HDTenEightyP/NetNews huggingface dataset:
From: daugher@cs.tamu.edu(Walter C. Daugherity)
Subject: Re: Third to be bombed...
Keywords: Oklahoma City?
Reply-To: daugher@cs.tamu.edu
Organization: Texas A&M University, College Station
Date: Sun, 6 Sep 1992 22:56:55 GMT

In article <1992Sep4.184825.18056@ultb.isc.rit.edu> bmb1021@ultb.isc.rit.edu  
(B.M. Buck ) writes:
| In at least two cities I've lived in (Charlotte, NC and Binghamton, NY),
| there is the claim that that city is "third" on the list of sites to be
| bombed by the Soviets (now that the Soviets are gone, I suspect that
| this legend had died, too), because of some strategic importance of the
| city.  The stated first two places (when pressed) end up being the
| missile sites, and Washington, DC.  After that, comes the current city.
| 
| Is this legend wide-spread?  If you've heard it for your locale, what is
| the supposed reason for being third?

I don't know about third, but when I lived in Oklahoma City (50's and 60's) it  
was said to be high on the list since Tinker Air Force Base was where all the  
B-52 maintenance, upgrading, etc. was done.  (Nowadays it's AWACS training for
NATO and various Arab countries.)

ObUL:  In high school the story was passed around that the shop teacher had  
told a dirty joke over the PA system during the study hall held in the  
cafeteria after lunch.  (Not likely.)
--
Walter C. Daugherity			Internet, NeXTmail: daugher@cs.tamu.edu
Texas A & M University			uucp: uunet!cs.tamu.edu!daugher
College Station, TX 77843-3112		BITNET: DAUGHER@TAMVENUS
	---Not an official document of Texas A&M---
Newsgroups: alt.folklore.urban
From: dw@unislc.uucp (Dan Wright)
Subject: Re: Renewing Nickel Cadmium batteries
X-Newsreader: Tin 1.1 PL5
Organization: Unisys Corporation SLC
Date: Sat, 12 Sep 1992 21:11:13 GMT

Peter Swanson (pjswan@engin.umich.edu) wrote:
: You should not fully discharge a battery (series of cells) ...
: ... it is sufficient to discharge them until their voltage drops
: about 10% ... Most sophisticated equipment (computers, for example)
: automatically shut down when this happens ...
: Ni-Cads are killed when the gel inside them crystallizes ...
: Some expensive chargers use a very short, high voltage reversed current
: to shatter the crystals without damaging the cells ...
: Dropping the batteries a short distance onto a hard surface might also
: break up the crystals and renew the cells ...
: 
Dozens of articles have been posted in rec.video and other groups on 
the controversial subject of ni-cad battery life.  I read most of them
with interest since batteries for my camcorder are so very expensive.
From what I've read and from my personal experience, Peter Swanson
knows exactly what he is talking about here.

   -- Dan Wright
From: wfs5572@rigel.tamu.edu (SMITH, WILLIAM FRANK, IV)
Newsgroups: alt.folklore.urban
Subject: Re: You are humble and loveable.  CHOMP!
Summary: nickel counterfeit
Date: 9 Sep 92 02:01:00 GMT
Organization: Texas A&M University, Academic Computing Services
News-Software: VAX/VMS VNEWS 1.41

In article <1992Sep5.022523.23724@wuecl.wustl.edu>, gl1@cec2.wustl.edu (Greg Lyon) writes...
>>sasbmt@jjoyce.unx.sas.com (Bruce Tindall) writes:
>>: 
>>: Somebody actually did counterfeit nickels back in the '30s or '40s,
>>: and ultimately got caught.  Reference:  children's book "Story of the
>>: Secret Service," published early/mid 1960s, by Quentin Reynolds (?).
>>: 
>>
>>I wonder where the authors of the book got the story? It would be interesting
>>to see if it is actually based on fact, or an UL.
>>
>>Bill
> 
>  This did actually happen.  It was done by a man who had previously 
>counterfeitted larger denominations (ie. paper money, I believe).  He
>"minted" thousands of nickels in the mid-1950s.  The reason the coins were
>easy to identify was that he used the reverse of a war nickel (the ones with
>the large mintmarks over Monticello) with an obverse that was not a war
>year (so, the large mintmark shouldn't have been there).
> 
> I don't remember exactly where the article was published, but it was by a 
>person named Michael Wescott (who has recently published a book on nickels)
>and I believe the article might have been in "New Jersey Numismatic Journal",
>the magazine of the Garden State Numismatic Association (the counterfeitting
>was done in NJ).

Almost right.  The man did counterfeit nickels in the fifties.  But he matched 
a regular reverse (without the large mintmark over Monticello) with an obverse,
or head side, from 1944, which would have had the war nickel reverse.  
Collectors spotted these, leading to his arrest.  The incident is mentioned
in many numismatic publications (Coin World, etc.) and in books (the 
encyclopedia of U.S. coins by Walter Breen, for one).


Bill "Spike" Smith, grad student, numismatist, keeper of the cheese
From: scottm@intime.intime.COM (Scott Michel)
Newsgroups: alt.folklore.urban
Subject: Re: Fuel misers
Date: 9 Sep 92 16:14:16 GMT
Distribution: alt
Organization: IntelliMED Corporation, Santa Monica, CA

In article <92252.080430WAUGH@SLACVM.SLAC.STANFORD.EDU> WAUGH@SLACVM.SLAC.STANFORD.EDU writes:
>In article <BAUDAIS.92Sep8084924@bmerh160.bnr.ca>, baudais@bnr.ca (Michael
>Baudais) says:
>>
>>Someone somewhere has invented a new engine/car/carbeurator/
>>fuel-injector that will allow cars to achieve 100 to 200 miles per
>>gallon.  The only reason we aren't driving these things is that the
>>Big Bad Oil Companies (BBOCs) have bought out the inventors to
>>preserve their markets.
>
>What about the guy in Utah who invented a car that ran on hydrogen.  The gas
>was stored in tanks in the form of a metal hydride to be released by heating
>the tank.  I remember seeing a TV program about it where they demonstrated how
>much safer than gasoline the new fuel was and that the byproduct of its
>combustion was water.  (The inventor placed a beaker under the tailpipe of a
>running car, collected 100 ml or so of the stuff that dripped out and "down
>the hatch" it went.)

BMW had donated a 325i that some Berkeley enginerring students converted
to using a hydrogen engine, but they used compressed H2 tanks, not metal
hydride.

>
>As I recall the mileage wasn't fantastic (about like my '69 Mustang) but the
>fuel was reasonably inexpensive, readily available and non-polluting.
>
>Did the BBOC (Big Bad Oil Companies) squash this one too?
>
>Brian Waugh                       |    "What's for dinner?"
>WAUGH@SLACVM.SLAC.STANFORD.EDU    |        Lazlo Toth

-scottm
scottm@intime.intime.com
Newsgroups: alt.folklore.urban
Subject: Re: Counterfeiting
From: rmk@rmkhome.UUCP (Rick Kelly)
Organization: The Man With Ten Cats
Date: Sun, 6 Sep 1992 23:42:48 GMT
Reply-To: rmk@rmkhome.UUCP (Rick Kelly)

In article <26101@dog.ee.lbl.gov> TWChan@lbl.gov (Terry Chan) writes:
>meissner@osf.org (Michael Meissner) writes:
>
>  +>Last week, on the commuter rail train I go on (Boston - Fitchburg
>  +>line), the conductor had been given a phony $1 (it didn't have the
>  +>small serial numbers and some other marks), and he passed it around.
>  +>Nobody on the train could believe that somebody would be smart enough
>  +>to be able to produce a reasonable conterfeit bill, but would be dumb
>  +>enough to make one's.
>
>Shouldn't this story end where when the conductor gets the bill back,
>it's a counterfeit bill of some other denomination?


A recent story in the Boston Globe or the Middlesex News indicated that
the treasury has recently released new $1 bills that have some numbers
and other marks missing.  Evidently, the Secret Service/Federal Reserve
people in Boston have been answering a lot of questions.  It is simply
a new style of $1 bill.

-- 

Rick Kelly	rmk@rmkhome.UUCP	unixland!rmkhome!rmk	rmk@frog.UUCP
Newsgroups: alt.folklore.urban
From: lawson@acuson.com (Drew Lawson)
Subject: Re: Wild Chicken Flocks
Reply-To: lawson@aldia.UUCP (Drew Lawson)
Organization: ACUSON, Mountain View, CA
Date: Wed, 9 Sep 1992 20:01:11 GMT

In article <26174@dog.ee.lbl.gov> TWChan@lbl.gov (Terry Chan) writes:

>  +"free ranging chickens"tm, no durgs or hormones just eat the stuff on the
>  +side of the road.
>
>No drugs or hormones but how about crap like lead and other automotive
>by-products?
>
>Terry "Hmmm, tastes like a heavy chicken" Chan


Terry, Terry, Terry. . .  There hasn't been lead as a gasoline additive
since when, 1988?  Most chickens don't live so long, except perhaps as
pets.

-- 
Drew Lawson                      If you're not part of the solution,
lawson@acuson.com                you're part of the precipitate
Newsgroups: alt.folklore.urban
From: barth@cbnewsd.cb.att.com (barth.richards)
Subject: Re: Bridges
Organization: AT&T
Date: Mon, 14 Sep 1992 18:52:55 GMT


In article <1992Sep11.200543.16837@magnus.acs.ohio-state.edu> PAPAI@kcgl1.eng.ohio-state.edu (Jonathan Papai) writes:

>For the sake of the geographically impaired:  "UP" refers to the
>upper penninsula of Michigan.  This is a vast, mostly uninhabited
>, cold and desolate place.  It is inhabited by Finnish, Norwegian
>and Swedish immigrants known as "Yoopers".

Hoo boot Cahnehdiens?  Doon't fergit dem, eh.

Newsgroups: alt.folklore.urban,alt.religion.kibology
From: snopes%club33@stlth.enet.dec.com (snopes)
Subject: Re: For RS Walz, everyone else hit "n" now.
Organization: Just put everything on the floor; I can find it.
Date:  5 SEP 92 23:17:03    


In article <1992Aug29.163650.14092@midway.uchicago.edu> 
  thf2@midway.uchicago.edu writes:

>Why does RSW include the entire post when he posts?  And why does he post
>it to all of these inappropriate groups?

Isn't using the phrase "inappropriate groups" in something cross-posted to
alt.religion.kibology sort of self-contradictory?

 - snopes

+-----------------------------------------------------------------------------+
|       WARNING:  This posting is a turbulent, high-speed read through        | 
|                 the world of sarcasm, witticism, and tomfoolery.            |
+-----------------------------------------------------------------------------+
|   You must be as tall as the    Children under age 7    Expectant mothers   |
|   bottom of this signature      must be accompanied     should not read     |
|   to read this posting.         by an adult.            this posting.       |
|                                                                             |
|         Wait time from this signature is approximately [40] minutes         |
+-----------------------------------------------------------------------------+
|  David P. Mikkelson   Digital Equipment Corporation   Culver City, CA  USA  |
+-----------------------------------------------------------------------------+
From: jtchew@csa3.lbl.gov (JOSEPH T CHEW)
Newsgroups: alt.folklore.urban
Subject: Re: Wild Chicken Flocks
Date: 8 Sep 92 22:30:05 GMT
Organization: Lawrence Berkeley Laboratory - Berkeley, CA, USA
Reply-To: jtchew@csa3.lbl.gov
NNTP-Posting-Host: 128.3.254.198
Summary: "..and them hens commenced a-cluckin'" -C.W. McCall, "Wolf Creek Pass"
Keywords: chicken, freeway, flock, human flesh
News-Software: VAX/VMS VNEWS 1.3-4   

>A truck driver with a load of chickens took a freeway offramp a bit
>too fast and spilled his load, so to speak, blocking traffic for a few
>hours and freeing a gaggle of chickens. Now, authorities -say- they
>got all the chickens back, but some people to this day claim that they
>see chickens wandering around in the shrubery 

As you've noted, this sure sounds a lot like a UL.  But chicken
sightings ("tastes just like iguana") might not be implausible,
depending on the neighborhood, and might not have anything to do
with the truck accident. A lot more livestock-type animals are
kept in the cities and 'burbs than one might imagine.  Someone not 
far from our old house in Vallejo had both chickens and goats, and 
one night here in Berserkeley -- on the campus, no less -- I saw a 
woman taking her rather large pig for a walk.

Joe "Or maybe they're ghost chickens, trying to hitchhike" Chew
From: matt@cs.city.ac.uk (Matthew G Sillitoe (Matt))
Newsgroups: alt.folklore.urban
Subject: Re: Counterfeitin'
Date: 2 Sep 92 16:54:12 GMT
Organization: Systems Architecture Research Centre, City University, London.

Joe "Don't take any wooden nickels" Chew@csa3.lbl.gov writes:
>>> I'm under the understanding that nothing smaller than $20 bills gets
>>> counterfeited because it simply doesn't pay.
>
>[finds some funny money]
>
>(Backing-and-filling for foreigners:  U.S. currency is printed on a
>truly deluxe paper of a special variety whose manufacture and
>distribution are controlled.  Obtaining paper that looks and feels
>plausible is said to be the hardest part of counterfeiting.)

Just got some $US from the Cambio de Change and to be quite frank
the paper (and print quality) seems quite poxy. Perhaps I've     ___
some counterfiet ones - can't see watermark or any metal strips {8^)}-K
                                                                `---
(filling-in for foreigners: _poxy_ is a colq. meaning "of fairly
low quality". Prob. derived from _pox_: "Arch. an expression of
digust or aversion.")  

UK notes only go down to \pound 5 but seem in another
league (though the `computer aided' designers at the Royal Mint
seem to have had a field-day on the number of fonts, typefaces
and colours used on the new versions). French notes are quite nice
too - the artwork really impresses the note's value.

m
--
Matthew G Sillitoe                                email:  matt@cs.city.ac.uk
Systems Architecture Research Centre,             tel: +44 71 477 8000 x3722
City University, London EC1V 0HB, UK.             fax: +44 71 477 8587
Newsgroups: alt.folklore.urban,soc.culture.jewish
From: goldberg@techunix.technion.ac.il (Jacques Goldberg)
Subject: Re: What time is it at the North Pole?
Organization: Technion, Israel Institute of Technology
Date: Tue, 15 Sep 1992 08:00:42 GMT

smb@ulysses.att.com (Steven Bellovin) writes:

>.................  Etc. -- though she didn't even understand some
>of the concepts I was talking about, since there's nothing in the
>Talmud about relativity or Lorentz contractions.

  How SURE are you of that ?
  Since I believe that every word of teaching from our Sages has its root
in the Talmud, specially when written by the Prague MAHARAL, and since this
author has written : "as those who have studied know, space and time are one
entity which cannot be unfolded", I feel less sure than you about it.
       Yaaqov Goldberg
Newsgroups: alt.folklore.urban
From: berger@atropa (Mike Berger)
Subject: Re: Counterfeiting
Organization: University of Illinois at Urbana
Date: Mon, 14 Sep 1992 15:40:44 GMT

wb8foz@skybridge.SCL.CWRU.Edu (David Lesher) writes:
>Others said
># >I'm under the understanding that nothing smaller than $20 bills gets
># >counterfeited because it simply doesn't pay.
># 
># I think I've heard of $10 bills being faked.

>I recall reading about some guy that counterfeited nickels!
>Even though it was about 50 years back, it sure takes a lot of
>them...
*----
Technically, "counterfeiting" involves passing something off as legal
currency that isn't - it doesn't have to be a good copy.  So using
brass washers in toll booths and vending machines, and shuffling play
money through faulty change machines, are counterfeiting, and have
definitely been done for trivial denominations.

I imagine it could easily pay to duplicate $ 1 bills on a well-adjusted
color copier, since you could do several at once.  And they'd have different
serial numbers.

And now it's time for an urban legend:
I heard that the federal government first tried to lock up all of
xerox'x color copier production when they first came out.  Unable
to do that, they insisted that the company adjust the machines so
they didn't duplicate some colors religiously, so as to make it
difficult to copy money accurately.  Naturally I heard this from
a friend's mother (her company had one of the very first color copiers).

--
	Mike Berger
	Department of Statistics, University of Illinois
	AT&TNET     217-244-6067
	Internet    berger@atropa.stat.uiuc.edu
From: csuah@warwick.ac.uk (~WISP at CU~)
Newsgroups: alt.folklore.urban
Subject: Re: Colour perception (was: Death by sneezing)
Date: 6 Sep 92 18:09:35 GMT
Organization: Computing Services, Warwick University, UK

In article <Z3umqB1w165w@dogbox.acme.gen.nz> dogbowl@dogbox.acme.gen.nz (dogbowl) writes:
>moroney@ramblr.enet.dec.com writes:
>
>> ObUL:  Red traffic lights are tinged a little on the orange side, and
>> green lights tinged on the blue to help red-green colorblind folks to
>> distinguish them.
>
>I don't know about the red lights having orange in them, but the green
>lights *do* have blue tints in them. At least they do in the area where
>I was born, as the rate of red-green colour-blindness in males approaches
>30%.
>
>(Apparently when the traffic lights were first installed 35 years ago, they
> didn't have the tinting, and there were quite a few accidents because of it)
>

I very much doubt this. (All of it) If you can't read a traffic light, you
have to be vertically-blind, as well as color-blind. The position of the light
in the stack, and the fact that you can tell which light is on or off, is all
you need to use traffic lights. Now in an aircraft, it's a different ball-game
hence the fact you aren't allowed any kind of powered flight licence (in
the UK at least) if you're red-green color-blind...

The Wisp.
-- 
-----------------------------------------------------------------------------
     Chris Williams <csuah@uk.ac.warwick.csv> aka <csuah@csv.warwick.ac.uk>
"Tony Greig in the slips, legs apart, waiting for a tickle"
                                      Brian Johnson (thanks to A. Simha 8^>)
From: Tony.Sander@f840.n800.z3.fidonet.org (Tony Sander)
Sender: acsnet@csource.oz.au
Newsgroups: alt.folklore.urban
Subject: Mnemonics
Date: Fri, 04 Sep 1992 18:31:46 +1000

mm>  >people  who  worried  about  this  sort  of  thing should picket Adidas,
mm>  >because Adidas is an acronym for "All Day I Dream About Sex".
mm>
mm>  And rare is the creature knowing how adidas really got its
mm>  name...

I heard that Adidas really stands for "After Dinner I Do A Shit".


--
Tony


 * Origin: Oblivion. Masquerade Beta/Support. (08) 2871938 V.32 (3:800/840)

Newsgroups: alt.folklore.urban
From: theo@physics.su.OZ.AU (Theo ten Brummelaar)
Subject: Re: Notorious Toothpaste Skit
Organization: School of Physics, University of Sydney, Australia
Date: Fri, 11 Sep 1992 05:45:55 GMT

In article <1992Sep10.172818.8887@unislc.uucp> dw@unislc.uucp (Dan Wright) writes:
>
>I can only imagine that McGrew has each of the students brush their
>teeth five times immediately before performing the skit.  I have also
>wondered whether the "toothpaste" was something more inert like
>cornstarch-paste.  Lastly I'll bet McGrew pays the girl who swallows
>something like 50 bucks (joke away with that line you clowns).
>
>Have any of you seen a similar trick?  Do any of you know of some other
>device or explanation for this skit?
>
>  -- Dan Wright
Who needs a trick ? People will do the most amazing things to get on stage !

Theo


Newsgroups: alt.folklore.urban
From: snopes%club33@stlth.enet.dec.com (snopes)
Subject: Re: Stupid Cop Tricks & the Reagan Office Hours
Organization: Just put everything on the floor; I can find it.
Date: 14 SEP 92 20:05:55    


In article <NEIL.92Sep14170738@ulysses.robots>, 
  neil@ulysses.robots (& Townsend) writes...

>Well, seeing as the cop had already started writting out the first
>(parking) ticket, it would seem logical that (s)he could either
>remember the number, or copy it from the previous ticket.

You *were* being facetious, right?  I'd hate to think I have to explain this.

 - snopes

+-----------------------------------------------------------------------------+
|  David P. Mikkelson   Digital Equipment Corporation   Culver City, CA  USA  |
+-----------------------------------------------------------------------------+
|                                                                             |
|        When brides are registered, only registrars will have brides.        |
|                                                                             |
+-----------------------------------------------------------------------------+
Newsgroups: alt.folklore.urban
From: heathh@cco.caltech.edu (Heath Ian Hunnicutt)
Subject: Opossums in folklore
Organization: California Institute of Technology, Pasadena
Date: Tue, 15 Sep 1992 06:41:00 GMT

Hi,
	Now, I'm not joking here....

	Does anybody know of any supernatural, symbolic, predictive,
or otherwise mythological traits being attributed to the lowly
opossum?  Specifically, is this little dude ever associated
with reproduction, birth, or death in mythology?  (That's any
mythology, sports fans...)

See ya,
Heath

-- 
--
From the Home for Amnesiac Computer Scientists....
  heathh@cco.caltech.edu

Newsgroups: alt.folklore.urban
From: grimjack@milton.u.washington.edu (Leslie Basel)
Subject: Re: Smallest denominations of paper money (was: Counterfeiting)
Organization: University of Washington, Seattle
Date: Fri, 11 Sep 1992 05:23:52 GMT


How about the largest denomination printed (interestingly enough,
 the largest bill
printed in Fiji is a $20 bill -- a _really_ small economy)

Rodger Coghlan

Newsgroups: alt.folklore.urban,alt.magic,rec.misc,alt.stagecraft,alt.tasteless
From: davem@county.lmt.mn.org (David Mackmiller)
Subject: Re: Notorious Toothpaste Skit
Organization: LaserMaster R&D, Minneapolis, MN  USA
Date: Tue, 15 Sep 1992 21:30:20 GMT

>>On a small table are a glass of water, a toothbrush, and a tube of
>>toothpaste.  The first performer comes on, squeezes some toothpaste onto
>>the brush, and proceeds to brush his teeth.  He then rinses with the
>>water, spitting it back into the cup.  The next performer comes on,
>>squeezes more toothpaste onto the brush, brushes his teeth thoroughly,
>>then uses the dirty water to rinse, again spitting it back into the cup.
>>The audience gets more grossed out and groans more loudly as two other
>>performers come on and further dirty the water in their turn.  The cup
>>is looking positively sickening when the last performer comes on.  For
>>this role Mr. McGrew would chose the prettiest, most dainty girl he
>>could find.  After brushing her teeth, this girl does the unthinkable:
>>she raises the filthy cup to her lips and drinks it all down, swallowing
>>several times, till every last drop is gone.
>>
>>Have any of you seen a similar trick? 

I hate to admit even having knowledge of this show, but I remember seeing 
this skit on "The Gong Show" back in the '70s.  Three guys: last one slams 
it before anyone got a chance to hit the gong.  I believe it was the 
catalyst that started me down the path of tastelessness.

I haven't been able to brush my teeth since.

DaveMac
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
              ...it's not funny 'til someone loses an eye.
------------------------------+-----------------------+--------------------
mail: davem@county.lmt.mn.org | flames: alt.good.news | Opinions=mine alone
------------------------------+-----------------------+--------------------

Newsgroups: alt.folklore.urban
From: obrien@netcom.com (Robert O'Brien)
Subject: Re: Opossums in folklore
Date: Tue, 15 Sep 92 08:15:15 GMT
Organization: Netcom Online Communications Services (408-241-9760 login: guest)

Well, the little suckers've nearly been responsible for *my* death more
than once, driving late at night in Roseville, or a few other neighborhoods
around Sacramento, CA at certain times of the year.

Rumor has it they come onto the road at night because it radiates some of the
heat it has absorbed all day.  I'm sure of this with the rats on Hwy 70 between
Sac. and Chico because we used to score 'em  ("thump" = no points;
"thumpthump" = 1 point)  Anyway, the possums are small enough to be hard to
see but big enough that I swerve to avoid them.

	Bob '"thumpthumpthump" = what the...? '  O'Brien