Fair Food

Either my memory of the food offerings at the fair has grown dim or they have come up with many more concoctions since the last time I was at a fair and looking to eat deep fried anything. Some of the foods available at today's fairs I wouldn't try on a bet,i.e.: caviar covered Twinkies,Krispy Kreme chicken sandwich, and probably not spaghetti ice cream. I would try a hot beef sundae,deep fried chocolate chip cookie dough,bacon and cheddar jalapeno corn dog, funnel cake burger,deep fried pickle chips,Ramen burger, and the delicious sounding brown butter fried Nutella banana croissant sandwich. They've come a long way from pronto pups,popcorn and caramel/candy apples.

Unbalanced Load

Before I get started today I will give you fair warning that the reason why is never given,I hope that helps curb your disappointment. A 22 year old Australia man got stuck in a top loading washing machine,it also doesn't mention how help was summoned but the Fire and Rescue team arrived to perform their first washing machine rescue. The entire washing machine had to be disassembled then the stainless steel drum had to be cut away to free the man. He was okay but was transported by ambulance to the hospital as a precaution. We've all done at least one foolish thing in our lives but right now nothing comes to mind that would involve getting trapped in a washing machine.

Know Your Sh*t?

Yesterday on my trivia site I read about a poop museum in Holland and since I enjoy the occasional post about out of the ordinary museums I decided it would be today's topic. I was in for a surprise however because there are mentions of the poop museum in Holland but no more than that but earlier this year another poop museum opened in Italy plus there is a similar place in Japan. The one in Italy, "Museo Della Merda" which translates to something a little further south of Museum of Poop was opened by a farmer with the intention of showing "what a useful and living substance crap really is". The exhibit tracks the history of excrement and seeks to educate visitors on the many uses of poop.
 

Bandals or Maybe Boondals

Today's title was my attempt to make a portmanteau word out of boots and sandals. Why you ask? In Missouri there is a cobbler who for $50 plus $25 shipping and handling will take your comfy cowboy boot and cut out the material around the toe and arch and create your own custom Redneck Boot Sandals (the name of the company) or as some customers call them Bootles. They are doing a brisk business and are also getting special orders for events,such as weddings. The process would definitely make the boots cooler to wear,but would sacrifice the protection afforded by the missing material should you still desire to use them for their original purpose. Since I haven't had a reason to wear cowboy boots for many years I will not be rushing an order off anytime soon.

Button Up

My first thought when I read about Graham Barker's unique collection was "That's one weird dude". After I thought about it for awhile I realized that I am fairly weird myself although so far I haven't started a belly button lint collection. He was quite pleased to be included in the Guinness Book of World Records,he explained it all started accidentally one day while he was waiting for his shower to warm up. He decided it would be interesting to see how much lint a person produced and started collecting it on a daily basis. Being a librarian he went the extra mile and also separated the lint by color. The amount produced daily depends on what he wears,with thermal underwear being the leading lint producer. It never goes bad or gets moldy so it is a low maintenance hobby.  Now here is the weirdest part of all...he has sold three jars for an undisclosed amount,so in conclusion is he the weird one,or the buyer of the belly button lint??

Incompetence

I will warn you right now that today's post might turn into a rant,so those of you having your own crumby days feel free to tune me out. I made a special trip down my stairs this morning to put a letter in my mailbox,but did it get picked up when the mail carrier came? NO. This is not unusual for my neighborhood when the regular carrier is on,yes I meant regular carrier. He mis-delivers mail about once a week and that includes items such as bank statements,never mind we not only have different addresses we also have different last names,but it doesn't stop there,along with the aforementioned shoddy service he also leaves his rig running when he gets out to walk to each mailbox,which is wrong not only on a safety level (I live on a steep hill) but it is also bad for the environment. I am sure it is against the postal policies as the new hire carriers all park at the end of the block and walk to the boxes. I intended to include the problems with the paper delivery but I have already spent my allotted complaining time for the day! Better luck tomorrow.

Happy Hoax Day

On 8/25/1835 the first of a series of six articles collectively known as "The Great Moon Hoax" was published in the New York Sun newspaper. Dr. Andrew Grant was the name on the articles claiming that a leading astronomer of the era (Sir John Herschel) had seen incredible life forms on the moon with a new powerful telescope. He went on to describe unicorns,two legged beavers,winged humanoids,plus rushing rivers,lush vegetation and massive amethyst crystals. People bought the stories hook,line and sinker and sales of the paper increased even though the articles were meant as satire. When the hoax was revealed about a month later people were amused and sales remained the same. Someone please tell me that the current Trump reports are also a hoax!

Employable,or Not?

Today I am going to give you the details then you can decide if this Florida (yes,Florida again!) woman is someone you would hire. The drunk 23 year old woman went into an adult novelty shop to apply for a job,she filled out an application complete with contact information then shoplifted a sex toy. After the woman left the store the manager noticed an Evolved brand "short and sweet" vibrator had been taken from the display so she reviewed security footage showing the recent applicant stowing the merchandise down the front of her pants. Needless to say she was later contacted by the police and arrested as the device was not in an unused condition and could not be returned. I don't know about the rest of you but I personally have never been drunk enough to think it would be a good idea to go apply for work in that condition,then again maybe that wasn't really this woman's primary objective.

Always Watching

I watch the crows and the crows watch me. I don't know what they get out of watching me but I am forever fascinated by their behavior. One thing that I have noticed over the years of crow watching is the ones around here never seem to molt,which in most circumstances mean a bird is in poor health,but these birds are the picture of health,always vibrant black and never seem to have a feather out of place. I did a little research and found out that they are supposed to molt in July-August,but I still see no sign of feather loss. I am wondering if they hide out somewhere when they molt,but how would they feed if they were doing that? Plus there never seems to be any time when they aren't nearby. They are fearless of the Eagles and will pursue them to their death when they catch them robbing their nests,at the same time once their young are capable of feeding themselves they can be brutal about forcing them to find and eat their own food,still once the young birds are adults they cooperate as a unit with other crows to insure the flocks safety and general well being.
 

Hankering

I was thinking the word handkerchief was a curious sounding word and decided to see how it came by its name. Combining the words hand+kerchief originally meant a cloth for covering the head (not sure how hand meant head),but the meaning changed in Middle English to a piece of cloth used about the person,more like the current meaning. Oddly enough the word hanker means to have a craving or longing for something but for some reason I expected these two words to relate to each other because I had always mentally omitted the "d" in handkerchief most likely because the feminine term for handkerchief was hanky. I'm a little disappointed that the etymology isn't nearly as strange as I had hoped,oh well tomorrow is another day as Scarlett would say!

Early Safety

I have no idea what made me start thinking about early explorers or the ships bringing passengers to the new world,but how on earth did they manage to get anywhere at all? It seems to me that the captains and crews must have been half in the bag most of the time since they drank mainly beer and rum on their journeys,it is a wonder they didn't run aground before they left their respective ports. I know part of the reason for the rum was it was mixed with lemon or lime and water (then called grog) to ward off scurvy,but how did they keep from getting dehydrated? I must be going about this search the wrong way as I'm not finding the information on the supplies aboard the early sailing vessels. Good thing there wasn't a Coast Guard in those early days,they would have locked up entire crews for DUI. Oh well,if nothing else the choice of beverages on board helps explain the early sailing songs.

Fore or Against

Most of us were taught punctuation in school and how improper use of it could change the meaning of a sentence and I still feel it is an important part of conveying the information or sentiments that one wishes to convey,but (you knew that but was coming,didn't you?) the Bible wasn't originally punctuated and perhaps that is why there are so many differing interpretations of the book. George Bernard Shaw insisted "There is not the faintest reason for persisting in the ugly and silly trick of peppering pages with these uncouth bacilli." in regards to commas,but without the simple comma the meaning of words can be drastically changed.

 Just a little something for you to chew on for the day. I would also like to introduce punctus percontativus which was a reversed question mark used in the 16th and 17th centuries to mark a rhetorical question...now wouldn't that puppy come in handy?

No Violins

First thing on the agenda today is to explain how the title is fitting and apt. Before I retired we had morning meetings whenever a supervisor (read stupidvisor) was in town,the subject of one of those meeting was "Violence in the Workplace",when the supervisor was done reading the memo on violence I couldn't resist asking how would we ever be able to perform a decent rendition of "Kashmir" if we couldn't have violins in the workplace...those pesky supervisors never did have a sense of humor. Another huge issue at that time was sexual harassment (no I didn't ask if it would be graded!). But I am digressing once again,what I am trying to get to is the current VW commercials with the older women (who happen to be related) where they are clearly sexually harassing the men. Don't get me wrong,I think they are as funny as can be,but I can't help but wonder how they made it onto TV...or did we change back to pre-sexual harassment days and no one sent me the memo?

Zip

Internet and phone were down during the time I usually devote to preparing the daily post so I have nothing to offer today except my apologies. With any luck the problem is solved and things will be back to normal tomorrow. Now I need to call and go through the dreaded menu to cancel the appointment to fix it tomorrow!

Hot & Cold Running Feet

I'm a little disappointed that I didn't know about this product while I was still working,but it isn't too late for those of you who are still pounding the pavement. I am talking about an air conditioned shoe! The first one I read about was patented in 1993 and worked through gravity,every step you took made energy to power the A/C shoe (kind of like the self winding watch) and if that wasn't pure heaven when it was cold out and a person wanted their feet warm the shoe functioned as a foot warmer. I haven't found anything indicating that shoe was ever produced, however Japan is offering a A/C shoe powered by USB for a mere $78,though nothing was mentioned about a warming feature.

Ratings

With all the fires burning in the western US I have been wondering how fires are classified as disasters,what I am trying to say is with hurricanes there is the Saffir-Simpson scale of 1-5,with earthquakes the Richter scale is used but I haven't found any comparable  scale used to measure the devastation caused by fires,maybe because it would be next to impossible to measure the true scope of the disaster since it involves years of events related to the fires themselves. On a lighter note avalanches are rated by size (R and 1-5 and D,destructive force 1-5) so it is entirely possible to have an avalanche rated R2D2!

In Other Words

Did you know that the words Macho and Wimp are also acronyms?  Macho originally came from the Latin word masculus and later became machismo in Spanish,both words meaning masculine. Wimp is a more current word dating to the 1920s meaning woman,then morphing into the current meaning in the 1960s of ineffectual,perhaps derived from whimper...but wait there's more! Those jokers in astrophysics (think "The Big Bang Theory") put the words to use. MACHO is used to describe astronomical bodies called 'massive astrophysical compact halo objects' and WIMP is short for 'weakly interacting massive particles'.  There are also other uses for them if you look online,but rather than having actual assigned meanings they are more likely used in small groups to not so much shorten a term but to see how many uses there can be for those letters.

Not To Be Trusted!

To say I am upset about this information is a gross understatement. It leaves me wondering what the difference is between fiction and non-fiction, if reference works deliberately use false entries exactly where is a person supposed to get information they can rely on? This practice has apparently been going on for years and is employed by dictionaries,encyclopedias,maps and other reference works. I am familiar with the phrase "only believe half of what you see,and none of what you hear" but I didn't apply it to the written word in reference materials. The reasons for this practice range from copyright traps to out and out hoaxes. Maybe I am the only one who was unaware of this,but exactly where is a person supposed to turn for reliable information?

Know Your A B Cs?

If ever there was useless information today's post will qualify...but is any information truly useless? Most people probably have never given any thought to why vitamins only employ the letters A-E and K,(sounds like the beginning of a grammar rule!)but for those of you that have wondered today is your lucky day! When the first five vitamins were discovered in the early 20th century they got their names sequentially but then a combination of disorganization and others being re-identified as part of the B vitamin group,so that plan was scrapped. Also some of the discoveries were not important to human health,for example vitamin J was important for guinea pigs,but not humans, vitamin F became the Omega-3 fatty acids, vitamin L got its name because it was important for lactation (in rats),it also was later used to make Quaaludes. The remaining letters either became part of the B complex or were deemed unessential to human health. There you have your dose of "learned something new today"!

Dirty Minds?

I don't know whether to laugh or cry over the implications of a recently discovered species of fish,if it turns out to be a product of evolution I will lean more toward crying. The fish was found in The Mekong Delta in 2009,nothing strange so far but how would it grab you to know their sex organs are on their heads? Not to be out done by the reproductive organs the anus also makes its appearance in the same general area. If nothing else it gives validation to the word "dickhead" and I guess you could also call it a "shithead" without stretching the truth. The physical setup of this fish leaves me wondering where the brain might be located? Maybe the brain is that orange/yellow spot by the tail?

A. Male B. Female