Monday, July 23, 2012

quicko: how many nifty united states?

Australians have virtually as much trouble remembering how many American states there are as they do remembering when Halloween is.  Both times they guess perilously close (October 30?  No, wait, November 1 ... er, maybe the 29th?  Okay, okay, I give up!), but with no cigars.

Obviously, then, the prime guesses for American states are somewhere in the high 40s or low 50s ... ranging generally from about 47 to 52, encompassing any number but 50.

How do they think the song goes?  Fifty-one nifty United States?  It really doesn't have the same ring.

4 comments:

Georgina said...

There's a song??

Laetitia :-) said...

Erm, expecting us to know the song to which you refer is probably akin to our expecting Joe Blow, US citizen, to know the words to "Waltzing Mathilda".

Mom said...

Actually, Captain Kangaroo, a children's TV host back in the 60's, taught American children "Waltzing Mathilda" (except we don't spell it with an h). Consequently, as those children became parents, it is likely that some of them also passed along that song to their children.
The "50 Nifty United States" is a more recent song, so those same parents may not know it exactly, but might have listened to their kids perform it in their 5th grade concert once.

Anonymous said...

Really? I would have thought most would have guessed 50, as its such a round number; unless they have a flag at home pre-Alaska or Hawaii joining the union, or perhaps they are counting Porto Rico, Guam or American Samoa as states??