Well, now I have plans for the weekend.
All I can say is that I chuckled. I cannot ask more.
I think that one was a gag by analogy with imaginary numbers. Occasionally one comes across a crank that believes imaginary numbers aren’t “real” (common English definition here!) or are somehow less substantial than the reals. And in fact, imaginary numbers got their name for just this reason, but really they have just as much basis as negative numbers, or positive for that matter.