In a similar vein, Stradivarius violins from the 1700s were made from wood obtained from a certain grove of trees in northern Italy. The grove (now a forest) is still there, and the occasional tree is still sacrificed for music.
There are more museums in the USA than there are McDonald’s and Starbucks. Combined.
The latest issue of American Scientist (Nov-Dec 2021) contains a number of interesting articles. One by the ever-entertaining Tony Rothman on Einstein’s Big Equation, and one on Insect Decision-making. But the most interesting one is on the Evolution of Bird’s Brains. Not because of what it says about bird brains, but because it told me about a creature I’d never heard of, with the most amazing and outrageous name
The Bony-Eared Assfish
Yes, The Bony-Eared Assfish. The author knows that this name has instantly captivated your inner eight year old, and both times he brings it up he apologetically calls it “unfortunately named”. Somewhat appropriately, it has a brain the size of that of a baby trout, despite being 60 times larger. Evidently the bony-headed assfish is something of an asshat.
How did it get a name like that? If you’re like me, you immediately recall the drawing by Don Martin in his book Don Martin Carries On showing the results of a charter boat coming back from “Bottom Fishing”. But, no, the assfish doesn’;t look like that at all. In fact, it looks like a fish drawn by someone who’d never seen a fish. It’s shaped sort of like a tadpole, with an ass-end that tapers down to a point, without proper tailfins or flukes.
If you look it up on Google there’s a helpful question “How did the Bony-Eared Assfish get named?”, which concentrates unhelpfully on the first part – the fish is “bony eared” because it has protruding spines on its “nose” and “ears” (well, gills, really). But it doesn’t even try to explain the “assfish” part. Embarassed, no doubt.
If you turn to the Wikipedia article, you learn that the spikres are responsible for the both parts of its scientific name, Acanthonus armatus. “Akanthos” is Greek for “prickly” and “Armatus” means “armed”. the “-onos” part is supposed to signify a relationship to cod and hake, but Wikipedia conjectures that confusion with latin “onus” = “donkey” might have lead to the “ass-” part. (Wikipedia confirms, the tiny relative brain size, saying that " The bony-eared assfish holds the record for the smallest brain-to-body weight ratio of all vertebrates." Way to go, Assfish!
Obviously we’re not still confused, so why keep calling it the Assfish? I think that weird names like this become self-perpetuating, especially if they trigger your internal eight-year-old. I’ve long suspected that the reason we still call the Diet of Worms – the 1521 conference at which the Holy Roman Emperor denounced Martin Luther as a heretic – by that name is because our immature inner selves inevitably see it as someone cramming earthworms into their mouth. The German name for this is Reichstag zu Worms, and the usual translation for “Reichstag” is “Parliament”. Translating it as “Diet” is really pretty odd – the word is rarely used in English. It may be technically correct , but its use is idiosyncratic. I almost always see it used to refer to this particular meeting. There’s no reason not to change it to “Conference of Worms” or “Parliament of Worms” (both of which could still set off that inner child, but with not as gross an image). I suspect the only reason we haven’t is because of inertia and feeding of the immature part of our brains.
Of course, a “Diet of Assfish” would be really ridiculous…
A fun baseball fact: over their star-crossed 1899 “major league” season, the Cleveland Spiders drew just over 6,000 fans. That works out to about 80 fans attending per game.
That year the Spiders won 20 games and lost 134. Pitcher Crazy Schmit won two games and lost seventeen, but his winning percentage was only the third worst on the team*.
R.I.P., Crazy.
*the leader in that category was the legendary Harry Colliflower, who in his one and only year in the bigs went 1-11.
That is interesting.
Love museums.
One of destinations we visited on my honeymoon.
You don’t have to go all the way to Asia. There’s a Museum of Sex in New York City
The Waittresses, an early 80’s group, had hits with “I Know What Boys Like” and “Christmas Wrapping.”
Patty Donahue, the lead singer, was discovered by founder Chris Butler in a bar. He had already written “I Know What Boys Like” and challenged the bar patrons to sing it.
“One day I write this song, and then it’s noon and the liquid lunchers are packed into a … bar. I stand on a chair and bang a beer bottle for attention and declare: ‘I need a chanteuse to coo a tune. The song is funny and stupid and cool and different, and is anybody interested?’ A voice in the back says ‘uh-huh.’ It’s Patty.”
Haven’t read the whole thread, but has anyone yet mentioned Reykjavik’s Penis Museum?
I was there a few weeks ago. Not nearly as interesting as it sounds, unless you like looking at preserved penes floating in formaldehyde - the questionably-sane man who founded the museum collected a sample from every species of mammals in or around Iceland. Including the naked plains ape.
Then you get to the last gallery, which is devoted to the wedding tackle of trolls, hulderfolk, and elves. The exhibit helpfully noted that the troll apparently had an STD when his schlong was collected.
Probably the weirdest thing about the museum is that it has a restaurant. To my eternal shame, I didn’t look to see if hot dogs or sausages were on the menu.
Amazon has “Eat a Dick” that allows you to send a chocolate penis anonymously. I bet there are others. The reviews complain it’s kind of small. I’ll let you run with that.
While we’re talking about junk, some info about kangaroos. According to this site…
Kangaroos have three vaginas. The outside two are for sperm and lead to two uteruses. The middle one is for giving birth.
The urinary tract goes through the middle of the three vaginas, which may be why joeys are so small (40,000 times smaller than adult kangaroos) — there’s no room for a bigger birth canal with the urinary tract in the way.
To go with the two sperm-vaginas, male kangaroos often have two-pronged penises.
Been to Amsterdam Sex Museum.
Was flashed by a mannequin wearing a trench coat as soon as I walked in.
I visited the Sax Museum in Dinant, Belgium. It honors Adolph Sax (1814-1894) - inventor of the saxophone.
The town is also known for its bridge, which is lined with saxophones.
When my gf went to Iceland she stopped for a photo-op. Spent under 5 minutes there, but had to get a dick-pic.
During the filming of “Goldfinger” (1964), Sean Connery (James Bond) was never filmed in the United States. The sets for the Fontainebleau Hotel (Miami) and Fort Knox (Kentucky) were constructed on a sound stage at Pinewood Studios in the UK.
Beijing is famous for its penis restaurant (which is primarily for the purposes of “natural male enhancement” rather than delicious flavour).
Does this mean David Arquette is a Bozo?
We’re all bozos on this bus.
I even have what I refer to as “bozo hair.” Red-ish, and sticks out to the side.