Tasty Tidbit

Walgreen's original drugstore was opened in Chicago in 1901 by Charles Walgreen. Until 1922 malted milk drinks were made by mixing milk,chocolate syrup and a spoonful of malt powder in a metal container,then serving it in a glass. On a hot summer day in 1922,Ivar "Pop" Coulson made the first malted milkshake. To the basic mixture he added two scoops of vanilla ice cream,creating an instant sensation. It was not unusual to see long lines outside of Walgreen's and customers standing three and four deep at the fountain. "Meet me at Walgreen's for a shake and a sandwich" became a common saying.
I am still free after the dental appointment yesterday,but don't want to say anymore about that until the next appointment has come and gone...I did find out it is not wise to say things in a joking manner to a serious person that is about to stick a needle in your mouth. Silly me,I should have thought of that beforehand!

Now You See It,Now You Don't

Ferdinandea is at present a submerged volcanic island about 26 nautical miles from Sicily. It has appeared and disappeared as an island four or five times when eruptions raise it above sea level,then erosion eventually submerges it again.
In 1831 when it emerged it nearly caused a war,a four way dispute. Britain was first to plant its flag,The King of Naples,Ferdinand II had Britain's flag replaced with their own,his men christened it Ferdinandea in his honor. Last on the scene was France naming it Ile Julia,for its July appearance. Next Spain declared its territorial ambitions. The island resolved the issue by crumbling in on itself and disappearing.
Other than the close call on a war over it,Ferdinandea brings to mind The Lost Continent of Atlantis,though its size never reached large proportions (213-229 feet) above sea level,and I imagine Atlantis would have been considerably larger.

What if?

I have often been told my imagination is a bit on the overactive side,and we also know I can be a bit paranoid,but those two things aside lets just think about what I am suggesting could in fact be a possibility.
In the last month I have broken two teeth,I made an appointment for the first one and had it looked at and was waiting for the next appointment to come up for it to be fixed when this morning (I was eating a bowl of soup,remember this part!) I broke yet another tooth. I called the dentist and they had an opening tomorrow and are going to take care of the first broken tooth and look at the second to decide what needs to be done. Most people at this point would probably chalk this whole tooth business up to getting older and wear and tear,all that happiness,but what if...What if over the years when the dentist did various work,lets call it maintenance,on my teeth that as way of planning to pay for his future expenses (maybe the wife will need a face lift,or the kid is going away to college) that he without my knowledge sets charges inside of my teeth that are set to go off around the times he will be needing extra money in the future,and there you have yet another explanation for how I have two broken teeth in less than a month's time! Maybe I am in denial,or maybe this is what is really going on. I think I will mention it to the dentist tomorrow,so if you don't see any further blogs from me,you will know what happened... or at least you will wonder if I was right!

In the Beginning...

A question on Millionaire last week asked, "what the original lyrics to The Beatles song "Yesterday" were." I hadn't a clue,but the answer was "Scrambled Eggs".
 McCartney composed the entire melody in a dream but was then afraid he had subconsciously plagiarised someone else's work. For about a month he went around to people in the music business asking if they had ever heard it before. Once he was sure he hadn't robbed anyone of the melody he began writing lyrics to suit it. As Lennon and McCartney were known to do at the time,a substitute working lyric titled "Scrambled Eggs" was used. The opening verse was "Scrambled eggs/Oh,my baby how I love your legs" was used until something more suitable was written. According to Paul's girlfriend at the time (Jane Asher) the original lyrics were:
Scrambled eggs
Have an omelet with some muenster cheese.
Put your dishes in the wash bin please so I can clean the scrambled eggs.
Join me,do
There are lots of eggs for me and you
I've got ham and cheese and bacon too
so go get two and join me,do.
Fried or sunny-side
just aren't right. The mix-bowl begs.
Quick-go get a pan
and we'll scram-ble up some eggs,eggs,eggs,eggs.
Scrambled eggs
good for breakfast dinnertime or brunch
and we'll have lunch
on scrambled eggs.
"Yesterday" was released in the U.S. as a single before it was released in the U.K. as The Beatles didn't feel it fit their image.
I don't know about the rest of you,but from now on every time I hear "Yesterday" I will think "Scrambled Eggs".

Innocent...Right?

If you ever travel abroad you might want to check on local customs and meanings of gestures,it can be kind of tricky depending on where you are traveling to. The basic "thumbs up" gesture can mean more than approval depending on your location. In some Middle East countries thumbs up translates as an insult,the easiest translation is "Up yours,pal!" The sign also has negative connotation in parts of West Africa,South America,Iran and Sardinia. Eating with your left hand is also taboo in many Eastern countries. In Great Britain thumbs up has a few meanings,"OK good","brilliant" and is also used to say hello and goodbye. In Iran it is the equivalent to the middle finger in the Western world. In Brazil,the "OK" gesture is equivalent to the middle finger.
As far as gift giving is concerned you really need to research the particulars for where you visit, as not only the gift you give but even the way you hand it to the person has to be done in certain manners. In Russia even numbers of flowers are only given at funerals,if given otherwise it is considered inviting death. Giving a clock to a Chinese person is also suggesting death. For the most part you don't want to hand anyone anything with your left hand as it is thought unclean.

Seriously?

Oxymoron comes to mind,but that doesn't really do the phrase "medical misadventure" justice. Kind of makes it sound like you were having fun with it at some point and then oops! The definition of medical misadventure is:personal injury caused by a medical error or mishap...no need to mention that the "injury" may involve death.
If I didn't know what the term meant I would think someone was talking about being in the hospital and going into the bathroom in your open in the back hospital gown and when you were finished you accidentally took a wrong turn and ended up in the gift shop. Or maybe another scenario would be going to the cafeteria and ordering scrambled eggs without realizing that the carton they came in would taste better than the eggs themselves. I don't know, maybe the whole thing should just be filed under "to err is human" and left at that,but I would still like to meet the person that coined the phrase "medical misadventure"and ask them exactly what they were thinking when they came up with the phrase.

Caw,Caw

I have always been fascinated by crows,the neighbors once commented on how the crows would come and sit near me when I am outside and they wanted to know what I did to attract the birds. I told them I didn't do anything special,I just mainly talked to them. After watching one get into a closed garbage can yesterday I decided it was time to take a closer look at these clever birds.

The first thing that came to my attention was  crows can recognize individual people,they can pick a person out of a crowd,follow them and remember them for years,but people can't tell one crow from another. If you alienate a crow it will also harass you along with its family for a long time. Crows are also very aggressive,I have witnessed them chasing eagles. They seem quite brutal when they are feeding their young,in fact it looks and sounds like they are choking them,but to give them credit at the point I see them doing this you can't tell the young from the adults. They also not only use tools, they adapt items to use for different purposes,and teach each other what they have learned. Crows are also one of the few species that have not only adapted but thrived as the human population grows and takes over more of their natural habitat.

An Unsung Feline Hero

More news on how your tax dollars work! I had heard about some of these plots employed during the Cold War,the one most people have heard of is sending exploding cigars to Cuban leader Fidel Castro,but that is far from the craziest of the schemes. They also used psychics to attempt remote viewing of Russian military secrets. The most barbaric of these schemes was named Operation Acoustic Kitty. The CIA Science and Technology directorate documents revealed that some Cold War era cats were surgically altered to become bugging devices. The idea was the cats would be used to eavesdrop on Soviet conversations from park benches,windowsills and garbage cans,they figured the cats could just stroll up to sensitive conversations unnoticed. I have to interject here,what the hell were they thinking? They had obviously never spent much time around cats to think this was a workable plan. Cats have their own agendas,it's not that they aren't trainable so much as they aren't dependable to do what they are trained to do.
The project was funded and work began in 1961. They slit the cat open,put batteries in him,and his tail was to be used as an antenna. During tests they found he would walk off the job when he got hungry,so they put in another wire to override the hunger. The first field test was in Washington,D.C. they let the cat out of a van across the street from a Soviet compound. The cat strolled into the road and was struck by a taxi. Five years and over $15 million was instantly reduced to roadkill. The operation was abandoned in 1967.

A Girl Can Dream

One reader suggested after reading the "Dream On" blog a couple of days ago that she thought men didn't dream in color. I became curious about that and decided to check (my thought is men aren't as tuned into color as women,or possibly it has something to do with men being more prone to color blindness?).
I found several interesting things when looking for more information on dreaming. People usually have several dreams each night,each one lasting between 5-20 minutes. During an average lifetime that is around six years. As much as 95% of all dreams are forgotten shortly after waking,this is thought to be because the frontal lobes that play a key role in memory are inactive during REM sleep. 80% of all dreams are in color,though there are people who claim to dream only in black and white. Men dream more of aggression,women tend to have longer dreams with more characters. Men dream more about other men that they dream about women,while women dream about both sexes equally. A lucid dream is one in which you are aware that you are dreaming,and you can often direct or control the content of the dream. (I don't recall ever having one of these.) The most common emotion experienced in dreams is anxiety,and negative emotions are more common that positive ones. REM sleep,when dreams occur,is characterized by paralysis of voluntary muscles,which prevents you from acting out your dreams while you are asleep. Many dreams are universal,being chased,attacked,falling,school events,feeling unable to move,arriving late,flying,and being naked in public.
In a one of my recent dreams I dreamt I had hot pink hair and was so angry about it (I don't care for pink) that it woke me up,in another I dreamt the neighbors mail box had two red flags instead of one, the next morning I was fixated on their mail box until I finally made myself quit looking at it!

Traditionally Speaking

I recently read something that referred to an Italian wedding tradition of the groom carrying a piece of iron in his pocket. Today I got around to checking this tradition out plus a few others I stumbled into along the way.
Some modern wedding traditions that many modern couples adhere to are attributed to the Italians. The wearing of a veil can be traced to Italy (and other regions of Europe) to conceal the bride and ward off evil spirits. Folklore claims it is very lucky for the veil to be torn (though I didn't find a reason for this). It was also believed that diamonds were created out of the flames of love. A tradition from southern Italy has the bride and groom shatter a glass,the number of pieces symbolize the number of happy years they will have together. The piece of iron the groom carries is to ward off the evil eye or any other bad luck. The bride should carry a satin bag in which guests place envelopes of money. Candy covered almonds,also called confetti are tied in mesh bags and tossed at the couple instead of rice or birdseed. This was to ward off childlessness and symbolize the union of bitter and sweet. The number of confetti in each bag is very important,it should never be an even number as that is bad luck,5 and 7 are good luck numbers.

Dream On

Can you tell from the title I'm an Aerosmith fan? Okay enough fun and games,on with the real deal. I have always had vivid dreams and they are usually pretty strange. I guess because of this I was wondering how blind people dream,do they see in their dreams? And if not how do they dream? There is not a terrific amount of information on this subject,but there are several references to a blind film critic named Tommy Edison featuring a YouTube video where he answers the question,not terribly informative but as I said not a lot of info on this subject.
The following is what I managed to scrape together. People blind from birth do not see in their dreams instead it is much like in their waking hours where they rely on smell,sound,taste and touch, but mainly auditory. This is also true for people that go blind before the age of 5. If you go blind between 5-7 it could go either way and from 7 on there will be some images but they usually fade as the dreamer ages. The people that go blind later in life can experience visually intense dreams for years,but the longer they are without sight the less frequent these dreams become. Blind people have very little or no rapid eye movement (REM) during the deep sleep stage in which we have vivid dreams. That doesn't mean they aren't dreaming,just they their eyes aren't involved. 60% of blind people dream of transportation issues,as they are obstacles in their waking lives. Sighted people have dreams with sounds but rarely the other senses.
Another interesting thing I found was that people who grew up with black and white television sometimes dream in black and white. I have heard several people claim that they dream in black and white and I can barely believe it, being one that has dreams with many colors that usually stay with me when I wake up.

Phrase of the Day

Often a bridesmaid,never a bride was first used in a song titled "Why Am I Always a Bridesmaid" 1864-1952. The phrase was resurrected for an ad campaign for Listerine mouthwash in 1924. At the time there was worry about how to approach such a delicate subject. The most famous of their ads was the pathetic case of Edna,who was "often a bridesmaid,but never a bride". She was approaching the "tragic" 30th birthday unmarried because she suffered from halitosis-a disorder that "you,yourself,rarely know when you have it. And even your closest friends won't tell you". The ad campaign increased the company's revenue from $115,000 to more than 8 million. The ad itself if pretty laughable by today's standards.
Some interesting side notes on Listerine,most of you have probably heard that Dr. Joesph Lister is referred to as the father of modern antiseptics and performed the first ever antiseptic surgery. Listerine was developed as a disinfectant for surgical procedures,not as a mouthwash. It was also sold during its early years as a floor cleaner and a cure for gonorrhea...I don't even want to think about that potential use! The word halitosis is also credited to one of the sons of the founders,who took the Latin word for breath,halitus,and added the Greek ending osis which is used to describe a medical condition.
In answer to the question at the end of yesterday's blog,I had to do quite a lot of poking around to find which was the biggest living organism. As it turn out the fungus in Oregon is the biggest single living organism,though far smaller than the Great Barrier Reef. The Great Barrier Reef is the largest superorganism,meaning it is combined of many living creatures instead of a single living organism.

Fun Guys

Okay,that was just a little play on the word Fungi,but I couldn't resist. During my recent journey I picked up the in flight magazine and discovered that Hawaii has mushrooms,for some reason I had never considered mushrooms growing there. I have picked mushrooms locally and there are some tasty treats to be had if you can find them and don't mind getting wet (usually).
Since 1990 Don Hemmes and his partner Dennis Desjardin have identified over 400 species,60 of those are endemic to Hawaii. The amount of mushrooms there is not great but there are several that are unique,there is even one that glows (lamalama). There are also ones called stinkhorns that have a chemical compound called cadaverine that makes them smell like rotting flesh,others smell like pig manure or worse. The article also mentioned that the largest living organism in the world is a fungus that stretches over nearly a 4 mile radius under an Oregon forest and is about 2,400 years old. I have not confirmed that as fact yet,as I always thought the largest living organism was the Great Barrier Reef,I will try remember to post the results when I find out which is the largest is,but my money is still of the Great Barrier Reef!


Starfish Stinkhorn



Yellow Veiled Stinkhorn



Another Historical Glitch

I am beginning to wonder how many of the things I learned in school are actually facts,as time goes on the accuracy rate drops lower and lower.

Everyone knows that Rosa Parks is famous for not giving up her seat on a bus in Montgomery,Alabama on December 1,1955,but she was not the first black woman to do so. Nine months prior to Rosa,on March 2,1955 a 15 year old Claudette Colvin refused to surrender her seat. Montgomery's black leaders did not publicize Colvin's effort because she was a teenager and became pregnant while unmarried. The NAACP worried about using her to represent the movement due to social norms of the time.



A young Claudette



Colvin admires Rosa Parks and concedes that as a 42 year old adult she made a better symbol for the bus boycott than a youth of 15 would have. Parks was a Colvin family friend,and Claudette's mother always felt that Rosa was the mother of the civil rights movement,and nothing should be said to contradict that.

Claudette today

Focusing?

As some of you know I was away for the last week. While I was gone I had a rental car,a Ford Focus,I am never picky about what kind of car I have for a rental because first of all it isn't like I have to deal with anything I don't like about it for very long and secondly it is nice to see what the different auto makers offer.
The thing I found laughably literal about the Focus was the name of the model (Focus) was prominently displayed in the middle of the tachometer,which if taken literally and you were to focus your attention there, it would not be a good thing.
The next thing I observed is something  that I have noticed in the past and can't believe the airlines are still using the same safety spiel when many people have English as a second language and in an emergency would possibly be confused. The phrase I am talking about is "In the event of a water landing (read crash) remove the life vest from under your seat (they go on to explain how to inflate it after you exit the plane) the next part is where the confusion comes in...Removing a life vest from the aircraft is a federal offense!" So if you were to take this literally would you  touch the life vest for fear of committing a federal offense? or just say screw it I'll go ahead and take my chances on drowning? There are many ways they could alter the statement that would to lessen the chances of misinterpreting it but in all the years I have been flying it remains the same. Maybe they don't figure you have a prayer in the event of a water landing? Again I realize it is all in taking it literally but it seems odd that with all the other changes that they wouldn't attend to that little detail.

Mixed Bag

Today's blog is a mixture of several things that alone didn't have enough substance to make a post,but I found them interesting anyway.
First off an update on the bee situation,I keep thinking that some of the bees that I rescue from the porch are the same ones I have previously rescued,so I was wondering if I should call them repeat offenders,or the less nefarious returning customers?
Next up are a couple of words I ran across that I found interesting. Gambrinous-full of beer,thought to be derived from the mythical Flemish King credited with inventing beer. Vituperation-To rail against abusively;revile;berate.
Lizzie Andrew Borden didn't kill her mother because her mother died when she was 2. Her father remarried 3 years after the death of her mother,and this stepmother is the one she was accused of murdering. I guess the poem just wouldn't have the same rhythm if it used stepmother.
Lizzie Borden took an axe and gave her (step)mother forty whacks
When she saw what she had done
She gave her father forty-one.
Since I will be off the air for about a week,I would like to leave you with a quote:By ethical conduct toward all creatures,we enter into a spiritual relationship with the universe.-Albert Schweitzer.
Stay with me my valued readers-"I'll be back!"

No Stone Unturned

Lucy Stone was the first American woman of record,to retain her own last name after marriage and from her background it is easy to understand why she became all she did.
Lucy was born on her family's farm in Massachusetts in 1818. She was the 8th of 9 children. Her father drank too much,had a temper and ruled as master of his home. To make ends meet the girls wove,canned fruits and sewed piecework for a local shoe factory,the boys would hunt whatever they could get. All the children tended the family cows. Her mother had to beg her husband for money for other necessities,and sometimes stole coins from him or sold cheese without his knowledge. Lucy wasn't happy to see her mother resort to these methods just to maintain a household.
When the Bible was quoted to her,defending the subordinate position of women,she vowed to learn Greek and Hebrew so she could correct the mistranslation.
Lucy went on to be the first woman from Massachusetts to earn a college degree. She was also a prominent abolitionist and suffragist,and advocate and organizer for women's rights. She also gave the speech which caused Susan B. Anthony to become active in the women's suffrage movement.

Entrapment

Entrapment or entanglement? I will tell you the story and you, my treasured readers, can decide on the title you prefer.
As most of you have noticed I am an animal lover and am delighted to learn about ones I have never heard of,or learn new things about animals that I am familiar with. This love extends to other creatures as well,when I find spiders inside my house I capture them and return them to the outside.
 The entrapment problem is about my front porch. Several years ago I had it partially enclosed so it would be more useful in the rainy months. The problem I didn't foresee is that the bees get trapped in the enclosed part and start beating themselves on the windows,yes the windows open but they can seem to find the openings. I know bees are responsible for a lot of the pollination and many other parts of plant cycles so I can't stand to see them get stuck on my porch. I keep a jar out there and very carefully (I am allergic to them) trap them under the jar then slide a piece of paper between the jar and the window then walk them to the open area and release them. This way I don't feel responsible for the needless death of the bees and can still enjoy my porch guilt free. I know,there are probably many of you out there scratching your heads about now thinking, is she for real?? The answer is yes,I am afraid so!

Happy Hippo

Happy hippo is a candy/cookie. I was also thinking about hungry,hungry hippo,which is a kids game,but neither one of these is actually the subject of today's blog.
I read somewhere that hippo milk was bright pink,and having never milked a hippo I was unaware of that. My first thought after that was,I wonder if it is strawberry flavored?
Hippos are the third largest living land mammal and their hide alone can weigh 1/2 ton. Their bodies are almost completely hairless,what hair they have is found on the tip of the tail and around the mouth. The hippo has neither sweat glands or oil producing glands,but they do have a unique gland that produces a thick red fluid,which is where the idea that hippos sweat blood came from. It is thought that this fluid may be part of their cooling system or maybe a form of sunblock. Hippos are very aggressive,and what one would think of as a yawn is actually a show of aggression. They have long,razor sharp incisors and tusk like canines. Hippos have killed hundreds of people,more than any other wild animal,and despite their size and shape can outrun a human.
An interesting side note,many people thought George Washington's teeth were made out of wood but it was actually ivory from a hippos tusk.

Bigger is not Better

Can you imagine what it would be like to be 8 feet 11.1 inches tall and weigh 485 pounds? Robert Wadlow though deceased, still holds the world record for tallest man. He continued growing until his death in 1940 at age 22 due to hypertrophy of his pituitary gland which resulted in an abnormally high level of human growth hormone.
He was the oldest of 5 children. Special desks had to be made for him in elementary school. His shoes,size 37AA, were provided for free by a shoe company that he did promotional work for.
Eventually his size began to take its toll: he needed leg braces to walk and had little feeling in his legs and feet. While touring his braces rubbed a blister which became infected, and though he was given a blood transfusion and had surgery, it still resulted in his death.


Pictured with his father who was 5 ft. ll1/2 in.



Robert's size 37AA shoe compared to a size 12



Another Pearl of Wisdom

Another fallacy revealed! I had always heard that pearls formed when a grain of sand found its way inside an oyster,mussel or clam,not true. It is a small piece of clay,mud,worm,small crab or parasite that causes the pearl to form. As a defense mechanism,the mollusk attempts to isolate the foreign matter by secreting nacre (also known as mother of pearl). Over time many layers of nacre are formed around the intruding object and a pearl is made. The rounder the object-the rounder the pearl. The color of the pearl depends on the mollusk that incubates it. Cultured pearls are real pearls,but they are formed through human intervention known as perliculture.
The first person to produce a cultured pearl was taxonomist Carolus Linnaeus. After visiting a pearl fishery he thought there should be another way of growing pearls without relying on nature. He experimented by putting a piece of plaster of paris inside a mussel shell. He retrieved the pearls six years later the size of peas.

Missing Links

Another piece of my missing education was discovered today.
In 1865 a 6 year old Teddy Roosevelt and his brother Elliot (future father of Eleanor) watched Lincoln's funeral procession from the second story window of their grandfather Cornelius Roosevelt's house on Broadway between 13th and 14th Streets. Nine days after his death,Lincoln arrived in New York City on a ferry from Jersey City. The glass hearse,pulled by 16 horses,traveled from the ferry terminal down Broadway to City Hall where it remained for viewing until the next day.
That would have been the closest that Theodore Roosevelt and Abraham Lincoln ever came to meeting,though Teddy knew Lincoln's son Robert well. Teddy invited Robert Lincoln to his inauguration in 1905,though Robert declined,having lived through his father's assassination,and being present at the assassination of both James Garfield and William McKinley,he did not wish to chance extending the streak of bad luck.

Saddle Up?

Ever wonder what the saddle like enclosures used on elephants were called? I happened to come across it in my never ending trivia quest and thought it was noteworthy.
A howdah,or houdah,also know as hahti howdah,is a carriage used on elephants and sometimes camels,used most often in the past to carry wealthy people or in hunting and warfare. It was also a symbol of wealth and was decorated with expensive gems.
In present time,howdahs are mainly used for tourist or commercial purposes. They are the subject of controversy as animal rights groups openly criticize their use,citing how they can cause permanent damage to an elephants spine,lungs and other organs.
I have rode on both an elephant and a camel,the elephant was bareback with two friends (both now deceased),the camel had some sort of a saddle but nothing you would call a howdah. Both animals really swayed a lot when they moved and it was kind of tricky to stay on them compared to horses. I have pictures of me on both,but they aren't on the computer and I am not sure where the one with the elephant is,I might have to do some digging!