Not An Urban Legend.

I love urban legends and the way that people swear they are true. Of course when you ask for the facts they heard it from someone who knew someone whose third cousin had a babysitter that it actually happened too. Of course today it comes in an email that gets passed around. Anytime I hear something that doesn't quite ring true I check out Snopes.com to find out the real tale.

I have a friend in Illinois who I talk to every week. He doesn't have the internet so he is always giving me things to look up. He had heard a tale on the NPR show, Wait, Wait, Don't Tell Me, that sounded like a classic urban legend. A flight attendant was fired for putting a baby in the overhead storage compartment. I knew that Snopes had not covered that because I have their RSS feed on my homepage, so I did a search and amazingly I found out the story was true. On a Virgin Blue flight from Fiji to Sydney a father was playing peek-a-boo with his 17 month old son when a male flight attendant picked up the boy, put him in the compartment, and closed the door. The flight attendant has been fired.

The story takes a turn here. The mother claims that she was traumatized because of the incident, her husband was shocked, and the baby is suffering from anxiety and withdrawal. The baby has seen various specialists since the incident. Can you say doctor shopping? Can you say lawsuit? I knew you could. The most shocking thing about this incident is they are Australians, not Americans. I am sure there will be a settlement out of court but in my opinion this woman is going a little overboard here. I believe her husband agrees because they have separated.

Here's Mud In Your Eye.

My buddy in Illinois called me last week and asked if I could find out what the origin of the phrase "here's mud in your eye" was. I like doing little research projects like this. I found out there is no definitive origin. I found at least three versions.

The first claimed it was started by soldiers during World War One. They fought in the trenches which many times were very muddy, so this was a toast from one soldier to another.

The second version is from the world of horse racing. In a horse race every horse except for the leader gets mud in their eyes. I am not exactly sure how that could be considered a good thing. I have always considered the phrase as a way of wishing someone well.

The third version, and the one that I believe is the correct one, comes from the Bible. In John Chapter 9 Jesus healed a blind man by spitting in the soil and rubbing that mixture on the man's eyes. I am sure there are also other explanations for this phrase. If you know of any please send them along.
Sorry Travis, but you missed it. I agreed with you that the age was 30. That is the minimum age for a Senator. For the House Of Representatives they must be 25.

The weekend question is Grade 1/Art.

To make the color pink, you should mix white with what primary color?

I knew this one. 105-19.