FACT: In 1969, El Salvador and Honduras went to war against each other after a hotly contested soccer match between the two countries.
OPINION: Any sport where you can't use your hands to touch the ball is bound to end with someone getting killed.

FACT: A man in Sweden in 1910 got an advance payment from a research institute for the right to use his body for medical research after he died. The next year, the institute sued him because he lost two teeth decreasing the value of his body.
OPINION: I recommend having your body appraised by a pimp every couple of years to make sure you know its street value in case you want to rent it out for "research."

FACT: When Albert Einstein was a teenager he was rejected by a college because he "showed no promise."
OPINION: Any idiot can get a Nobel Prize, but only the best and brightest are accepted by Compu-College.

FACT: In 1906, a noted astronomer announced the discovery of canals on Mars, but he was actually suffering from a rare eye disease in which the victim sees the veins of his own eyes.
OPINION: I once thought I saw canals on Mars too, but it turned out to be Ottawa.

FACT: When bicycling became a national obsession in the 1890's, hat makers pushed for a law requiring bicyclists to buy two new hats every year because of the lack of business from cyclists who stopped wearing hats.
OPINION: There's not nearly enough arbitrary hat laws in our judicial system. I'd feel a lot safer/stylish in a society that forced me to buy a couple of caps.

FACT: When the waltz was first introduced as a dance style in the early 1800's in England, it was considered indecent and lewd because the dancers touched each other.
OPINION: The waltz is a slutty, slutty dance.

FACT: In 1900, a pair of shoes only cost $1.25, but the average wage was only 22 cents an hour.
OPINION: Air Jordans may cost a small fortune, but at least Nike is consistent in paying their workers the same wages as the1900's.

FACT: On the first air mail service flight in 1926, the pilot forgot to fill the tank.
OPINION: They probably should have taught mailmen how to fly before giving them airplanes.

FACT: When air mail service began between New York and Chicago, it cut delivery time in half, but 31 out of the original 40 pilots on this run died in crashes.
OPINION: Most mailmen fear being chased by dogs while on duty, but that's nothing compared to being chased by a flock of birds thousands of miles above ground.

FACT: In a single day at the turn of the last century, the horses in New York City produced 60,000 gallons of urine and 2.5 million pounds of road apples.
OPINION: That's not much waste when you consider the amount of road apples left by rickshaws in China.

FACT: One radio station banned an ad for toothpaste in the 1920's because the subject was thought to be too racy.
OPINION: Radio stations back then were really sensitive about offending audiences with racy commercials during broadcasts of "The Amos and Andy Show."

FACT: In 1930, the first stewardesses were allowed to slap passengers if they got out of control.
OPINION: According to The Editor, stewardesses are still allowed to slap you if you call them waitresses.

FACT: After World War II, New York City held one of the largest ticker tape parades in history producing 5438 tons of discarded paper.
OPINION: It must have been reassuring to soldiers returning home to celebrate killing the Germans by wasting a shitload of paper.

FACT: Stress reportedly created by people dancing the Charleston caused the roof of a dance hall to collapse in Boston, killing 44 people.
OPINION: That would probably be a tragedy if it didn't involve people that like swing dancing.

FACT: Chubby Checker's dance craze, the Twist, was banned in the USSR because it represented "bourgeois decadence."
OPINION: If Chubby Checker represents bourgeois decadence, then what does Regis Philbman represent?

FACT: Most consumers had no idea how to use frozen foods in the 1940's, so a Frostmobile was used to visit neighborhoods and demonstrate how to thaw and cook frozen food products.
OPINION: I wouldn't mind driving a Frostmobile, if I did not have to deal with idiots who can't thaw or cook frozen food.

FACT: In the first postwar housing development, Levittown, New York, homes sold for $6990 in 1947. The same houses now sell for more than $200000.
OPINION: I'd pay $200000 not to live in a housing development. They're full of too many honkies with dogs.

FACT: The first half-hour situation comedy on television was "The Goldbergs," which debuted in 1949. A year later, the first canned laughter was added to a sitcom, "The Hank McCune Show."
OPINION: "The Hank McCune Show" was kind of like "Everybody Loves Raymond" with more racial slurs.

FACT: In 1968, the estate of a rich woman was left to her 150 dogs. After 5 years of legal battles waged by her family, 77 of the dogs died, leaving $9 million to be divided up among the remaining canines.
OPINION: Would millionaire dogs hire humans to be their butlers, or would they save money by hiring Chihuahuas?

FACT: Cats can live to be more than 25 years old, and neutered cats can live up to two years longer.
OPINION: The key to living a longer is to eat healthy, don't smoke, and have your balls surgically removed.

FACT: Passenger pigeons were once so plentiful that flocks contained hundreds of millions, even billions of birds. The last passenger pigeon died in a zoo in 1914.
OPINION: Sometimes a species of bird must be sacrificed in order to feed families of machine gun toting southerners.

FACT: In the Middle Ages, bloodletting was widely used as a preventative for all diseases.
OPINION: Bleeding to death is a surefire method to avoid getting a disease.

Stephan MacLeod lives in Charlottetown, P.E.I. He is a musician, a scholar and an award winning dancer. You can also find him here.