THUNDER AND LIGHTING

Today I learned (thanks Chuck and Josh!) that it isn't that your rubber tires keeping your car grounded that keeps you safe from lighting strikes during a lighting storm.  

I learned that it is due to the engineering of your car, and your car being a Faraday cage.  I already knew what a Faraday cage was because I looked it up after seeing The Sorcerer's Apprentice (yes I saw it, it's a Nicolas Cage movie, and a good one too.)

Speaking of Sorcerer's Apprentice, I hate Fantasia.  

For the animals

Today I learned about Sodium Thiosulfate.

We have a HUGE (that doesn't even begin to describe it) hole in our street.  I would estimate it is 20' x 20' x 20'.

There's a water main break under our street and they've been working on it for a week plus.  There's a guy out on 24 hour duty (okay, multiple guys on shifts) to keep people from falling in, and he'll usually answer the public's questions about what's going on.

The water main break means water needs to be pumped out, and they're pumping it on to our street, which goes down the sewer lines and out to the ocean.

The weirdest thing is that they've been dripping a liquid in to it from 5 gallon jugs, just a few drops a minute.  The jug is just set up on the curb with a drip valve on it.  It's labeled Sodium Thiosulfate, and my boyfriend was curious as to what it was for.  So we learned a thing or two.  Basically, it dechlorinates water so that it makes it safe for animals to drink. From wikipedia;

To dechlorinate tap water for aquariums or treat effluent from waste water treatments prior to release into rivers. The reduction reaction is analogous to the iodine reduction reaction. Treatment of tap water requires between 0.1 grams and 0.3 grams of pentahydrated (crystalline) sodium thiosulfate per 10 liters of water.


Somehow I don't think the jug with the valve on it on the curb is that precisely metered.

The blog is back, Dewlap!

Dewlap - noun - loose skin hanging under the neck; especially of a bovine animal.

Today I learned what a dewlap is.  I always thought it was called a wattle.  Wattle is typically reserved for birds.  I'll spare you pictures.

I was reading a book and one of the characters says that another character is unattractive and is never going to catch a husband "especially with that dewlap." so of course I had to look up what a dewlap is.

As for the absence of the blog, there was a bit of a hiccup with wifi while house sitting.  The cleaners threw away the envelope with the wifi password before I had a chance to connect my computer.  I'm sure I could have LEARNED how to figure out what the password was from my boyfriend's computer (which was already connected to it) but I was lazy and decided to take some time off.  If I couldn't do it on the internet from my phone, I didn't.

I got a lot of reading done.  I read a book about sister wives.  I read short ebook about the construction of the statue of liberty.  I read a short ebook about one of the guys on the FBIs most wanted list.  All of which could have provided topics for the blog, but since I didn't learn any of those things today, they don't count!

Dicipline

One thing I've learned is that it is very hard to post daily.  I'm quite impressed with anyone who is able to do it.  Either they have more free time than I do or they don't waste it like I do.

A few days ago I learned about the Streisand Effect. 

A photographer was documenting the coastline of California to look at the effects of erosion.  One of the photographs featured Barbara Streisand's beachfront home.  Streisand (or her lawyers) asked for it to be removed from the photographer's website.  Prior to them making a big deal and asking for it to be taken down, it had been downloaded 6 times, 2 of those times were by her lawyers.  Post the story breaking about this, it was downloaded over 400,000 in a month.

So now whenever acknowledging something causes it to blow up more (especially online) it's referred to as the Streisand Effect.  Where did I learn about this? Online.  I was reading something in an internet article and the comments section someone said, "haven't they ever heard of the Streisand Effect?"  I hadn't, so I went and looked it up.  Of course, now I have no idea what article I was reading, but I haven't forgotten what I learned.

Something I learned from running spellcheck on this post-

A) Google doesn't recognize Streisand
B) they want me to capitalize internet.

George Carlin caused censorship!

Today I learned a little bit about censorship.  It's been going on forever, so my title is quite misleading, but somewhat true when it comes to American radio, TV, music, etc.

George Carlin came up with his routine about the "Seven dirty words you can never say on television" in 1972.  I will not list the words (self censoring, because anyone can type in 7 dirty words in google and have them in .02 seconds.) At that time, there was no official list and no official censorship board for television.  When George Carlin performed this routine in public, he was arrested for disturbing the peace.  He went on to put out another album with another dirty routine, which when aired on the radio led to complaints, which led to a court case, which led to a Supreme Court ruling which led to an official indecency regulation through the FCC.

So if you think Standards and Practices are a bit ridiculous, you can thank George Carlin.

I would like to thank Caustic Soda for today's information.  They use ALL the dirty words.

I pledge allegiance to queen fragg and her mighty state of hysteria

This is the article I read today for my "thing I learned." 

Mental Floss' twitter feed is one of the most enjoyable ways to kill a few minutes between meetings or when you need to clear your head at work.  I also read an article about why traffic lights are red and green.  Did you know that the first traffic light ever installed killed the worker operating it?

Anyway, that's kind of a tangent from today's original topic - the pledge of allegiance.  I knew that "under god" had been added later, but I had no idea that the idea stemmed from  the notion that getting flags in to American classrooms would boost sales.

For some reason, learning the pledge of allegiance makes me think of the 2nd grade.  I'm sure I learned it younger than that; don't they start it for kids in kindergarten? I liked memorization things, so I'm sure I liked the challenge of learning it.  I memorize random stuff all the time.  I have no recollection of saying the pledge in high school.  Either my school didn't do it or I just wasn't paying attention. (The latter is entirely possible.)

If you ask me now I have to say that the pledge of allegiance is stupid.  Do other countries make their kids swear to love their country?  Sounds very shady, like something Korea would have its citizens do. Not a free nation like the United States.

Goal - American citizenship and a thinner population

The average American citizen knows less about our system of government than someone from another country who has become a naturalized citizen. (Made up fact I think is correct.)  I decided that I wanted to learn everything that people studying to take the citizenship test would learn.  I figured it would be good to have goals as well as learning random factoids or tidbits on larger subjects.  I need to find a study guide.

Today I learned about pros and cons for having a fat tax (again, Chuck and Josh and Stuff You Should Know.)  Studies show that having a fat tax would raise food prices across the board.  People who are struggling to get by as it is can't take a 3% increase in all of their food costs, but maybe that's what it will take to get people to stop buying chips and start buying carrots.  I can't really talk because I eat a lot of junk food (and let's not start talking about my soda habit - I have to have some vices.)  I honestly think if they started charging a 60 cent tax on coke, then I might curb my habit.  Anyway, it will probably never happen.  Nanny state arguments and all.  Of course, they did pass taxes on cigarettes so I could be wrong.