Number 1 among the plethora of lists

10 World Leaders Who Wear Footie Pajamas

8 Famous Parrots

A Dozen Celebrities Who Hiccup

The 10 Worst Area Rugs

Oh, my gosh. Hand over those lists and let’s discover who wears Dr. Dentons and whether Paris and Britney have secret bilious moments. Maybe Drudge knows. Or Guinness.

What? Those are fake lists? Say it isn’t so.

Alas, we confess, they are indeed fake compilations produced solely for amusement purposes. No parrots or area rugs were harmed in the process. But they could be real. There is a list for the top 10, top 20 and top 100 of anything and seemingly everything on the planet. Mankind revels in the best of, worst of, greatest, coolest, hottest, sexiest, tiniest, smelliest or scariest.

Want to put together an insider’s rating for refrigerator magnets? It’s been done. Hope to assemble the all-time most intriguing items that ever appeared on a grocery list? That’s been done, too. In fact, it’s a 240-page book.

“Milk Eggs Vodka,” by Bill Keaggy will be published by HOW Books in a few months, based around the author’s collection of grocery lists he found abandoned in carts, blowing around in the Safeway parking lot or flapping feebly in the gutter. The enterprising Mr. Keaggy has assembled and organized 1,300 of these lists to reveal that a surprising percentage of Americans do not know how to spell mayonnaise, banana, anchovy and yogurt.

His Web site (www.grocery lists.org) displays hundreds of the long-lost lists, and Mr. Keaggy says he is always looking for more.

But back to everybody else’s bright ideas.

The U.S. Hurricane Research Center has just assembled the top 10 worst places to live should one not enjoy storm surges and lawn furniture circling the house at 125 mph. The Minerals, Metals and Materials Society is looking for nominations for its list of the “world’s greatest moments in materials and engineering history,” to be unveiled with considerable ceremony at Walt Disney World next year.

Not to be outdone, the Social Security Administration compiles the top 10 baby names for both sexes every year — Emily and Jacob are in the lead. Mitsubishi Motors named the top 10 strangest street names: Psycho Path in Traverse City, Mich., and Divorce Court in Heather Highlands, Pa., were first and second. The American Pie Council named the top five holiday pies: pumpkin, apple, cherry and lemon meringue, with pecan, chocolate cream and mincemeat tied for fifth.

There also are strangely disquieting lists, such as “100 Things to See Before You Die,” a 1999 book by Neil Teplica, who suggests that one participate in the World Cow Chip Throwing Championship in Beaver, Okla., and the Pushkar Camel Fairin India, along with 98 other activities.

But that is just the tip of the phenomenon.

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