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Culturally Speaking #5

By Sarah Stodola

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So the U.S. Treasury spent roughly $33 million on its marketing campaign for the new $20 bills. They said this was necessary for two reasons: One, so that people would realize that these new bills were not counterfeit money, and two, so people would understand how to recognize the new not-just-greenbacks. It seems to me that posting simple signs at the banks and/or ATM machines would have done the trick. It's not like people are going to stop using $20 bills if there is no ad campaign to promote them.

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My friend Tim told me that you could fit the entire human population of the world into a cubic mile. I didn't believe him, so he sent me this:

"The average man is 69 inches tall, 17 inches across and 5 wide. That works out that the average volume of a man is 5865 inches.
There are 63360 inches in a mile (5280 ft x 12). Cube it and you get 254,358,061,100,000. Divide that by 5865 and you get 43,368,808,360...that is the number of 5865 people could fit in the cube.
Our population can even bring a spouse and still fit in."

So I guess it's true, but it still just doesn't seem possible. Anyway Tim was a turtle named The Gooch for Halloween once, so what does he know.

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This week I learned that if I ever again decide to donate a modest amount of money to a political campaign, I will probably just send the money in and skip the actual fundraiser. They just aren't really that great of parties, is all. And also $50 buys you absolutely no respect at these things.

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We here at Me Three were contemplating running a piece on how Halloween might be different for children in New York City than it is for suburban children. So in our preliminary research that ultimately led nowhere, Mark Grueter asked our friend who grew up in Queens what Halloween was like for him as a child, and this is what he said:

"It's pretty simple - you got a shitload of eggs, shaving cream, spray paint, and battery socks and went out until you got in trouble. I got beaten up so badly one year that I had to miss school the next day."

Mark said that didn't sound so different from his New Hampshire Halloweens, except for the violence part.

I, on the other hand, was a good kid.

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This week I also learned that Madison Square Garden looks completely different when they are playing basketball there than it does when they are playing rock music.

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This is interesting; a non-partisan organization dedicated to correcting the media's misinterpretation/misunderstanding of science and statistics.

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Click here to read the transcript of a girl's imaginary friendship with the Strokes.  It's hilarious (scroll down to Thursday on the page).

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Click here for last week's Culturally Speaking.

Sarah Stodola is the Managing Editor of Me Three.  She can be contacted at [email protected].

© 2003 Me Three