# Wait, that's real? **URL:** \ **Category:** Cafe Society\ **Created:** [January 2, 2012, 1:59am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/wait-thats-real/608103 "2012-01-02T01:59:53Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 11
**Author:** ![Sunspace](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/sunspace/32/1250_2.png) [@Sunspace](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Sunspace)\ **Post date:** [January 8, 2012, 3:21am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/wait-thats-real/608103/201 "2012-01-08T03:21:08Z")
> [@Teacake](#): > > He’s standing on his left leg with his right leg up on the step in front of him. He’s gesturing with his snake (hur hur) towards the woman looking straight out of the canvas over on the left hand side, whose attributes are so astonishing that the guy behind her, the one next to her, AND the woman to the far side of him are all gawking at them as well. The woman at the far end of that table can only pick her teeth and gaze dreamily from afar, sadly… I’m still not sure that isn’t a kangaroo looking through the railing at the top left… 😃 > [@ZPG\_Zealot](#): > > …I told them I was Roma and about half of group doesn’t know what that is, so I explain. Three people, one a white woman from a small town and a black woman and a black man from urban Houston of all places responded more or less with “Wow, I thought gypsies were just something they made up for fairy tales.” It is with some embarrassment that I admit I thought the same until well into adulthood. The only place I heard about “gypsies” was in old fairytales and Disney cartoons, alongside elves, dwarves, unicorns, giants, etc. So what else was I to think? ---
**Author:** ![Shagnasty](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/9dc877/32.png) [@Shagnasty](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Shagnasty)\ **Post date:** [January 8, 2012, 3:51am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/wait-thats-real/608103/202 "2012-01-08T03:51:54Z")
… ---
**Author:** ![Quimby](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/q/22d042/32.png) [@Quimby](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Quimby)\ **Post date:** [January 8, 2012, 7:35am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/wait-thats-real/608103/203 "2012-01-08T07:35:22Z")
This one wasn’t me but when I was in college in the midwest, someone in my Dorm asked me if there really were tunnels that connected New York and New Jersey. He read about it in The Stand and thought Stephen King had made it up. ---
**Author:** ![Cartooniverse](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/cartooniverse/32/3084_2.png) [@Cartooniverse](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Cartooniverse)\ **Post date:** [January 8, 2012, 3:28pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/wait-thats-real/608103/204 "2012-01-08T15:28:45Z")
You know that’s a work of non fiction. Right? 😛 ---
**Author:** ![Larry\_Mudd](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/l/f14d63/32.png) [@Larry\_Mudd](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Larry_Mudd)\ **Post date:** [January 8, 2012, 5:04pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/wait-thats-real/608103/205 "2012-01-08T17:04:37Z")
> [@Quimby](#): > > He read about it in The Stand and thought Stephen King had made it up. They considered a project like that back in the thirties, but it couldn’t get any traction because everyone agreed that it would just be too terrifying to traverse in the dark if were filled end-to-end with corpses in wrecked cars. It was an impractical idea, really. ---
**Author:** ![TBG](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/c89c15/32.png) [@TBG](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/TBG)\ **Post date:** [January 8, 2012, 10:15pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/wait-thats-real/608103/206 "2012-01-08T22:15:12Z")
> [@Mahaloth](#): > > [Mario Party 8 got pulled from the shelves over the word spastic, actually. The fixed after realizing their error. Changed the word to erratic.](http://www.mcvuk.com/news/read/mario-party-8-back-on-august-3rd) I don’t know if you were trying to support my statement that it’s offensive in the UK and nothing in the US or refute it, but if you’ll note, your link is to mcv **UK**. I’m certain any complaints about Mario Party 8 didn’t originate in America. Here’s wiki’s take > [@](#): > > It was released in North America on May 29, 2007, in Europe on June 22, 2007, in Australia on July 19, 2007, and in Japan on July 26, 2007. It was originally released in the United Kingdom on July 26, 2007. However, some retailers were reporting that it was supposedly withdrawn from shelves because some copies included the word “spastic”, which is considered a highly offensive word in the UK for referring to disability. The game was eventually re-released in the United Kingdom on August 3, 2007 with the word now used “erratic” instead.[2] ---
**Author:** ![voguevixen](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/v/b5ac83/32.png) [@voguevixen](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/voguevixen)\ **Post date:** [January 9, 2012, 4:23am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/wait-thats-real/608103/207 "2012-01-09T04:23:28Z")
> [@TBG](#): > > Last year Hasbro was going to sell a Transformers figure in the US with the name Spastic. What is that I don’t even! Reminds me of the time Reebok decided to name a shoe [Incubus](http://www.snopes.com/business/market/incubus.asp). Y’know. Because people want a shoe named after a demon who rapes women in their sleep. 😕 ---
**Author:** ![Nobody](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/n/94ad74/32.png) [@Nobody](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Nobody)\ **Post date:** [January 9, 2012, 5:13am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/wait-thats-real/608103/208 "2012-01-09T05:13:38Z")
The name hasn’t seemed to hurt [this band](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Incubus_%28band%29) any. ---
**Author:** ![dropzone](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/dropzone/32/7515_2.png) [@dropzone](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/dropzone)\ **Post date:** [January 9, 2012, 5:19am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/wait-thats-real/608103/209 "2012-01-09T05:19:05Z")
> [@voguevixen](#): > > What is that I don’t even! Reminds me of the time Reebok decided to name a shoe [Incubus](http://www.snopes.com/business/market/incubus.asp). Y’know. Because people want a shoe named after a demon who rapes women in their sleep. 😕 Y’know, I’m close to as tolerant as the next guy, but I suggested to a kid at church that he probably might not want to wear an Incubus T-shirt to services, considering. But Pastor didn’t care so I got over it. OTOH, the kid’s dead so maybe Someone else cared. :dubious: ---
**Author:** ![crowmanyclouds](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/crowmanyclouds/32/19884_2.png) [@crowmanyclouds](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/crowmanyclouds)\ **Post date:** [January 9, 2012, 10:39am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/wait-thats-real/608103/210 "2012-01-09T10:39:22Z")
> [@An\_Gadai](#): > > Well the actual gun as described in the film didn’t exist as I found out recently when I tried to buy one. Correct, not as described in the film, > [@](#): > > … The movie’s fictional BB gun, described as the “Red Ryder carbine-action, two hundred shot Range Model air rifle with a compass in the stock and this thing which tells time”, does not correspond to any model in existence nor even a prototype; the Red Ryder featured in the movie was specially made to match author Jean Shepherd’s story (which may be artistic license, but was the configuration Shepherd claimed to remember). However, the “Buck Jones” Daisy air rifle, immediately above the Red Ryder in the Daisy line, did have a compass and sundial in the stock, but no other features of the “Red Ryder” model. …[RIGHT]CITE[/RIGHT] but, they still make the [Model 1938 Red Ryder](http://www.daisy.com/shopping/customer/product.php?productid=16363&cat=249&page=1). CMC fnord! ---
**Author:** ![Dendarii\_Dame](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/bbce88/32.png) [@Dendarii\_Dame](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Dendarii_Dame)\ **Post date:** [January 9, 2012, 6:18pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/wait-thats-real/608103/211 "2012-01-09T18:18:44Z")
My mother’s way of saying “Nonsense” was to say, “Baloney, baloney, spumoni.” I knew what baloney was, but I always thought spumoni was a nonsense word Mom made up to rhyme with baloney. Turns out it’s an Italian dessert. ---
**Author:** ![aruvqan](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/aruvqan/32/2891_2.png) [@aruvqan](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/aruvqan)\ **Post date:** [January 9, 2012, 7:28pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/wait-thats-real/608103/212 "2012-01-09T19:28:45Z")
> [@ZPG\_Zealot](#): > > I was once the subject of OMG that’s real. Decades ago during univesity freshmen orientation our little tour group of dozen or so incoming freshmen is talking to each other as we are being shown the library, the UC, etc., and I am asked about my ethnicity. I told them I was Roma and about half of group doesn’t know what that is, so I explain. Three people, one a white woman from a small town and a black woman and a black man from urban Houston of all places responded more or less with “Wow, I thought gypsies were just something they made up for fairy tales.” The woman from the small town asked if she could take a picture of me to send home. _snicker_ I can believe that, I think in the roughly 5000 person town I spent much of my youth in was so blindingly white it glowed at night. I think there were about 15 families that were black or mulatto, I can’t think of one hispanic family in town until I had already left for college. I know that unless they were seriously hiding the fact that there were no Roma at all [though I did know someone that was claiming to be one, but it came out later that she was doing it to use the cachet of mystery to make her cardreading more popular so she could do it at parties for more money] ---
**Author:** ![Ponch8](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/ponch8/32/9883_2.png) [@Ponch8](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Ponch8)\ **Post date:** [January 9, 2012, 9:29pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/wait-thats-real/608103/213 "2012-01-09T21:29:23Z")
When I was growing up, my family had a drawing program for our Atari ST called Degas Elite. I had no idea that Degas was an actual painter. In an old _Beavis and Butt-head_ episode, Beavis mentioned Chick-fil-A. I didn’t find out it was a real place until a year or two later. I still remember when Beavis brought it up: it was when they were watching the music video for Tiffany’s remake of “I Think We’re Alone Now.” ---
**Author:** ![StusBlues](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/dc4da7/32.png) [@StusBlues](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/StusBlues)\ **Post date:** [January 9, 2012, 10:16pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/wait-thats-real/608103/214 "2012-01-09T22:16:36Z")
> [@dropzone](#): > > Y’know, I’m close to as tolerant as the next guy, but I suggested to a kid at church that he probably might not want to wear an Incubus T-shirt to services, considering. But Pastor didn’t care so I got over it. > > OTOH, the kid’s dead so maybe Someone else cared. :dubious: Or [Somebody Goofed](http://www.chick.com/reading/tracts/0003/0003_01.asp). ---
**Author:** ![Nobody](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/n/94ad74/32.png) [@Nobody](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Nobody)\ **Post date:** [January 9, 2012, 10:26pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/wait-thats-real/608103/215 "2012-01-09T22:26:19Z")
> [@Ponch8](#): > > In an old _Beavis and Butt-head_ episode, Beavis mentioned Chick-fil-A. I didn’t find out it was a real place until a year or two later. I still remember when Beavis brought it up: it was when they were watching the music video for Tiffany’s remake of “I Think We’re Alone Now.” In the **Ben Folds Five** song “Army” there are the lyrics: got a job at chic-fil-a citing artistic differences the band broke up in may I thought it was made up to rhyme with may. And something I was going to put in the OP but forgot due to my crappy memory. When the movie _Harold and Kumar go to White Castle_ came out I had no idea what the title was referring to because I’d never heard of White Castle. And for a trifecta, I had seen some ad, or maybe passed by some Adam Sandler movie (I think) where he’s eating at Popeyes Chicken and thought it was made up for the movie. ---
**Author:** ![XT](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/xt/32/456_2.png) [@XT](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/XT)\ **Post date:** [January 9, 2012, 10:30pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/wait-thats-real/608103/216 "2012-01-09T22:30:47Z")
I could see White Castle (I was familiar with it, but then I used to live in the North East), but where do you live that you hadn’t heard of Popeyes Chicken or Chic-fil-a…hell, they even have those out here in the wilds of the Great South West, and we’re the last to get everything! 😉 -XT ---
**Author:** ![NDP](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/ndp/32/55_2.png) [@NDP](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/NDP)\ **Post date:** [January 9, 2012, 10:51pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/wait-thats-real/608103/217 "2012-01-09T22:51:17Z")
Since we’re talking chain restaurants and fast food places, when I first heard [Bill Hicks’ routine about his encounter with the waitress who wonders why he’s reading](http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Uvs2g5Nj0NI), I thought "waffle house"was a general term like steakhouse or fish house for a type of restaurant that mostly served a specific type of food (in this case, waffles and other breakfast items). It was until years later that I found out there was an actual chain called Waffle House and that they were as common throughout the South as Starbucks are where I live. ---
**Author:** ![Nobody](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/n/94ad74/32.png) [@Nobody](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Nobody)\ **Post date:** [January 9, 2012, 11:15pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/wait-thats-real/608103/218 "2012-01-09T23:15:37Z")
> [@xtisme](#): > > I could see White Castle (I was familiar with it, but then I used to live in the North East), but where do you live that you hadn’t heard of Popeyes Chicken or Chic-fil-a…hell, they even have those out here in the wilds of the Great South West, and we’re the last to get everything! 😉 > > -XT I’ve lived most of my life here in Oregon. The first time I saw an actual **Popeyes Chicken** was a few years ago when I was visiting my dad’s side of the family in and around Sacramento California. Then, sometime recently Salem got one. But I don’t remember seeing any in Oregon before that. Doing an online search shows no **Chick-fil-a** locations in Oregon. ---
**Author:** ![XT](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/xt/32/456_2.png) [@XT](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/XT)\ **Post date:** [January 9, 2012, 11:18pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/wait-thats-real/608103/219 "2012-01-09T23:18:17Z")
Nope, none in Oregon…guess that explains it (they have commercials on TV, but they might be a regional thing and you might not get them since you don’t have any…though I’m always seeing ads for Joe’s Crab Shack, and we definitely don’t have any of those here. Or, until very recently, Jack in the Box ads). You definitely wouldn’t be familiar with White Castle, unless you ever saw them in the frozen foods isle (they sell a line of frozen hamburgers here, but they aren’t very good IMHO). And I thought I was in the back of beyond here in New Mexico! 😉 -XT ---
**Author:** ![Nobody](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/n/94ad74/32.png) [@Nobody](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Nobody)\ **Post date:** [January 9, 2012, 11:20pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/wait-thats-real/608103/220 "2012-01-09T23:20:16Z")
> [@xtisme](#): > > Nope, none in Oregon…guess that explains it. You definitely wouldn’t be familiar with White Castle, unless you ever saw them in the frozen foods isle (they sell a line of frozen hamburgers here, but they aren’t very good IMHO). A few years ago I started noticing the frozen hamburgers. I don’t know it was something recent, of if they were always there and I’d just never noticed. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/wait-thats-real/608103.md?page=10) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/wait-thats-real/608103.md?page=12)