The Hawaiian language uses only 13 letters in its alphabet. The next most economical major language is Finnish, which uses 16, except for recent borrowed words. Oddly, Hawaiian and Finnish use nearly the same letters.
The reef triggerfish is the state fish of Hawaii. Its name in Hawaiian is humuhumunukunukuapua’a, which means “triggerfish with a snout like a pig.”
An animated humuhumunukunukuapua’a appeared as a children’s computer interface in two episodes of Star Trek: The Next Generation.
According to the Waikiki Aquarium website, to early Hawaiians, the behaviors of the humuhumunukunukuapua’a, “triggerfish with a snout like a pig,” (rooting through sand or rocks for food and making grunting noises when handled or when pursued by a predator) were pig-like traits.
The Neutropic Cormorant ranges over the western hemisphere, north as far as coastal Louisiana, where they are common. The more southerly subspecies if South America is locally called “pig-bird” because a roosting colony of them sounds like hungry pigs at the troughs
Cormorants are fish-eating birds, diving into the water to capture their prey. Many species of cormorants engage in a characteristic wing-drying behavior after returning to the surface – they stand with their wings extended, letting them dry in the sun.
Among the migratory bird species, the Arctic tern is believed to have the longest distance of migration. The breeding grounds of the tern are in the Arctic and sub-Arctic regions of Europe, Asia, and North America; the tern migrates to the Antarctic coast for the southern summer. Recent studies have shown average annual roundtrip lengths of up to 56,000 miles.
The United States research base at McMurdo Station in the Antarctic is one of the last outposts of humanity in William Brinkley’s 1988 post-World War III novel The Last Ship (later very loosely adapted in a TV series of the same name).
The United States research base at McMurdo Station in the Antarctic is the largest research station on the continent. 42 nations have research stations, with the earliest, Orcadas, established by the Scottish National Antarctic Expedition in 1903 and transferred to the Argentine government in 1904. The most recent countries to establish stations are Belarus (2007) and Turkey (2019).
The John Carpenter-directed Antarctic sf horror movie The Thing is shown every year at McMurdo Station at the start of the winter season.
Antarctica is the driest, coldest, and windiest continent on earth.
Incontinence is a lack of control over defecation, leading to involuntary loss of bowel contents—including flatus (gas), liquid stool elements and mucus, or solid feces. In mild cases, any of several remedies can make the patient continent.
A scene in the film Monty Python’s Life of Brian revolves around joke faux-Latin names.
In the scene, Brian (Graham Chapman) claims to Pontius Pilate (Michael Palin) that his father was a Roman centurion named Naughtius Maximus. When another centurion laughs, and says that that must be a joke name, like “Sillius Soddus” or “Biggus Dickus,” Pilate becomes irate, because he has “a vewwy gweat fwiend in Wome” named Biggus Dickus. Pilate further notes that Biggus Dickus’s wife is named Incontinentia Buttocks.
The Giant Anaconda (also known as the Green Anaconda) is believed to be the largest snake in the world, by mass. A Giant Anaconda may reach a weight of 500 pounds.
The longest snake is believed to be the Reticulated Python. These snakes may reach a length of 10 meters.
Measuring 239 feet deep at its greatest depth, Green Lake is the deepest natural inland lake in the state of Wisconsin. It is not unusual for Lake Trout, cauht in the deep waters, to explode from depressurization when brought to the surface. Two nearby lakes are named Big Green and Little Green, and Little Green is the deep one.
O.C. Smith’s version of the song “Little Green Apples” was a #2 hit on the Hot 100, behind “Hey Jude” by the Beatles. It peaked at #2 on the R&B chart in Billboard and was certified Gold for domestic sales of one million units. The song won its composer, Bobby Russell, the 1969 Grammy Award for Song of the Year and the Grammy Award for Best Country Song.
St Jude, the patron saint of hopeless causes, is also the patron saint of the Armenian Apostolic Church along with St. Bartholemew.
Dr. Seuss published only two childrens books before switching to manuals for US forces overseas in WWII. They were “Horton Hatches an Egg” and “The 500 Hats of Bartholomew Cubbins”, the latter of which was read to me by Miss Rexwinkel, my second grade teacher, in 1944, a year after its first appearance.
“The 500 Hats of Bartholomew Cubbins” was read to me by Miss Whitman, my first grade teacher, in 1954.
Walt Whitman is one of America’s most revered poets. His book, Leaves of Grass has sold millions of copies since it was first self-published in 1855. Oddly enough, the book was described as obscene for its overt sensuality. Whitman’s own life came under scrutiny for his presumed homosexuality.