Old wives’ tales

Some gems from my Dad, for whom the internet’s sole purpose is facilitating the spread of spam emails:

A snake will not slither over a rope.

Cold water boils faster than hot water.

The only solution for a squealing belt is adding belt dressing.

EVERY new set of tires he’s EVER purchased that are not Michelins has had a “slipped belt.”

Knurled. said:

In reply to Hungary Bill :

Doing some refresher reading, I was wrong.  The methanol and the formaldehyde can be dealt with in small quantities by your body, since they both can evaporate and be passed out of your lungs.  (SMALL quantities, like the microgram levels of methanol that naturally occur in fruits and veggies)  When the formaldehyde is broken down into formic acid, though, is when you really run into trouble.

 

Also, that chemical I was talking about?  When it works, it also has the effect of making you extremely sensitive to alcohol, like as much as cats and other non fruit eating animals, and for the same reason.  Half a glass of beer would make you violently ill.

aw man.  Now what am I going to do with this blank prescription and all this cheap beer? 

On the formaldehyde:  I was drinking "Tiger beer" when I was in Singapore and everyone told me it had formaldehyde in it...  Google tells me that was a wives tale.

Hungary Bill said On the formaldehyde:  I was drinking "Tiger beer" when I was in Singapore and everyone told me it had formaldehyde in it...  Google tells me that was a wives tale.

I read that as "Tiger Bear" and was wondering WTF Tiger wasn't enough that they had to add bear to it.

Old Wive's Tale: Fish don't bite during the day. I've caught my largest fish when the sun was beating down on the lake. 

Formaldehyde... toward the end of his life, Bela Lugosi could not get drunk off of alcohol, no matter how much he drank. So he drank formaldehyde instead. Note to self, don't get that far gone. 

Weather and fishing as told to me by my grandfather Braden.

When the wind is from the north no need to venture forth

When the wind is from the East the fish bite the least

When the wind is from the south the bait balls in their mouth

When the wind is from the West the fish bite the best

I'm not certain but it does seem to have a bit of truth when fishing between 40 and 45 degrees of north latitude

aircooled said:

wvumtnbkr said:

Not an old wives tail, but an interesting tidbit.

 

A bullet shot out of a level rifle will hit the ground the same time as a bullet that is dropped from the same height. 

 

Wives tail....   steel  rims are stronger than aluminum rims.

(The gun is of course assumed to be perfectly aligned tangentially to the center of mass of the planet, we will have to assume a perfectly flat planet also)

That’s actually not entirely correct.  Both are affected by gravity the same way, so they “fall” at the exact same rate, but since the bullet (depending on gun and it elevation above the ground) travels a distance, the curvature of the earth will make it have to fall farther.

Also, if the bullet somehow achieves orbital or escape velocity (virtually impossible near the surface on earth, but on the moon, MUCH easier) it will never touch the ground.

What if we tried more power?

In reply to poopshovel again :

Oh yes, belt dressing. Let's add grease to a belt and hope it stops slipping...