True things you couldn't make up.

Subject: BS: Fun Facts You Can't Make Up.
From: John on the Sunset Coast
Date: 10 Apr 08 - 08:22 PM

Porn actress Jenna Jameson is the star of her own comic book. Big deal, you say. Did I mention that Ms Jameson's comic book is published by VIRGIN COMICS? Ya can't make things like this up.
BTW VC is part of the Virgin empire of Sir Richard Branson.

JotSC
PS - how I know this,,,,I'm not tellin', shhhh.

Subject: RE: True things you couldn't make up.
From: John on the Sunset Coast
Date: 10 Apr 08 - 08:40 PM

Sorry, I forgot to put BS: in the thread title.

Subject: RE: True things you couldn't make up.
From: Liz the Squeak
Date: 11 Apr 08 - 01:34 AM

Like the racing car sponsored by Durex that burst a tyre? Bet that instilled confidence in a lot of users.

LTS

Subject: RE: True things you couldn't make up.
From: Sandra in Sydney
Date: 11 Apr 08 - 05:20 AM

Durex is (was?) a brand of sticky tape in Oz so innocent conversations could lead to confusion.

Subject: RE: True things you couldn't make up.
From: Micca
Date: 11 Apr 08 - 05:53 AM

A bloke called Slaughter published a text book on Biology, which was fine but the publisher put his surname and the title on the spine so that it read
" Slaughter Living Things"

Subject: RE: True things you couldn't make up.
From: Escapee
Date: 11 Apr 08 - 11:25 AM

There is a urologist in my area named Dick Tapper. No, really!
SKP

Subject: RE: True things you couldn't make up.
From: Liz the Squeak
Date: 11 Apr 08 - 11:37 AM

There was a dentist in Weymouth, Dorset, who had written large upon his brass plaque, and in the Yellow Pages = I Savage, Dentist.

And without a word of a lie, my first doctor was a Doctor Paine. Our village bobby was PC Crook, who was followed by PC Pinches.

There is a hairdressers near me who frequently advertises that 'Mr Comber is now cutting'...

And then there's the vicar of Whitchurch Canonicorum, who, in the 1840's, was the Reverend Goforth.

LTS

Subject: RE: True things you couldn't make up.
From: Becca72
Date: 11 Apr 08 - 11:43 AM

My high school Biology teacher's name was Mr. Blood


I work in Radiology Transcription at a local hospital and was typing a report the other day for a scrotal ultrasound. The patient's last name? Johnson. :-)

Subject: RE: True things you couldn't make up.
From: Peace
Date: 11 Apr 08 - 11:44 AM

I have met people who got their tongues stuck to metal things in freezing weather. Some more than once.

Subject: RE: True things you couldn't make up.
From: Mrrzy
Date: 11 Apr 08 - 11:49 AM

There's a guy here in Infectious Diseases named Petri... wonder how much choice HE had in his career path?

Subject: RE: True things you couldn't make up.
From: Midchuck
Date: 11 Apr 08 - 11:58 AM

My neighbors are also named Payne.

So naturally, their answering-machine message starts, "You Have Reached the House of Payne..." And the guy is a big fellow with a resonant low baritone voice.

P.

Subject: RE: True things you couldn't make up.
From: bobad
Date: 11 Apr 08 - 01:12 PM

A fish shop in my home town was owned by a Mr. Richard Soles, the sign in his window read; "R.Soles Fresh Fish."

Subject: RE: True things you couldn't make up.
From: Acorn4
Date: 11 Apr 08 - 01:33 PM

I was once stopped and questioned by a PC Coshem.

I don't quite remember where it was but one of the nortren towns had a police station at Lettsby Avenue.

Subject: RE: True things you couldn't make up.
From: John on the Sunset Coast
Date: 11 Apr 08 - 02:41 PM

Coming down an escalator in a department store once, I saw the following sign, "Women's undergarments 1/3 off." I told the wife I'd like to see that. Boy, did I have sore ribs for days!

Subject: RE: True things you couldn't make up.
From: Herga Kitty
Date: 11 Apr 08 - 03:10 PM

My post from 21 January about Plough Monday...

Letter in today's Guardian (UK) newspaper:

Plough Sunday still happens (Letters, January 17). A few years ago at St John's Knaresborough, we jingled our way through Lord of the Dance with 150 morris men. All very bucolic.
Rev John Caperon
Crowborough, East Sussex


Kitty

Subject: RE: True things you couldn't make up.
From: Newport Boy
Date: 11 Apr 08 - 04:40 PM

There was a firm of Estate Agents in Newport a few years ago called Crooke and Blight. Who'd buy from them?

I once negotiated the final account on a contract with a surveyor named Bent. Didn't do me any good, though.

I think Acorn4's Lettsby Avenue is a nice myth - doesn't appear on my database.

And finally, if Mrrzy's Mr Petri had a sex change, presumably she'd be quite a dish!

I'll go now.

Phil

Subject: RE: True things you couldn't make up.
From: *Laura*
Date: 11 Apr 08 - 04:42 PM

LTS - I've USED that dentist!!!! She does a day a week at Yeovil hospital orthodontic bit. Alongside a doctor caller Dr Skinner.
Scared the crap out of me!!!

Subject: RE: True things you couldn't make up.
From: Donuel
Date: 11 Apr 08 - 04:44 PM

On my office door a "friend of mine put two hyphens on the sign which changed the whole meaning. Hyno-the-rapist

Subject: RE: True things you couldn't make up.
From: Donuel
Date: 11 Apr 08 - 04:46 PM

I got a office birthday cake once near the time of my transfer. It said: "May You Have the Best of Success".

When I got my piece it said

You
Succ

Subject: RE: True things you couldn't make up.
From: Donuel
Date: 11 Apr 08 - 04:58 PM

edit
thats Hypno-

Subject: RE: True things you couldn't make up.
From: Dave the Gnome
Date: 12 Apr 08 - 04:34 PM

I alwtys wished the village of Ramsbottom in Lancashire had an upper part. Then people could say they came from Upper Ramsbottom.

Unfortunatley there isn't.

:D

Subject: RE: True things you couldn't make up.
From: Dave the Gnome
Date: 12 Apr 08 - 04:36 PM

Our American visitors did find something highly amusing about the Cumbrian town of Cockermouth though. Can't think what...

Subject: RE: True things you couldn't make up.
From: Midchuck
Date: 12 Apr 08 - 04:44 PM

There is a Robert Burns poem, perfectly legitimate title in his time, "Cock up your Beaver."

Peter.

Subject: RE: True things you couldn't make up.
From: Bill D
Date: 12 Apr 08 - 05:16 PM

One time, it was necessary to make this fine establishment aware that the first two letters of their neon sign were out.

Subject: RE: True things you couldn't make up.
From: Uncle_DaveO
Date: 13 Apr 08 - 10:52 AM

Acorn4 told us two (to me) mysterious things:

I was once stopped and questioned by a PC Coshem.

I don't quite remember where it was but one of the nortren towns had a police station at Lettsby Avenue.

Maybe I'm dense this morning, but I don't get the point of either of those. Could someone explicate?

Dave Oesterreich

Subject: RE: True things you couldn't make up.
From: GUEST,Chief Chaos
Date: 13 Apr 08 - 11:12 AM

Uncle Dave,

A Cosh is another name for blackjack, and in case you don't know what that is, it's a small club or leather bag full of lead shot that crooks use to hit people on the back of the head or neck.

Lettsby - Lets (them) go avenue (my interpretation) is a humorous location for a police station.

Subject: RE: True things you couldn't make up.
From: Emma B
Date: 13 Apr 08 - 11:54 AM

Let's be 'aving you! :)

Subject: RE: True things you couldn't make up.
From: John on the Sunset Coast
Date: 13 Apr 08 - 02:15 PM

Many (to the 3rd power) years ago our 6th grade class was giving our teacher a farewell/thank you gift. I, parroting the close of then current Roy Rogers radio programs, said, "This is from all of us to all of you, Miss Hutchinson." Did I indicate she was a stout, middle aged woman. She allowed as how she appreciated it was from all of us, but there was only one of her.

Subject: RE: True things you couldn't make up.
From: Acorn4
Date: 13 Apr 08 - 06:32 PM

to Uncle Dave O ...

I think a former post has explained the "coshem" -

"Let's be 'aving you, then" (Lettsby Avenue) is a phrase that English policemen are supposed to use when moving on suspicious characters - probably goes back to a sixties series "Dixon of Dock Green". I sometimes forget the cosmopolitan nature of Mudcat.

The local butcher in Glenfield near Leicester is called R.Tuff.

There was once a shop in Leicester called "High and Mighty" which specialised in clothes for tall men -next door was a loading bay with a notice :- "maximum headroom - 9 feet" -don't know if it was photographed.

Ad advert in the Leicester Mercury recently read:-

BONDAGE

require lead guitarist-

No Ties!

Subject: RE: True things you couldn't make up.
From: skarpi
Date: 13 Apr 08 - 06:50 PM

Porn actress Jenna Jameson is the star of her own comic book. Big deal, you say. Did I mention that Ms Jameson's comic book is published by VIRGIN COMICS? Ya can't make things like this up.
BTW VC is part of the Virgin empire of Sir Richard Branson. ??

So ........... big deal .

ATB SKHA

Subject: RE: True things you couldn't make up.
From: John on the Sunset Coast
Date: 13 Apr 08 - 07:44 PM

No big deal, skarpi. The conflation of porn star/virgin struck a funny note to me. Maybe not you; it's okay. The rest was just background.

Subject: RE: True things you couldn't make up.
From: The Fooles Troupe
Date: 13 Apr 08 - 09:11 PM

When a boss of mine who was into gardening and rooting cuttings, retired I gave him a present. Many people misunderstood, as he had been rather nasty to me.

The packet clearly said "Rooting Powder"...

Subject: RE: True things you couldn't make up.
From: Bert
Date: 14 Apr 08 - 12:42 AM

One time when in England when driving to work I used to pass this electical sub-station which was at the end of a short driveway. It was complete with pylons. At the entrance to the driveway was a sign "Forestry service - Experimental Division".

I always regret never taking a picture of it.

Subject: RE: True things you couldn't make up.
From: eddie1
Date: 14 Apr 08 - 01:45 AM

For many years, until it fell to bits, I had a photograph I took in Edinburgh Zoo of two signs on the one post.
One said "Gentlemen", the other "Exhibition Area Under Redevelopment!

Eddie

Subject: RE: True things you couldn't make up.
From: skarpi
Date: 14 Apr 08 - 03:38 AM

Okei :>))

Subject: RE: True things you couldn't make up.
From: Gurney
Date: 14 Apr 08 - 03:39 AM

My boss, on holiday from NZ in England, stopped on impulse in Coventry to look in a tropical fish shop, and got talking to another customer. The customer was my dad, the only occasion he ever went into such a shop. He was buying something for a present for me. He lived about 12 miles from the shop, too.

On names, my aunt went to school in Leicester with the Trump kids, Harry Will and Elsie May. So she said.
If it doesn't translate into American, trump is a slightly more polite term for fart, as well as the card term.

Subject: RE: True things you couldn't make up.
From: Bryn Pugh
Date: 14 Apr 08 - 04:42 AM

There is said to be a firm of Solicitors in Sheffield -

Dalley and Doolittle.

Subject: RE: True things you couldn't make up.
From: GUEST,PMB
Date: 14 Apr 08 - 06:23 AM

Sheffield humour I think. They used to have a cafe there, called Sam and Ella's.

Subject: RE: True things you couldn't make up.
From: Black belt caterpillar wrestler
Date: 14 Apr 08 - 07:41 AM

I thought that Dalley and Doolittle were estate agents. I've certainly seen their signs.

There was a dentist in Taunton called Brendan Blood and I've heard of one called I. Pullham.

Near Bradford there is the "Idle Workingmens Club".

When living in Somerset used to wonder if Chard or Burnham had fire brigades.

Subject: RE: True things you couldn't make up.
From: Barbara
Date: 14 Apr 08 - 08:06 AM

Though it actually is in Kensington, the First Unitarian Church calls itself the First Unitarian Church of Berkeley. Wonder why?

And my childhood optometrist was Dr. I. Doctor.

Blessings,
Barbara

Subject: RE: True things you couldn't make up.
From: Tig
Date: 14 Apr 08 - 08:12 AM

At one of the local schools Head of English was Mr Shakespere. Head of Music? Mr Tune!

Subject: RE: True things you couldn't make up.
From: Donuel
Date: 14 Apr 08 - 09:00 AM

Domestic surveillance of American bank accounts and finance is up 70% over the last 6 years in part to combat money being funneled to terrorists or terrorist states.

The Bush administration has given over $600 billion dollars to the Supreme Islamic Council in Iraq over the last 3 years.

Subject: RE: True things you couldn't make up.
From: Mr Happy
Date: 14 Apr 08 - 10:16 AM

..........& then there's the Ugley Women's Institute!


http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ugley

Subject: RE: True things you couldn't make up.
From: GUEST,PMB
Date: 14 Apr 08 - 10:22 AM

The Boy had a primary school teacher called Miss Leaning, universally known as Miss Leading. Then she got married and became Mrs. Knibbs. Roald Dahl was very popular at the time (back then primary school kids did education rather than SATs and "brain gym")- so she immediatley became Mrs. Vermicious Knidds.

Subject: RE: True things you couldn't make up.
From: SINSULL
Date: 15 Apr 08 - 09:56 AM

We once had a Hamburger and a Frankfurter on the Supreme Court .

Subject: RE: True things you couldn't make up.
From: Rusty Dobro
Date: 15 Apr 08 - 10:24 AM

There used to be (still is?) a Devon estate agents called 'Lecher and Scorer'.

On a TV news report yesterday concerning Japanese whaling, I was delighted to see that the interviewee was Jonah Fisher.

Subject: RE: True things you couldn't make up.
From: eddie1
Date: 15 Apr 08 - 12:56 PM

JFK's famous "Ich bin ein Berliner!" speech translates from colloquial German as "I am a Doughnut!"

Eddie

Subject: RE: True things you couldn't make up.
From: Rasener
Date: 15 Apr 08 - 05:11 PM

It looks like it does exist Cockwell Inn

Subject: RE: True things you couldn't make up.
From: Herga Kitty
Date: 15 Apr 08 - 05:15 PM

Ah yes, the apocryphal doctor's address was Bedside Manor, Lettsby Avenue...

Kitty

Subject: RE: True things you couldn't make up.
From: HuwG
Date: 15 Apr 08 - 05:52 PM

Dave Polshaw, Ramsbottom is informally, though not officially, divided into Upper and Lower parts of the town. Above Upper Ramsbottom, near the village of Holcombe (locally pronounced "Hokum") is a famous monument, the Peel Tower. It is several hundred feet high, and on climbing to the top, you find the guardrail is barely knee-high. The views from the top are dizzying but spectacular.

Until they were exposed as hoaxers, two regular correspondents to the UK newspaper, the Guardian, were "C. Mababijive" and "A. N. Gelfingus".

A long-defunct Sheffield metal-working firm were "Shufflebottom and Co. Wire-drawers".

Subject: RE: True things you couldn't make up.
From: The Fooles Troupe
Date: 15 Apr 08 - 06:46 PM

And then there's the song "The Widow Who Keeps the Cock Inn"... which weirdly I can find no link to... even though it is from 'Pills to Purge Melancholy'.

Subject: RE: True things you couldn't make up.
From: Dave the Gnome
Date: 16 Apr 08 - 03:33 AM

1970's female rock band 'Fanny' had a poster out saying 'Fanny and supporting band'. Different meanings on different sides of the pond of course:-)

Didn't know that about Ramsbottom, Huw - Been up the Peel Tower though - Surely, only hundreds of feet if you include the height of 'okum 'ill, on which it stands? Still as scary as say nontheless!

Cheers

Dave