Back Up Underpants / No Pets Allowed

Before I get to my main topic today, I briefly wanted to touch upon the Back-Up Underpants idea I wrote about the other day. Today there was a fire drill. I don't think I've had a fire drill since my internship here at HBO, but nonetheless there was a fire drill. Had this been a real fire, depending on the extent of the fire, I'm sure that the 13th floor wouldn't make it out alive. Regardless, even if I did live through the fire, I would've still been incapacitated. I have yet to put a back-up underpants in my bag. Maybe someone knew. How often is there a fire drill? What are the chances it would happen a few days after coming up with the back-up underwear idea? I'm guessing roughly 365:1. Incredible odds! But I'm happy the drill did happen. Even if I'm not at HBO ever again, tonight I will place extra underpants in my bag so I will always be prepared. I hope you do the same.

Alright onto the main topic:

No Pets Allowed Signs

This morning I saw a "No Pets Allowed" sign, which I've seen hundreds of times as I'm sure you have as well. But something happened this morning that made me think of the history of the sign, which I'm sure none of you know. I am lucky enough to have heard the tale and will share it with you now.

When you here "No Pets Allowed" you usually think of a dog, possibly a cat. These are the pets that people carry around with them. But some people have exotic animals as pets, like a cougar or a bear. But these people are jackasses and should die (which they usually do at the hands of their 'pets'). Is that why No Pets Signs started? Maybe it was do to people's allergies? No. It started years and years ago. Back when pets were more than just cats and dogs and bears. Back when your pet was your life...

In the early 1800's, the west was only beginning to be explored. Most of the land a mystery filled with savages and oddly wonders. People wanted not only to explore, but to find a new life for their families. People wanted not only to find a new life, but also get really drunk at bars. So that's what they did. Cowboys would ride their horses to the bar, go in the bar, and drink until the sun came up. The only problem was...they never got off their horse. There weren't any "No Pets Allowed" signs, so cowboys would just ride into the bar and stay on their horses for the stay. They would drink on their horses, get into bar fights on their horses, even drunkenly fondle young ladies on their horses. This seems odd, but that's the way it had always been done, so no one really thought anything of it. The problem was that with all these people on the horses, only 7 or 8 people could fit into a bar. And if youi were unlucky enough to have a horse and entered one of these bars, well you would most likely get trampled to death.

Anyway, one bar owner had enough. "These horses are taking up too much space," he might've proclaimed. So what did he do. He imposed a 2 drink minimum for any horse in his bar. This only created more problems. First, the horses didn't understand the concept of a drink minimum. They are horses and don't understand simple economics. Also, most horses work for food, not money. So they didn't have any money to buy the beer. A few cases have shown that horses bartered some of their food for a beer, but horse food isn't worth much and the owner just stopped trading all together. So after the drink minimum plan failed, the owner was out of ideas. Except for one. The lightbulb went off and he knew what he had to do. He found a rope and hung himself in his bar. He was dead. What else could he do? He was out of money, he wasn't a good bar owner and he also suffered from depression.

So now that he was dead, his son, Buck McSign Jr., took over the bar. Now Buck was only a child of 8, but he knew his shit. He learned from his father how to run a business and also, how to hate horses. He blamed his father's suicide on horses. He hated them with all his passion, He spent his childhood protesting horses and starting Anti-Horse Organizations. But his words fell upon deaf ears. Most people at the time had a horse, so why would they hate them. Even those without horses still thought they were pretty. So Buck decided to use his hatred to drive a successful business. (Which is really the only way to run a successful business) One night Buck went into his playroom, opened up his box of Crayola crayons and wrote down three words.

"No Horses Allowed"

Not only was this the first "No Pets Allowed" Sign. It Was The FIRST SIGN EVER!!! Words on paper, posted in a visible area seems like a simple idea, but this was the first time in history anyone ever did it. Up until this point you just had to know what was where. But now they had signs.

At first it was called a "McSign" after Buck McSign. The people came to the bar that morning and read the McSign. The didn't know what to do. They wanted to drink, but how could they drink not on their horse. So they tried it. They tied up their horses outside and walked into the bar. And it WORKED!!! The people still got drunk. They enjoyed it more as well. They could fight easier, without the fear of falling of their horse. Drinking was easier, as the horse walking usually spilt half their drinks. And fondling girls was no longer an art form. You could just grab any girl that walked by. Life was grand.

The "McSign" was later shortened to "Mc," which soon took on a new meaning. When the Irish came to America in the late 1800's, they carried over thousands of signs with them. So people called them "Mcs" or "Mics" After that it was hard to differentiate whether someone was talking about an Irish man or a McSign, so people just started calling McSigns "Signs."


And that's how the M. Night Shyamalan movie, starring Mel Gibson, got its name.


So next time you see a no pets sign, stop and think for a second cause there's a lot of history behind that.

Next week I'll tell you the history of "No Coloreds Allowed" signs.