Survey Says ... !!!

If you hear the two words in the title, do you automatically think of "Family Feud?" Started in the seventies with Richard Dawson as the host, many other emcees have come and gone over the years. Yet the show endures.

In case you are unaware, here is the premise.

Two families, one dumber than the other, face off against each other, each attempting to name the most popular answers of surveys conducted among equally stupid people.

Witness a recent question: What is the largest state of the union?

Incredibly, Alaska was number two. Texas ranked first, followed by California in third place and New York in fourth.

The answers to the questions, as you can see, have no basis in fact or logic.

The five family members encourage each other by clapping rabidly after each answer, whether or not the answer makes any sense. "Good answer!" "Good answer!"

By the end of the show their palms should be swollen and bloody.

The first family to amass 300 points gets the opportunity to play for fast money. Two members of the team answer survey questions separately. If they tote up 200 points they win $20,000. That's $4,000 a piece for each of the family's players. Not huge prize money by game show standards.

Although the survey says some strange things, it does match some of the oddities that come out of the contestants' mouths.

When asked what a woman might throw out of her husband's, one elderly woman replied, "Dirty ashtrays."

She was the same woman who opined that someone might exit the house by a window to chase a dog.

One had the distinct impression that she was speaking from experience.