4. Too many smiles and frowns. These expressions not only can build crow’s feet but bags. We can safely disregard this answer to explain Bob Newhart’s bags, however.
Another less fascinating explanation for many sightings of bags under the eyes was noted by Dr. Tom Meek, of the American Academy of Dermatology, in the New York Times: “The circles are probably caused by shadows cast from overhead lighting….”
Submitted by Stephen T. Kelly of New York, New York.
How Do Blind People Discriminate Between Different Denominations of Paper Money?
Sandra Abrams, supervisor of Independent Living Services for Associated Services of the Blind, points out that the government defines “legally blind” as possessing 10% or less of normal vision. Legally blind people with partial vision usually have few problems handling paper money:
Individuals who are partially sighted may be able to see the numbers on bills, especially in certain lighting conditions. Some people with low vision must hold the money up to their noses in order to see the numbers; some people have been asked by members of the public if they are smelling their money. Other persons with low vision might use different types of magnification. Some people with partial sight have pointed out that the numbers on the top corners of bills are larger than those on the bottoms.
The U.S. government certainly doesn’t make it easy for blind people to identify currency. Virtually every other nation varies the size and color of denominations. One reader asked whether a five-dollar bill feels different from a twenty-dollar bill. Although suggestions have been made to introduce slight differences in texture, a blind person can’t now discriminate between bills by touching them.
Initially blind people must rely on bank tellers or friends to identify the denomination of each bill, and then they develop a system to keep track of which bill is which. Gwynn Luxton, of the American Foundation for the Blind, uses a popular system with her clients:
One-dollar bills are kept flat in the wallet.
Five-dollar bills are folded in half crosswise, so that they are approximately three inches long.
Ten-dollar bills are folded in thirds crosswise, so that they are approximately two inches long.
Twenty-dollar bills are folded in half lengthwise, so that they are half the height of the other bills and sit down much farther in the wallet or purse than the other bills.
Machines have been created to solve this problem as well. The relatively inexpensive Talking Wallet reads out the denomination of bills it receives. The more expensive Talking Money Identifier can be hooked up to cash registers and be used for commercial use. Many newspaper vendors are blind, and the Money Identifier can save them from being shortchanged.
Blind people have so many pressing problems imposed on them by a seeing culture that identifying paper money is a minor irritant. As Sandra Abrams puts it, “Frankly, of all the things I do daily, identifying money is one of the easiest.”
Submitted by Jon Gregerson of Marshall, Michigan.
When Not Flying, Why Do Some Birds Walk and Others Hop?
Birds are one of the few vertebrates that are built for both walking and flying. Physiologically, flying is much more taxing on the body than walking. Usually a bird without fear of attack by predators in its native habitat will eventually become flightless. New Zealand, an oceanic island with few predators, has flightless cormorants, grebes, wrens, and even a flightless owl parrot. As Joel Carl Welty states in The Life of Birds:
Why maintain splendid wings if the legs can do an adequate job? This principle may well explain why birds who are good runners fly poorly or not at all. And some of the best fliers, such as hummingbirds, swifts, and swallows, are all but helpless on their feet.
More birds are hoppers than walkers. Birds that walk or run characteristically possess long legs and live in wide open spaces. While the typical tree dweller has four toes on each foot, many walkers have only two or three. Most tree-dwelling birds are hoppers, because it is easier to navigate from branch to branch by hopping than by walking. Most birds that hop in trees will hop on the ground. Although each hop covers more ground than a step would, the hop is more physically taxing.
Dr. Robert Altman, of the A & A Veterinary Hospital, points out that some birds will hop or walk depending on the amount of ground they plan to cover. “For a few steps, it might be easier for a bird to hop from place to place as he would from perch to perch in trees. To cover longer distances, the bird would walk or run.”
Submitted by Jill Clark of West Lafayette, Indiana.
Why Does String Cheese “String” When Torn Apart?
If you read Why Do Clocks Run Clockwise? and Other Imponderables, and shame on you if you haven’t, you know that newspapers tear easily in a vertical position because all the fibers are lined up in the same direction when pulp is put into the papermaking machine. String cheese works on exactly the same principle.
When producing string cheese, the cheese curd is formed into a large mass and then stretched mechanically. The stretching causes the protein fibers to line up in a parallel fashion. According to Tamara J. Hartweg, of Kraft, “This physical modification of the protein structure is what causes the stringing quality of the cheese. When peeled, the protein fibers, which are aligned in one direction, come off in strings.”
Submitted by Lee Hand of Newbury Park, California.
Who Got the Idea of Making Horseshoes? Why are Horseshoes Necessary? What Would Happen If Horses Weren’t Shod?
If horses weren’t shod, they would probably have trouble getting served at fast-food establishments. Maybe they can get away with no shirts. But no shoes?
But seriously, folks, horses have the Romans to blame for the end of their barefoot existence. Horses were perfectly happy galloping around without shoes until the leaders of the Roman Empire decided that it would be a good idea to build paved roads. Without support, horses’ hooves would split and crack on the hard pavement.
The paving of roadways hastened the time when horses, used to riding the range in the wild, were domesticated and forced to carry loads and pull heavy carts. These added burdens put strain on horses’ feet, so the Romans used straw pads as the first horseshoes.
Karen L. Glaske, executive secretary of the United Professional Horsemen’s Association, says that although evolution has bred out some of the toughness of horses’ feet, many can still live a barefoot life:
Shoes are not essential to a horse that is left to pasture or used only as an occasional trail mount. However, the stresses which horses’ feet endure when jumping, racing, showing, or driving make it necessary for the conscientious owner to shoe the animal. It is a protective measure.
Why Are Tattoos Usually Blue (With an Occasional Touch of Red)?
Most tattoos are not blue. The pigment, made from carbon, is actually jet black. Since the pigment is lodged underneath the skin, tattoos appear blue because of the juxtaposition of black against the yellowish to brown skin of most Caucasians. Although red is the second most popular color, many other shades are readily available; in fact, most tattoo artists buy many different colorings, premade, from Du Pont.
We spoke to Spider Webb, perhaps the most famous tattooist in the United States and leader of the Tattoo Club of America, about the prevalence of black pigment in tattoos. Webb felt that most clients, once they decide to take the plunge, want to show off their tattoos: Black is by far the strongest and most visible color. Webb added that in the case of one client, albino guitarist Johnny Winter, a black tattoo does appear to be black and not blue.
Submitted by Venia Stanley of Albuquerque, New Mexico
Why Is the Width of Standard Gauge Railroads Four Feet Eight-and-One-Half Inches?
When tramways were built in England to carry coal by cart or coach, the vehicles were built with wheels four feet eight-and-one-half inches apart. Legend has it that this was the same distance apart as Roman chariot wheels, but we doubt it for one important reason: There is a more logical explanation. Track gauges ar
e determined by measuring from the inside of one rail to the inside of the other. However, the rails themselves occupied three-and-one-half inches of space. In other words, fifty-six-and-one-half inches was almost certainly derived by starting with a measurement of five feet and deducting the width of the rails themselves.
When steam railroads were later constructed in England, the tramway gauge was retained for the most part, and in 1840 Parliament made it official, decreeing four feet eight-and-one-half inches as the standard gauge in Great Britain.
If only the United States were as logical. The first railroad in America, in Massachusetts, featured locomotives from England, built for standard gauge tracks, so the U.S. started with the same track dimensions. But no one in the fledgling American rail industry seemed to consider that it might be nice to have an interlocking system of compatible railways.
As companies from different states started their own lines, anarchy ruled. The Mohawk & Hudson stretched the standard gauge only one half inch, but the Delaware & Hudson featured a six-foot behemoth. In the early and mid-nineteenth century, gauges ranged between a little more than three feet to more than six feet.
Faced with incompatible rolling stock, long delays were common, yet to be preferred to the numerous accidents that ensued when engineers tried to roll locomotives on gauges a few inches too wide at the usual breakneck speeds.
When Union Pacific was about to be built, Abraham Lincoln tried to fix five feet—then the most popular width in the South and California—as the standard gauge for the whole country. But the established railroads in the North and the East objected on financial grounds and managed to lobby to retain fifty-six-and-one-half inches as the standard.
According to railroad expert Alvin Harlow in “The Tangle of Gauges,”
In 1871 there were no fewer than twenty-three gages, ranging from 3 feet up to 6 feet on the railroads of the United States. Less than fifteen years later there were twenty-five; a considerable group of roads in Maine had been born only two feet wide, whilst a logging company in Oregon had built one that sprawled over 8 feet of ground.
The proliferation of gauges was caused not only by regional stubbornness but because no railroad company seemed willing to spring for the cost of converting its tracks. Finally, Illinois Central broke the logjam. In one wild, torchlit night, Illinois Central workers narrowed six hundred miles of track. Southern railroad companies, reluctant to adopt the Yankee standard, followed suit years later.
Even more difficult than relaying track was the task of refitting the rolling stock. Locomotives and cars were dragged into shops all along their routes. Harlow mentions that although the companies tried to return cars to their home lines for conversion, the logistics were a nightmare. Usually cars were converted wherever they were when the tracks were remodeled. Sufficient numbers of new workers had to be hired temporarily to have crews working twenty-four hours a day resetting locomotive truck wheels, removing the tires from truck wheels, and resetting them for the standard gauge.
A few gauges with oddball widths survived into the twentieth century, mostly in New England and the Pacific Northwest, but they were anomalies. The United States eventually rejected the “new and improved” and returned to the standard gauge of the English.
Why Is the Bathtub Drain Right Below the Faucet? Why Isn’t the Bathtub Drain on the Opposite Side of the Bathtub from the Faucet?
“Wouldn’t this configuration be easier for rinsing purposes?” asks our correspondent Pam Lebo. No doubt it would, but there are plenty of reasons why the plumbing industry is going to continue to make you and the makers of Woolite unhappy.
Now hard as it may be to believe, some people actually use the bathtub for bathing. These heathens would not appreciate having to sit on the drain (or for that matter, having the spigot clawing at their backs). John Laughton, of American Standard, raises another legitimate objection: A dripping faucet in Pam’s configuration would cause a stain on the whole length of the bathtub.
Your dream configuration would have other practical drawbacks. Peter J. Fetterer, of Kohler Company, explains why:
The bathtub drain is generally at the same location as the water supply because of the piping required for both. Drains and supplies run through buildings in plumbing chases, vertical spaces for pipes that move water from floor to floor. Drains are attached to vent pipes that run through the chases and vent to the outside of a structure. These chases use up living space and are kept to a minimum for economic reasons.
So must we resign ourselves to a lifetime of boring bathtubs? Not necessarily. Pam’s configuration might attract some who take only showers, but it will probably never be popular. However, American Standard has created a bathtub that presents interesting possibilities for extracurricular activities besides rinsing. Their avant garde bathtub places both the faucet and the drain halfway along the bath with, offers John Laughton, “a back slope at both ends so that two could bathe together in comfort and save water.” Save water. Sure, Mr. Laughton.
Submitted by Pam Lebo of Glen Burnie, Maryland.
Do Fish Sleep? If So, When Do Fish Sleep?
Our trusty Webster’s New World Dictionary defines sleep as “a natural, regularly recurring condition of rest for the body and mind, during which the eyes are usually closed and there is little or no conscious thought or voluntary movement.” Those strategically placed little weasel words we have italicized make it hard for us to give you a yes or no answer to this mystery. So as much as we want to present you with a tidy solution to our title Imponderable, we feel you deserve the hard truth.
Webster probably didn’t have fish in mind when he wrote this definition of “sleep.” First of all, except for elasmobranchs (fish with cartilaginous skeletons, such as sharks and rays), fish don’t have eyelids. So they can’t very well close them to sleep. No fish has opaque eyelids that block out vision, but some have a transparent membrane that protects their eyes from irritants.
Pelagic fish (who live in the open sea, as opposed to coasts), such as tuna, bluefish, and marlins, never stop swimming. Jane Fonda would be proud. Even coastal fish, who catch a wink or two, do not fall asleep in the same way humans do. Gerry Carr, director of Species Research for the International Game Fish Association, wrote us about some of the ingenious ways that fish try to catch a few winks, even if forty winks are an elusive dream:
Some reef fishes simply become inactive and hover around like they’re sleeping, but they are still acutely aware of danger approaching. Others, like some parrot fishes and wrasses, exude a mucus membrane at night that completely covers their body as though they’ve been placed in baggies. They wedge themselves into a crevice in the reef, bag themselves, and remain there, semicomatose, through the night. Their eyes remain open, but a scuba diver can approach them and, if careful, even pick them up at night, as I have done. A sudden flurry of movement, though, will send them scurrying. They are not totally unaware of danger.
In many ways, fish sleep the same way we plod through our everyday lives when we are awake. Our eyes are open but we choose, unconsciously, not to register in our brains most of the sensory data we see. A fish sleeping is in a state similar to the poor fish depicted watching the slide show in Kassie Schwan’s illustration. We stare at the screen with our eyes open, but our minds turn to mush. If a crazed assassin burst into the room, we could rouse ourselves to attention, but if someone asked us to describe what fabulous tourist attraction we were watching, we couldn’t say whether it was Stonehenge or the Blarney Stone.
If you accept that a fish’s blanking out is sleeping, then the answer to the second part of the mystery is that fish sleep at night, presumably because of the darkness. Anyone with an aquarium can see that fish can float effortlessly while sleeping. They exude grace—which is more than we can say for how most humans look when they are sleeping.
Submitted by Karole Rathouz of Mehlville, Missouri. Thanks also to Cindy and Sandor Keri of Woodstock, Georgia; and Heather Bowser of Tulsa, Oklahoma.
Why Do We Seem to Feel Worse at Night When We Have a Cold?
For the same reason that your feet swell up and hurt after a long day standing up. To quote Dr. Ernst Zander, of Winthrop Consumer Products:
Nasal obstruction, produced by a great variety of conditions, usually seems worse to a patient when he is lying down. This is because tissue fluids and blood tend to pool in the head more when he is recumbent than when he is standing.
Of course, one is generally more likely to feel tired and worn out at night. But the doctors who Imponderables consulted indicated that reclining for long periods of time will worsen symptoms—one reason why often we feel lousy despite the “luxury” of being able to lie in bed all day long when we are sick.
Why Do Many Dry Cleaning Stores Advertise Themselves as “French” Dry Cleaners? Is There Any Difference Between a French Dry Cleaner and a Regular Dry Cleaner?
To answer the last part of this Imponderable first, there is a BIG difference between a French dry cleaner and a regular dry cleaner: about one dollar per garment.
Sure, some justification exists for calling any dry cleaning establishment “French.” Dry cleaning was supposedly discovered in the 1830s by one Jolie Belin, a Frenchman who reputedly tipped over a kerosene lamp on a soiled tablecloth and found that the oil eliminated the stains. The story of Jolie Belin might be apocryphal, but dry cleaning definitely started in France.
When Do Fish Sleep? Page 14