home of the pa dutch amish and
>>mennonites)  we used to get (not all that clearly) a channel *69* which as i
>>recall dealt with christian topics... 
>
>   This isn't quite as good, but in the DC area there was and maybe still
>   is a channel 66 catering to the same clientele.  If only the numbers
>   had three digits.
>

Albany, NY has channel 62.
Newsgroups: alt.folklore.urban