Wolf Peach

 There isn't a lot for me to say on this one, but I find it too hilarious to skip. 

The Latin Name for Tomatoes can translate to Wolf Peach. 

This comes from the fact that they come from the Nightshade family, which is notoriously poisonous. To try to warn people off of them, they got called Wolf Peaches. It was later discovered that they aren't poisonous, but the name stuck. 

There is some link between these 'wolf peaches' and German Werewolves, but I haven't been able to find specifics on it. I also haven't been able to figure out what they supposedly did with Witches and Black Magic. 

Interestingly, the French called them 'Love Apples' because they thought it was an aphrodisiac, but it wasn't until the 1800's that people started thinking it was something safe to eat, not just a nice ornamental plant. 

Tomatoes themselves are still in contention because of their classification as fruit or vegetables. Tomatoes count as fruits, since they contain seeds, but they're treated as vegetables by most. Botanically, fruit. Culinarily, vegetable. This actually got to the supreme court in 1893, and was ruled to be a vegetable as far as taxes are concerned at least, and because they are commonly used for savory dishes. 

That's why you get to see those shirts saying that 'Knowledge is knowing Tomato is a Fruit, Wisdom is knowing not to put it in Fruit Salad'. There have also been jokes about Ketchup being a fruit smoothie, but the thought of drinking a cup of it makes me nauseous. 

I'll leave this at that. There's a rich and saucy history to the tomato that I didn't cover, so you might look into that if you're interested. The first link below is really good for that if you want more information. Either way though, please keep this in mind next time you want some 'Wolf Peach Sauce' or something. 

Summary:

Richard Niesenbaum-- Wolf Peach or Love Apple, Our Complicated History with the Tomato

Times leader-- Tomato once called Wolf Peach

New Historian-- Taming the Tomato

North Carolina Extension Gardener-- Tomatoes

Image Sources:

Wolf Peach from Instagram

Tomatoes Picture from iStock

April Fools Day!

 I've been holding onto this story for a bit. It's one of those April Fools' Day pranks that...well, it didn't work like it should have because the people being pranked didn't realist they were being pranked in time. 

In 1971, Texas Representative Tom Moore sent in a bill to have the Texas House of Representatives honor Albert DeSalvo, from Massachussetts, honored for his work in 'Population Control' and 'Applied Psychology'. 

This was both meant as a prank, and to prove that no one was reading the proposals well enough. Unfortunately, it kinda backfired because it got passed. 

So...Texas honored a serial killer, known as the Boston Strangler. 

Oops? 

Thankfully, I think he pulled it before it became official. 

So, lesson learned. Make sure you'll be ok with it if the prank goes unnoticed. Or maybe make sure it's flashy enough to get noticed. 

Either way, I hope you had fun and pranked someone somehow today, and basically just that you had a good day. Hopefully I'll see you again soon. 

Sources:

Snopes-- The Texas Legislature Honored a Serial Killer

KUT- Austin News-- A look back at Texas' Unfunniest April Fools Jokes

Encyclopedia Britannica-- One Good Fact about Legislative Pranks 

Acnestis

 I found another old word that no one will ever remember but is really awesome. 

Acnestis: That one spot on your back that you can never manage to scratch. Somewhere between shoulderblades and pelvis, that itches and you can't reach. 

Amusingly, this applies to animals too, so that dog rolling on his back to scratch an itch is dealing with Acnestis. So is the cat rubbing it's back against everything. And bears rubbing on trees, like Baloo in the Jungle Book. Pretty much any animal, really. If it can have itches, it can have this itch. 

So...shockingly, I'm going to go rub against a doorway now to see if I can hit the itch in the middle of my back that I didn't have until I started thinking about this too much. Have fun, I hope you don't have issues with the itches now that I've got you thinking about them, and feel free to use it against people to sound smart. 

Just to prove that I didn't come up with it, here are some Sources. 

Living With Dyslexia-- 26 lost English Words We Love

CSoft-- Wacky Word Wednesday-- Acnestis

Medium-- Peter Flom Blog-- Acnestis

Wonderland Press- Word of the Day-- Acnestis

Salute the Pig-- Acnestis

Wordsmith-- Word a Day-- Acnestis

Wiktionary-- Acnestis

Galaxy Frog

 Google's probably tired of how many times I've done a search for this one. I think it looks really cool and I know a few people who like frogs, who then said something about it later so I pulled it up again. And again. And now I'm going to tell you about it, at least some. 

This picture, from A-Z Animals, is a Galaxy Frog from India. They're pretty rare and only grow to about an inch long, so it's hard to do pictures. 

Unfortunately, there are a lot of people who found out about these awesome frogs and started hurrying in to get more pictures. It's especially hard because these frogs only live in a small area, which is under threat from construction and whatnot. Even worse, if handled with bare hands, photographers can easily kill these frogs or make them sick, same for using flash on their cameras, but I doubt most nature photographers would think twice about that. 

This is from Discover Wildlife, link below. 

These guys have their own branch of the Frog family tree, but I haven't been able to find out much information that describes how these guys are different from the other frogs, and what makes them special. Part of that is because of their rarity, part of it is because there are limited funds for studying things like this. 

Again, Discover Wildlife link below. 

I look forward to seeing what they discover about them in the future, and hope they hang around long enough for us to learn about them. I understand, unfortunately, that they might not. Either way, this is a really fun frog to show to frog lovers and kids. 

Sources:

Discover Wildlife-- The Rare, Starlit Frog

A-Z Animals-- Exploring the Unique Celestial Frog

ZSL-- Star Studded Galaxy Frog

Mongabay--Photo Tourism Threatens Rare Frog

Edge Of Existence-- Survival Blueprint for Galaxy Frog

Parrot Waxcap Mushroom

I came across a picture of this and I thought it was AI generated, but it's not. It's a
real thing. 

See why I thought that? Seriously. 

This isn't AI generated, but it is a very carefully done picture of a very specific phase of growth, so most pictures don't look like this. You can see why it's interesting to me though.

They're from the UK, which is hilarious because that's the home of Wonderland and I really think this would be a better mushroom for that weirdness than the red and white one, but they can also be found...pretty much anywhere. They're a bit rare, only in acidic-soiled grasslands, so don't expect to find them much. 

Unlike alot of mushrooms, these guys aren't poisonous. Instead, they're slimy. There's a chance they might give you an upset stomach, but some people say they're edible. 

They do fade from that lovely sliminess to a normal mushroom that would be overlooked by most people. 

There isn't a lot of information on these guys for me, but I really wanted to share because that picture is insane. 

Mushrooms are awesome and likely to show up a lot now that I've seen some really cool looking ones. 

I hope you have fun with them, have fun with life, and have an awesome day. Seeya again soon. 

Sources: None of which had much awesome information, which is why I don't have much here. 

First Nature-- Parrot Waxcap Mushrooms

Wild Food UK-- Parrot Waxcap

iNaturalist-- Parrot Waxcap Mushroom

Mushroom Expert-- Green Parrot Waxcap

Totally Wild UK-- Parrot Waxcap

Arbor True-- Mushroom Monday-- Parrot Waxcap

St. Patrick

 Since it's St. Patrick's Day, I thought I should share some things about the guy it's named after, who you probably don't know nearly as well as you think you do. 

Before you object- here's one fact you probably won't know. He wasn't Irish. 

Yeah, no. We don't have a lot of information about the guy's start and whatnot, but he was brought to Ireland as a slave. After 6 years, he escaped and went somewhere, possibly France. After more time I don't know a lot about, he got promoted to Bishop at age 43 and had a dream that the people of Ireland needed him to bring Christianity to them, so he left to preach at them with some effectiveness. 

He used shamrocks to explain the trinity, so it seems a bit amusing that everyone is looking for the four-leaf one.

He supposedly banished all snakes from Ireland. It was probably a metaphor for the 'evils' of paganism, since they're considered a sign of the devil from when he took the form of a serpent in Eden. Archeologists say there weren't any snakes then, and there aren't many now, so don't that's kinda a weird choice, but I'll leave that alone. 

Everyone knows he's the Patron Saint of Ireland, but apparently he's also the Patron Saint of Nigeria. Yay? Not sure how that happened. 

And while everyone knows him for Green...his favorite color was Blue. He was most often associated with blue, but everyone knows Ireland is 80 shades of green, so they switched it over. 

So, now that I've told you that the Irish Saint isn't Irish, that the three-leaf clover is the one he liked more than the one we all search for, that green isn't his color, and I assume everyone already knew that he really didn't have anything to do with leprechauns, I'll leave you to the rest of the holiday. 

Maybe I should have posted this yesterday so you could grumble at people today, but this way I don't destroy any celebrations you want to do. Life's short, have fun. Even if the holiday and the saint don't match up well.  

Sources: 

Tourism Ireland-- 10 Things You DIdn't Know about St. Patrick

Franciscan Media-- Saint Patrick

Catholic Online-- St. Patrick

Encyclopedia Britannica- St. Patrick Facts

Pi Day

Ok, a little bit late. I was planning to something for the last week, but I've been feeling really off and sleep takes precedence right now. Sorry. 

Anyway. 

Pi day. My favorite mathematical holiday. 

3.14-- March 14. The first 3 digits of mathematical Pi. 

My family celebrates it with Mom making our favorite pies, but sometimes we're a bit off on the exact day because of things. 

Either way though, you now have a mathematical holiday to celebrate and an excuse to eat pizza and pies. Though not cobbler. That's a different thing. 

I hope you have fun with it in the future and remember next time it comes around. If you already knew about it, what kind of Pie did you have? Was it good? 

Hopefully I'll be back soon. Have fun. 

Clarke's Third Law

Firstly, sorry for disappearing for a week. Had to go off some meds for a test and it made keeping track of time a bit weird, but I'm back on them now and I can remember that I did not in fact post already today, so I go post. 

Secondly- the third law. 

This is the one that gets quoted most. I know it's popped up in Marvel, and probably DC, and probably half of the science fiction shows ever created. 

Any Sufficiently Advanced Technology Is Indistinguishable From Magic. 

There's a theory about a lot of old mythology and gods were created to explain the world. Thunder and Lightning are because a God is mad, not because electricity. (I should have chosen a different example because I can't remember the science of lightning right now. I now assign that to myself as homework.) The seasons changed because of magic, not getting closer/further from the sun. Magic. 

Alternatively, show a video to someone from Ancient Rome and you'll definitely be called a magician. Predict the weather correctly and you'll be a magician or god (This counts right now still, at least for me). Use your phone to call someone. Cars. Printers. Depending on how much you know about things, these pieces of technology are simple, or they're magic. 

I'm not saying there's no magic in the world, but there are a lot of things we call magic that I bet will be figured out in 50 years. They'll just find more magic then. 

Now that I've got this posted, I'm going to do a magical thing called 'Sleep' that we still haven't explained but is essential for health even if we can't figure out how. 

Sources:

My favorite place to look through these laws, which is a compilation from several places

Statistical Modelling--Columbia University-- Clarke's Laws

Twitter-- Physics in History-- Clarke's Three Laws

Geoff Marlow-- Substack-- Clarke's Three Laws

Ebsco-- Clarke's Three Laws

New Scientist-- Clarke's three laws

Clarke's Second Law

 The Only Way to Discover the Limits of the Possible Is to Venture a Little Bit Past Them Into The Impossible. 

Sounds pretty self Explanatory. You never know what you can do until you do it, or try. And I'm not exactly sure how to comment on this one, so...seeya soon. 

Sources Same as Yesterday:

My favorite place to look through these laws, which is a compilation from several places

Statistical Modelling--Columbia University-- Clarke's Laws

Twitter-- Physics in History-- Clarke's Three Laws

Geoff Marlow-- Substack-- Clarke's Three Laws

Ebsco-- Clarke's Three Laws

New Scientist-- Clarke's three laws

Clarke's First Law and Asimov's Corollary

So, this is straight out copy/pasted from my favorite link below, but who it's from is a bit...weird. I've mostly been using it to find a law I want to bring up and googling it to find other sources. 

 Clarke's First Law:

When a distinguished but elderly scientist states that something is possible, he is almost certainly right. When he states that something is impossible, he is very probably wrong.

Corollary (Asimov): When the lay public rallies round an idea that is denounced by distinguished but elderly scientists, and supports that idea with great fervor and emotion -- the distinguished but elderly scientists are then, after all, right.

It should be noted that the 'elderly' scientist is someone in the range of 30-50, because Clarke believed that any scientist past the age of 50 is useful only in board meetings and should be kept out of labs. 

Personally, I'll just say it as a fact of life. If someone knows what they're talking about and says it's possible, probably right. If they say something is impossible, that's probably wrong because anything is possible. 

I think I'm going to leave it at that and come back with the second law tomorrow, because he's fun. 

Sources:

My favorite place to look through these laws, which is a compilation from several places

Statistical Modelling--Columbia University-- Clarke's Laws

Twitter-- Physics in History-- Clarke's Three Laws

Geoff Marlow-- Substack-- Clarke's Three Laws

Ebsco-- Clarke's Three Laws

New Scientist-- Clarke's three laws

Schmidt Sting Pain Index

So, I started a list a while ago of interesting things to tell everyone about and it's...well, not short. And I have a bad habit of finding things a dozen at a time when I'm listening to podcasts or watching QI, or something like that. I also have sections for reminding myself to post about these things during specific points in the year, for things like Pride Month or National Velociraptor Awareness Day. One must always be aware of Velociraptors. 

But that's a different matter. 

Today, I picked from the list and now I'm going to tell you about the Schmidt Sting Pain Index. It's another case of Scientists being...special. 

American Entymologist Justin Schmidt, who died in 2023, got himself purposefully stung/bit by over a thousand insects so he could tell you how painful they are in comparison. To be sure, those thousand+ stings came from 83 types of ant/bee/wasp, so he didn't one-and-done them, and he probably reminded himself of relative pain levels several times so he didn't inflate them in his memory or have a particularly strong/weak bug for the only example. 

Like several other historical scientists, I just have one question. Why? 

Ok, so I actually can answer that kinda. That's information that can actually help later. The scale only goes from 1-4, with one being pretty painless and four being intensely painful. 

The really hilarious part though, is how he describes them. It's not just a number, he's...poetic about it. And hilarious. 

Here's an example of one that I actually know, and I'll disagree. It's not that bad.

2.0 -- Yellow jacket: Hot and smoky, almost irreverent. Imagine W.C. Fields extinguishing a cigar on your tongue.

Going by last time I got bit, I'd say it's more like...a drop of boiling oil that hits your arm when you don't have time to wipe it off. That could be just me though. 

He puts the Bald Faced Hornet at the same level as Yellow Jacket, but my Dad, who has been bit by both, says the hornet is a lot worse. 

I kinda like the description for the Fierce Black Polybia Wasp. Despite it being a 2.5, it's described as 'A ritual gone wrong, satanic. The gas lamp in the old church explodes in your face when you light it.' And I just like that it's not bad, but he called it satanic. He might have been getting that idea from the looks of it though, which you can see in the picture below from the Missoula Butterfly House. 

The highest his scale goes is to 4. After reading his descriptions, I'm more than happy to not go near those dudes. It started with just the Bullet Ant, but it's expanded from there to a few other 4s. 

4.0 -- Bullet ant: Pure, intense, brilliant pain. Like walking over flaming charcoal with a 3-inch nail in your heel.

4.0 -- Warrior Wasp: Torture. You are chained in the flow of an active volcano. Why did I start this list?

If you just want a visual representation of it, try this link to Compound Chem, who have a PDF of it drawn up for those who like bubbles. 

I can think of a lot of things I'd do for science, but...not that. Props to the guy that did, along with a recommendation to talk to a psychiatrist. Or three. 

While you consider this and probably stare thoughtfully at the nearest ant/bee/etc, I'm going to go try not to have nightmares about this. Seeya again soon. 

Sources: 

Entomology Today- Suffering for Science-- Written by Justin Schmidt

National History Museum-- The Schmidt Sting Pain Index

Encyclopedia Britannica-- Schmidt Sting Pain Index

Missoula Butterfly House-- Schmidt Pain Scale

Altschmerz

Today, I figured I'd tell you about another one of those really cool words I've come across. 

Altschmerz is a sense of weariness of the same old problems. The exhaustion from wrestling your anxieties, fears, and flaws into submission every day to just get on with life. 

Examples include imposter syndrome, which is basically the feeling that you're not good enough to be (Blank). Such as, I've almost hit 200 blog posts here, but am I really saying anything that anyone wants to hear? Am I being too opinionated? Missing information you want to know? Is it annoying that I keep linking my sources at the bottom like this instead of trying to do it MLA style or something? These are my demons to wrestle, and they can get tiring, so this resonates with me a lot. Especially right now, but I'll deal with it. I always do. 

Weltschmerz is a similar word, but instead of focusing on yourself, it's the feeling you get when you look at the world as it is and realize that it's not what you think the world should be, and that it will never be what you think it should be. That's one that I can almost guarantee everyone is feeling. 

And now I'm too depressed to want to talk about them more. 

Darn. Well, now you've got a new word to explain why you're tired even when you haven't done anything. 

Go do something fun and tell me about it, so I can look at the world and see more good bits to it. Beyond the purring cat that has decided it needs to try to climb up my nose now. 

Sources:

The Dictionary of Unknown Sorrows-- Altschmerz

Practical Psych-- What is Altschmerz

German Language Blog-- Altschmerz and Weltschmerz

Sea Bunnies

 I think I might accidentally be falling in love with sea slugs, because they're a lot more adorable and interesting than the ones on land. You might see a few more of them in the near future, but that's more because they're adorable than anything else. 

Case in point: Sea Bunnies. 

This image is from The Strange Animals link below. It's a podcast, if you'd rather hear them talk about Sea Bunnies while staring adoringly at a picture of them. I won't, but only because I already decided to listen to the podcast when I get to number 420, later. Going back over something this cute isn't a bad thing, and a reminder to see what new things get learned about them can be good. 

For those interested, you can also buy a plush version of these guys to cuddle. That may or may not be what tipped me off to them. Strangely, the same way the Strange Animals people found a plush version, by going in the day after Valentine's Day and finding them on sale. 

So, the sea bunny is a type of sea slug, also known as nudibranchs, which are a type of mollusk, like oysters. Same family tree, vastly different critters. Sea Bunnies live in tropical waters, particularly in the Indo-Pacific, and have lifespans of a few months to a year. They're covered in a fuzzy coating of protuberances they use to feel the world, and have two black stalks of chemoreceptors on top that look like bunny ears, plus gills on their 'butt' that look like a fluffy tail. Picture below, from A-Z Animals, shows their fuzzy-butts too, but looks a bit less bunny-like. A bit.  

Despite their innocent and fluffy-looking appearance, these guys are actually poisonous because they eat sea sponges that have toxins in them, which the itty-bitty bunny absorbs. That's actually why they don't get eaten much either, because anything that can handle the toxins wouldn't see these tiny, one-inch long creatures as anything near big enough to be worth eating. That's not to say there aren't critters that eat them, like sea-hares and cone snails, but they're pretty off the menu for most. They aren't too picky about what to eat though, so some of them might actually also have jellyfish poison in them too, which means any plans of cuddling one might lead to skin irritation for humans to. So, either stick to imaginary cuddles, get a plush, or I guess we can wear gloves.

Until then, this is my plush sea bunny, named Disco because of the shinies and because the family group for him is Discodorididae. I'll give him cuddles for all the sea bunnies I can't cuddle. Let me know if I need to cuddle him for you too. 

I'll see you again soon, to tell you about something else fun I find. Until then, find some fun for yourself. 

Sources:

Ocean Info-- Sea Bunny

Our Breathing Planet-- Sea Bunny

North American Divers-- 5 facts about the Sea Bunny

Animal Fact Files-- Sea Bunny

Padi-- 10 facts about the Sea Bunny

A-Z Animals-- Pokemon or Sea Creature?

A-Z Animals-- Discover the Sea Bunny

Strange Animals Podcast-- Sea Bunnies

Happy Mardi Gras!

Hi! 

I could (and would) have sworn that I posted again the day before yesterday, but oops. Sorry. But, I'm back again. 

So, today's going to be pretty short because I'm a bit tired after the business today, but I really wanted to post this today, because it's Mardi Gras. 

I'm actually going to skip finding sources here because there are a lot if you want to go looking, and I just want to share what I already know. 

Mardi Gras is also known as Fat Tuesday, or Shrove Tuesday. It's the day before Ash Wednesday, which is the start of Lent. 

For those that don't know it, Lent is the Christian practice of abstaining from something for the period of time that Jesus spent in the Desert. 40 days (minus Sundays). During that time, people are supposed to pick something to abstain from such as no soda, no fast food, or no sugar. In the past, it was a time of giving up red meat, leavening agents, desserts, and sometimes other things. This was meant to be a time of cleansing and being extra religious and whatnot. 

(It might also be a thing about spring being a bit sparse on some foods because the fall harvest is running out and the spring crops aren't ready yet, but that's just a theory from me, so ignore that.)

Mardi Gras was the last day of eating the good food or having a party before Lent, when you had to be good and eat bland foods. Since the start of it all, it's become a giant festival and a symbol of letting go. 

New Orleans has the largest festival and has gotten more than a bit of a reputation from it, but that all makes sense because they're a large, Catholic, city, and a tourist attraction. Because of the tourist aspect and a few other things, I'm not sure how much they still stick to the Lent part of things, and how much has changed because of the festival attracting people who just want to go wild for a bit. 

Today, at my church, my Mother, Brother, and I put together a Pancake Dinner with pancakes and sausages and bacon and fruit salad and all sorts of sugary toppings, to celebrate. Normally, it's not hard to make that as a dinner for my family, but in a different kitchen, making it for 30 people, it was rather chaotic and annoyingly harder. So, I'll make you do the work to look up anything you're curious about for Mardi Gras. 

Hopefully I'll be back tomorrow to tell you about Sea bunnies, because those things are seriously adorable and I can't wait to find out more to tell you about them. 

Hellbender

 As promised, Hellbender Salamanders. 

The picture here is from the link below for Marine Sanctuary. 

Also known as Snot Otters, Mudcats, and Devil Dogs. They spend most of their time hiding under large rocks, which is why the picture above. 

This is the largest species of Salamanders in North America, growing to over a foot long and weighing up to 5 pounds. Most of the salamanders I've encountered have been about the size of a finger, so this is a pretty large critter. Not the largest in the world, but I'll cover that one someday too. 

Interestingly, at least to me, these guys need the water they live in to be clear and clean because they breathe through their skin instead of through gills or their mouths or anything like that. Well, they have gills when they're younger, but they grow out of them. If they get covered in mud, like one of the nicknames suggests, or if the water has too much other stuff in it, then they suffocate. That's part of why they are entirely aquatic instead of being able to wander in and out, like a lot of other salamanders. 

You'd probably think that the tiny salamanders only live for a year or two, but they can live up to 10 sometimes. These guys specifically can live for 25 years in the wild, or longer in captivity. 

This picture comes from the Smithsonian link below. This is closer to the image that had me investigating hellbenders first, along with the name. 

Ok, so, this is one of those times where I have problems defending scientists, but please don't hate on them too much. They've done a lot of research into how salamanders, axolotls, and others can regrow toes and limbs and things, which has led to advancements that have helped in humans. These guys don't do that. They were tracked by cutting off toes to mark them. Please don't hate on scientists too much for this. 

Before you get too up-in-arms about them though, they do have teeth that can break through human skin. They also have a defense mechanism to excrete mucus when threatened. Which means, they can bite and are slippery. I'm actually not too surprised that attempts to tag them caused problems. 

One of the really cool things about them though, one that I adore finding out about, is that these guys are apparently the only species left on their particular branch of the Salamander Family Tree. There are fossils of these guys going back over 150 million years, and these are the guys that managed to survive it all. 

Please, Humanity, don't destroy this unique and weird creature. I like them. 

Hopefully I'll be back tomorrow with something else. I don't know what yet. Any votes?

Sources
Fish and Wildlife-- Eastern Hellbender

Fish and Wildlife-- Hellbenders, Fantastic Beasts of Rivers and Streams

Fish and Wildlife-- Hellbenders, a Song

Marine Sanctuary-- Hellbenders

Smithsonian-- Hellbender

New York Department of Environmental Conservation-- Eastern Hellbender

Wildlife Facts-- Hellbender Salamander

PBS-- 12 facts about the Hellbender

Defenders of Wildlife-- Hellbender

Sorry Again and National Don't Cry Over Spilled Milk Day

 Sorry. I didn't mean to disappear for an entire month. Things just got hectic and I really didn't have the energy for this, so I kept saying I'd do it tomorrow. Then I had paperwork hell, but that's a different matter. 

In some ways though, I thought this would be the perfect day to come back because today is National Don't Cry Over Spilled Milk Day. So, I'm not going to cry over the days I didn't post or that my break took a lot longer than I had planned it to be. 

One fun thing about that phrase though, is that it's not limited to English. You can check at this blog here, who already wrote up about it. Most cultures have something similar to this phrase, a surprising number of them even include milk specifically instead of just water or juice or something. I seriously expected more variety from this phrase in other languages. 

Hopefully I'll be back tomorrow to tell you about Hellbender Salamanders. I haven't investigated them much because I'm bribing myself to get back to this with that, but there's got to be something interesting about them beyond their name and being the largest salamander in North America. And that they're the only member of their branch of the Salamander family tree. And that they're also known as Snot Otters. Or Lasagna Lizards. 

I'm just gonna sign off now before I start diving down that rabbit hole and tell you about them immediately. Tomorrow. Bribing myself with that. 

Sorry

 Sorry for disappearing. Things have been hectic and I've just been feeling pretty run-down overall, so I haven't had the energy to remember to do this most of the time. Sorry. 

I've got lots of plans moving forward and lots of ideas about things, but I don't know when I'll be able to do this. I'll try when I can, but no promises. I'm just tired and it's hard to do the things I really need to do, I don't have the energy to do more. Sorry.

World Record Cookie Swap

 Christmas takes a lot more everything than anyone actually plans for. It's annoying. Even more annoying is that my oven decided to die literally mid-cookie-bake. I had a pan of Hawaiian Butter Mochi in it, along with a tray of gluten-free almond sugar cookies, and the oven lost heat enough that neither actually finished baking. I had to get everything baked up in my tiny toaster oven, which I actually have the oven version of that because it's so much more useful than a pop-up toaster. It was annoying, but that was my option. 

Since that's been on my mind a lot recently, I've got two things for amusement here. Well, one recent story and what I think of it. 

The story first, is that there was a thing done in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, recently with 83,000 cookies put together in a cookie swap, to try to break a world record. I'm not entirely certain what record was attempted to be broken, or who with, but...well, it's a pretty big event. 83,427 cookies to be more exact, baked by 583 bakers in 67 teams from 14 states and New Zealand. They provided evidence for the Guinness book of world records in hopes that they could get the record for the largest cookies swap. 

This is...an interesting story. It involves a lot of people and moving parts and could be very impressive sounding. 

Except...well, I'm me. 

I'm not particularly religious, but I do have affiliations with a church that I've been going to at least twice a year for my entire life. It used to be a lot more, but lately, I can only guarantee two days that I'd be there, and now I'm not even sure about that. The first day was the Shrove Tuesday Pancake Feed that my family put together because my brother makes the best pancakes. The other was the Cookie Faire in December, but apparently the Health Department says that a bake-sale type thing is no longer allowed because there's too much risk that someone could get sick and blame the church or a baker. To keep this even vaguely child-friendly, I'm going to skip entirely over my opinion of that and those people. 

The Cookie Faire was something that my Church put together every December, for the community. We'd bake up all sorts of cookies and homemade candies and donate them, then people would come in and pick out their favorites from the selection to put in their personal boxes. We sold them by the pound, cookies 6 dollars a pound and candy 8, then we'd donate all the money to the local food bank. 

This is the part where I'm really not impressed by that 80,000 cookie count. 

The last time we were able to put that on before the Health Department got too upset about it, I baked about 15,000 cookies for it, of 60 different types. I also made about two dozen different kinds of candy. In my home kitchen, over the course of a month, a few hours a day most days. They'd get made, then put into a freezer until the day of. The list of planned bakes for me was three pages long, single space, over 100 planned cookie types. Most of them I made about 200 of. 

So, if I want to challenge that, I just need about 6-7 people as enthused about it as me, and a lot of people to come eat them. The number of people they had there, they could have just baked 100 apiece and gotten there pretty easily. I can do that in less than two hours, if you don't count frosting them. 67 teams, yeah, one days work for each of them and all's good. 

This boils down to: Very impressive act. 

Hold My Beer.

Sources:

Go look it up yourself. Pittsburgh, 80,000 cookies, world record. 

P.S. Might not actually try to break their record, just giving it some serious consideration to try. 

HAPPY NATIONAL CAT HERDER'S DAY!!!!

 As above, Happy National Cat Herder's Day. 

You might know that the phrase 'it's like herding cats' means that it's a chaotic and impossible task. I've also heard a similar phrase of 'nailing jello to a tree', which I find hilarious in so many ways. Today is the day that we celebrate those that have to do impossible tasks, or somehow succeed at controlling the chaos. Cats are not required, but they're always welcome. 

In case you're curious, I have tried herding cats and it's actually kinda workable as long as you're inside a house and using a squirt bottle to do the herding. Kinda. Maybe. I mean, I got them out of the area I didn't want them in, and I count that as enough of a win. 

Today is the day to celebrate the people that do the impossible. People like project managers that have to get everyone to work together on a project with deadlines and possible interpersonal conflicts. People like office managers (or assistants, receptionists, whoever the miracle worker is in the office) that make sure paperwork is done on time and correctly, and things run smoothly. People like caretakers that help their clients make sense of what can be a pretty big mess in their lives. People like parents and teachers who have to somehow manage to herd actual kids for years on end. People who manage to tame the chaos and keep lives on track. Those people are not just worthy of appreciating, but worth having their own day to thank them and make sure they know that you appreciate the herculean tasks they manage to perform every day. 

It's been suggested that you might celebrate this day by using your favorite cat meme or video to draw attention to it and spread word so that, in the future, more people will know the holiday, along with trying to make your own cat herders feel appreciated. 

Naturally, I like this day just for the job of herding cats because, as you know, I have a few of them. For a random fun thing though, here's a video of my silly kittens. The bigger one, Emu, doesn't like sharing her can of wet food, but little Pan would like some too. I just find Emu's reaction hilarious. 

Sources:

National Day Calendar-- Cat Herders Day

National Today-- Cat Herders Day

Days of the Year-- National Cat Herders Day

A Curious Nature-- National Cat Herders day

Silbo Gomero

 This is a really weird language, but also very interesting. Buusuu apparently has a course in it if you really need to try to learn it. 

So, here's how it's weird. 

Silbo Gomero is a whistle-language, where the speakers 'whistle in Spanish' so that they can be heard across canyons and stuff on the Canary Island that this language originates from. 

If you know Spanish, you can kinda figure it out, but it is still very weird. The one time I heard it, admittedly on an episode of QI, it sounded a bit like a cringy high voice was speaking through a napkin, for lack of a better comparison. 

Considering that it's all done in whistles, they did have to break down the language to only a few sounds so that it can survive distortion from the surroundings better, turning the entire language into two sounds for vowels and five for consonants, give or take. The interesting thing is that the language used to have a basis in another language, but it got adopted into Spanish when the conquistadors came around 

Even with phones and whatnot, there are a lot of people working to keep around the only whistled language in the world, which I totally support. If I were better at whistling, I might try to learn it myself. 

I don't know how to put the sounds here, so I'm adding a few Youtube sources that you can listen to and learn more. I just got reminded of this and thought it was something really cool to share. I hope you enjoyed learning and I hope that I'll be back soon, despite my recent issues with things. 

Sources;

Language Museum-- Silbo Gomero

BBC- Silbo Gomero

Buusuu-- Learn Silbo Gomero

Unesco-- Intangible Heritage-- Silbo Gomero

Youtube--Euromaxx-- The Ancient Whistle Language of Silbo Gomero

Youtube-- Unesco-- Whistled Language of the Canary Islands

Youtube--ENTR-- How the Whistle Language worlds