Here’s one for you:
A 59-year-old woman in France is suing a company that she says kept her employed full-time and at full salary for 20 years—but never assigned her any work.
Sounds like a dream to you? Not to her. She described it as “psychological torture.”
Let's get on with the countdown.
Along with today's Mindbender you get these bonus stories:
We love our spuds
Lying about your age
The best high school movies ever
But first, today's Mindbender:
Nine percent of people have hit themselves in the eye with (blank).
I'll have a clue coming up.
We love our spuds
Today we honor perhaps the most popular of the vegetables. It’s National Potato Day.
A poll asked people to name their favorite homemade potato dishes. That pretty much ruled out French fries, since most people go out to get those.
At the top of the list? Mashed potatoes, of course, followed by potato salad and baked potatoes.
They also looked at the scores regionally, and it’s clear that different parts of the country have their potato comfort foods. In the Rocky Mountain region, for example, mashed and baked were tops. But in the South, they’re big on potato soup.
If you just can’t get enough spud news, there’s an entire website devoted to it, called “Potato News Today.”
Lying about your age
One of the biggest turnoffs in the dating world is when someone lies to you about their age.
And yet nearly four in ten people admit they’ve done that. A whopping 12% go so far as to actually knock more than five years off their actual age.
If you break it down, men are twice as likely as women to do this. But if you’re considering it, be careful—62% of people say it’s a total dealbreaker if someone lies about that.
What about that profile picture you’re using online? More than 40% say they’ve used old photos of themselves, and one in five have used—or are using—a pic that’s more than ten years old.
Hey, the truth will come out eventually. Might as well own your age now.
Here's a clue for the Mindbender:
I wonder how many did this while trying to hit one of their coworkers with it. It does take a bit of skill.
The best high school movies ever
I always liked the movie “The Breakfast Club,” although its ultimate message always bothered me:
If you’re the slacker dude who mocks education, you’ll be the funniest person in the room AND you’ll get girl in the end. If you’re the brainy kid who tries hard in school, you’ll end up wanting to kill yourself.
Really? That’s the message we want to share with kids?
Regardless, “Entertainment Weekly” put that movie at the top of their list of the 50 Best High School Movies of All Time.
Number two was “Fast Times at Ridgemont High” and then “Dazed and Confused.” All right, all right, all right!
The list has some newer stuff and some much older stuff—like “Rebel Without a Cause”—and you can see their picks here.
And now, the answer to today's Mindbender:
What have they hit themselves in the eye with?
A rubber band.
I think it was cartoonist Gary Larson who showed that it took only a few minutes after the rubber band was invented for someone to shoot it at a coworker.
Hey, did you know Premium/Paid members to The Mindbender Club get an actual audio version to listen to each day?
Upgrade now and you can listen as you commute home!
To see what it’s like, check out today’s example right here:
That'll do it for today's Mindbender. Thank you for being part of The Club.
Enjoy your day!
Dom
We're all pretty bizarre. Some of us are just better at hiding it, that's all.
Originally written for young adults—but adults seem to like it just as much.
When the Galahad series first roared to life, Dom immediately won the International Grand Prize from Writer’s Digest, and then the EVVY Award for Best Young Adult Book.
As Booklist said: “Few YA SF series in recent memory have been this satisfying.”
Yes, it’s under the pen name Tyber North—but that’s Dom.
Grab the print or ebook version of the first book We know you’ll then want the rest of the six-book series, which you can find right here.
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