“Oooooh… that’s so corny”

Winner: Rosebud

Tonight’s game focused on current events, including the attacks in Paris. We raised a drink in memory of the victims and to salute those residents of our sister city, especially our friend Carole, who are going through such a difficult time. Lots of players tonight, but only one winner – Rosebud. Randy, Carol D, and Pluto finished a close second, edging out Linda and JohnnyG.

Bobby Barcelona finished back in the pack and seemed a bit rusty from his long layoff. JohnnyG on the other hand seemed as sharp as ever and it sure was good to see him. Darin & Mistress Daphne dressed appropriately for the occasion and looked pretty sharp in their Parisian outfits.

Good Question!: In 1907, an ad campaign for Kellogg’s Corn Flakes offered  a free box of cereal to any woman who would do what?

Choices: a. flex her muscles  b. wear a swim suit to the store   c. lift a case of Wheaties   d. wink at the grocer

Answer: wink at the grocer

Holy Cow! Times sure have changed. Imagine how far Miley Cyrus would take that offer.

Developed by brothers, Dr. John Harvey Kellogg and Will Keith Kellogg, this cereal was first introduced as Sanitas Toasted Corn Flakes in 1898. The cereal was an extension of the brothers’ first great cereal innovation, the wheat flake, which they’d introduced as Granose Flakes a few years earlier.

Initial sales of Sanitas Toasted Corn Flakes were lackluster, thanks mostly to the fact the cereal turned rancid shortly after purchase. By 1902, the Kelloggs had reworked the recipe to overcome the spoilage problem. Sugar was also added to the flakes to boost the flavor (much to the dismay of Dr. John Kellogg who considered sugar an enemy to the human body). Sales of the reworked cereal shot through the roof.

In 1903, a large ad campaign was launched under the direction Will Keith Kellogg. The cereal’s popularity continued to grow. In 1906, the Battle Creek Toasted Corn Flake Company was formed. Will Keith eventually bought out most of his brother’s share of the Corn Flakes Company and, in 1925, changed the name of the company to the Kellogg Company.

In the early 1960’s, Kellogg’s promoted their Corn Flakes cereal with ads that featured corny puns. For instance: “What’s the corniest state in the union? Corn-tucky”. The company engaged radio stars Homer & Jethro to record a series of commercials which featured the catch phrase “Oooooh… that’s corny!”. Once the campaign made its way to televisions, “Oooooh… that’s so corny” became a popular phrase to describe anything hackneyed and cliched.

A collection of corny cereal commercials from the 1960’s-70’s:

 

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Poor Richard’s Almanack, a Guide to Meeting Ladies

 

Winner: Judy

Tonight we were missing Darin and Mistress Daphne, but women were ably represented by the top 3 finishers. Judy played a strong, quiet game in the bay window and edged Rhys and Maddy. Ten O’Clock Bill was also seated in the bay window, but proved once again that where you sit is not a factor, even when you sit with the winner. Judy may need to give Bill some remedial trivia instruction to help him be competitive.

MikeP. stepped in to moderate the game and control a raucous crowd of 15. Those new players from Minnesota sure were noisy. Mike gets everyone’s attention with his earsplitting whistle. Might be something Mistress Daphne needs to try. We all missed Darin (and her treats) and hope she makes a speedy recovery.

Good Question!: According to one estimate, Ben Franklin had 24 what?

Choices: a. patents   b. wives   c. horses   d. illegitimate children

Answer: illegitimate children

Good Grief! Is that possible?

The best info I could find was this statement: “Benjamin Franklin was rumored to have fathered more than a dozen illegitimate children.” There is nothing more definitive and most of the biographical info leans towards old Ben having numerous relationships, but fewer illegitimate children.

The Chicago Tribune had an interesting piece on ladies man Ben in 1990:

Ben Franklin`s Dangerous Liaisons
That Kindly Old Kite Flyer Was Also A High-flying Ladies` Man

“Franklin Delano Roosevelt had Lucy Mercer.

Dwight Eisenhower had Kay Summersby.

John F. Kennedy had Judith Exner.

Benjamin Franklin had Anna-Louise d`Hardancourt Brillon de Jouy. And Madame Helvetius. And Margaret Stevenson. And Polly Hewson. And Madame Foucault. And Countess Diane de Polignac. And Countess Wilhelmina Golowkin. And Catherine Ray. And Georgiana Shipley. And Madame Le Veillard. And Madame Le Roy. And Countess Houdetot. . . .

And, of course, Deborah Read, his wife of 38 years.”

Unfortunately, there are no videos of Ben and his ladies, but we do have one of Marilyn Monroe singing Happy Birthday to JFK:

“Yes, even Ben Franklin-who is ensconced in our national consciousness as a kindly, bespectacled dispenser of aphoristic advice-was a womanizer. Make that especially Ben Franklin.

Franklin often philosophized that it was important for a man to be reasonable-since it enabled him to find a reason for doing anything he wanted to do. But Franklin himself was frightened by his sexual appetite, admitting in his autobiography that “the hard-to-be-governed passion of my youth had hurried me frequently into intrigues with low women that fell in my way.“

Franklin`s siring of an illegitimate son in Philadelphia, and his neglect of his wife, Deborah, have been well documented by historians. But from the age of 50 until the end of his life, a period in which he spent more time on the banks of the Seine and the Thames than the Schuylkill, Franklin had a sucession of relationships with younger women. Some of the affairs were sexual and others were platonic.”

blogger’s note: This blog, “TNBE,” celebrated it’s fifth anniversary last month, and I almost missed it. You keep reading, we’ll keep writing.

 

 

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Just One Word – “Plastics”

Co-Winners: Driver Shea and Droppin’

It was a cold night, but a close, hot contest. If Driver Shea had not muffed an easy one, he would have been sole champ tonight. I mean, who else doesn’t know Alan Freed was the DJ who introduced rock ‘n roll to a generation of young Americans in the 1950’s! Following close behind was Pluto, who also blew an easy one when he carelessly threw the wrong card down on  a question that was clearly a  “tomber”.

Good Question! : What was the first plastic?

Answer: Bakelite

How important was Bakelite? Well, 60 years after it was invented it played a key role in the highest-grossing motion picture of 1968. A movie nominated for seven Academy Awards, and which the American Film Institute ranked at number seven in its list of the greatest films of the century.

If all that doesn’t ring a bell, I’ve got one word for you. Just one word — plastics. Which, of course, was Mr. McGuire’s career path advice to Benjamin in “The Graduate.”

A Belgian chemist named Dr. Leo Baekeland (1863-1944) is seen as the father of the plastics industry.

Dr. Baekeland was responsible for the invention of Bakelite in 1907 while he was working in Yonkers, NY as an independent chemist. Dr. Baekeland had spent several years working on a durable coating for the lanes of bowling alleys, similar to today’s protective polyurethane floor sealants. He combined carbolic acid and formaldehyde to form phenolic resin.

This resin would remain pourable long enough to apply to hardwood flooring, but then become insoluble and impermeable after curing. In fact, when he tried to reheat the solidified compound he discovered it would not melt, no matter how high the temperature.

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Dr. Baekeland patented this early form of plastic and started his own Bakelite corporation around 1910 to market it to heavy industry and automobile manufacturers. Bakelite could be used for electric insulators or as an insulating coating for automotive wiring.

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Bakelite was the first completely synthetic plastic. Because of its durability and beauty, its uses were limitless. Its popularity grew very quickly, and within 15 years it had taken the world by storm. You could find everything from electrical plugs to ornate jewelry made from Bakelite.
The Bakelite Corporation was a leader in convincing manufacturers to use plastic to beautify products. It worked with industrial designers, who in turn embraced plastics and applied them in the design of everything from telephones and radios to kitchen equipment, vanity cases, and jewelry. Bakelite was “the material of a thousand uses.” And during the Depression of the 1930s, the cheerful colors, whimsical design, and low cost of many Bakelite products were just what was needed.

Today objects made from Bakelite are considered highly collectible, although in its glory days of the 1930s and 1940s, Bakelite was seen as an inexpensive alternative to high-end jewelry materials such as jade and pearl.

By the end of the World War II, new technologies for molded plastics had been developed. These new products consisted of plastics such as Lucite, Fiberglass, Vinyl, and Acrylic – all which were molded.

And so Bakelite became obsolete, except in the hearts of collectors who still pursue it today.

sources: inventors.about.com, wisegeek.com,

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Bah Humbug!

Winner: iPod

Tonight’s quiz was filled with the most obscure Christmas questions, leaving most of us feeling that Santa had left only a lump of coal for us this year. Did you know that Rudolph, the Red Nosed Reindeer, allegedly the most famous reindeer of them all, did not even make an appearance in “Twas the Night Before Christmas.” I feel hoodwinked by the reindeer’s press agent. Even iPod was surprised to learn that his sheet with only 1/2 right was good enough to win. Following closely behind were Rosebud, who is a Santa elve wannabe, and Brenda, a newcomer to the game.

Not to worry, next week will be much more fun. No bar exam, because next Tuesday will be the annual night of Christmas carols at Main Street Cafe, surely one of the year’s highlights. Now if only we can convince Ellen to ditch her family responsibilities, and appear to perform her lead role of “5 Golden Rings!”, the night will be complete. Looking forward to seeing you all there.

Good Question!: How many ghosts are there in “A Christmas Carol” ?

Answer: 4

A Christmas Carol is a novella by English author Charles Dickens first published December 1843. The story tells of sour and stingy Ebenezer Scrooge‘s ideological, ethical, and emotional transformation after the supernatural visitations of Jacob Marley and the Ghosts of Christmases Past, Present, and Yet to Come- that’s 4. The novella met with instant success and critical acclaim.

The book was written and published in early Victorian era Britain when it was experiencing a nostalgic interest in its forgotten Christmas traditions, and at the time when new customs such as the Christmas tree and greeting cards were being introduced.

Dickens’s Carol was one of the greatest influences in rejuvenating the old Christmas traditions of England, but, while it brings to the reader images of light, joy, warmth, and life it also brings strong and unforgettable images of darkness, despair, coldness, sadness and death. Scrooge himself is the embodiment of winter, and, just as winter is followed by spring and the renewal of life, so too is Scrooge’s cold, pinched heart restored to the innocent goodwill he had known in his childhood and youth.

The forces that impelled Dickens to create a powerful, impressive, and enduring tale were the profoundly humiliating experiences of his childhood, the plight of the poor and their children during the boom decades of the 1830s and 1840s, and Washington Irving‘s stories of the traditional old English Christmas.

The tale has been viewed as an indictment of nineteenth century industrial capitalism and was adapted several times to the stage, and has been credited with restoring the holiday to one of merriment and festivity in Britain and America after a period of sobriety and sombreness. A Christmas Carol remains popular, has never been out of print, and has been adapted to film, opera, and other media.

A recap follows:

The tale begins on Christmas Eve seven years after the death of Ebenezer Scrooge‘s business partner Jacob Marley. Scrooge is established within the first chapter as a greedy and stingy businessman who has no place in his life for kindness, compassion, charity, or benevolence. After being warned by Marley’s ghost to change his ways, Scrooge is visited by three additional ghosts – each in its turn, and each visitation detailed in a separate chapter – who accompany him to various scenes with the hope of achieving his transformation.

The first of the spirits, the Ghost of Christmas Past, takes Scrooge to the scenes of his boyhood and youth which stir the old miser’s gentle and tender side by reminding him of a time when he was more innocent. The second spirit, the Ghost of Christmas Present, takes Scrooge to several radically differing scenes (a joy-filled market of people buying the makings of Christmas dinner, the family feast of Scrooge’s near-impoverished clerk Bob Cratchit, a miner‘s cottage, and a lighthouse among other sites) in order to evince from the miser a sense of responsibility for his fellow man. The third spirit, the Ghost of Christmas Yet to Come, harrows Scrooge with dire visions of the future if he does not learn and act upon what he has witnessed. Scrooge’s own neglected and untended grave is revealed, prompting the miser to aver that he will change his ways in hopes of changing these “shadows of what may be.”

In the fifth and final chapter, Scrooge awakens Christmas morning with joy and love in his heart, then spends the day with his nephew’s family after anonymously sending a prize turkey to the Cratchit home for Christmas dinner. Scrooge has become a different man overnight, and now treats his fellow men with kindness, generosity, and compassion, gaining a reputation as a man who embodies the spirit of Christmas. The story closes with the narrator confirming the validity, completeness, and permanence of Scrooge’s transformation.

According to historian Ronald Hutton, the current state of observance of Christmas is largely the result of a mid-Victorian revival of the holiday spearheaded by A Christmas Carol. Hutton argues that Dickens sought to construct Christmas as a family-centered festival of generosity, in contrast to the community-based and church-centered observations, the observance of which had dwindled during the late 18th and early 19th centuries. In superimposing his secular vision of the holiday, Dickens influenced many aspects of Christmas that are celebrated today in Western culture, such as family gatherings, seasonal food and drink, dancing, games, and a festive generosity of spirit.

For a nice tribute site with the full text of  “A Christmas Carol,” illustrated with images from the most-beloved screen version, the 1951 movie “Scrooge,” starring Alastair Sim, try:

http://www.sheeplaughs.com/scrooge/

For those of you with a Kindle there is a wonderful free version at Amazon’s site:

http://www.amazon.com/A-Christmas-Carol-ebook/dp/B000JQUKKU/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&m=AG56TWVU5XWC2&s=digital-text&qid=1292778741&sr=1-1

For those of you more visually inclined, try either of these two performances, generally considered the best screen versions of Ebenezer Scrooge:

George C Scott – http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qh_fUMgFomk&feature=related

Alastair Sim – http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1l1_82x2BO4&feature=related

source: wikipedia

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Beth Wins, Bob AWOL

Winner: Beth

This evening Beth had dinner with her dad, and as she said goodbye, he urged her to win the game this week. Which is exactly what she did. The irony is that the quiz had been weighted with aviation questions to satisfy a beef from Flyboy Bob, Beth’s husband. Alas, Bob was AWOL this evening. It was left to Beth to carry the family flag and post her very first win. Finishing second was Beth’s old friend, droppin’ Dave.

Good Question: Who was the first man to die in a US airplane crash?

Answer: Thomas Selfridge

Flight’s First Fatal Trip

It was Sept. 17, 1908. Orville Wright was showing off a new “aeroplane” at Fort Myer, Va., for about 2,000 people, including Army brass. Wright took up a 26-year-old lieutenant in the Army Signal Corps, Thomas E. Selfridge, “an aeroplanist himself,” according to neewspaper reports.

The Army had awarded the Wrights a contract to fly a two-man “heavier-than-air” flying machine that would have to complete a series of trials over a measured course. In addition to the $25,000 (about $600,000 in today’s buying power) bid, the brothers would receive a $2,500 bonus for every mile per hour of speed faster than 40 mph. No supersonic stealth fighters just yet.

Contemporary accounts vary, but the pair apparently made three and a half successful circuits at an altitude of about 75 feet, when three or four minutes into the flight, a blade on one of the two wooden propellers split and caused the engine to shake violently. Orville shut down the engine but was unable to control the airplane.

The propeller had hit a bracing wire and pulled a rear rudder from the vertical position to a horizontal position. This caused the airplane to pitch nose-down, and it could not be countered by the pilot.

The Wright Flyer hit the ground hard, and both men were injured. Orville suffered a fractured leg and several broken ribs. Selfridge suffered a fractured skull and died in the hospital a few hours later.

“My brothers will pursue these tests until the machines are as near perfect as it is possible to make them,” Lorin Wright told reporters right after the crash, “if they are not killed in the meantime.” Yikes!

Because of the crash, the first Army pilots were required to wear helmets similar to early football helmets in order to minimize the chance of a head injury like the one that killed Selfridge.

Aviation endured, punctuated by occasional catastrophic crashes that have, in the end, made flying much safer, especially in the United States, where the airlines carry some two million people a day on tens of thousands of flights.

The arc of safety improvements has been dramatic.

Boeing, reaching back to the beginning of the jet age, found one fatal accident for every 30,000 commercial jet flights in 1959. By 2006, the rate for all airliner flights had dropped to one accident for every 4.2 million flights by Western-built commercial jets.

Lieutenant Selfridge nonetheless stands at the head of a rather long queue. Boeing counted 26,454 deaths of people on commercial jets between 1959 and 2006, and an additional 934 on the ground.

Still, an American’s chance of dying in a plane crash in 2007 was one in 432,484, according to the National Safety Council, while the chance of dying in a car was one in 19,216. The lifetime risk? According to the council, one in 5,552 for planes, one in 247 for cars. Maybe we should strap on our helmets when we get in our much more high risk automobiles.

sources: nyt, wired

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Welcome Back Kotter

Winner: Droppin’ Dave

A medium- sized crowd of eleven hopefuls competed this week, including first timers Katherine and Melanie.  Some grumbling was heard as the mostly science-based questions took their toll, but all in all it was judged to be a fairly easy quiz.  Just have another beer, relax, and enjoy the free peanuts.  It was anybodyʼs game until the end, but Droppinʼ finished strongest by acing the second half and edging out Melanie and Ethan.

Good Question!: “What weapon did German gunsmith August Kotter unload on the world in 1520?”

Answer: The rifle.

Before Kotter, gun barrels were smooth on the inside and fired round lead bullets that were slightly smaller than the diameter of the barrel.  When fired, the bullets careened down the barrel and emerged at unpredictable angles, making accuracy impossible except at close range.  By finding a way to cut spiral grooves on the inside of the barrel, Kotter imparted spin to the bullets, making them fly straighter and farther, like a Dan Marino football.

The spiral grooves themselves are called rifling and can be created in a number of ways. Typically rifling is a constant rate down the barrel, usually measured by the length of travel required to produce a single turn. Occasionally firearms are encountered with a gain twist, where the rate of spin increases from chamber to muzzle. For best performance, the barrel should have a twist rate sufficient to stabilize any bullet that it would reasonably be expected to fire, but not significantly more. Large diameter bullets provide more stability, as the larger radius provides more gyroscopic inertia, while long bullets are harder to stabilize, as they tend to be very back heavy and the aerodynamic pressures have a longer “lever” to act on.

Kotterʼs invention is very much in use today, and deserves credit for our ability to deliver death at great distance and with great accuracy.    Kotter himself is little remembered except for a brief reappearance in a 80ʼs sitcom, where he was welcomed back, and ended up being executed by a firing squad of TV execs.

Thanks to our special Guest Blogger this week – Droppin’ Dave.

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Oktoberfest Mother and Daughter Reunion

Winner: Trish the Dish

Oktoberfest trivia drew a good crowd of 17 players, including a former champion, Trish the Dish, and her German mom, Ilse. With tonight’s questions all focused on Oktoberfest, these frauleins figured to have an edge, but as the game started Pluto jumped to an early lead. As they stumbled on the first few questions, Pluto even questioned whether Ilse and Trish were really German. Trash talking these girls was a bad idea. They finished strong, played the last dozen questions flawlessly, and Dish won easily with Ilse right behind – a classic mother and daughter reunion.

Darin hosted a very fine Oktoberfest night. From first to wurst – sausage, beer, and cookies – it was a fun night to play trivia. And the ladies who came in their best hofbrau attire added just the right touch to the evening. BTW, did you know that the wearing of a dirndl has its pitfalls. By placing the knot on the right side of the apron the wearer can signal to the world that she is engaged, married or otherwise taken. A knot on the left side means: “I’m single, open to advances.”

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If we learned one important thing tonight it was that someone who has had too much to drink and is passed out on the ground is “bierleichen” – a beer corpse.

For some great pix of this year’s Oktoberfest (and for a great photo site just generally) try the Boston Globe’s daily online feature: “The Big Picture”

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Good Question!: Munich celebrates its Spring Strong Beer Festival every March. Why was the original “Strong Beer” brewed?

Answer: As a preparation for Lent

Munich’s annual starkbier festival, or strong beer season, is an homage to the traditions of 17th-century monks—and an insider’s alternative to Oktoberfest

Two weeks after Fasching, or Fat Tuesday, each year, a short list of local celebrities gathers at the Paulaner cellar in Munich to watch an honorary braumeister drive a brass tap into a new keg. The content he unleashes is called “strong beer,” and when it starts flowing, Starkbierzeit, or strong beer season, officially kicks off.

This is Munich’s subdued and slightly delayed Mardi Gras of sorts. It’s also described as the insider’s Oktoberfest—there are still the party tents, but the beer is stronger and the crowds thinner.

During Starkbierzeit, Muncheners sip earthenware steins of the dark, formidable suds to ward off winter’s lingering chill—strong beer was originally concocted by 17th-century monks who drank it in place of solid food during Lent. The locals still call it their “health tonic,” and, keeping with tradition, celebrate and imbibe it during these late-winter weeks.

Befitting of its name, the beer is much stronger than what is served in late September—almost twice as potent. Guidelines for strong beer, or starkbier, guarantee an alcohol percentage of at least 7.5%. Some weigh in at 9% alcohol, plenty potent to protect against the cold weather. (Standard Oktoberfest beers chalk up 4% to 6% alcohol.)

The “strong” in strong beer, however, doesn’t refer to alcohol content, but rather to the heavy, full-bodied flavor, which 400 years ago was meant to be as much a meal as a tipple.

Starkbier is actually a doppelbock, or double bock beer, which is heavy on malt. It was first brewed by way of a religious loophole of sorts: In the mid 1600s at Munich’s Neudeck ob der Au monastery, Paulaner monks concocted a beverage to sustain them through the Lent fast. They were forbidden to eat solid foods, but liquids were deemed acceptable. So they brewed the strongest, most nourishing beer they could come up with.

The strong beer brews require almost 1.5 pounds of malt (nourishment for the monks) per liter, giving it a sweet flavor. “Beer is called liquid bread and that’s no more truer than with a double bock,” says Jim Koch, founding brewer of the Boston Beer Company. He says the double bock holds a high place in the canon of great beers. “The double bock, along with stouts, Bohemian pilsners and Belgian ales are the foundational beers for brewers,” he says.

“Toffee, caramel, cloves, bread, toast, coffee and sugar are the common comparisons used for the taste of a starkbier,” says Henrich Schmidt, a professional beer taster from Munich. When poured, a creamy butterscotch head settles on a bright yet dark amber beer. Color, along with maltiness, are key differentiating characteristics among Bavarian double bocks.

During Starkbierzeit, each brewery opens a tent for revelers just as they would during Oktoberfest. Starkbierzeit is, at its core, meant to be a celebration of Bavarian culture, not a bleary-eyed race to the bottom of the stein. Like Oktoberfest, Oompah bands fill the tents with the usual rotation of drinking songs, while waiters don traditional costumes (think winterized versions of lederhosen) and manhandle 10 steins at a time for delivery to waiting customers.

Partially because of the alcohol strength, Starkbierzeit has stricter hours than its Bacchanalian equivalent in the fall. “The beer hall doesn’t open until six and it closes at midnight,” says Kerstin Jungblut, a manager at the Lowenbrau Keller. Attendance is also significantly smaller. “Our tent holds 2,000 [people] during Starkbierzeit and 10,000 at Oktoberfest,” Mr. Jungblut says.

But the lack of crowds also means the absence of astronomical prices. Entrance fees, which range from €7.50 at Augustiner to €16 at Lowenbrau, include a drink ticket. Single beers cost between €6 and €8, versus €9 to €11 during Oktoberfest. The Starkbierzeit festivities always end abruptly on the Saturday before Palm Sunday.

source: wall street journal

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Crazy !

Winners: JohnnyG and Dave

It was flower power night at the main street cafe and the questions focused on the 1960’s. You remember the 60’s – the era of tv westerns, james bond movies, and the early, wild years of rock and roll. We had a good crowd of players, including the return of a couple of old timers – Bobby Barcelona & JohnnyG. A special guest was that famous equestrian from Connecticut – Ms. Connie, who sailed all the way across Long Island sound to play with us. She is now running a bed & breakfast in Old Saybrook, on the CT shore, and hopes to see some of us as guests.

The game turned into a closely fought contest among a group of 6 players. Although Bobby Barcelona didn’t bring his A game, his sidekick JohnnyG was tough all night. The fact that there weren’t any sports questions was a big advantage for JohnnyG, who is more of a pop culture guy. Among the regulars, Driver Shea, Pluto, Miss Vicky, and Dave stayed close until the end when it came down to the ridiculous last question:

The Reason the Purple People Eater wouldn’t harm the songwriter: “I wouldn’t eat you cause   ……..  “you’re so tough””

And so Driver Shea, Miss Vicky and Pluto, all finished one back, along with Steve. Close, but no purple people eater. Dave hung in there to tie JohnnyG with 2 wrong.

Because it was flower power night some of the ladies went into their closets to find some of their hippy, dippy clothes from the 60’s and livened up the scene for us. Those were the days.

“Good Question!”: Who wrote Patsy Cline’s hit “Crazy”?

Answer: Willie Nelson

Nelson wrote the song in early 1961; at the time he was a journeyman singer-songwriter who had written several hits for other artists but had not yet had a significant recording of his own. Cline was already a country music superstar who was working to extend a string of hits. Nelson originally wrote the song for country singer Billy Walker, but Walker turned it down and Cline picked it as a follow up to her previous big hit “I Fall to Pieces“. The song was released in late 1961 and immediately became another huge hit for Cline, eventually becoming one of her signature tunes, and its success helped launch Nelson as a performer as well as a songwriter. This song as sung by Patsy Cline is #85 on Rolling Stone‘s list of The 500 Greatest Songs of All Time.^[3]

Musically the song is a jazz-pop ballad with country overtones. The complex melody suited Cline’s vocal talent perfectly and widened the crossover audience she had established with her prior hits. The lyrics describe the singer’s state of bemusement at the singer’s own helpless love for the object of his affection.

According to the Ellis Nassour biography Patsy Cline, Nelson, who at that time was known as a struggling songwriter by the name of Hugh Nelson, was a regular at Tootsie’s Orchid Lounge on Nashville’s Music Row, where he frequented with friends Kris Kristofferson and Roger Miller, both unknown songwriters at that time. Nelson met Cline’s husband, Charlie Dick, at the bar one evening and pitched the song to him. Dick took the track home and played it for Cline, who absolutely hated it at first because Nelson’s demo “spoke” the lyrics to a faster tempo than what Cline later recorded as a ballad. Cline’s producer, Owen Bradley, loved the song and arranged it as the ballad it was recorded as. Still recovering from a recent automobile accident that nearly took her life, Cline had difficulty reaching the high notes of the song at first due to her broken ribs, so she came back the next day to record the vocal, which she did in one take.

Loretta Lynn remembers the first time Cline performed it at the Grand Ole Opry on crutches, she received three standing ovations. Barbara Mandrell remembers Cline introducing the song to her audiences live in concert saying “I had a hit out called ‘I Fall to Pieces’ and I was in a car wreck. Now I’m really worried because I have a new hit single out and its called ‘Crazy’.”

Willie Nelson stated on the 1993 documentary Remembering Patsy that Cline’s version of “Crazy” was his favorite song of his that anybody had ever recorded because it “was a lot of magic.”

source: wikipedia

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Save the Rainforest

Winner: Dave

It was a hot, steamy “Jungle Night”, with lots of rain forest questions and another narrow win for Dropping Dave. Driver Shea was right there with him until the last question, but even with his African safari experience, couldn’t quite pull it off. The temperature had hit 103 in the afternoon, so only about 13 mad dogs and englishmen came out to play trivia. Maybe next week the temperatures and Dave will cool off and we’ll have a new winner. Quizmaster Daphne was her usual charming self and actually ran two non players out the door.

The jungle gorilla could not make this years event (his keeper had grounded him for excessive drinking last time), so Rosebud was accompanied by Babar the Elephant. Even so, she missed all the elephant questions and Babar was quite disappointed in her. Better luck next time Babar. Here’s a nice picture of tonight’s jungle ladies.

Interesting “Who Wants to be a Millionaire” story in the news this week.

The wild success of Walt Disney’s “Who Wants to Be a Millionaire?” could cost the company a cool $270 million from a suit it lost for stiffing the creators of the original quiz-show hit. A federal jury in California awarded the prize to Celador International, which built its UK-based show a decade ago before selling the US rights to Disney’s ABC.It became network TV’s biggest runaway winner for several years, dominating four nights of prime time each week.

The British creators claimed in court they were cheated out of about half of their profits based on the show’s $1 billion earnings. Their lawyers said Disney units ABC and Buena Vista Television concocted sweetheart deals to broker the show among themselves, allegedly cooking the books along the way to soak up added fees and revenue. Hope they don’t come after us.

“Good Question!”: How many species of plants and animals are being lost every single day due to rainforest deforestation?

Answer: 137

The tropical rainforest is one of the most important resources on earth, and the loss of this rainforest may be an enormous catastrophe for mankind, for many reasons. The rainforest is virtually untouched, with millions of acres of pristine land that may hold the secrets to many mysteries, and the cure for many different diseases. Every year, between twenty seven million and sixty million acres of rainforest are destroyed, for timber, ore, and other resources, and this can never be brought back. More than two thirds of all known plant and animal species exist in the rainforest, as well as many more species that have never been seen by modern man and are still unknown. The rainforest contains native tribes of people who still live as they did hundreds of years ago, and have never had contact with the outside world. The rainforest may hold the plants which will prove to be a cure for cancer and other diseases that are not currently curable. New species of plants and animals are discovered all the time by scientists doing research and looking for these things in areas of the rainforest.

Experts estimates that we are losing 137 plant, animal and insect species every single day due to rainforest deforestation. That equates to 50,000 species a year. As the rainforest species disappear, so do many possible cures for life-threatening diseases. Currently, 121 prescription drugs sold worldwide come from plant-derived sources. While 25% of Western pharmaceuticals are derived from rainforest ingredients, less that 1% of these tropical trees and plants have been tested by scientists.

There were an estimated ten million Indians living in the Amazonian Rainforest five centuries ago. Today there are less than 200,000. In Brazil alone, European colonists have destroyed more than 90 indigenous tribes since the 1900’s. With them have gone centuries of accumulated knowledge of the medicinal value of rainforest species. As their homelands continue to be destroyed by deforestation, rainforest peoples are also disappearing. Most medicine men and shamans remaining in the Rainforests today are 70 years old or more. Each time a rainforest medicine man dies, it is as if a library has burned down

The rainforest not only acts as home to numerous plants and animals, this dense forest provides an enormous amount of oxygen to the atmosphere of the earth, and removes an unbelievable amount of carbon from the air through natural processes. If the rainforest is gone, there would not be enough oxygen made, and carbon emissions into the air would not be filtered out. The loss of the tropical rainforest would be the biggest catastrophe for mankind that has ever occurred. The rainforest has given mankind many gifts, including medicines, rubber, chocolate, gum, and millions more, and it must be protected at all costs. The loss of the rainforest would be a tragic turn of events that could have a drastic effect on mankind and the entire earth.

sources: bionomicfuel blog, raintree nutrition inc.

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Let the Baby Pick His Birthday

Winner: Mike

It was baby night at the pub and all the questions focused on newborns. Mike, from Belgium, had stopped in the pub with his wife for just a drink, with no intention of playing. Good thing he decided to give it a try. His background at Stony Brook Medical center stood him well, and he held off challenges from Carol and Rosebud to be a first time winner as a first time player. Most of the men finished way back in the pack of 19 players and competed only for the village idiot prize tonight.

Next week is “Jungle Night”, so come in your best safari outfit. With Daphne away, Artie filled in as quizmaster. He ran the game at a fast and furious pace and it felt a bit rushed, more like a race to the finish (or like he had an early tee time the next day — which he did).

It’s going to be a BOY! Tonight was blue or pink night and we learned that Margaret’s baby is going to be a boy and that the folks in blue had guessed right. Mike tells us that if this had been in Belgium the right color would have been pink. Imagine that! We all hope he’s a healthy baby boy. When you consider all the games the baby will have listened to in utero, he should turn out to be a pretty good trivia player.

“Good Question!”: What percentage of babies actually arrive on their “Due Date”?

Answer: 3-4%

From the time that you learn you are pregnant, the countdown to your due date begins. But the seemingly simple question “When are you due?” can really be answered by only one person: Your baby.

For earlier generations of women, the concept of a due date was “around Thanksgiving” or “late fall.” As birth moved from home to hospital, women were given the approximate date when they should expect to be confined to a hospital bed, called the “estimated date of confinement.” Eventually, this term evolved into “expected date of delivery,” now called “due date.”

Unfortunately, a specified due date has made women (and their family and friends) place too much emphasis on a precise day – to the point that they plan their life around it. Your baby doesn’t have a calendar, however, so it is no surprise that less than 10 percent of babies actually arrive on the date they are due. For the other 90 percent of pregnant women, what does your due date really mean?

The Numbers Game

Many health-care providers use a sonogram to pinpoint your due date, but don’t be swayed by technology: A date based on an ultrasound can be off by a week or more depending on the skill of the technician, the timing of the sonogram and the size of the baby. Until 13 weeks of gestation, most babies grow at the same rate, but as pregnancy progresses, fetal size corresponds less and less to the amount of time that the baby is in the womb. So while many health-care providers keep giving ultrasounds to reassess a woman’s due date throughout her pregnancy, the date is actually becoming less accurate as time goes by. In fact, there’s really no need for a sonogram to determine a due date unless you don’t know the date of your last period.

If you do know the date of your last period, try the following calculation, called Naegele’s Rule. Babies have a gestational period of about 280 days, so count back 3 months from the first day of your last period and add 7 more days. Your approximate due date is that day within the next year. Take note of the word “approximate:” Your baby will grow and mature on his own schedule. The only thing you’ll know for sure is that you should give birth within two weeks before or after that day.

Wait It Out

Many women (and their health-care providers) become so attached to their due date that when the baby doesn’t come on that day, they schedule an induction. But because the due date is unreliable in the first place, inducing the baby may cause him to be born too soon. These “near-term” infants (as they are known) can have trouble breathing, staying warm and breastfeeding, and they often need special hospital care after birth.

Induction isn’t without risks for you, either: Research has shown that a first-time mother whose labor is induced is twice as likely to have a cesarean as one whose labor starts on its own. When you let your baby choose his own birthday, it means he’s really ready to begin life outside the womb.

Remember: Your due date is an estimate of when you will give birth, not a guarantee. If you are “over due,” just count it as more time to establish a bond with your baby, to prepare mentally for motherhood, to discuss your partner’s role during the birth and to ready your home for your baby’s arrival. Consider telling family and friends that you are due “sometime in May” rather than on a specific day in order to prevent a daily barrage of phone calls near the end of your pregnancy. Trust that your baby will know when the time is right for his big debut. It will be worth the wait for everyone.

source: lamaze magazine

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