COOKIE
Meaning: A small sweet cake, typically round, flat, and crisp
Origin: “The word was borrowed from the Dutch koekje, ‘little cake,’ which is the diminutive of Dutch koek, ‘cake.’ Cookie came into American English from the Dutch settlers of New York. It first appears in 1703 in the statement that ‘at a funeral, 800 cockies…were furnished.’ This early English spelling of the word differs from our modern spelling, but several other spellings also arose, such as cookey and cooky. The spelling cookie may have won out because the word is very common in the plural, spelled cookies.” (From Word Mysteries and Histories, by the Editors of The American Heritage Dictionaries)
DRAB
Meaning: Lacking brightness, dull
Origin: “In the 16th century, drab was a word for a kind of cloth, coming into English from French drap, ‘cloth.’ From this, the word came to mean the common color of such cloth, which was its natural undyed color of dull brown or gray. Hence the fairly general meaning ‘dull,’ whether of an object’s color (where it usually is brown or gray still, as ‘drab’ walls) or in a figurative sense, as a ‘drab’ day or someone’s ‘drab’ existence.” (From Dunces, Gourmands & Petticoats, by Adrian Room)
Old softie: Princeton professor John W. Tukey coined the term software in 1958.
URANIUM
Meaning: A dense radioactive metal used as a fuel in nuclear reactors
Origin: “In 1781 the brilliant English-German astronomer Sir William Herschel first recognized the seventh planet in our solar system, and named for it Uranus from the Greek god Ouranos. Eight years later the German chemist Kloproth discovered element 92, which he named uranium in honor of Herschel.” (From Word Origins, by Wilfred Funk)
NONCHALANT
Meaning: Feeling or appearing casual and relaxed
Origin: “The nonchalant person is cool and indifferent, a literal etymology, since the word is from French nonchaloir, meaning ‘not heated,’ which is derived from Latin noncalere, ‘not to be hot.’ Calor is Latin for ‘heat,’ from which we get calorie, the amount of food needed to heat you or energize you.” (From More About Words, by Margaret S. Ernst)
SALARY
Meaning: A regular payment made by an employer to an employee
Origin: “A salary, during the great days of the Romans, was called a salarium, ‘salt-money.’ The ancients regarded salt as such an essential to good diet (and before refrigeration it was the only chemical that preserved meat) that they made a special allowance in the wages of soldiers to buy sal (Latin for ‘salt’). With time any stipend came to be called a salarium, from which English acquired the word salary.” (From Hue and Cry and Humble Pie, by Morton S. Freeman)
BLINDFOLD
Meaning: A piece of cloth tied around the head to cover the eyes
Origin: “The name of the folded piece of cloth has only a coincidental resemblance to the way the material is doubled over. Blindfold actually comes from the Middle English blindfeld, ‘to be struck blind.’ Walter Tyndale used blyndfolded in his English translation of the Bible (1526), and if he was not the first to make the mistake, he was certainly the most influential.” (From Devious Derivations, by Hugh Rawson)
Q: What woman’s body part would ancient Chinese artists never paint? A: The feet.
EH TWO, CANADA?
While rummaging through the trivia vault here at the BRI, we kept coming across a fascinating fact: Of the 175-plus nations in the world, Canada—the 35th most populous country—comes in second in a surprising number of categories.
Canada was the 2nd country to legalize medical marijuana. (1st: Belgium)
Canada has the 2nd coldest national capital: Ottawa. (1st: Ulaanbaatar, Mongolia)
Canada is the 2nd largest foreign investor in Chile. (1st: United States)
Canada has the 2nd highest University enrollment rate in the world. (1st: United States)
Canada has the 2nd most tornadoes. (1st: United States)
Canada is the 2nd in pork exports. (1st: Denmark)
Canada has the 2nd highest amount of gum chewed per capita. (1st: United States)
Canada has the 2nd highest broadband Internet access in the world. (1st: South Korea)
Canada was the 2nd country to publish a National Atlas. (1st: Finland)
Canada has the 2nd highest fresh water use per capita. (1st: United States)
Canada has the 2nd highest water quality. (1st: Finland)
Canada is the 2nd largest per capita emitter of greenhouse gases. (1st: United States)
Canada has the 2nd most biotech companies. (1st: United States)
Canada is the 2nd largest exporter of red meat. (1st: Australia)
Canada is the 2nd biggest market for U.S. seafood. (1st: Japan)
Canada is the 2nd largest foreign investor in Korea. (1st: United States)
Canada has the 2nd highest incidence of breast cancer in the world. (1st: United States)
Canada is the 2nd most workaholic nation in the world. (1st: Japan)
Canada was the 2nd country with triple platinum sales of Prodigy’s “Fat Of The Land,” featuring the single Smack My Bitch Up. (1st: New Zealand)
Only 20% of the Sahara is covered with sand—the rest is rocky.
Thanksgiving Day in Canada is the 2nd Monday in October.
Canada has the 2nd most foreign visitors to Texas. (1st: Mexico)
Canada was the 2nd country to establish a Ministry of the Environment. (1st: France)
Canada was the 2nd country to require daytime running lights on all new vehicles. (1st: Norway)
Canada has the 2nd largest oil reserves in the world. (1st: Saudi Arabia)
Canada has the 2nd highest proportion of immigrant population. (1st: Australia)
Canada was the 2nd country with a Boy Scout program. (1st: England)
Canada has the 2nd most civilian pilots in the world. (1st: United States)
Canada has the 2nd highest cable TV access in the world. (1st: Belgium)
Canada was the 2nd country in the world to have a nuclear reactor. (1st: United States)
Canada was the 2nd country to develop a jet airplane. (1st: Great Britian)
Canada is the 2nd largest country in the world. (1st: Russia)
ALTHOUGH…
• Canada is 1st in literacy rate.
• Canada is 1st in waste generated per person.
• Canada was the 1st country to mine uranium.
• Canada was the 1st British colony to gain self-government.
• Canada was the 1st western country to recognize Ukrainian independence.
• Canada was the 1st country to conduct a national survey on violence against women.
• Canada was the 1st country to have a domestic communications satellite.
• Canada is 1st in ATM usage.
• Canada was the 1st to adopt a national multiculturalism policy.
• Canada is 1st in hydropower generation.
• Canada also has…
…the highest ocean tides (They’re in the Bay of Fundy).
…the longest covered bridge (New Brunswick).
…the longest street (Yonge Street, Toronto, at 1,178 miles).
…the largest National Park (Wood Buffalo National Park in Alberta/North West Territories).
No surprise: Canada is the largest importer of American automobiles.
LITTLE THINGS MEAN A LOT
A few more little things that caused big problems.
ANOTHER CONVERSION ERROR
The Mars Climate Orbiter blasted off in December 1998. Ten months later, it suddenly stopped transmitting signals and was presumed lost. An investigation found that the satellite had entered Martian orbit 60 miles too low and was destroyed entering the atmosphere. What caused the error? Lockheed Martin, which operated the satellite for NASA, had been sending maneuvering data to the orbiter in standard English units…unaware that the navigation team had done its calculations in metric units. Asked if they knew that NASA used th
e metric system, a Lockheed spokesman said, “obviously not.” Estimated loss: $125 million.
A COMMA
In 1997 the American Asphalt Co. submitted the winning bid ($27 million) for a contract to build and pave the planned Las Vegas Beltway. But one of the losing bidders noticed something—American had mistakenly put a comma where a period was supposed to be, and road signs that were supposed to be priced at $23.80 per square foot were priced at $23,800 instead. This erroneous amount hadn’t been added to the final price—the $27 million bid was still correct—but rather than risk a lawsuit, county officials scrapped all the bids and changed the scope of the bid, delaying construction for weeks…and adding $3.1 million in new costs.
A CHIP OF PAINT
On April 24, 1990, NASA launched the $1.5 billion Hubble Space telescope into Earth orbit…only to have it send back blurry images. What happened? A single chip of paint flaked off one of the instruments used to measure the shape of the telescope’s huge 94.5-inch main mirror. That distorted some of the measurements and caused the mirror to be shaped slightly too flat. NASA evenutally fixed the problem, but it took an extra space shuttle mission to do it and cost them millions of dollars.
Up or down? The Congo is the only river that flows both north and south of the equator.
DISEASES THAT JUST WON’T DIE
Before modern medicine and sanitation, diseases routinely decimated huge portions of the population. Some of these scourges, such as smallpox, have been virtually eliminated…but not all of them.
THE PLAGUE. It thrives in unsanitary environments and comes in two main varieties: bubonic and pneumonic. Bubonic plague is transmitted by infected fleas carried by rats. It’s 50% to 60% fatal without treatment. Pneumonic plague is even worse—it’s spread via airborne droplets and kills nearly 100% of untreated victims.
Over the course of world history, plagues have been responsible for 200 million human deaths and it’s still with us. According to the Centers for Disease Control, a dozen Americans get it every year, mostly in southwestern states. It’s treatable today, but still deadly: two U.S. citizens died of the disease in 1996.
RICKETS. This condition—caused by a lack of vitamin D—won’t kill you. But it weakens your bones to the point where they become deformed. Children who develop rickets can end up with curved spines and bow-shaped legs resembling wishbones.
Rickets was a widespread ailment until the 1920s, when the introduction of vitamin D–fortified milk, along with a greater awareness of nutrition, led to a dramatic decline in cases. Yet the preventable condition still occurs where bad eating habits prevail. In 2001 the CDC identified six cases of rickets among children in Georgia.
LEPROSY. Contrary to popular belief, leprosy does not cause body parts to fall off. It is an infectious disease that kills all feeling in the victim’s nerve-endings. Because lepers can’t feel pain, their infected parts are easily bruised, battered, and burned, which can result in a loss of digits and limbs.
Leprosy is still common in developing countries. The CDC says there were 738,284 cases of the disease in 2000, largely in India, Nepal, and Myanmar. But Americans still get it, too. According to the CDC, 108 cases of leprosy were identified in the U.S. in 1999.
What are zoonoses? Not what you think—they’re animal diseases communicable to man.
THE ICE WORM COMETH
The BRI library has an entire wing for books and articles on hoaxes. Here are a few classics.
KLONDIKE ICE WORMS
Background: In 1898 a young journalist named “Stroller” White got a job in Dawson, Alaska, with the Klondike Nugget. The terms of his employment were tough: he had to increase sales…or he was out in the cold. Just then, a fierce storm took hold of the area and it gave him an idea. He wrote an article about “ice worms” that had crawled out of a nearby glacier to “bask in the unusual frigidity in such numbers that their chirping was seriously interfering with the sleep of Dawson’s inhabitants.”
What Happened: Sales of the Nugget skyrocketed as people began forming expedition teams to search for the noisy creatures. White got to keep his job and the ice worm story became so popular that bartenders started serving “ice-worm cocktails,” in which they added a piece of frozen spaghetti to a customer’s drink. Annual ice worm festivals became a local tradition—and are still held today.
Update: For years everyone assumed that ice worms were just a figment of White’s imagination, but scientists recently claimed to have found real evidence of the existence of ice worms living inside Alaskan glaciers. No word on whether or not they chirp.
PRINCESS CARABOO
Background: One spring morning in 1817, a strange woman strolled into Almondsbury, England. She was five-foot-two and stunning, wearing a black shawl twisted like a turban around her head. She spoke a language no one could understand and had to use gestures to communicate. In those days a homeless woman roaming the street was usually tossed in the poorhouse, so the stranger was directed to see the Overseer of the Poor. But instead of sending her to the poorhouse, he sent her to stay at the home of Samuel Worrall, the county magistrate.
Days later a Portuguese sailor arrived at the Worrall household claiming to speak Caraboo’s bizarre language. He translated as Caraboo revealed her secret past: she was no homeless beggar—she was a princess from the island of Javasu. Pirates had kidnapped her and carried her across the ocean, but as they sailed through the English Channel, Caraboo jumped ship and swam ashore.
Q: What was Queen Anne’s Revenge? A: The name of Blackbeard’s pirate ship.
What Happened: The Worralls informed the local press and soon all England knew of Princess Caraboo. And for weeks, Caraboo was treated royally…until her former employer came forward.
A woman named Mrs. Neale had recognized the newspaper description of “Princess Caraboo” as her former servant, Mary Baker, a cobbler’s daughter. The giveaway: Baker had often entertained Mrs. Neale’s children by speaking a nonsense language. “Caraboo” reluctantly confessed to the fraud she and the “sailor” had perpetrated.
Amazingly, Mrs. Worrall took pity on Caraboo and gave her enough money to sail to Philadelphia. Seven years later she returned to England and made a living selling leeches to the Infirmary Hospital in Bristol.
CROSS-DRESSING KEN
Background: In July 1990, Carina Guillot and her 12-year-old daughter, Jocelyn, were shopping at a Toys “R” Us in Florida. As they strolled up and down the store aisles, they caught a glimpse of a peculiar-looking Ken doll. Sealed inside of a cardboard package was Barbie’s friend Ken, dressed in a purple tank top and a polka-dotted skirt with a lace apron. As doll collectors, the Guillots immediately knew this one was out of the ordinary and brought it to the front register for closer inspection. Employees determined that the doll hadn’t been tampered with and was indeed a genuine Mattel original. The Guillots purchased it for $8.99.
What Happened: Word of the “cross-dressing Ken” quickly hit the national media circuit. Newspapers wrote about it; TV talk shows talked about it. Collectors made outrageous bids of up to $4,000 for it. But the Guillots wouldn’t sell. Instead they kept the doll long enough for the truth to come out of the closet. Finally, a night clerk at the store, Ron Zero, came forward and confessed to the prank. Apparently Zero had dressed Ken up in Barbie’s clothes and then carefully resealed the package with white glue. Toys “R” Us fired him four days later.
Chinese food? Most of the egg rolls sold in the U.S. are made in Houston.
MORE DIAMOND GEMS
Another collection of fantastic baseball feats. If you like these you can find more in Who Was Traded for Lefty Grove? by Mike Attiyeh.
HE WHAT?
In 1960 Stan “The Man” Musial of the St. Louis Cardinals did something almost unheard of in today’s world of professional sports. After receiving one of baseball’s biggest ever contracts—$100,000 a year—in 1958, Musial had a subpar year in 1959 (he failed to bat above .310 for the first time in his 17-year career). So he deman
ded—and received—a $20,000 pay cut.
BUSY DAY
Mets center fielder Joel Youngblood showed up at Wrigley Field in Chicago on August 4, 1982, having no idea he was about to make history. In the third inning, he hit a two-run single off the Cubs’ Ferguson Jenkins. The following inning, he was told that he’d been traded to the Montreal Expos—and that they were waiting for him. So he packed his stuff and caught a plane to Philadelphia. He joined the Expos’ lineup late in the game and singled off Phillies ace Steve Carlton. Youngblood made the record books for being on two different teams, batting against two future Hall of Famers, and getting hits off both of them…all on the same day.
BET ON PETE
He may have had a gambling problem off the field, but on the field, Pete Rose was a gambler’s best friend. Rose has the distinction of being on the winning side in more games than any other player in baseball history: 2,011 games.
IN LIKE A LION, OUT LIKE A LAMB
When most fans hear the words “Red Sox” and the date “1986,” only one thing comes to mind: the infamous ball that went through Bill Buckner’s legs, which cost them game 6 of the World Series, which the “cursed” Red Sox then lost in game 7. But the Red Sox season started on a positive note. For the only time in major-league history, Dwight Evans hit the very first pitch of the baseball season over the fence for a home run.
Full moon? We see a man in the moon; other cultures see a woman, an ape, or a rabbit.
FROM A TO Z
Hank Aaron holds arguably the game’s most coveted record: 755 career home runs. He comes in first in another category as well: alphabetically. Of the more than 15,000 players in the history of the game, Aaron’s name comes first. (In case you were wondering, Dutch Zwilling of the 1910 Chicago White Sox comes last.)
Uncle John’s Unstoppable Bathroom Reader Page 42