The Smarmy Carny

On May 17, 1972, Don Gorske ate a Big Mac.

"No big deal," you might say, but Gorske never stopped. In that first month in 1972, he ate 265 Big Macs.

Due to his obsessive-compulsive disorder, Gorske continued eating Big Macs every day. In fact, Gorske has had less than 10 Big Mac-less days in those 36+ years since. According to the AP, Gorske recently hit the 23,000 Big Mac milestone. Currently, he generally eats two Big Macs a day.

What, you don't believe Gorske? Lucky for you, he has also saved all of his Big Mac receipts for all those Big Macs!

Gorske wrote a book about his experiences titled 22,477 Big Macs

Watch this video to get an idea of what the man is like . . . and no, he's not obese!

Here's to you, Mr. Obsessive Compulsive Big Mac Eater.

America owns gluttony again!

In 2006, there was speculation that Joey "Jaws" Chestnut had a chance to beat Takeru "Tsunami" Kobayashi, who is the man when it comes to eating competitions. After all, Chestnut was the first American to break the 50 HDB (hot dog and bun) mark in 12 minutes. Chestnut ate 52 HDBs but still fell short in 2006, losing to Kobayashi by just 1¾ HDBs.

This year, however, the record was shattered yet again at the 2007 Nathan's Famous Fourth of July Hot Dog Eating Championship. The record of 53¾ HDBs in 12 minutes was set last year by Kobayashi. It was decimated as Chestnut ate 66 HDBs in 12 minutes. That's an average of 5.5 HDBs each minute, or one hot dog every 11 seconds!

Kobayashi recently had a wisdom tooth removed, but still broke his own record by eating 63 HDBs. He said he'll be back next year for a rematch.

The top six eaters all broke their personal records this year. Sonya "The Black Widow" Thomas upped her personal best and raised the women's record by downing 39 HDBs in 12 minutes.

The Crayola Factory in Easton, PA used to give out bracelets to visitors as they entered. To save money, they started giving out stickers instead, which makes sense.

What happened, however, is that one customer left the factory and realized they were wearing a sticker they no longer wanted or needed. So, instead of throwing it out, they decided to stick it on a nearby garbage can in front of neighboring stores. What one customer started, thousands of subsequent visitors followed up on. Today, stickers cover many of the garbage cans, parking meters, traffic signs, and even the columns in front of Easton's City Hall.

Who can blame a kid for wanting to save their sticker to add to the collection of hundreds, if not thousands, of stickers outside of the Crayola Factory? Once the large number of stickers are in place, putting a sticker up is not defacing property — it's adding to the community "art."

Some city leaders were bothered enough to tell Crayola to do something about the problem. Easton Councilman Carole Heffley complained about the stickers in a March city council meeting, and later that month, an Easton representative spoke with a Crayola representative about the problem. Crayola committed to placing large sticker boards near the exits so that visitors could have an acceptable place to put their stickers before they left.

Despite Crayola's attempts to help out, Easton council President Sandra Vulcano still wasn't happy. She wants Crayola employees to clear the stickers from the public areas and pay two employees to walk the surrounding area and police any children who might look like they are about to place a sticker on public property. As if these demands weren't enough, the city of Easton already has a 5% City of Easton Admissions Tax that is added to the cost to enter the Crayola Factory:

An admissions tax of 5% is due on a quarterly basis for all admissions collected in the City of Easton. In addition a $50 permit is required for year round establishments and a $25 permit for temporary venues. — Easton's official website

Perhaps the City of Easton should start ticketing small children and charging them $50 fines for placing these colorful stickers on already-covered garbage cans. Or maybe the center of town should include a large banner hanging from the Center Square Civil War Memorial that reads, "Visit the Crayola Factory, pay your 48 cent per person tax on admission there, and get the heck out of town." They'd rather have a sticker-free town than your business, apparently. Add Easton, PA to your list of towns not to move to.

Of course, I'm sure that Easton has normal people who don't mind the stickers and what they represent. Unfortunately, it's not their voices we're hearing.

I was skimming through some lists when I came upon a "Top 10 Pet Costumes" list.

I have to wonder — who actually dresses their pet up, even at Halloween? I've seen plenty of dogs on TV dressed up in funny costumes, but in real life, I've really only seen a handful of short-haired dogs wearing "functional" sweaters during the winter months.

I have to admit, some of these costumes here are cute and look like good ideas, but I just haven't seen any pets dressed up for Halloween. Perhaps I just don't run with the "dress up your pet" crowd.

1. Men in Black: Frank the Dog
2. Darth Vader
3. Superman
4. Snow White
5. Dracula
6. Spiderman
7. Zorro
8. Raggedy Ann
9. Wonder Woman
10. Prisoner

For goodness' sake, if you really dress your animal up like this, please comment here and let me know. I'm curious about how much you spend on your pet's costume, how you decide which costume your pet will wear, and what sort of reaction you get out of people when they see your pet. Also, do you take it trick-or-treating?

I've been (slowly) putting together a calendar of eccentric holidays on Google Calendar.

Unfortunately, I haven't come across any eccentric holidays for today, July 29, but here are some from the past couple days and from next week:

• July 27 was "Take Your Pants for a Walk Day."
• July 28 was "National Talk in Elevators Day."
• August 2 is one of the days of "National Dadaism Month." August isn't National Dadaism Month, though — this holiday's month is celebrated on 13 days throughout the year. That's dadaism for you.
• August 9 is National Underwear Day

If you head to the calendar, each holiday has a brief description and a link to available websites.

The calendar is a bit bare, as I have plenty more work to do on it. To subscribe to the calendar, log into Google Calendar and search for "eccentric holidays." Expect to see the days fill up more and more — The goal is to have at least one holiday on every day of the year!

Image by TravelFurther

I stumbled across the Firing Squad Riddle a few months ago. Honestly, I eventually gave up and looked at the answer before figuring it out. I wish I had spent more time on the riddle, but I figured that it was one of those "trick" riddles.

You can find this riddle all over the internet, but TravelFurther created the helpful graphic you see above.

The Firing Squad Riddle

The graphic above depicts four men, buried up to their necks, about to get shot by a firing squad. We'll call them A, B, C, and D, appropriately.

A is facing the wall from the left and the other 3 (B, C, D) are facing the wall from the right. They all know they are 3 on one side and 1 on the other. They are also lined up in a straight line and cannot see around or through the wall.

They were blindfolded when their hats were placed on their heads, so they do not know what color hat they are wearing. They do know, however, that there are four men altogether and that two of them are wearing a white hat and two a black one.

In order to for all of them to avoid being shot, one of them must call out to the executioner the color of THEIR hat. If they get it wrong, they will all be shot. They are not allowed to talk to each other, nor is there any other form of communiciation. They have 5 minutes to figure it out.

After two minutes of silence, one of them calls out his own hat color with certainty. Which one of the four calls out his color, and how can he be certain?

As I mentioned above, this is not a "trick" riddle. They cannot move. They are buried in a straight line. A & B can only see their respective views of the wall, C can see B, and D can see B & C.

In case it crosses your mind, I'll say it again: This is not a trick riddle. The wall does not have a hole in it, it's not made of glass or another transparent or translucent material, and it's not a mirrored wall.

Think hard. If you can't figure it out right now, keep it in the back of your mind and work on it over the course of a day. Bookmark this page to come back and verify the answer once you figure it out or once you give up.

To see the answer, head over to TravelFurther's Firing Squad Riddle solution page.

Happy Independence Day . . . and along with it, of course, came the 2006 Nathan's Famous Fourth of July Hot Dog Eating Championship, where twenty or so contestants see who can eat the most hot dogs and buns (known as HDBs in the competitive eating community) in a mere 12 minutes.

There was speculation that America might win the title back from Japanese speed-eater Takeru "Tsunami" Kobayashi. Even such a speculation was big news in the speed-eating world, considering Kobayashi's previous five victories. From 2001 through 2005, Kobayashi won by 19, 24.5, 20, 15.5, and then 12 hot dogs and buns. This May, however, Joey "Jaws" Chestnut beat the American record by eating 50 HDBs in 12 minutes. Granted, this didn't beat Kobayashi's record, but it did beat his 2005 Nathan's contest performance of 49 HDBs. Point is, the Americans have caught up.

Nonetheless, Kobayashi proved that he is still the champion, even under pressure. Not only did he win, but he broke his previous record by ¼ of a HDB. Still, Kobayashi's lead was not so comfortable this year. He won by a mere 1¾: Kobayashi's 53¾ HDBs to Chestnut's 52 HDBs.

Chestnut now easily holds the American record, however. He stole the record from Sonya "Black Widow" Thomas, who still holds the female record at 37. (She tied her 2005 performance this year.)

I'd remind you not to invite any of the competitive eaters over to your house for your 4th of July hot dog cookout, but I'm sure they've already got plans anyway.