# Lets see how long it takes this to become an urban legend **URL:** \ **Category:** Miscellaneous and Personal Stuff I Must Share\ **Created:** [January 31, 2000, 9:38pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/lets-see-how-long-it-takes-this-to-become-an-urban-legend/13375 "2000-01-31T21:38:00Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 18\ **Page:** 1
**Author:** ![Inkz](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/i/ecb155/32.png) [@Inkz](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Inkz)\ **Post date:** [January 31, 2000, 9:38pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/lets-see-how-long-it-takes-this-to-become-an-urban-legend/13375/1 "2000-01-31T21:38:00Z")
Have you ever why some candy that is ostensibly a fruit flavor (cherry, strawberry and watermelon are the most obvious examples) don’t so much taste like their real-world fruit namesakes as much as they taste like some kind globally accepted alternate universe candy namesakes. That is to say, a cherry flavored Wonka ring-pop tastes very much like a cherry flavored Charms Blo-pop which tastes exactly like a cherry flavored Jolly Rancher candy which tastes mostly like a cherry flavored Dum Dum lollipop, which is much like a cherry flavored Drummond spiral-pop (the kind that come in those long, clear cellophane bandoliers you used to be able to get at K-Mart). My point is they all taste the same, yet none of them bear the slightest resemblance to a real cherry’s flavor at all. So, how did these come to be accepted as a cherry’s flavor? Did they perhaps start out actually resembling a real cherry’s flavor, and gradually degrade into an unrecognizable hybrid? Like the Chihuahua’s bloodline evolving from the timber wolf’s? No, the real answer is far stranger… Recently I read about the Department of Standards and Practices in Cambridge England. There, guarded and protected, are THE DEFINITIVE examples of weights and measures that set the standard for the world. They have THE standard twelve inch ruler that is the template for the billions of rulers and tape measures around the planet. There they have THE copper weight that is the one and only globally accepted standard kilogram. Yes, they have the items that are used to calibrate almost every measure. Somewhere, under heavy guard, in a jar, sealed with wax, under lock and key, is THE standard cherry lollipop, well over a hundred years old now. Every twenty or so years, with great fanfare, a beurocrat enters the room, presents his credentials to the seargent-at-arms who, if they are acceptable, opens the lock and unseals the jar. The well trained beurocrat licks that lollipop, and using that information he determines what the accepted flavor of cherry lollipops should be the world over. So that’s why cherry lollipops don’t taste like real cherries. They are based on a hundred year old in Cambridge England. Inky ---
**Author:** ![WillGolfForFood](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/w/82dd89/32.png) [@WillGolfForFood](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/WillGolfForFood)\ **Post date:** [January 31, 2000, 10:05pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/lets-see-how-long-it-takes-this-to-become-an-urban-legend/13375/2 "2000-01-31T22:05:00Z")
> [@](#): > > Originally posted by Inkz: > **So that’s why cherry lollipops don’t taste like real cherries. They are based on a hundred year old in Cambridge England.** And anybody that old tends to taste a little musty. ---
**Author:** ![Studi](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/5daacb/32.png) [@Studi](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Studi)\ **Post date:** [January 31, 2000, 10:14pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/lets-see-how-long-it-takes-this-to-become-an-urban-legend/13375/3 "2000-01-31T22:14:00Z")
What about lemon-flavoured things? Huh? Or watermelon-flavoured candies, how did the fit a watermelon in a jar? Huh, didn’t think about that, did you? Studi * * * Don’t _speak_ ill of your enemies; plot it. ---
**Author:** ![Inkz](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/i/ecb155/32.png) [@Inkz](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Inkz)\ **Post date:** [January 31, 2000, 10:18pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/lets-see-how-long-it-takes-this-to-become-an-urban-legend/13375/4 "2000-01-31T22:18:00Z")
details, details… ---
**Author:** ![neuro-trash\_grrrl](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/n/3ab097/32.png) [@neuro-trash\_grrrl](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/neuro-trash_grrrl)\ **Post date:** [January 31, 2000, 11:32pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/lets-see-how-long-it-takes-this-to-become-an-urban-legend/13375/5 "2000-01-31T23:32:00Z")
Excellent UL, I’ll start spreading it today. * * * An infinite number of rednecks in an infinite number of pickup trucks shooting an infinite number of shotguns at an infinite number of road signs will eventually produce all the world’s great works of literature in Braille. ---
**Author:** ![Konrad](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/k/f475e1/32.png) [@Konrad](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Konrad)\ **Post date:** [February 1, 2000, 12:31am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/lets-see-how-long-it-takes-this-to-become-an-urban-legend/13375/6 "2000-02-01T00:31:00Z")
I thought the standard cherry flavour was stored in Gottingen, Germany, along with the standard ketchup flavour. ---
**Author:** ![RTA](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/b4bc9f/32.png) [@RTA](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/RTA)\ **Post date:** [February 1, 2000, 12:43am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/lets-see-how-long-it-takes-this-to-become-an-urban-legend/13375/7 "2000-02-01T00:43:00Z")
Actually, it’s true; it happened to my aunt’s former boss. ---
**Author:** ![ChiefScott](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/58f4c7/32.png) [@ChiefScott](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/ChiefScott)\ **Post date:** [February 1, 2000, 12:45am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/lets-see-how-long-it-takes-this-to-become-an-urban-legend/13375/8 "2000-02-01T00:45:00Z")
OK, Inkzter. Now explain Cherry Nyquil. Just a shitty knock-off of the Cambridge standard? ---
**Author:** ![Gr8Kat](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/gr8kat/32/18668_2.png) [@Gr8Kat](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Gr8Kat)\ **Post date:** [February 1, 2000, 1:11am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/lets-see-how-long-it-takes-this-to-become-an-urban-legend/13375/9 "2000-02-01T01:11:00Z")
That’s an interesting idea… let’s start spreading it and see how long it takes to get on snopes 🙂 * * * “I hope life isn’t a big joke, because I don’t get it,” Jack Handy [The Kat House](http://members.aol.com/gr8kat1/KatGen/home.htm) [Join the FSH Muscular Dystrophy Webring](http://members.aol.com/gr8kat1/KatGen/fshwebring.htm) ---
**Author:** ![Little\_Nemo](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/little_nemo/32/3120_2.png) [@Little\_Nemo](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Little_Nemo)\ **Post date:** [February 2, 2000, 1:54am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/lets-see-how-long-it-takes-this-to-become-an-urban-legend/13375/10 "2000-02-02T01:54:00Z")
“So the well trained bureaucrat was licking the one hundred year old cherry lollipop, when suddenly everyone saw that instead of holding it with his right hand, he was holding it with a … STEEL HOOK!!!” ---
**Author:** ![Johnny\_L.A](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/johnny_l.a/32/1084_2.png) [@Johnny\_L.A](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Johnny_L.A)\ **Post date:** [February 2, 2000, 2:14am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/lets-see-how-long-it-takes-this-to-become-an-urban-legend/13375/11 "2000-02-02T02:14:00Z")
Little Nemo, It’s TRUE! My sister has a friend of a friend in England and she SAW the hook! (I don’t know my sister’s friend’s friend’s name, though. I PROMISE I’ll find out and get back to you!) ---
**Author:** ![Glitch](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/g/0ea827/32.png) [@Glitch](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Glitch)\ **Post date:** [February 2, 2000, 2:32am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/lets-see-how-long-it-takes-this-to-become-an-urban-legend/13375/12 "2000-02-02T02:32:00Z")
Its true… my uncle’s father’s mother’s sister’s daughter’s aunt’s neice’s nephew’s former roommate used to work for Former Agent as a … well, maybe I better not tell you about that. Anyway, he actually saw and tasted the standard. ---
**Author:** ![BoBettie](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/4af34b/32.png) [@BoBettie](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/BoBettie)\ **Post date:** [February 2, 2000, 2:32am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/lets-see-how-long-it-takes-this-to-become-an-urban-legend/13375/13 "2000-02-02T02:32:00Z")
And I know this guy who’s a paramedic who went on this weird call… This lady was taking a bath and using a cherry lollipop for her “pleasure”, and well…you know the rest… Hint: Think mudshrimp, toilets, and other nasties * * * Love is like popsicles…you get too much you get too high. Not enough and you’re gonna die… [Click here for some GOOD news for a change](http://www.binghamtonpress.com/binghamtonnews/local/Sanews5.html)[Zettecity](http://www.angelfire.com/ny3/zettecity/index.html) ---
**Author:** ![Irishman](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/i/b487fb/32.png) [@Irishman](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Irishman)\ **Post date:** [February 2, 2000, 4:21am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/lets-see-how-long-it-takes-this-to-become-an-urban-legend/13375/14 "2000-02-02T04:21:00Z")
Zette - I was trying to forget that! Ugh! ---
**Author:** ![drollman](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/f04885/32.png) [@drollman](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/drollman)\ **Post date:** [February 2, 2000, 8:55pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/lets-see-how-long-it-takes-this-to-become-an-urban-legend/13375/15 "2000-02-02T20:55:00Z")
Hey, hey, hey! We’re supposed to be fighting ignorance here…not perpetuating it! Besides if I wanted something that tastes like a hundred year old cherry lollipop, I’d slip my grandmother the tongue. * * * With God as my witness, I thought turkey’s could fly. ---
**Author:** ![Inkz](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/i/ecb155/32.png) [@Inkz](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Inkz)\ **Post date:** [February 2, 2000, 8:59pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/lets-see-how-long-it-takes-this-to-become-an-urban-legend/13375/16 "2000-02-02T20:59:00Z")
Drollman, I’m shocked! ---
**Author:** ![SwimmingRiddles](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/43a26b/32.png) [@SwimmingRiddles](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/SwimmingRiddles)\ **Post date:** [February 2, 2000, 9:03pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/lets-see-how-long-it-takes-this-to-become-an-urban-legend/13375/17 "2000-02-02T21:03:00Z")
Hey! Drollman’s grandmother is the beurocrat! * * * One must have chaos in oneself to give birth to a dancing star. -Nietzche ---
**Author:** ![Kat](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/k/b19c9b/32.png) [@Kat](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Kat)\ **Post date:** [February 3, 2000, 5:00am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/lets-see-how-long-it-takes-this-to-become-an-urban-legend/13375/18 "2000-02-03T05:00:00Z")
You forgot the most important part! A plausible yet fake name and title to stick on the bottom of the message. * * * Your Official Cat Goddess since 10/20/99. “I’m a god. I’m not _the_ God–I don’t think.” --P.C.