That makes much more sense, though I had read what I wrote somewhere a long time ago. I see now it is camelo - pardis, not camel - leo - pardis, thanks for the correction!
It’s quite possible you’ve seen “cameleopard” in English, as that was a variant of “camelopard”. English went through a phase of using new spellings to match what they thought were the etymologies of words. A famous example is “island” (that is, “is” + “land”) from the original “eyland” (that is, “egg” + “land”). (Edited to add: we still pronounce the word as if spelled the original “eyland” way.)
I don’t think the original Greeks had that problem.
“Eiland” is an obsolete German word that is almost pronounced the same as “island”, except for the ‘a’ sound. It was common until, I estimate, the end of the 19th century, and you still hear it used if someone wants to sound old-timey. The modern word is “Insel”, which I guess is rather related to the French “île” and the Italian “isola”. (“island”, too? And where does the English “isle” figure into?)
All coming, I think, from the Latin “insula” meaning island. The Latin prefix paen- meaning ‘almost’ thus a paen-insula is almost an island.
English “isle” is from French “ile” (from Latin “insula”), with an added “s” to match the one in “island”. The words are unrelated, but it’s a common error to think they are.
And now poking around Wiktionary, it seems I made an error. The “ey” in “eyland” is not the Old English version of “egg”*, but another word spelled the same. Which is cognate to the German word “Aue” and Latin “aqua”–water.
*Modern English “egg” is actually from the Old Norse word for egg instead of the Old English word for egg.
This is also why we insulate things: from a heat transfer perspective, insulating a thing transforms it into an island.
I would like to think that he set them up with a good salary and at least one servant to make up for the loss of hands but I doubt if he did.
Falling down a rabbit hole, I learned about “migraine crowns.” Here’s hoping they’re effective in helping a lot of people. I find regular headaches miserable, and I wouldn’t want to experience a migraine.
I think camels and giraffes have the same gait; moving both left legs forward together, then both right legs, etc. That might be part of the reason for drawing some relationship between the two.
And the speed of light divided by a year is just about exactly 1 g.
No, the CMB defines a whole bunch of different reference frames. Every location in the Universe would have a different CMB-defined reference frame.
And “Cameleopardus, or the Royal Nonesuch” was the creature purportedly depicted by the two con artist in Huckleberry Finn.
The Giraffe has a slight hump behind its neck (like a camel), and coloration that is similar to that of a leopard.
I have a couple of friends who use them to good effect
I just read Edgar Allan Poe may have died of rabies.
I wonder what bit him?
“Quoth the Raven, Nevermore”
There are probably more species of parasitic animals than all the other animals taken together. I say probably because we haven’t counted all the animals: we don’t know how many there are. But almost every animal you examine close enough has at least one dedicated parasite. Humans, for instance, have at least three obligate ectoparasites: the head louse, the body louse and the crab louse. That is not couting the numerous parasited we share with other animals, like the flea, several mites, all kind of worms, tapeworms, nematodes, etc. etc.
There are roughly 5,000 species of lice described, with 4,000 parasitizing birds and an additional 800 special parasites of mammals worldwide. Considering that there are about 10,400 extant species of birds lice alone are enough to provide a dedicated parasite for every two species of bird (plus the mites, the fleas… you get the idea).
Lice are so attached to their hosts that they can be used to confirm other theories about when humans and chimpanzees diverged or when humans first arrived to America.
Parasites can also be used to gauge the health of an entire ecosystem: as many parasites require multiple hosts during their life cycle they will disappear among the first if only one of the hosts in the chain becomes rare.
And coming back to the Iberian lynx: when in 2002 there were only 94 left in the world they were all captured to start a conservation and breeding program. They were de-wormed and washed. They will get their worms back, no problem, they get them with the diet. But the lynx lice that were their specific parasite are probably gone for good. They will still occasionally get some lice from other animals, from the rabbits they mostly eat, or from birds. But the lice won’t like it very much and will jump ship as soon as they can.
They will still get ticks, though.
This is very British so I’ll have to provide some background. Delia Smith is a National Treasure. She is a writer of cookbooks and presenter of cookery shows, dating back to the 1970s. No gimmicks, no showmanship, she just explains how to cook stuff. We have several of her cook books and use her recipes all the time. Her video taught me how to make marmalade. Her lemon curd recipe is virtually foolproof.
But, you ask (quite reasonably) Did the lemon curd recipe get her into The Museum of Modern Art?
No it did not. But this (created when she was young and unknown) did:
As quoted in bassist Bill Wyman’s memoir, Rolling with the Stones, Smith recalled, “I was working then as a jobbing home economist with a food photographer who shot for commercials and magazines. I’d cook anything they needed. One day they said they wanted a cake for a Rolling Stones record cover, it was just another job at the time. They wanted it to be very over-the-top and as gaudy as I could make it.”
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This morning I was told that if a couple has two children of the same gender, it is more likely that their third child will also be of that gender. IOW, if you and your spouse have two girls, your third child will probably also be a girl.
But I cannot find anything online to prove or disprove this assertion. Has anybody also heard this, or can find research to back it up or shoot it down?
No, but Cecil did wax thoroughly about similar odds on choosing another door in Let’s Make A Deal. He refers to your question near the bottom.
That actually isn’t my question. I was told that if the first two kids are girls, then if and when the woman again becomes pregnant, the odds are much higher that she will again give birth to a girl. Or if the first two kids are boys, then the odds are much higher that she will again give birth to a boy.
Not the question/puzzle that Cecil was discussing.
Snow Leopards win.
Also, the old name for Snow Leopard is Ounce. This odd name derived from Latin, luncea (meaning lynx). Luncea became lonce in Old French, and those old French thought the first letter indicated ‘the’. So it became l’once, which in English became ounce.
The word ounce a measure of weight or volume was derived entirely differently, from Latin uncia, one.
That is very interesting about the Lynx and Lice in general. If in fact they did actually get all the lynx I wonder if a now type of lice will quickly adapt.