Did you hear about the latest sighting of rocker David Lee Roth in Brantford? He was being chased by a cougar. The jokes just keep coming after a man who claimed to be the Van Halen frontman in visits to local bars was exposed last week as an impostor.
Now folks are saying they knew all along -- or, at least, were suspicious -- that the guy in the fancy clothes wasn't the genuine article. They just didn't speak up.
Media around the world carried a story that Roth, while recently staying with a friend in the Oakland area, was stopped for speeding by two OPP officers.
The officers quickly realized the man was having an allergic reaction to peanuts. They called paramedics and got him to hospital.
The story took on a life of its own. By the time it got to the Australian entertainment website, undercover.com.au, Roth had police to thank for saving his life "while driving on a freeway . . . on Oakland, near Ontario, Canada."
But the gap-toothed guy with the California driver's licence for David Lee Roth was not the rock star famous for his renditions of Just a Gigolo and California Girls.
The real Roth was performing in New York City the night he was supposed to be on the freeway in Oakland. And he's not allergic to peanuts.
Last week The Expositor published a photo of the fake Roth. Anyone familiar with the real Roth would have spotted the impostor.
The thing is, as much as we like to think we live in a skeptical world, we're still pretty gullible, or to put it in a more positive way, we tend to believe people are who they say they are unless proven otherwise.
The police officers didn't know David Lee Roth. Someone at the police station recognized the name days later. The story was picked up by a TV station and area newspapers.
It didn't take long for the media to get to the truth, especially after the real Roth issued a statement that had not been in Canada at the time, hadn't been stopped by police and isn't allergic to peanuts.
How about the folks who met the false David Lee Roth at local night spots and at a Cambridge hair salon? We don't blame them for accepting him as the real deal.
Celebrities are the world's royalty. To meet a rock star is a thrill, even if we're not sure what they're supposed to look like.
Guys like the unreal Roth trade on our credulity. Apparently, he's been suckering folks around North America for years.
So, no more about David Lee Roth. However, we haven't given up on the cougar. Although there have been no sightings lately, we haven't ruled out that the animals are roaming Southern Ontario, maybe even speeding on the Oakland freeway.
