Where Did Calories Come From

Rotund Dr. Lulu Hunt Peters introduced a new word, calorie, to the world in 1918. Peters’ book, 'Diet and Health, With a Key to Calories', which included a phonetic spelling of the word “calorie,” because so many people were unfamiliar with it. It probably sold more than a million copies and established calorie-counting as the framework of a good health.

The diet regime gave a dangerous tool to those looking for a way to quantify and reduce their food intake. The Scarsdale Diet of 1979, a strict 700-calorie a day diet that works, because you are starving.

British Papers Go Online

The British Library has announced a project to make 40 million pages from its newspaper archive available online. It has more than 300 years of information, including coverage of the Crimean and Boer Wars. The plan is to complete the digitization of more than 4 million pages within the first two years.

With journalism standards as they are today, the world will get a totally different view of reality, if it depends only on newspapers.

Hot Stuff

To Be a Bee

A queen bee is selectively bred in a special "queen cell" in the hive and fed royal jelly by worker bees to induce her to become sexually mature. A virgin queen that survives to adulthood without being killed by her rivals will take a mating flight with a dozen or so male drones. During mating, their genitals explode and snap off inside the queen.

The snapped-off penis acts as a genital plug to prevent other drones from fertilizing the queen. Ouch!

Dr. Demento Moves On

Do you remember Doctor Demento? Last weekend, the Dr. Demento Show had its final broadcast on KIYU, KLOO, WLVQ (QFM96), WRKH and KOZT after forty years of wacky, lively, interesting broadcasting and great music, like 'The Chainsaw Juggler, 'Dirty Old Man', 'You Wanna Buy a Bunny', and more.

He will continue producing new shows every week, starting this weekend for www.drdemento.com for the foreseeable future. New shows will be posted every Saturday. That is good news for the Demento Society and his legions of followers. You know you liked him.

Birds Moonwalk

Here is a cute video of a bird doing the moonwalk to attract a mate. Click on the title for link.

Lost in Translation

 When officials asked for the Welsh translation of a road sign, they thought the reply was what they needed.

All official road signs in Wales are bilingual, so the local authority e-mailed its in-house translation service for the Welsh version of, "No entry for heavy goods vehicles. Residential site only."

Unfortunately, the e-mail response to Swansea council said in Welsh, "I am not in the office at the moment. Send any work to be translated."

Wake-up Call

Want to have some fun? You can call anyone, including yourself and schedule a wake-up call. The calls can be text or voice. Need to get out of a meeting early? Schedule a message to yourself to go off ten minutes after the meeting starts. The first ten are free. Here is the link to http://wakerupper.com/

What's in a Name

Here are five web site names, not meant to be funny, but they are. Read the web site names slowly and enjoy.  You can also click on the link to prove they are real.

Experts Exchange – a site where programmers can trade advice. http://www.expertsexchange.com

La Drape – a British company selling high-end quilted bedspreads. http://www.ladrape.co.uk

American Scrap Metal – a scrap metal recycling firm. http://www.angelfire.com/alt/americanscrapmetal

Speed of Art – a collective of art designers. http://www.speedofart.com

Therapist Finder – a directory for therapy services.  http://www.therapistfinder.com