Interesting Facts and Baseless Claims About July 2011 - - False Money Bags Story Related to Chinese Feng Shui

Beware! Its a Cyber Worl - - Summary:

Widely circulating email message states that July 2011 has 5 Fridays, 5 Saturdays and 5 Sundays and that this combination of days only happens once in 823 years.

It's just a hoax even though it is completely right that July 2011 has 5 Fridays, 5 Saturdays and 5 Sundays. But, such a combination happens far more often than every 823 years. The last occurrence was in July 2005 while the next occurrence will take place in July 2016. The message is just a reshaped version of very similar- and equally erroneous - messages about August and October 2010. 

Let's check out the contents of the message:

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Subject: July 2011: INTERESTING!

This year, July has 5 Fridays, 5 Saturdays and 5 Sundays. This happens once every 823 years. This is called money bags. So, forward this to your friends and money will arrive within 4 days. Based on Chinese Feng Shui the one who does not forward ..... will be without money. I'm not taking any chances!

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Beware! Its a Cyber World - - Explanation:

This silly piece of nonsense circulates via email and social networking websites and is now in its third incarnation. The message imparts the "interesting" fact that July 2011 will have 5 Fridays, 5 Saturdays and 5 Sundays. It claims that such a combination of days only occurs once every 823 years. It also claims that those who forward the message to their friends will receive money within four days.

It is perfectly true that July 2011 will have 5 Fridays, 5 Saturdays and 5 Sundays. However, the claim that such an occurrence for July only happens once every 823 years is nonsense. In fact such combination occur in the month of July every few years. As the following calendar shows, the next time a July has 5 Fridays, 5 Saturdays and 5 Sundays will be in the year 2016:

And the same combination of days occurred in July 2005:

And, in any case, there is nothing even remotely unusual about months that have such "interesting" combination of days. In fact, any month that has 31 days will have three consecutive days that occur five times in the month. Such combination are commonplace and occur each and every year.

The message is a revamped version of similar - and equally nonsensical - chain letters about August 2010 and October 2010.