Findings: It’s very unlikely that lobsters feel any pain when they’re being cooked—their brains are too small to read the information as pain. The same goes for worms that are used as fish bait. “The common earthworm has a very simple nervous system,” Farstad says. “It seems to be only reflex curling when put on the hook. They might sense something, but it is not painful and does not compromise their well-being.”
Will this study change any minds about lobster boiling? Animal rights groups like People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals (PETA) point out that Norway has a large fishing industry and isn’t exactly unbiased when it comes to studying lobsters. “This is exactly like the tobacco industry claiming that smoking doesn’t cause cancer,” says PETA spokeswoman Karin Robertson.
The scent of a human footprint is so strong that even humans can follow it.
DOUBLE TROUBLE
It might be great to have an identical twin—you could switch places in school, on dates, on the job, etc. But as these sets of twins demonstrate, it’s not always twice as nice.
TWINS: Brian and Ryan Clausen of Greenville, Texas BACKGROUND: At only two months of age in 1983, Brian and Ryan were more alike even than most identical twins: they were not only the same height and weight, but both also had the same birthmark on their foreheads and a smaller middle toe on their right feet. So how did their parents, Butch and Gwyen Clausen, tell them apart? By labeling their clothing and being very, very careful.
DOUBLE TROUBLE: That system worked great…for a while. But one day in December, Butch got their clothes mixed up and Gwyen’s sister changed the babies’ diapers before Butch could straighten them out. Then Gwyen changed the babies’ diapers a second time; that’s when things really got confusing. Was the kid wearing Ryan’s clothes Ryan or Brian? Was “Brian” Brian or Ryan?
WHAT HAPPENED: Some people probably would have just started over, picking one of the kids to be Brian and one to be Ryan; Butch and Gwyen hired a private detective. He took the case to the district attorney’s office, and after poring over dozens of sets of maternity ward footprints, they got a match: the baby wearing Ryan’s shirt was Ryan, and the other baby was Brian.
TWINS: John and Glen Winslow, 38
BACKGROUND: If you were an identical twin and had a warrant out for your arrest, what would you do if you got pulled over for speeding? When John Winslow was pulled over in Council Bluffs, Iowa, in July 2004, he didn’t have his license with him, and he knew he had a misdemeanor warrant for damaging someone’s property. So rather than admit who he was, he identified himself as Glen Winslow.
DOUBLE TROUBLE: What John didn’t know at the time was that Glen was wanted by the police, too—for first-degree sexual assault. When John identified himself as Glen, the police immediately slapped the cuffs on him and hauled him off to jail.
WHAT HAPPENED: John confessed to furnishing false information to the police, but they weren’t taking any chances. They held him until a fingerprint check confirmed that he really was John. Then he did 10 days in jail for the original property damage charge, for not having a driver’s license, and for providing false information to police. A new arrest warrant went out for Glen; he was taken into custody in Omaha five days later.
The world’s population increases by 237,748 every 24 hours.
TWINS: Angela and Sharon Statton, 19
BACKGROUND: In April 1997, Angela got into a heated argument with her boyfriend and called the police. DOUBLE TROUBLE: When they arrived on the scene, the boyfriend lied and told them that Angela wasn’t Angela, she was her sister, Sharon, who had a warrant out for her arrest for failing to appear in court on a shoplifting charge. Angela insisted she really was Angela, and to prove it she pleaded with the police to drive her to her mother’s house to talk to the real Sharon.
Even after talking to the real Sharon, the police weren’t convinced. They still suspected that Angela might really be Sharon and considered arresting both sisters, but decided they couldn’t because they had only one arrest warrant. In the end they arrested Angela on Sharon’s warrant and took her to jail.
WHAT HAPPENED: Angela spent four nights in jail before she got her day in court. Then she and Sharon appeared together and convinced the judge that Angela really was who she said she was. “I kept telling people, ‘My name is not Sharon. It’s Angela,’” Angela says. “They thought I was playing with them, but I wasn’t. I sat in jail for nothing. But I’m just glad I’m out.” Sharon was ordered to reappear at a later date to answer for the shoplifting and failure-to-appear charges, but no word on whether she showed up (or somebody else did).
* * *
COWBOY WISDOM
• Don’t squat with your spurs on.
• Never slap a man who’s chewin’ tobacco.
• There’s two theories to arguin’ with a woman. Neither one works.
Russian Czar Ivan the Terrible once had an elephant killed because it did not bow to him.
STRANGE TOURIST ATTRACTIONS
Planning a vacation? Looking for something a little unusual? Next time you’re traveling, you might want to consider one of these attractions.
FIELD OF DREAMS
Location: Dyersville, Iowa
Background: Every year more than 50,000 people visit the baseball field from the 1989 movie Field of Dreams. It actually straddles two farms: Al Ameskamp owns left and center field; Don Lansing owns the infield, right field, and the bleachers. Both have their own access roads and gift shops (they sell the same stuff).
Be sure to see: One Sunday a month, a local minor league baseball team dresses in early 1900s uniforms, hides in the cornfield, and then emerges to play catch with visitors.
UNCLAIMED BAGGAGE CENTER
Location: Scottsboro, Alabama
Background: When airport luggage goes unclaimed, it eventually ends up at this facility—part thrift store, part vacation destination. Anything in good shape that’s clean and legal is put on sale here, very cheap: books, jewelry, electronics, sports equipment, and clothes (cleaned and pressed). Lost something on a previous vacation? Come here on your next one—you might recover it.
Be sure to see: The glass-encased “UBC Museum” of rare or valuable salvaged items, including a violin from 1770, some ancient Egyptian artifacts, a 40.95-karat emerald, and a gnome from the movie Labyrinth.
BEN & JERRY’S FLAVOR GRAVEYARD
Location: Behind the Ben & Jerry’s factory in Waterbury, Vermont
Background: The specialty ice-cream company is always coming up with new flavors. Some, like Chunky Monkey or Cherry Garcia, do very well; others don’t. So every year Ben & Jerry’s discontinues eight to ten of its worst sellers and retires them in the “Flavor Graveyard.” It’s a real graveyard, covered with lush green grass and surrounded by a white picket fence. There are currently 56 dead flavors in the cemetery. Each one has a real tombstone with an illustration of its lid, topped with a winged cone ascending upward.
Why did French women wear high heels in the 1600s? To show they were too rich to walk.
Be sure to see: The graves of Peanut Butter & Jelly, Sweet Potato Pie, Lemon Peppermint Carob Chip, and Ricotta.
THE CENTER OF THE WORLD
Location: Southeastern California, near the Arizona border
Background: In 1985 Jacques André Istel, author of an obscure children’s book called Coe: The Good Dragon at the Center of the World—and recipient of two votes in the 2003 California gubernatorial election—bought a chunk of desert just off Interstate 8, incorporated the town of Felicity (named after his wife), and declared himself mayor. Then he built a 21-foot-tall pink marble pyramid. On the floor of the pyramid is a bronze plaque, and on the plaque is a tiny dot. That, according to Istel, is the center of the world.
Be sure to see: A 25-foot-high section of spiral staircase from the Eiffel Tower. Istel bought it at auction for $200,000; it now sits at the entrance to the pyramid, spiraling upward to nowhere in particular. And don’t miss the Wall for the Ages, a 100-foot-long grani
te wall where visitors can have their names inscribed. Cost per name: $200. (It’s tax-deductible.)
SWEATSHOP TOUR
Location: Los Angeles
Background: This educational and political tour, offered by the Communist Revolutionary Party of California, takes visitors through L.A.’s garment district. Highlights include visits to actual textile factories and sweatshops and classes on profit earnings distribution and working conditions. Visitors may also peer through locked, grated doors at rows of heads bent over sewing machines.
Be sure not to see: Government agents raiding the premises, looking for illegal immigrants. (Tour organizers recommend running shoes and loose-fitting clothing for a quick escape.)
Serve yourself: In a feeding frenzy, a shark may eat parts of its own body.
FAMOUS LAST WORDS
We’re all going to go, but it would be nice to have something clever to say when we do.
“To die, to sleep, to pass into nothingness, what does it matter? Everything is an illusion.”
—Mata Hari
“I don’t need bodyguards.”
—Jimmy Hoffa
“All the damn fool things you do in life you pay for.”
—Edith Piaf, singer
“I believe we must adjourn this meeting to some other place.”
—Adam Smith, economist
“Shakespeare, here I come.”
—Theodore Dreiser, author
“What is the answer? In that case, what is the question?”
—Gertrude Stein
“So much mortality still clings to me; I wanted most desperately to live and still do.”
—Thomas Wolfe, author
“What? The flames already?”
—Voltaire
“My design is to make what haste I can to be gone.”
—Oliver Cromwell
“God, don’t let me die. I have so much to do.”
—Huey Long, Louisiana governor
“Let not my end disarm you, and on no account weep or keen for me, let the enemy be warned of my death.”
—Genghis Khan
“I am still alive!”
—Caligula, Roman emperor
“Kill me, or else you are a murderer!”
—Franz Kafka, author, begging his doctor for an overdose of morphine
“Everybody has got to die, but I have always believed an exception would be made in my case. Now what?”
—William Saroyan, author
“Bless you sister. May all your sons be bishops.”
—Brendan Behan, author, to his nurse, a nun
“Tomorrow, I shall no longer be here.”
—Nostradamus
Uhh, uhh, the average American only knows about 10% of the words in the English language.
CURSES!
In previous Bathroom Readers we’ve told you about famous curses like the curse of the Hope diamond and the curse of King Tut. Here are a few you may not have heard of.
THE CURSE OF THE DEVIL MONKEY
Background: In 2000 a Ghanian witch doctor mailed a wooden statue of a monkey to Great Britain and then flew there to get it. Why didn’t he just take it with him on the plane? Because, as suspicious customs officials discovered when they examined the statue closely, it was hollow—and stuffed with 666 grams of marijuana.
Cursed! When the witch doctor showed up to collect the statue, police arrested him. As he was being led off to jail, he placed a curse on the statue. Dubbed the “devil monkey,” it has been blamed for inflicting dozens of injuries to workers at the customs warehouse, where it’s still being held as evidence. Workers have received nasty splinters from it, tripped over it, and even been hit on the head by it when it mysteriously falls off shelves as people walk by. “It is cursed,” customs spokesman Nigel Knott told reporters in 2001, “and very dangerous.”
THE LIVERMORE SEWER CURSE
Background: In 1969 Chippewa Indian Adam Fortunate Eagle Nordwall carved a 20-foot totem pole, which he donated to the city of Livermore, California, as part of the city’s centennial celebration. The city accepted the gift but then “desecrated” it by sawing several feet off the bottom before installing it in a park.
Cursed! Nordwall was furious. He insisted that the city reattach the bottom part of the totem pole. When officials refused, he went to a city council meeting and placed a curse on the city’s sewer system. Less than two weeks later, the sewers backed up. Did the curse work? City officials didn’t take any chances—they reattached the bottom of the pole…and the sewer problems cleared up.
Update: More than 30 years later, Nordwall still hasn’t lifted the curse. He says he’s waiting for an official apology. Meanwhile, other Indians in the area have complained to the city about Nordwall. They accuse him of making a mockery of a Native American art form—totem poles—by tying them to a silly curse. Nordwall, who comes from what he calls a “teasing clan,” says he isn’t going to apologize either. “I use humor in a way some Indians don’t understand,” the 73-year-old told the San Francisco Chronicle in 2002. “It’s called serious joke medicine.”
Q: What’s the scientific name for heavy winter fog containing ice crystals? A: Pogonip.
THE CURSE OF THE ABBEY WALL
Background: In 1534 England’s King Henry VIII broke from the Roman Catholic Church and established the Church of England. Two years later he began to disband Catholic monasteries in England and seize their property, including the 12th-century Margam Abbey in Port Talbot, Wales.
Cursed! As one of the last monks was being thrown out of the abbey, he pointed a finger at one of the walls and said, “If this wall doth fall, then so will all that surrounds it.” Neither the new owner, Sir Rice Mansel, nor any of the property’s subsequent owners dared challenge the curse. Over the years, as the abbey buildings were demolished and replaced, the wall was preserved.
Update: Today Margam Abbey is long gone. A steel plant now occupies the site…but a 20-foot portion of the nearly 1,000-year-old wall still stands, lovingly preserved by its owner, Corus Group. Why? The company says it has a responsibility to preserve this unique piece of British heritage…but they also don’t want to mess with the curse. “We’re not superstitious,” says a company spokesman, “but we like to hedge our bets.”
THE MUNDA BABY CURSE
Background: Ask your parents—did your first baby tooth break through your upper or your lower gum?
Cursed! If you’re female and your first tooth broke through on top, be glad you’re not a member of one of the Munda tribes of India. According to them, you are cursed and will someday be devoured by wild animals. The Munda ward off the curse by literally marrying their infant daughters to dogs, who will protect them from the wild animals. Two such weddings were performed in 2005 in a village outside the Indian city of Bhubaneswar. “All the wedding rituals are carried out,” one beaming father of the bride told the Hindustan Times. “The groom (dog) comes in a marriage procession and the bride’s family welcomes him. Then all the rituals are followed like an original marriage. We cannot take a risk with our daughter’s future.”
The brightest star in the sky, Sirius, gives off 26 times more light than the Sun.
The Good News: Though the infant-dog wedding is considered as real as a wedding between a normal bride and groom, when the girl grows up she is free to marry again, without having to divorce the dog.
THE CURSE OF LADY MACDOUGALL
Background: One Sunday morning in the 1550s, members of the MacCallum clan gathered at their church in Kilbride, Scotland, for Sunday Mass. Members of the MacDougall clan also attended services there, but by the time they arrived the church was so full of MacCallums that there was no place for them to sit.
Cursed! It made Lady MacDougall so mad that she put a curse on the MacCallum clan: the sons and their descendants would die unless they moved off the family farm at Cologin.
The twelve MacCallum brothers who lived on the Cologin farm ignored the curse…until, one by one, over the next f
ew years, nine of them died. The surviving three got the message—they moved off the farm and their descendants survive to this day. The story of the curse, which was never lifted, has been passed down in both clans for more than 400 years.
Update: Finally in July 2002, American members of the two clans met at the annual Highland Games at Grandfather Mountain in North Carolina and performed a “lifting of the curse” ceremony in front of the beer tent (there was no church handy). Just as they had done in the 16th century, a group of MacCallums blocked the entrance. But this time, when the MacDougalls tried to enter, the MacCallums parted and let them pass.
* * *
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World’s deepest valley: the Yarlung Zangbu Valley in Tibet (average depth: 16,400 feet).
ODD PROMOTIONS
Sometimes ad campaigns do more than sell a product—sometimes they make us laugh.
The R.J. Reynolds Tobacco Company tried to market Salem cigarettes in Japan using the American slogan “Salem—Feeling Free.” They had to change it: it translated into Japanese as “When smoking Salem, you feel so refreshed that your mind seems to be empty.”
• Swedish furniture manufacturer IKEA issued an apology after it advertised its children’s “Gutvik” bunk beds in Christmas catalogs in Germany. Reason: In German, Gutvik translates into an explicit sexual reference. (Gut means “good”—you’ll have to figure out the rest.) An IKEA spokeswoman explained that “Gutvik is the name of a tiny Swedish town. We didn’t realize that it could also be taken as something obscene.”
Uncle John’s Fast-Acting Long-Lasting Bathroom Reader Page 11
