All domestic chickens are descended from Gallus gallus, the Red Junglefowl.
THINKING BIG
The Mini was by far the most successful British car in history; no other model has ever come close to selling 5.3 million units. But the success of the tiny car also contributed to the decline of the British auto industry, as Issigonis tried to repeat the Mini’s formula in much larger cars and failed.
When customers pay $1,400 for a car, they’re willing to settle for one that offers only the bare essentials, but when they pay full price, they want a little luxury. Issigonis understood this, but because he thought he understood car buyers better than they understood themselves, he would not budge. “I know there are such people, but I will not design cars for them,” he said.
FOLLOW THE MONEY
Later cars designed by Issigonis, including the full-sized Austin Maxi, were sales disappointments that helped force the flailing British Motor Corporation into a shotgun merger with other troubled British automakers in 1968. The resulting conglomerate, British Leyland, lost so much money that the British government nationalized it in 1975, keeping it from going under.
The remnants of British Leyland were renamed the Rover Group in 1986. BMW bought Rover in 1994 and spent millions trying to make it profitable. But BMW finally gave up in 2000 and sold the company off in pieces—every piece, that is, except for the Mini division. BMW has since built Mini into a thriving company, one that owes much of its success to nostalgia for Issigonis’s original tiny car of dreams. In April 2007, 11 years after they bought the company, BMW sold its one millionth Mini—about the same amount of time it took the British Motor Corporation to sell its millionth Mini. If sales remain strong, the new Mini should outsell the old Mini sometime in the late 2030s.
Dutch winemaker Ilja Gort insured his nose for $8 million.
GROSS COCKTAILS
Culled from bartenders and bar guides from around the world, most of these drinks had to have been created—and consumed—on a dare.
Buffalo Sweat
3 parts bourbon
1 part Tabasco
Liquid Steak
1.5 oz rum
Drizzle of Worcestershire sauce
(The end result supposedly tastes like grilled meat.)
Smoker’s Cough
1.5 oz Jägermeister
A dollop of mayonnaise
Relishious
1.5 oz Jägermeister
A spoonful of pickle relish
Prairie Oyster
1.5 oz bourbon Dash of Tabasco
1 raw egg
Hot Sauce
1.5 oz pepper-flavored vodka
1 oz olive juice
1 oz tomato juice
3 oz Guinness
Dash of Worcestershire sauce
Dash of Tabasco
(Garnish with blue-cheese-stuffed olives.)
Green Monster
4 oz Red Bull energy drink
12 oz Mountain Drew
6 oz cognac
Eggermeister
1.5 oz Jägermeister (or licorice-flavored liqueur)
1 pickled egg
(Drink the booze while chewing the egg.)
Beergasm
1 part beer
1 part whole milk
Black Death
1 part vodka
1 part soy sauce
Ranchero
2 parts tequila
1 part Tabasco
1 part ranch dressing
Cement Mixer
1.5 oz Irish cream
A lime wedge
(The drinker sucks the wedge and holds the juice in their mouth while consuming the Irish cream. The acidity of the lime juice makes the creamy liqueur instantly curdle.)
Active ingredient in Planet brand anti-aging face cream: snake venom.
PRANKELANGELO
Michelangelo’s paintings and sculptures are beautiful, timeless…and full of secret messages.
The massive mural on the ceiling of the Sistine Chapel in Rome contains hundreds of images. The work was commissioned by Pope Julius II, who Michelangelo reportedly thought was corrupt due to his aggressive schemes to obtain new lands for the church. So he painted Julius II (“The Fearsome Pope”) into the mural: The depiction of the prophet Zechariah has Julius’ face. But behind Zechariah is an angel holding his thumb between his index and middle finger—a gesture known as “the fig.” It meant to Renaissance-era Italians what the middle finger does to present-day Americans—the angel is flipping off the pope.
• Another part of the Sistine mural is “The Creation of Adam,” in which God and Adam touch fingers, representing the creation of human life. Upon closer inspection, writes Dr. Frank Meshberger in the Journal of the American Medical Association, the “heaven” in which God and angels float is shaped like a human brain. The different parts of the organ are distinct, including the cerebellum, optic nerve, and pituitary gland. God’s green sash, for example, is the vertebral artery. What does it mean? Michelangelo believed in a philosophy called Neoplatonism, which attests that intellect is a divine gift, so the painting may be his expression of that idea. Or, as he believed the Church was corrupt, it might have been a suggestion that God was the creation of a human brain (i.e., not real).
• Michelangelo’s David is one of the world’s best-known statues, and represents the artist’s ideal human form—even though critics have long wondered why the “ideal human form” would have such disproportionately small “private parts.” David is 13 feet high and placed on a pedestal so admirers have to look up at it. But according to Pietro Bernabei, writing in the Italian journal Il Giornale dell'Arte, viewing David’s face head-on, his blank expression changes to one of fear and worry. This makes sense—the statue depicts David just before his fight with the giant Goliath. And in a bit of dark humor, it explains the figure’s “shrinkage”: Male genitals typically recede when the body is under stress.
Most dangerous food to consume while driving, according to one study: coffee.
PUN-LINERS
They say puns are the lowest form of humor. Just who are “they,” and why are “they” trying to rain on our pun parade?
“Putting your hands in the earth is very grounding.”
—John Glover
“Two Dallas women opened up a marina. They ran the best little oarhouse in Texas.”
—Richard Lederer
“Sometimes I pray to Cod for the veal-power to stop playing with my food words, but I fear it’s too bread into me.”
—Mark Morton
“I made a killing on Wall Street a few years ago. I shot my broker.”
—Groucho Marx
“Dunkin Donuts…Just move the ‘D’ to the end and you get ‘Unkind Donuts,’ which I’ve had a few of in my day.”
—Merl Reagle
“The advantages of simple origami are twofold.”
—Tim Vine
“What did the carrot say to the wheat? Lettuce rest, I’m feeling beet.”
—Shel Silverstein
“My wife’s a water sign. I’m an earth sign. Together we make mud.”
—Rodney Dangerfield
“This concerto was written in four flats because Rachmaninoff had to move four times while he wrote it.”
—Victor Borge
“Double negatives are a no-no.”
—Zac Hill
“The safest place in an earthquake is a stationary store.”
—George Carlin
“Why is a martini without an olive or lemon twist called a Charles Dickens? No olive or twist.”
—Martin Gardner
“I’ve always wanted to make an impact on the world. I’ve also always wanted to go sky diving. I just hope I don’t to both at the same time.”
—David Brandenburg
“It was so quiet, you could hear a pun drop.”
—Bugs Baer
Uncle John is a paronomasiac—one who is addicted to puns and wordplay.
THE #2 AMENDMENT
GUN OWNER: Deputy Robert Greek of the Plymouth County Sheriff’s Department in Massachusetts
ARMED & DANGEROUS: In November 2005, nature called while Deputy Greek was at a Dunkin’ Donuts. He popped into the restroom and set down his service weapon while he attended to the matter at hand. Then, when it was time to leave, he forgot to take his gun with him. Nearly an hour passed before he realized his gun was missing. He immediately returned to Dunkin’ Donuts to get it, but by then, it was long gone.
WHAT HAPPENED: Luckily for Deputy Greek, the gun was found by a responsible citizen, who dropped it into a Post Office letter box and then notified the police where they could find it. Deputy Greek’s carelessness cost him his firearm license, and that in turn cost him his job. “Because he was unable to be certified to carry a firearm, we were unable to retain him as a deputy,” a Sheriff’s Department spokesperson told reporters. (Greek did notify the department as soon as he realized his firearm was missing: “He deserves some credit for that,” said the spokesperson.)
GUN OWNER: An unidentified 52-year-old woman living in Hoover, Alabama
ARMED & DANGEROUS: On election day in June 2000. the woman went to her polling station to vote. Unfortunately for her, the polling station was located in the chambers of the Hoover City Council, and no handguns are allowed in there. (The woman was packing a loaded .45-caliber Beretta semiautomatic.) Apparently she didn’t realize that guns weren’t permitted until she saw the warning sign next to the metal detectors. Instead of leaving the premises, the woman simply hid the Beretta in the ladies’ room while she went in and voted. She couldn’t have hidden it very well, because by the time she got back, a city employee had already found the gun and turned it over to the police.
It takes a village: A nursing lioness will give milk to any of the pride’s cubs.
WHAT HAPPENED: When the woman asked if anyone had seen her gun, the police arrested her…at which point the woman began complaining of chest pains. Rather than file charges, the police called paramedics. (She received a clean bill of health and was released from the hospital two hours later; the police did not attempt to file charges again.)
GUN OWNER: Steve Schmulbach of Belleville, Missouri
ARMED & DANGEROUS: In July 1990, Schmulbach, his wife, and another couple were visiting Union Station in St. Louis when Schmulbach had to use the restroom. Not long after he got down to “business,” he was confronted by two robbers who poked their heads over the bathroom stall and pointed a gun at him.
WHAT HAPPENED: What are the odds that the robbers would have picked a bathroom stall occupied by an off-duty police officer? An armed off-duty police officer? Schmulbach, a 12-year veteran of the Belleville, Missouri, police department, grabbed for his .38-caliber service revolver and fired off a shot, missing both men but so startling them that the one with the gun dropped it (it didn’t go off) as he fled the restroom. At last report, a 19-year-old suspect was in custody and police were still looking for his 21-year-old accomplice.
GUN OWNER: Sergeant Nicole Girardi of the Boca Raton, Florida, police department
ARMED & DANGEROUS: In March 2006, the Secret Service asked the Boca PD to assist in securing a local country club in advance of a GOP fundraiser headlined by Vice President Dick Cheney. Sgt. Girardi was assigned to the detail. When she took a bathroom break at the country club, she put her gun down in the restroom and forgot to take it with her when she finished. Police officers conducting a security sweep found the gun a short time later.
WHAT HAPPENED: Luckily for Girardi, the gun was found before Vice President Cheney arrived. That kept the incident a local police matter rather than a federal case. Girardi received an official reprimand, but no other disciplinary measures were taken. (Although she has been warned that if she misplaces her gun again, she could lose her job.)
The words “stereotype” and “cliche” both originated as French book-printing terms.
HOW ________
GOT TO JAPAN
See if you can guess the blank before the end of the article.
Clue #1: In 1897 the German government was able to coerce the Chinese government into giving them a 99-year lease to the city of Tsingtao, on Kiautschou Bay in East China. The bay and surrounding region soon became a German colony, and a large naval fort was built in its harbor.
• Clue #2: In July 1914, World War I officially began. In August the British—and their allies, the Japanese—attacked Tsingtao, and by November they had taken it from the Germans. The Japanese captured about 4,000 German prisoners in Tsingtao and transported them to POW camps in Japan.
• Clue #3: In 1915 several hundred of those prisoners were transferred to the newly built Narashino camp, east of Tokyo. Among those prisoners was one Karl Jahn, an expert in a field that had been mastered by Germans centuries earlier.
• Clue #4: In 1918 Jahn and a handful of other POWs taught the secrets of their skill to Yoshifusa Iida, a Japanese government official. Yoshifusa, who happened to be in the midst of experiments with the processing of a certain kind of food, was impressed.
• Clue #5: Yoshifusa subsequently taught the process to manufacturers all across Japan, marking the beginning of a new industry in the country.
• Clue #6: As the years passed, the story of how the Japanese learned to produce this product was almost completely forgotten. Then, in 2008, a collection of photos of Narashino camp was discovered—including images of Yoshifusa Iida, Karl Jahn, and the other prisoners making it.
Have you guessed the mystery German product? Turn to page 534 for the answer.
Los Angeles has 24-hour vending machines for marijuana.
READY…SET…HURL!
We’ve done hundreds of “weird world” articles over the past two decades. This, we believe, is the first one that’s focused on vomiting. (Warning: not for the squeamish.)
Ready: Police in Winona, Minnesota, were called to the scene of an automobile accident in April 2010. Set: They found a car that had been driven into a utility pole. Witnesses said they saw a young man walking a dog leave the scene. Four hours later, 18-year-old Michael Allen Butler called police and confessed.
HURL! Butler told police he had crashed into the pole…because his dog had puked on him. Deputy Police Chief Tom Williams was skeptical at first, but after investigating the scene said he believed the young man…because they found dog puke all over the inside of the car. Butler was ticketed for driving without a license.
Ready: Matthew Clemmens, 21, of Cherry Hill, New Jersey, and a friend were at a Philadelphia Phillies-Washington Nationals baseball game in 2010. They were both drinking. They started yelling obscenities and acting like jerks.
Set: Clemmens and his friend were sitting behind off-duty Police Captain Michael Vangelo. When the two wouldn’t stop swearing, Vangelo asked an usher to call the cops. Result: Clemmens and his friend were expelled.
HURL! As they were being escorted out of the stadium, Clemmens leaned over the railing between the seat rows, stuck his finger down his throat, and purposely puked on Vangelo…and his 11-year-old daughter. He also managed to puke on a security officer. Bad idea: Clemmens was arrested on charges of aggravated assault, harassment, resisting arrest, and other offenses. “It was the most vile, disgusting thing I’ve ever seen,” Vangelo said. “And I’ve been a cop for 20 years.” Clemmens was sentenced to a month in jail, two years’ probation, and 50 hours of community service…and he had to reimburse the Vangelo family for their tickets to the game.
Ready: Twenty-six-year-old Justin Krohmer, an off-duty sheriff’s deputy in Fargo, North Dakota, was at a Kenny Chesney concert in the Fargodome in June 2009. (He was with his mom.) Set: He was drinking. (So was his mom.)
Cloudiest city in the U.S.: Astoria, Oregon, which averages 240 cloudy days a year.
HURL! At one point during the show, Krohmer—now drunk—threw up on the people in front of him. Then he was told by Fargod
ome security that he had to leave—but he refused. Police were called, and Deputy Krohmer was arrested for disorderly conduct.
Extra: Krohmer’s mother, 47-year-old Susan Krohmer, was also arrested and taken to jail, after allegedly screaming profanities at the officers and trying to prevent them from removing her son. Mrs. Krohmer is the wife of the local police chief.
Ready: In July 2008, the town of Builth Wells, Wales, hosted their annual Mountain Bike Marathon race. More than 650 showed up to participate.
Set: The starter fired the starting gun…the race began…and the bikers finished the race without incident.
HURL! Then they all started puking. Well, not all of them, but over the next few days more than 160 of the racers suffered severe bouts of vomiting. The U.K.’s National Public Health Service issued a report and England’s Sunderland Echo newspaper ran a story about it. Headline: “Sheep poo caused mountain bike vomit carnage.” Explanation: Some of the mud that the racers had ridden through was contaminated with Campylobacter—a bacteria found in sheep feces—which caused the bikers to become ill. The situation had been exacerbated, the report said, by heavy rain before the races, which made for an abundance of liquid mud that could easily fly into the participants’ mouths. (Yum!)
PRIORITIES?
A 2010 poll asked British adults to rank the 100 greatest inventions of all time. Coming in at #1 and #2: the wheel and the airplane. Coming in at #8 was the Apple iPhone, which is apparently a more important invention than the flush toilet (#9), the internal combustion engine (#10), hot tap water (#29), and the wristwatch (#59).
Uncle John’s Heavy Duty Bathroom Reader@ Page 36