Uncle John’s 24-Karat Gold Bathroom Reader® (75 page)
Read Uncle John’s 24-Karat Gold Bathroom Reader® Online
Authors: Bathroom Readers’ Institute
The area was populated by tribes of nomadic horsemen, and as they went off in separate directions to conquer various areas of Europe and Southern Asia, PIE spread with them and evolved into ancient Greek, Sanskrit, and Latin. With further expansion over the next few thousands of years, the ancestors of all modern languages based on PIE were born. No written samples of PIE exist—because written language hadn’t developed yet. Most of its words have disappeared, but at least one lives on in dozens of languages:
kaka
, or caca. Or poop.
MEDICAL TERMS
Medical terms are formed from words in ancient Greek, one of the few ways the language survives today. “Cac” is a medical prefix used to describe things that are wrong, off, or otherwise unsavory. In other words, poopy. They include:
• cacodermia
: a general term to describe bad skin conditions
• cacomelia:
deformed limbs
• cacidrosis:
foul-smelling sweat
• cachexia:
wasting away from disease
There are about 140 billion pennies in circulation—$1.4 billion worth.
SCIENTIFIC TERMS
Scientific names have the same Greek lineage. Some caca-based words:
• cacophony:
harsh noise
• cacodemon:
evil spirit
• cacosmia:
the hallucination of a bad smell
• cacology:
poor word choice
SLANG
Caca pops up in slang all over the world, too:
• In the Jewish dialect of Yiddish, an
alter kocker
is an insulting term for an old person. It literally translates to “old pooper.”
• Poppycock, the English slang word for nonsense comes from the Dutch word
pappekak
, which means “soft poop.”
• The Dutch expression
bekakt
means “to put on airs.” Literally, bekakt means “covered with excrement.”
• The Aztec word for the chocolate they drank was
cacahuatl
. But that sounded (and looked) like you-know-what to the Spaniards, so they called it
chocolatl
, which eventually became “chocolate.”
WE’RE NOT DUNG YET
Here are some more variations of “caca” from the world’s collective vocabulary:
• French: caca
• Lithuanian: kakoti
• Gaelic: cac
• Portuguese: cagar
• German: kacken
• Russian: kakat
• Greek: kakke
• Italian: cacca
• Bosnian: kakiti
• Ukrainian: kakaty
• Turkish: kaka yapmak
• Basque: kaka egin
BOOK SMART
By age 15, Harry Truman had read every book in the Independence, Missouri, library (but he never graduated from college).
Skeletal remains of people living 10,000 years ago in what is now Pakistan have no cavities.
Just when we thought we’d done every origin under the sun...it starts to rain
.
U
NDER COVER
According to some scholars, the only early treatise on the history of the umbrella burned when Julius Caesar torched Egypt’s Library of Alexandria. But legend says that a Chinese woman invented the device 3,000 years ago. Its purpose: to provide relief from the sun for the elite. In fact, only Chinese men of royal blood and government officials could be shaded by a
san kai
. The higher a man’s rank, the more umbrellas in his entourage, with as many as 24 being carried in the emperor’s procession. Since its invention, the umbrella has popped up all over the world, and for a long time, it was anything but humble.
THE UMBRELLAS MAKE THE KING
• A bas-relief sculpture dated between 668 and 626 B.C., located in the palace of Ashurbanipal, King of Assyria, shows the king riding his chariot back from war. He has just trounced his brother, the king of Babylon, and rides in triumph beneath an umbrella.
• In Egypt, the umbrella protected the exalted heads of the pharaohs from the harsh African sun. In Thent-Amen’s time, around 1120 B.C., the Egyptian courts held that if the shadow of the Pharaoh’s umbrella fell upon a man, he became a slave for the rest of his life.
• In ancient India, umbrellas were stacked, one atop another on a single pole, to show status. The king’s umbrellas were stacked 13 high. And in nearby Burma, the ruler held the title “King of the White Elephants and Lord of the Twenty-Four Umbrellas.”
GETTING CARRIED AWAY
• In 339 B.C., the poet Claudius Claudianus complained that effeminate Roman youths of the day were more interested in parading around with umbrellas than they were in carrying off conquered Sabine women.
In San Marino (a tiny republic inside Italy), tourists outnumber residents almost 19 to 1.
• In the Middle Ages, the Catholic church used special umbrellas to signify the status of the clergy. Red and gold for the pope, red or violet for cardinals, and green for bishops. Whenever the Pope appeared in public, an umbrella shaded him. The papal court keeps the tradition to this day.
• Between 1619 and 1637, King Louis XIII built a collection of umbrellas that included 11 made of taffeta (an expensive silk fabric) and 3 made of oiled cloth trimmed with gold and silver lace.
THE MAN IN THE STREET
• In 1772 a Baltimore, Maryland, shop owner bought an umbrella off a ship that had just returned from India. When he walked outside and popped it open, women—who had never seen an umbrella before—screamed. Horses bolted and children started following him. Bystanders stoned him, then took his umbrella and tore it to shreds. The town watch had to be called out to stop the free-for-all.
• So how did the umbrella go from shading royalty to sheltering commoners? It happened in London, a city that’s synonymous with rain—it gets an average of 25.6 inches per year. So it’s no surprise that the British have many nicknames for the umbrella: a
brolly
, a
mush-topper
, a
rain-napper
, a
gingham
, a
gamp
...and a
Hanway
. Around 1750 an eccentric traveler and philanthropist named Jonas Hanway ventured into the rain carrying an umbrella he’d brought home from China. Nearby coachmen nearly hooted him off the street. (At the time, Londoners considered any man who carried an umbrella to be either effeminate or French.)
If not for the 18th-century British dandies called
macaronis
, known for following absurd fashion trends (such as sticking feathers in their hats), Hanway might have been the first and last Englishman to carry an umbrella. Unfazed by the catcalls of coachmen, the macaronis adopted the device, and after about 30 years it became “the indispensable companion of the British gentleman.”
• The umbrella’s round-the-world journey ends where it began, in China—the world’s largest umbrella manufacturer—where one city alone, Shangyu, has more than 1,000 umbrella factories. It takes 80 steps to make a single umbrella, but only one to open it and take shelter from the sun or rain. The next time you open an umbrella, don’t think of London. Thank the Chinese.
World’s largest comic-book collection: The Library of Congress has more than 100,000.
WEIRD UMBRELLAS
The basic design of the umbrella has gone unchanged for 3,000 years. But that hasn’t stopped the world’s would-be inventors and mad scientists from trying to “improve” on it. Here are a few examples:
Stunning Umbrella.
The United States Patent and Trademark Office has received thousands of applications for umbrella patents. Examples include a weather-forecasting umbrella, an umbrella with a self-contained rain-measuring device, a glow-in-the-dark umbrella, a strap-on umbrella for pets, and an electric stun-gun umbrella. The patent office reportedly has four full-time employees who do nothing but process umbrella claims.
Internet Umbrella.
A projector located in the umbrella’s shaft projects a 3-D image of a map onto a large display inside the umbrella’s canopy. Using GPS technology, Flickr, and Google Earth, the map updates constantly. Users can watch the 3-D views to help find their way as they walk around the city streets. (And, hopefully, watch where they’re going.)
Gunbrella.
A Hong Kong gadget-maker offers an umbrella that is opened by pressing the “trigger” on its rifle-stock-shaped handle. Carried slung over the shoulder by its handy strap, the umbrella looks like a rifle.
Light Saber Umbrella.
The shaft lights up like a prop from
Star Wars
, illuminating you and your path. Even on the darkest nights, you’re visible to cyclists, drivers, and Jedi knights.
Eco-Umbrella.
Though umbrellas have been around for thousands of years, they don’t seem to last very long. “Umbrellas,” says Julie Lasky, editor-in-chief of
International Design
magazine, “suffer from design flaws that often lead to their premature deaths and unwelcome burials in landfills.” In 2006
I.D
. sponsored a contest for eco-friendly umbrella designs. The winner? The Crayella. All the pieces of its frame are made from recycled polyethylene (soda bottles). And all the moving parts have ball-and-socket joints that snap together, so a Crayella can be assembled quickly and any broken parts can be replaced in minutes without tools. Bonus: It’s oval shaped so you can shelter a friend or your backpack.
First female U.S. Senator: Hattie Caraway of Arkansas, elected in 1932 (and again in 1938).
Strange tips from real travel agencies to help plan your next vacation
.
C
ome to Colombia!
“Anywhere that illicit drugs are cultivated in Colombia is a dangerous zone. To get to any of these areas, you’d have to go off the beaten track and avoid everyone’s local advice. You’re unlikely to just stumble across a coca field. So forget about that point.”
Come to Russia!
“In most parts of Russia, a tourist is a great rarity, and speaking to one is not always that easy psychologically.”
—
Svezhy Veter Agency
Come to Cameroon!
“Cameroon is a real paradise for animals in the wild. Forests and rivers full of funny gorillas are waiting for your visits.”
Come to Mongolia!
“It is better to avoid dogs, even ones which appear tame, and take caution if offered marmot meat.”
—
Blue Mongolia Tour
Come to Nepal!
“Public demonstrations and strikes are popular forms of political expression in Nepal and may occur on short notice. Travelers are requested to stay at the most prominent areas where no untoward incidents have taken place, so far.”
—
India Invites
Come to Iran!
“Do you want to travel to Iran but doubt it?”
Come to Latvia!
“For travelers, the best thing about Latvia is that it is so compact.”
Come to the USA!
“Many parts of the United States are subject to earthquakes, wildfires, floods, extreme heat, hurricanes, mudslides, landslides, thunderstorms and lightning, tornadoes, tsunamis, volcanoes, freezing rain, heavy snow and blizzards, and extreme cold.”
Fastest-flying insect: the hawk moth. With an 8-inch wingspan, it can fly up to 33 mph.
Is there any limit to the things underwear can do?
U
nderwear:
X-Ray Armor, made by Rocky Flats Gear, Inc., a Colorado underwear company
What It Does:
Shields your private parts from the view of invasive airport body scanners
Details:
X-Ray Armor consists of ordinary underwear with patches of “patent-pending lead-free shielding material” over the crotch and breasts. The material on the crotch is shaped like a fig leaf; on bras it’s shaped like clovers, clasped hands, or flowers. Inventor Jeff Buske says his skivvies protect sensitive areas from exposure to radiation and also prevent employees of the Transportation Security Administration from trading scanner images like baseball cards. The TSA maintains that its scanners can’t print, transmit, or save the images, which are deleted immediately anyway, so there’s no way for the agency’s employees to misuse them. It also says the radiation emitted by the equipment is minimal and harmless. But try telling that to Buske: “There’s no such thing as safe radiation,” he says. “Short of wearing an actual radiation suit, which would be impractical, you protect what you can.” (One caveat: The TSA might insist on patting you down if you wear underwear designed to defeat their equipment.)