Dedication to something, anything is a trait that should be admired, but then you have people who are so dedicated that it borders on the insane, people who’s dedication is more like an obsession with being awesome at something, people like.
10. The girl who lengthened her tongue to speak Korean.
Learning a new language is tough and anyone who manages to do it is someone you should congratulate, if only because them liking you decreases the likelihood of you being donkey punched by a foreigner for accidentally calling their mother a cow.
Rhiannon Brooksbank–Jones, while learning Korean, found that her tongue was just too short to properly enunciate some Korean words correctly. Note that she was perfectly fluent in speaking and understanding Korean to a very high level, she just had a weird way of pronouncing certain words.
When it dawned on her that her accent could affect her being able to talk like a native Korean, she did the only logical thing, she got elective surgery to have her tongue lengthened, which yes, is a real thing doctors apparently do. Meaning that Rhiannon can now talk with a native Korean accent just like a real Korean person. Because when you’re a white female teenager, the first thing that would tip off a Korean that you were foreign is how you pronounced words.
9. The guy who hides in a bush every day.
David Johnson is a homeless man who earns a reported 60 thousand dollars a year: how, you ask? Well Johnson hides behind a bush and jumps out to scare people. Every. Single. Day. His dedication to this endeavour has made him a local legend in San Fransisco.
Johnson has done his act so much that people will actually stand to watch him do it. In fact he does it so much that he had to hire a bodyguard. Just let the soak in: there’s a man out there who earns more than most families do in a year by hiding behind a bush and then leaping out and scaring people. And people stand and watch him do this, then give him money. That man is the literal embodiment of the American dream, because what’s more American than scaring people into giving you stuff you want. Nothing, that’s what!
8. The man who was in the news, all the time.
Greg Packer is the quintessential “man on the street”, no really. Packer, for a reason known only to him, has spent decades being quoted by hundreds of news sources, seemingly, just because he can. The New York Times, Fox News, CNN, you name a news source, Packer has been in it and given a quote about something.
He’s also dedicated to being the first in line for buying things, which increases his chances of being interviewed, to the point some simply call him “the stupid guy who’s first in line for everything”. Because he really, really is. He was first in line to get an iPhone and would have been the first in line for an iPad, but he was kicked out of the queue for not having a reservation. Which despite what precedes, is probably the stupidest part of this article.
7. The man who perfected Pac-Man
Billy Mitchell is well known in the video game world for being the first guy to perfect Pac-Man. Doing so required Billy to play the game for 6 hours straight, which doesn’t even start to take into account the hundreds of hours spent practising.
Along with the perfect Pac-Man score Mitchell’s also held ridiculously high scores on 4 other classic arcade games. All of which, again, took hundreds of hours worth of practise to achieve. So the next time your parents say nothing will ever come of playing video games for hours on end, tell them they’re right, but something will come of playing them for hundreds of hours on end. Then point them to Billy Mitchell’s Wikipedia page.
6. The guy who went to every sports game ever, in a rainbow wig.
Have you ever wondered why people hold up John 3:16 signs at sports games? Well if you haven’t you should probably skip this entry or go watch television or something. If you’ve read this far, we’ve already got our ad revenue.
The reason is all due to Rollen Stewart, who made it his mission in life to spread the word of God, so he grabbed a sign board, a marker and a giant rainbow afro wig and started going to every sports event he could. Stewart became so infamous for this that Sportscasters actively tried to remove him from any shot he was in, which proved difficult because Stewart was always in shot. Mainly because he spent every penny he had to make sure he had the best seats.
It wasn’t all fun and games for Rollen though because in 1992, out of nowhere, he went crazy and took three people hostage. Wow, maybe the guy who spent all his life savings on wearing a rainbow coloured wig wasn’t that mentally stable after all. Still, the guy was pretty dedicated. Since then he rejected a 12 year sentence for life, just so he could spread his message in court. Balls Rollen, you have them.
5. The guy who built a sports car, while blind.
Pete Golsby thought his life was over when a doctor sat down in front of him and gave him a letter written in size 22 font that said he was going blind. Pete sat and realised that he’d never get to do any of the things he’d dreamed of when he was younger. A few seconds after that he realised that blind guys kind of don’t have to work and that he suddenly had a lot of free time.
So he decided, screw it, “I’m going to build a car, even though I don’t have eyes that work” because being blind doesn’t mean you can’t build a car, it just means you can’t drive it, which again, didn’t stop Pete from jumping behind the wheel for this photo. Pete explained that he built the car so his wife could drive him around when the weather is nice.
Although I can’t help but feel that most people wouldn’t be overly pleased about having to drive around a tiny sports car built by a guy who can’t see, then again, I guess she could just put a fan in front of it and tell him she’s driving or something.
4. The guy who lived in an office for 2 months, even though he didn’t work there.
Eric Simons was a young entrepreneur who wanted to get his own tech start-up company off of the ground, but how is a young guy with no equipment and a steel set of balls supposed to do that.
The answer is obviously move into AOL’s headquarters and just live and work there until you’re thrown out by security. Wait, is that not the right answer? Because it’s what Eric did. If you’re imagining him sneaking around at night, stealing food, sleeping on sofas and what not, you’re not far off, because that’s exactly what Eric did. He even managed to use AOL’s shower and gym facilities. Eric, if you’re reading this, if you want to blend in with a tech company, don’t use the gym and showers dude. The clean, in shape guy kind of sticks out in an office full of computer programmers.
3. The guards who never leave their post, ever.
The guards at the Tomb of the Unknowns have never once left their post since 1937. Nothing in American history has ever caused them to abandon their duty. When hurricane Irene reared its ugly head, the tomb guards flipped it the bird and did their shift anyway.
In addition to this, every guard spends 6 hours preparing their uniform for their next shift and has the location and occupant of 300 graves in Arlington memorised. Being a guard for the tomb is such an honour and so rare of an occasion that the official guard badge is one of the rarest awarded, behind only the astronaut badge. When the only way you can serve your country in a more badass way is to be strapped to a piece of metal and punch God square in the dome, dedication is kind of a job requirement.
2. The guy who stayed in character, in a coma.
Mel Blanc voiced the childhoods of millions, being the voice Bug Bunny meant that Blanc probably owned one of the most well known and valuable voices on the entire planet. He was also allergic to carrots; that’s not relevant, it’s just an interesting fact.
Blanc was famously dedicated to his roles, so much so that when he lapsed into a coma due to a car accident he stayed in character. To explain, Blanc was initially unresponsive to any stimulus, at a complete loss as to what, if anything could be done, a doctor in the room asked “Bugs, where are you?”, to which Blanc instinctively answered “What’s up doc?” in character.
There aren’t even words to describe that, because I was fairly certain up until I saw it written down that such a thing was completely impossible. That’ll teach me for disrespecting the rabbit.
1. The man who couldn’t give away his money fast enough.
Charles Feeney is a man with a simple dream. To give away all his money, which you’d think would be kind of easy, people in casinos do it all the time. But Feeney isn’t an average guy, he’s a multi billionaire dedicated to giving away every penny.
And he’s spent decades doing just that, anonymously. Feeney has given away billions and asked for nothing in return; he buys clothes off the rack, lives in a standard apartment and always flys coach. He really does just wants to give all his money away to charity and die poor and has spent the latter half of his golden years doing just that.
So the next time you watch the news and hear about a cartoonishly evil billionaire laying off a bunch of people, realise that not all of them are bad, and none of them can take it with them when they die, except for Feeney, who has earned billions in Karma dollars, the all purpose money you can only spend in the afterlife. Then again, I bet he’ll just give all that away too.
10 Comments
Awesome list, best one I’ve read in a while.
I think number 3 is the best.
I had the “honour” of getting the crap scared out of me by the bush man while I was visiting San Fran. He scared a couple after me and the girl shrieked for about 30 seconds. He told the guy “Bet you never made her scream like that!” I gave him 10 bucks just for that.
Muhammad Akber liked this on Facebook.
Interesting, but why wouldn’t someone enjoy driving a sports car, no matter who it was built by? And of course he would know it’s just a fan blowing. He’s blind, not stupid.
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Great list. However, Mel Blanc was not actually allergic to carrots. Just an urban legend.
http://www.snopes.com/movies/actors/melblanc.asp
For an honorable mention, how about Michael Larson. For those that don’t know who that is, he is the goofy guy that memorized the repeating board light patterns on the 1980’s game show Press Your Luck. He spent months memorizing the patterns and then went on the show and won over $100,000. That was dedication. That was the record for a single game on a game show up to that point. Needless to say the producers of Press Your Luck changed the patterns after that. Go figure!!
Really nice and funny list. So well written!!!
Fantastic list. One, two and three are awesome.