Uncle John’s Unsinkable Bathroom Reader

by Bathroom Readers' Institute

  • New York. The Statue of Liberty.

  • North Carolina. A rendering of the Wright brothers’ first airplane flight in 1903 at Kitty Hawk, North Carolina.

  • Rhode Island. A sailboat (representing the state’s most popular sport) on Narragansett Bay.

  • Vermont. A man tapping trees to get raw maple syrup, with Camel’s Hump Mountain in the background.

  • Kentucky. The state is known for horse racing, so a horse is shown. (Ironically, it’s a Thoroughbred, not a Quarter Horse.)

  • Tennessee. The state’s musical heritage is depicted with a fiddle to represent Appalachian music, a trumpet for the blues, and a guitar for country music.

  • Ohio. With the caption “the Birthplace of Aviation Pioneers,” an early wooden airplane (the Wright brothers were born in Ohio) and an astronaut in full space suit (Neil Armstrong and John Glenn are both from Ohio).

  • Louisiana. An outline of the 1803 Louisiana Purchase (it doubled the size of the United States), the state bird (the pelican), and a trumpet (to represent the state as the birthplace of jazz).

  • Indiana. A race car, as Indiana is home to the Indianapolis 500.

  • Mississippi. The state flower, the magnolia.

  • Illinois. Abraham Lincoln, who grew up and practiced law in the state.

  • Alabama. A portrait of native Helen Keller sitting in a chair, reading a braille book.

  • Maine. Pemaquid Point lighthouse (built in 1826) guiding a ship safely into harbor.

  • Missouri. Lewis and Clark are seen returning from their Western expedition in a river-boat on the Missouri River (they returned in 1806), going through St. Louis’ Gateway Arch (built in 1965).

  • Arkansas. Reflecting its major industries, Arkansas’s quarter shows rice stalks, a diamond, and a duck.

  • Michigan. A map of the state with the Great Lakes highlighted.

  • Florida. On the left is a Spanish galleon (Spain explored and settled Florida in the 1500s); on the right is the Space Shuttle (it launches from Florida’s Kennedy Space Center).

  • Texas. A map of Texas with a large star, referencing its nickname “the Lone Star State,” which comes from the Texas flag—red, white, and blue with a single star—designed when it was an independent republic in the 1840s.

  • Iowa. A one-room schoolhouse with students outside planting a tree. It’s a rendering of the painting Arbor Day by Iowan artist Grant Wood.

  • Wisconsin. Three of the state’s biggest commodities: a cow, a wheel of cheese, and an ear of corn.

  • California. As 19th-century naturalist John Muir gazes at Yosemite National Park’s granite Half Dome monolith, a California condor soars overhead.

  • Minnesota. A lake (Minnesota is the “land of 10,000 lakes”).

  • Oregon. Crater Lake, a crystal-blue body of water that sits in a caldera (a volcanic crater) and is the nation’s deepest lake.

  • Kansas. A buffalo (the state animal) and a sunflower (the state flower).

  • West Virginia. The quarter depicts the state’s 3,030-foot long, 876-foot high New River Gorge Bridge—one of the longest and highest steel-span bridges in the world.

  • Nevada. Three mustangs running free. Nevada is home to more than half of the country’s wild horses.

  • Nebraska. Passing by landmark Chimney Rock is a family in a covered wagon headed west on the Oregon Trail.

  • Colorado. The Rocky Mountains.

  • North Dakota. In 1906 President Roosevelt signed the Antiquities Act, which set aside the state’s Badlands as a nature preserve for endangered bison. Today, 400 bison roam the area (and two of them are on the quarter).

  • South Dakota. Mount Rushmore and a ring-necked pheasant.

  • Montana. A bison skull, which is both a Western icon and a symbol of the state’s Native American heritage.

  • Washington. A leaping salmon and Mount Rainier.

  • Idaho. The peregrine falcon, once endangered but now abundant in Idaho.

  • Wyoming. A bucking horse and a rider, symbolizing the Wild West.

  • Utah. Two trains and a railroad spike. In 1869 the Union Pacific and Central Pacific railway lines were joined in Promontory, Utah, completing the transcontinental railroad.

  • Oklahoma. The state bird, the scissortail flycatcher, flying over a field of wildflowers, and the state flower, the Indian blanket.

  • New Mexico. Over a topographical map of the state is the sun symbol of the Zia Pueblo tribe. Emanating from a circle are four points, which represent the four directions, the four seasons, and the four ages of man (childhood, youth, middle age, old age).

  • Arizona. The Grand Canyon and a saguaro cactus.

  • Alaska. A grizzly bear eating a salmon.

  • Hawaii. A portrait of 19th-century Hawaiian king Kamehameha I, who united the islands into one kingdom.

  By walking an extra 20 minutes every day, an average person will burn off 7 lb. of body fat per year.

  The U.S. flag is always flown at half-staff at Arlington Cemetery, the Tomb of the Unknown Soldier, and Pearl Harbor.

  EXTREME PUN-ISHMENT

  A lion, a hawk, and a skunk were arguing in a clearing. “I am the strongest,” said the lion, “because every animal fears me!” “No, I am the strongest,” said the hawk, “because only I can hunt from the air!” “No, I am the strongest,” replied the skunk, “because my stench could keep both of you away!”

  And then a fisherman walked out into the clearing and easily captured all three animals—hawk, lion, and stinker.

  “I wouldn’t run for president. I wouldn’t want to move to a smaller house.” —Bono

  SUITS SUCK

  T-shirts are like bumper stickers, only for people, not cars. (Duh.) Here are some real T-shirts sent in by BRI stalwart Megan Todd.

  Y2K Survivor

  Volunteering: It Doesn’t Pay

  Kenya Dig It?

  Practice Safe Lunch: Use a Condiment

  Canada: America’s hat

  Mexico: America’s beard

  OBSCURE BAND YOU’VE NEVER HEARD OF

  Without me, It’s Just Awso

  SOUTH KOREA’S GOT SEOUL

  Beards: They Grow On You

  Earthquakes: Not My Fault

  Prague: Czech It Out

  Sex: Do It for the Kids

  Missouri Loves Company

  I Got This Shirt at a Thrift Store

  EVERYBODY LOVES RAMEN

  Attention Ladies: I Enjoy Grey’s Anatomy

  I (blank) Mad Libs

  Hyperbole Is the Best Thing Ever!

  Suits Suck

  Kinetic Energy: Pass It On

  Pavlov: The Name That Rings a Bell

  Club Sandwiches, Not Seals

  I Went T-Shirt Shopping and All I Got Was This Lousy T-Shirt

  It’s Okay, Pluto. I’m Not a Planet, Either

  The Police Never Think It’s as Funny As You Do

  Ask Me About My Ability to Annoy Complete Strangers

  WITH A SHIRT LIKE THIS, WHO NEEDS PANTS?

  The last land battle of the U.S. Civil War was fought in Texas.

  HYPERMILING 101

  Some people call it “ecodriving,” others call it penny-pinching. Whether you’re doing it out of environmental conscience or financial necessity, saving gas has become a way of life. Here are some tips from the experts.

  MOTOR MISERS

  For as long as people have been driving cars, there have been a dedicated few motorists who try to squeeze as many miles as they can out of a single tank of gas. During good times, when gas was plentiful and cheap, they did it for the fun of the challenge, or just for the principle of preserving a limited natural resource. In harder times, such as World War II, when gasoline was strictly rationed, or during the oil crisis of 1973, when gas cost more than ever before, people couldn’t afford not to save gas.

  Lucky for us they did do it, because over the years they’ve developed a lot of gas-saving techniques that we can use t
oday. Many involve nothing more than common sense, and you may be surprised how many of these “secrets” you knew already without even realizing it. Now all you have to do is put them into practice.

  FIRST THINGS FIRST: FIGURING FUEL ECONOMY

  Many cars now come equipped with onboard computers that track fuel mileage continuously and give an estimate of how much fuel a car is consuming at any given moment. If your car has such a computer, all you have to do is follow the instructions in your owner’s manual that tell you how to get the computer to display continuous mpg. Aftermarket computers are also available; they work on most vehicles made after 1996 and sell for under $200.

  For those who drive older cars or don’t have $200 to spend, calculating a car’s mpg at any given moment won’t be possible. But it’s still possible to calculate the average miles per gallon for each tank of gas using the trip odometer. You probably know this, but just in case…

  • The next time you gas up, remember to reset your trip odometer to zero. Then, after you’ve used up that tank of gas, make a note of how many miles you’ve driven and how many gallons of gas it takes to fill back up. Divide the miles by the number of gallons to get your average mpg. (Remember to reset your trip odometer to zero, so that you can calculate average mpg again the next time you fill up.) If you drove 300 miles and had to buy 12.5 gallons of gas, for example, your average miles per gallon on that tank of gas were roughly 300/12.5=24 mpg.

  • If your car doesn’t have a trip odometer, it will still have an ordinary odometer that tells you how many miles the car has been driven over its lifetime. Make a note of the odometer reading every time you buy gas, and subtract the previous reading to calculate the number of miles you drove on your last tank of gas.

  • However you calculate your car’s average mpg, it helps to keep track of the information in a notepad or pocket calendar, so that you can measure how your fuel economy improves over time as you put hypermiling tips into practice.

  The average North American car contains 300 pounds of plastics.

  YOUR FIX-IT CHECKLIST

  • Repairs. If you aren’t already in the habit of keeping your car properly tuned up and fixing mechanical problems as they arise, start now. Just by doing so, you can improve your car’s fuel efficiency by anywhere from 4% to 40%, depending on the severity of the problems that need to be fixed.

  • Tires. Keeping your tires inflated to the proper pressure (listed in the owner’s manual and on the inside edge of the driver’s side door) can increase fuel economy as much as 3%. Tires that are underinflated require more energy to move because more of their surface area touches the road, increasing friction or what’s known as “rolling resistance,” which harms fuel economy. Keeping your tires properly inflated saves additional money by reducing wear and extending the life of your tires.

  • Oil. Be sure to use the correct grade of motor oil; using the wrong grade can reduce your mileage by as much as 2%. Change the oil as often as the auto manufacturer suggests: the longer the oil is in your car, the thicker it becomes with dirt and grime. And the thicker it gets, the more energy is required to push it through the engine.

  In 1989 the Space Shuttle Discovery carried 32 fertilized chicken eggs into orbit.

  SLOW AND STEADY WINS THE RACE

  The good news: you can save gas in a car that’s already tuned up. The bad news: you do it by slowing down. If you drive 65-75 mph on the highway, the biggest step you can take toward increasing your car’s mpg is slowing to 55 mph. Most passenger cars are most economical at between 40 and 55 mph. Then fuel economy drops rapidly as speed increases above 60 mph, due to the fact that aerodynamic drag increases exponentially as speed increases. At high speeds, more than half the gas your car burns is spent overcoming wind resistance. And your lead foot may cost you more than you realize: The Department of Energy estimates that when gas is priced at $4.08 a gallon, every 5 mph you drive over 60 is the same as paying an extra 30 cents per gallon of gas.

  In a test conducted by Consumer Reports magazine, simply decreasing the speed of a Toyota Camry from 75 to 55 mph resulted in a nearly 30% increase in fuel economy, from 30 up to 40 mpg. And if 55 mph is asking too much, when the Camry slowed from 75 to 65 mph, fuel economy still increased from 30 to 35 mpg.

  MELLOW OUT

  • If you have aggressive driving habits, such as rapid acceleration and frequent braking, back off a little. Don’t accelerate hard just to brake again a short time later; it uses extra gas and wears out your brake pads. It’s better to try to maintain a constant speed, with no unnecessary acceleration.

  • When you do need to accelerate, do so gently—slow acceleration uses less gas than rapid acceleration. One simple trick for moderating your rate of acceleration is to use the resume/accelerate switch on the cruise control to speed up, instead of stepping on the gas. Cruise control is designed to accelerate at a slow rate, and when you accelerate slowly you use less gas. (Study your owner’s manual first if you don’t know all the ins and outs of your cruise control system.)

  • By eliminating unnecessary acceleration and applying the gas a little more moderately when you need to speed up, you could save an additional 2 to 3 miles per gallon—that’s 30 additional miles for every 10 gallons of gas in your tank.

  Want more tips on hypermiling? Drive over to page 294. (But please try to keep your speed under 55 mph.)

  “Cow” is a Japanese brand of shaving cream.

  SIMPLE SUCCESS STORIES

  Inspiring tales of everyday entrepreneurs.

  PRODUCT: The Slug-X slug trap

  BACKGROUND: In 1999 Inge Beaumont, a 77-year-old retiree and longtime gardener, set out to solve a common gardening problem: how to get rid of slugs…without using poison. Over the next year she tried several different trap designs, and finally came up with a one that worked: a box the size and shape of a cigar box, with a lift-off lid that covers three small wells. What do you put in the wells? Beer—slugs love it. Openings in the side of the trap allow slugs into the wells, where they drink…and drown. “Quite a pleasant way to die,” Beaumont said.

  SUCCESS STORY: She knew the traps were so good that she had several hundred manufactured and set up an online company, Westfield Products, to sell them. “We had problems to begin with,” she said, “as I had never used a computer before.” It didn’t matter: As word of the traps spread, orders started pouring in from gardeners—and garden centers—all over the world. By the end of 2000, they’d sold sold more than $140,000 worth. But that was nothing: In 2001 they brought in more than $1.5 million.

  PRODUCT: Privacy Strips

  BACKGROUND: Attorney Jennifer Sloane of Winter Park, Florida, was tired of “shirt gap”—the openings between blouse buttons near the bustline. “It’s frustrating when you’re trying to project the image of a professional woman,” she told the Orlando Business Journal, “but your blouse becomes a distraction.” She decided to do something about it. In 2005, after a lot of experimentation with different glues, she came up with Privacy Strips, double-sided adhesive strips that you can stick to the inside of a blouse to invisibly hold the edges in place.

  SUCCESS STORY: Sloane convinced a local dry-cleaning chain to carry the products, then got national distributors interested and started a Web site that she handles at night after work. She sells Privacy Strips in packs of 10 for $2.99, and since starting out in 2005, she’s sold more than 100,000 packages.

  66% of American home-based businesses are owned by women.

  PRODUCT: Angel Guard

  BACKGROUND: In 2006, after Patricia Mandarino’s three-year-old daughter, Marilyn, managed to unbuckle the safety belt holding her child safety seat in place, the whole thing tumbled over when the car made a left turn. “I freaked out,” said the Spring Hill, Florida, mother. “I had no idea she could do that.” Mandarino couldn’t find a product designed to keep a toddler’s hands off seat-belts, so she decided to make one herself. A year later she came up with Angel Guard, a simple plastic device that fits ov
er the seat-belt buckle to prevent child access to the release button, but still comes off easily for adults.

  SUCCESS STORY: Angel Guards went on sale in February 2007, and the simple invention made newspapers all over the country. In 2008 Target stores started carrying them, and Angel Guards became a huge financial—and safety—success.

  PRODUCT: The MuSmate

  BACKGROUND: One afternoon in 2006, Ken and Anne Armitage of Devon, England, were walking as fast as they could, trying to get to a pub on time. One problem: Anne has multiple sclerosis (MS), which makes walking difficult. (The disease makes it hard for her to lift one of her feet.) Ken, a geophysicist and part-time inventor, had an idea: He tied a strap around the shoe on Anne’s weak foot, tied a bungee cord from the shoe to her backpack—and off they went. The cord helped lift Anne’s foot with every step and made walking a lot easier. “I covered the last two kilometers and got there in time for tea,” she told reporters.

  SUCCESS STORY: Wanting to share their discovery, Anne and Ken invented the “MuSmate,” short for “muscle mate.” The user wears a shoulder harness (it can go on under a shirt) with an elastic cord that runs to a connector attached to their shoe. It improves walking distances for some people by up to 600%. The device has received glowing endorsements from MS treatment centers in England, and is now sold across the country. The FDA approved it in 2008, and the Armitages are attempting to market it worldwide, believing it can help people with MS, cerebral palsy, and stroke symptoms. “If my husband hadn’t invented this,” Anne says, “I would probably be using a wheelchair by now.”

  75% of all raisins eaten in America are eaten at breakfast.

  PABLO AND THE PUMPKIN

  We can’t verify the scientific accuracy of this story… but it’s a pretty entertaining Mexican folktale.

  LAZY BOY

  Once there lived a boy named Pablo. His home was in a deep valley near a tall mountain. Long, long before, the mountain had erupted and had spouted forth something magical on the land below, and because of this, crops grew fast on the farm where Pablo lived. If his father planted corn, the full-grown ears were ripe in a week. If pumpkin seeds were planted, the pumpkins had to be picked in a few days, otherwise they would become too heavy to carry. As for weeds—they were knee-high an hour after they had sprouted.