What was unusual about the last great Spanish explorer in North America? And how many brains – if any – does an Octopus have? Join Bob and Marcia Smith for their 6th week of Q&A fun with Coronavirus Trivia. On the Off Ramp.
Bob and Marcia Smith engaged in a wide-ranging conversation, discussing the intelligence and brain structure of various creatures, including octopuses. Marcia shared interesting facts about octopuses and their multiple brains, while Bob joked about the intelligence of politicians and dinosaurs. They later discussed the evolution of business and technology, with a focus on the role of women in the field, and the effects of quarantine on work and personal life. Bob and Marcia also shared their experiences with their pets and reflected on the correlation between vocabulary and cognitive abilities among journalists, lawyers, and members of the clergy. Finally, they discussed their shared interests in historical exploration and nursing, with Bob highlighting the contributions of John Evans and Marcia delving into the history of nursing and its male-dominated past.
Outline
Animal intelligence, brains, and facts.
- Octopuses have 9 brains, including one main brain and 8 smaller brains per tentacle.
- Marcia and Bob discuss brains and octopuses, sharing interesting facts and tangents.
Spanish exploration and facts.
- Bob Smith shares an interesting fact about the last great Spanish explorer in North America, John Evans, who was actually Welsh and planted the Spanish flag at a Mandan Indian settlement in North Dakota.
- Evans believed a myth that a legendary Welsh hero Prince Madoc came to America 11 years before Columbus and set up a colony whose members intermarried with the Indians, leading him to North Dakota.
- Bob and Marcia discuss the weight gain of blue whale calves and Spanish colonization of the Americas.
- Bob Smith shares interesting facts about Alaska, including its history as a major fishing port and its role in World War Two.
- The Frisbee got its name from the Frisbee pie company in Connecticut, where students at Yale University flung tin plates through the air in the 1920s.
Nursing history, money, and Hollywood.
- Marcia and Bob discuss the history of nursing, with Marcia mentioning Clara Barton’s work during the Civil War and Bob adding that nursing was once a male-dominated field.
- Bob shares a book about Clara Barton, highlighting her independence and pioneering spirit in providing supplies to the frontlines despite bureaucratic obstacles.
- Marcia and Bob discuss the history of women in business, with Marcia sharing a fascinating fact about the number of years it would take to count from one to a billion.
- Bob Smith asks Marcia Smith questions about Hollywood history and movie stars, including Fred Astaire’s role in the film “Dancing Lady” (1933).
Work-from-home policies during COVID-19.
- Marcia and Bob Smith discuss Judy Garland’s early life and career in show business.
- Bob Smith reads an article by Jason Gay in the Wall Street Journal, where a cat argues that Americans need to get back to work, citing the cat’s own dislike of the quarantine and desire for alone time.
- Marcia Smith responds with a joke about their dog, Bowser, who wants to work from home forever.
- Bob Smith and Marcia Smith discuss their pets, including a Beagle named Buster and a cat named Bowser, who were well-loved and had a significant impact on their lives.
- The couple shares funny anecdotes about their pets, such as Buster peeing in Bob’s shoes, and Marcia’s cat living until the age of 21.
Vocabulary, boggle, and Coronavirus trivia.
- Marcia and Bob discuss the cost of owning an elephant as a pet, with Marcia estimating 1000 pounds of food and 1000 pounds of water consumed daily.
- Marcia and Bob Smith discuss their vocabulary sizes and competitive nature during a Coronavirus trivia show.
- They reminisce about their children’s boggle competitions and how they’re still competitive 30 years later.
Bob Smith 0:00
What was unusual about the last great Spanish explorer in North America?
Marcia Smith 0:05
How many if any brains does an octopus have answers
Bob Smith 0:09
to those another questions coming up in this sixth week of Coronavirus trivia from Bob and Marcia Smith on the off ramp
Welcome to the off ramp, chance to slow down steer clear of crazy take a side road to sanity and get some perspective on life. That is definitely what we need during these shot in weeks here during the Coronavirus emergency. Well, we’ve gone through six weeks of being together, every waking hour seems
Marcia Smith 0:57
like only 10.
Bob Smith 0:59
What do you mean by that? And we’re here again today with some trivia. What do you got there?
Marcia Smith 1:04
Well, you were probably just asking yourself this question this morning, Bob. Okay. How many if any brains does an octopus have?
Bob Smith 1:13
I would say, by the nature of that question. An octopus has multiple brains. It has like eight brains one for each. tentacle
Marcia Smith 1:22
tentacles? Yes, well, that’s a good guess wrong, but it is. Yes, you’re on the right track, because each of his tentacles has a brain a small brain. And then there’s one main brain in the middle of his body or hers. It’s one that controls the nervous system. So there are nine brains well, and they are considered to be one of the most intelligent in vertebrates. They’ve really got a lot going on for my considered. Who do you think has the biggest brain? Who has the biggest brain? Yes. And don’t say yourself.
Bob Smith 1:57
Wednesday myself. Like an elephant has a big brain or a whale. A whale probably is a huge brain.
Marcia Smith 2:03
That’s right, the sperm whale to be specific. Wow, check this 15 and a half pounds.
Bob Smith 2:09
And that’s as big as it gets. As a brain gets.
Marcia Smith 2:12
How big do you think yours?
Bob Smith 2:13
No, I’m not. No, I’m good about mine.
Marcia Smith 2:16
I know. But how do you think what do you think?
Bob Smith 2:18
I bet it’s only two and a half. Two pounds, two and a half pounds. Cheese.
Marcia Smith 2:21
Did you see my notes here? Yes, that is right. Really? Yeah, two and a half pounds? No, I had no idea. Well, and the last question related to brains because obviously I got an attention goodling away. But according to scientists, who’s one of the dumbest creatures that ever roamed the earth,
Bob Smith 2:42
I can think of some politicians the dumbest creature to ever roam the earth dinosaurs. One in particular, the What’s that huge one, that
Marcia Smith 2:54
terrain is wrecked? Yes. No. Oh, that steg Oh Soros. The dinosaur weighed 13,000 pounds and had a brain that weighed less than 300.
Bob Smith 3:09
Not a real brain. Oh, that’s, that sounds like a real accident of evolution.
Marcia Smith 3:13
So next time I want to sell to you. Hey, when are you? Stegosaurus?
Bob Smith 3:20
Well, those are things I didn’t know about. Animals. That’s fascinating. All right.
Marcia Smith 3:24
Can I just go back to the octopus for a sec? Are you rolling
Bob Smith 3:28
your eyes? Well, no. But I usually we trade back and forth. No questions. But
Marcia Smith 3:33
as long as I’m on I just this is factoids for the octopus, who has nine brains to reiterate, but they How many hearts you think it has?
Bob Smith 3:41
Oh, well, I never thought of that. Of course you didn’t. Is there a heart for each tentacle? No. Oh, okay. Well, I’ll just I’ll take say one heart. It’s
Marcia Smith 3:50
just three. Just three. And and in the last interesting fact about octopuses. Their blood is blue. Oh, I don’t know why. Okay, look into that further fascinating
Bob Smith 4:03
facts about creatures of the past and present. Very interesting. Okay, here’s one for you. This is historic. And I got on a tangent too. So I’ve got some interesting facts. What was unusual about the last great Spanish explorer in North America. Now we think of bizarro and all these famous ones that went through Mexico and everything else and, and Central America. What was unusual about the last great Spanish explorer in North America.
Marcia Smith 4:33
What was unusual? Yeah,
Bob Smith 4:35
there’s actually two unusual things about him. Well, that’s pretty
Marcia Smith 4:39
broad when you narrow it down. What he ate, how many wives he had, did he marry an Indian woman? Now,
Bob Smith 4:46
let me go back to Google and see. Okay, here’s what I found. Okay, first off, he wasn’t
Marcia Smith 4:51
Spanish. Why did you say he was Spanish? He was a Spanish
Bob Smith 4:55
explorer, but he was actually Welsh. He was a nationalized span. vineyard, who was hired by Spain to try to disrupt the relationship between Britain and Native Americans, and his name was one Evans, but his name was actually John Evans. And he was a Welsh separatists back in England. So he was trying to give Welsh independence from the British crown. So that’s why he joined the Spain. But that’s not unusual. Columbus was an Italian who sailed for Spain. But that’s the first great unusual thing about the last great explorer in North America. He wasn’t Spanish. Second, where did he plant the Spanish flag?
Marcia Smith 5:32
Ah,
Bob Smith 5:35
here’s the answer. North Dakota, North Dakota. Yeah, the last grade Spanish explorer planted the Spanish flag at a Mandan Indian settlement in North Dakota in September 1796. Why there and this is like your research it just kept going and going? Well, Evans believed a myth there was a myth that a legendary Welsh hero Prince Madoc, who was the son of the greatest Welsh King came to America in 11 7300 years before Columbus, and set up a colony whose members intermarried with the Indians. And for centuries, there were rumors of Welsh speaking Indians in North America, you’ll find references to them landing in Mobile, Alabama, and cities and towns across America and going all the way up to Canada. But Evans thought that the Mandan tribe in North Dakota, along the Missouri River were descendants of Prince Maddux legendary colony, that’s what took him there. But within three weeks, he lost faith in the myth and abandon the settlement. Now, this is interesting, because this is the way the Spanish you know, all of their exploration was were all these romantic notions that they went after like crazy, The Seven Cities of Gold, the fountain of youth, the terrestrial paradise. All that began in 1492, with Columbus, and when did the Spanish finally leave the Americas? Did they ever? Yeah, they finally left. They left after everyone else. Everybody else came. In the meantime, the French came, the British came. They were all driven out. The Spanish were here first. They were here last 400 years. They finally left the hemisphere in 1898. But they’re
Marcia Smith 7:16
back again. No, they’re not backache. Oh, sure. We have Spanish rice. We have all sorts of different interesting things. Okay. All right. What do you got? All right. For the first six or seven months of its life. How much does a blue whale calf gain a day in pounds? Okay, daily weight gain of the baby of the baby for the first six months. Wow. Okay.
Bob Smith 7:43
All right. Let’s say the fruit the weight gain is 50 pounds a day? Yeah.
Marcia Smith 7:48
Every day. Yeah. 50. Yeah. Cheese. Now, it’s 200 to 225 pounds a day. During this is more terrifying. The during lactation, Mom whale produces 50 gallons of milk a day. Oh my God. Have you ever seen 50 gallons of milk? No, I
Bob Smith 8:10
haven’t. That. Isn’t that what an amazing fact that is. Okay, I want to go back to the Spanish one more time. Oh, yay. Okay. We know that they colonized South and Central America. What is now the southwestern United States, you know, California, Arizona, Texas, and the southeast United States, Florida. But how far north did the Spanish go? And it was farther north than North Dakota?
Marcia Smith 8:35
Was it Canada? No.
Bob Smith 8:40
I don’t know. Believe it or not Alaska. Oh, they went to they went to Alaska. So almost from the tip of South America to Alaska, the Spanish were all over the Americas amazing. You’d never think of Spanish explorers going that far north. But they did. They claimed territory as far west as on Alaska now on Alaska is a small city at the very tip of the illusion When they got up there. Well, that’s the funny thing that the Al Utes, the Indians had been there for 1000s of years. The Russians had been there for 30 years. Even so the Spanish claimed on Alaska from Spain in 1788.
Marcia Smith 9:15
What what Gaul
Bob Smith 9:18
and that that city became the largest fishing port in the United States by volume in the 19th century because of Alaskan king crab. And it was also the first city in the continental United States attacked by Japanese aircraft during World War Two. So that little town of Alaska, Alaska, which is the farthest west tip of the Aleutian Islands, up there, you know, the Aleutian Islands, it kind of go out to the sea to the west. It’s the farthest west and that’s the farthest west that the Spanish went to so interesting facts, huh? Okay.
Marcia Smith 9:50
All right. This is right up your alley. When and how did the Frisbee get its name? Oh,
Bob Smith 9:57
I know the answer to this of course. So this was this is in Massachusetts, and I believe it was a Frisbee. Frisbee was the name of the restaurant I believe it was or that frisbees were actually pie plates. That’s correct that were spun by college students. That’s correct. And I think that frisbee got his name from the company that made the pie plates or something
Marcia Smith 10:19
like that. Very good. Okay, well, that’s it, but it was Connecticut. Okay. And it was the Frisbee pie company. And during the 20 students at Yale, it was little Dickens over there. All flung these tin plates through the air, and a precedent of future generations. I mean, they just that’s for entertainment. They went up through pie plates around that was in the 20s. And then whammo caught wind of it and bought the patent from Walter Morrison who modeled his first plastic disk in 1948. That’s 72 years ago, after the original pipeline. Anyway, in the late 50s. Godot whammo started producing the Pluto platter, which they soon renamed Frisbee. Thank God. Oh, really.
Bob Smith 11:11
They call it the Pluto platter at first.
Marcia Smith 11:13
When did the Pluto come?
Bob Smith 11:14
Let’s just go back to the Pipelight name. Okay.
Marcia Smith 11:16
Yeah, much better default name, then. Let’s go out and play Pluto platter.
Bob Smith 11:24
Okay, now I’ve got one that’s contemporary or relates to something that’s going on. Of course, healthcare workers are the heroes these days because they are fighting the Coronavirus on the front lines going into work every day and dealing with patients in in all of our hospitals, and many of them are nurses. But the nursing profession for years for centuries was all male. You go into any thing that resembled a hospital and everybody there was a man, when did that change in the United States? Was
Marcia Smith 11:53
it during a war? Like? Yes, it
Bob Smith 11:55
was what war was that? Okay, I
Marcia Smith 11:57
would say World War One. No. Two,
Bob Smith 12:01
it was the Civil War. They pulled all the men out of the hospitals and made them go to war. And the women had to come in at first it was just, you know, caring for people writing letters and all that, but it soon evolved into medical work. And Clara Barton, of course, was one of those and so as Louisa May Alcott they both wanted to be soldiers. They both wanted to fight but they both found they couldn’t. So they both ended up in hospitals. And this is something I didn’t know. Clara Barton. You know, she was the most prominent woman to emerge from the Civil War and did a lot of heroic work. At the battles of Fredericksburg and Antietam. They said they would call her a disrupter. Today, a recent book about her came out. And apparently she insisted on operating autonomously she refused to work with the government refused to work with the US Sanitary Commission, which provided nurses to the Union Army she preferred being in charge herself, so she raised money for food and bandages that she brought to the frontlines hired the horses and wagons to take her there she bypassed bureaucrats by going through backchannels with Massachusetts senator, he was able to get her supplies clandestinely from government warehouses, and she became the big pioneer.
Marcia Smith 13:05
Wow, that’s very impressive.
Bob Smith 13:07
So they had a lot of hoots. She had a lot of chutzpah. So there you go. That was 1863 to 1865.
Marcia Smith 13:16
And weren’t all back in the day two all secretarial jobs were held by men. Yes. Yeah. When did that change?
Bob Smith 13:24
I think that was with the typewriter. A lot of that came with a typewriter because a lot of men wouldn’t wouldn’t use that typewriter.
Marcia Smith 13:29
Yeah, that was too complicated. Probably.
Bob Smith 13:32
Hey, wait a minute. Oh.
Marcia Smith 13:35
But yeah, that’s when women got into that field. So yeah,
Bob Smith 13:39
you did interesting. You think about that. Women got into the field of business through a technology they adopted that men wouldn’t. There you go. It’s the same old story over and oh, man is too stubborn to try something new. What am I doing? I’m talking against my car. Okay, forget that.
Marcia Smith 14:01
You know, the word billion is thrown around a lot these days. Bob. It’s a billion dollars for here and a billion dollars for this. A lot. A lot of bucks. Yeah. In fact, if you were to count out loud, one to a billion, how long do you think it would take you?
Bob Smith 14:20
Oh, you mean every number from one to a billion? Yeah. You know, I saw something on that. It would take actually years. I don’t know. I’ll take I’ll say a year.
Marcia Smith 14:28
Yeah, that’s a good guess. almost 80 years. 80
Bob Smith 14:32
years just to say out loud. These numbers from one to a billion. It’s
Marcia Smith 14:36
actually 79.25. I kind of exaggerated there. But it’s closer to 79. But yeah, that’s how many years to if you just said and said out loud one to a billion.
Bob Smith 14:46
That tells you that we’re spending way too much money. So
Marcia Smith 14:49
think of those dollars. You’d have to sit here for almost 80 years and put dollars out there. Oh my gosh. Okay. Speaking
Bob Smith 14:57
of speaking of money, I’ve got an interesting fact. got several things on on on Hollywood Okay. movies a lot we’re a lot of people are binge watching films and TV shows these days. So there’s a lot of movie stars we’re seeing and watching. Marches watching the tiger King. I refuse to watch. It’s probably good sound like people I’m interested.
Marcia Smith 15:18
No, no, no, nobody is okay,
Bob Smith 15:21
who signed Hollywood’s first million dollar contract? Hollywood, Hollywood. And when Charlie Chaplin? That’s right. And he was a young guy, he was 28. He signed for a million dollars way back in 1917. So for 103 years, Hollywood has been paying million dollar contracts. And that’s when a million dollars was a lot more money than it is today. Pretty high on the hog back then what year was that? That was 1917. And his contract called for eight films for the first national exhibitors circuit. And if a movie performer could get a million dollars, think what the movie company owners must have been making from nickel admission prices. Yes, they must have been making a lot more than a million. Okay, now I have two more film questions. Since you seem to dominate topics. I’ll dominate one for a little bit here. I
Marcia Smith 16:11
got another elephant question. Okay.
Bob Smith 16:16
Elephants and movie stars. Okay. These are two older stars. These are two famous stars. But recently, new biographies have come out about them. Dancer Fred Astaire. Yeah, he appeared in his first film in 1933. What role did he play?
Marcia Smith 16:33
Hi, kids. I was picture being and now the, the dancer? I don’t know not answering the question. No, I’m trying to think what he could have been if he suddenly started singing and dancing. Okay, I’ll say he was a chef. Okay.
Bob Smith 16:46
That’s a good guess. But it’s wrong. What role did Fred Astaire play Fred Astaire Oh, he was already famous person. Oh, okay. Oh, that’s funny. It was the movie was dancing Lady and the star Joan Crawford greets him has Mr. Astaire Oh, okay. And he twirled the glamorous movie Queen around the floor. Dancing lady dancing. Now. What was Fred’s real name?
Marcia Smith 17:08
His. Yeah, like that’s in my file of Frederick Austerlitz.
Bob Smith 17:12
What Frederick Austerlitz and his sister Adele dragged him into dancing classes and show business and they were a huge act. And then she got married and retired and he went on by himself. And that’s how he got his career.
Marcia Smith 17:27
Yeah, he prance through life. He was quite a dancer.
Bob Smith 17:31
Alright, one more movie question. Yeah. Okay. Judy Garland died at the rather young age of 47. How many years did she work? Oh,
Marcia Smith 17:39
gosh, since she was little miss GM. I don’t know. 40 years.
Bob Smith 17:46
You’re right. She was one of the GM sisters. That was they were a family act. She died at the age of 47. She worked 45 years. Okay. Isn’t that a five
Marcia Smith 17:55
years since she was two? Yeah. What do you do with two little dancing
Bob Smith 17:59
girl you know, she danced and sang. She went into show business at the age of two she never left she did hundreds of vaudeville and radio shows before she was a teen. And before she ever starred in a motion picture. She started 32 feature films. And unlike the image we see now and many films, her biographer John tricky said she was always working and usually always laughing. She loved working. Yes, it was her private life. That was awful. Okay, we’ll take a break and we’ll be right back. You’re listening to the off ramp with Bob and Marcia Smith.
Well, we’re back from our break. You’re listening to Bob and Marcia Smith on the off ramp. And this is the end of week six of our self isolation for the Coronavirus. And Marsha. You know, there was a funny article recently in the Wall Street Journal written by Jason gay, and he took the point of view of animals who have these human beings in the house all these weeks, like a goldfish, like a cat and a dog. Oh, that’s so here are these articles. I thought we might find these kind of funny. Okay, okay. And these are short, so they’re just gonna fun. The first one is called America needs to get back to work by a cat. And the cat says, Enough is enough. American business has taken a historic plunge over the past month. It’s time to consider a practical plan for protecting public health while also allowing for every turn to work and hopefully a revival of the economy. Who am I kidding? On behalf of cats everywhere. I’ll just say it. We want everyone out of the house. Right now. It was cute for a while but the party’s over. We’re sick of this quarantine Shelter in Place directive. Shelter in Place. That’s a cat’s job. Cats invented shelter in place. Have we liked getting snacks at unexpected hours? Sure. Is it nice to roll around on that warm laptop keyboard during zoom calls? Sure is As warm keyboards are having, but it’s gotten to be too much. The other day I walked into the kitchen and saw someone standing in my 9am sunspots. Oh God, so rude that sunspot is only there 15 minutes a day.
Marcia Smith 20:18
Our Bowser did that Dindi I was looking for that ray of sun.
Bob Smith 20:21
So the cats essay concludes, cats are not the most social creatures. Sure, there are some exceptions. You might have one of those cats who actually enjoys human company. Congratulations. But the vast majority of us bird outside the window must get the bird. Oh, sorry, where was I? That’s the district gets. He says the vast majority of cats are ready for you to get back to work, or just leave the house for longer than 15 minutes. Please consider it not for America. But for cats. That’s cute. So that’s America needs to get back to work by a cat. Well, now let’s do why not work from home forever by a dog that come in. So here’s the dog’s essay, by Jason gay in the Wall Street Journal. As America debates, a return to work, it’s important not to rush. We need to balance the economy against the extremely valid concerns about public health and protecting lives and walks we need to think about all the walks and ball we need to also chase the ball. Lots and lots. Look, I’m a dog. I’m not some public intellectual. I’m a good good dog most of the time, but I just ate half of a baseball glove in the garage. I also knocked over a potted plant in the living room. I’m sorry, I’m a dog, what do you want? The important thing is dogs want you to stay. These past four weeks, they have been some of the greatest weeks of our lives. You’re there in the morning. You’re there in the evening, you’re there at lunch is the best. And the walks we’ve never been so fit in our lives. There’s the 8:30am walk the 11:15am walk the 1pm walk the 3pm walk the 7pm walk, and for lucky a 9:30pm Wow, that’s that’s and sometimes you throw the ball, sometimes you throw the ball, and then I get the ball and bring it back to you. And then you throw the ball again. And I bring it back again and again and again. And again. Bliss. It’s bliss. I’m sure the cats are telling you they’ve had it. Never trust a cat. They’re rude animals. They don’t appreciate you. But dogs understand what you bring to the table. We love having you at home stay. Stay forever. We promise to be a good dog. Or at least a pretty good dog. That’s why not work from home forever by a dog. actually written by Jason gay. In the Saturday Sunday Wall Street Journal on April
Marcia Smith 22:59
18. Can’t help but think of our Buster the dog. Yeah, we had a great little Beagle for 20 years like that. And Bowser the cat who was just like that they could have written those. They could have read the words buried under a rock in the backyard. Oh,
Bob Smith 23:12
that was definitely. That was definitely a Bowser our cat. Marcia had a cat she’d had it for 12 years when I met her and he wasn’t happy when we got together was he
Marcia Smith 23:23
he lived till he was 21. But in the
Bob Smith 23:25
meantime, he peed in my shoes. Yes, he did. My parents picture that
Marcia Smith 23:29
took you over the was the end of it was at one point you said me or the cat. And
Bob Smith 23:35
one day I found you holding that cat over your head crying saying please, please, please stop it. Stop it. Oh, you’re
Marcia Smith 23:45
gonna die. We couldn’t give him away to anybody. He was noisy and he beat what happened after I begged him to stop he did. He stopped. He’d stopped the miracle of Bowser. Bernstein Drouin and talk talking
Bob Smith 23:58
to him like he’s a real thinking creature. Yeah. Which I guess he was when he ran the show. Can you imagine what’s going to happen when this is over and people go back to work? The animals are gonna be like, What was that all about? What just happened here? Yeah. Where’s my master? Or thank God he’s gone.
Marcia Smith 24:19
Indeed. Thanks for sharing, Bob.
Bob Smith 24:23
Now let’s go to the elephant in the room.
Marcia Smith 24:25
Oh question. How much can elephant consume food and drink wise in a single day?
Bob Smith 24:34
Oh, this is a good reason why you don’t want an elephant as a pet. Remember
Marcia Smith 24:39
the white elephant from last week? Yeah, yes. Nobody could afford to feed. That’s right. That was a great here’s why. Here’s the answer. Okay, in detail. Just take a guess how many pounds of hay and how many pounds of water every day? I
Bob Smith 24:52
would imagine it’s probably 200. It’s
Marcia Smith 24:57
500 pounds of hay and five how 100 pounds of water all in one day. 1000 pounds of food 1000 pounds of food and water.
Bob Smith 25:08
Well, that will. That is pretty expensive. That will make you go underwater with your finances.
Marcia Smith 25:14
Okay? The average American has a vocabulary consisting of about how many words? Okay, that’s the average American. Yeah. That’s certain people in the limelight right now. Okay, average. All
Bob Smith 25:29
right, let’s say, let’s say 1200. Well, let’s say 5000. Words. That’s a lot of
Marcia Smith 25:35
words. It is. But it’s according to this it says 10,700 words, holy cow. Ah, journalists have nearly 19,000 words in their vocabularies. And lawyers and members of the clergy have slightly less than 18,000. So, so actually journalists have the most, and lawyers and clergy have less
Bob Smith 25:59
Yeah, but they’re still in the top 10. So people who make a living through words tend to have that makes sense. Certainly does. Yeah. would make sense that they would tend
Marcia Smith 26:07
to, if that’s an I’m a former reporter, what why do I always lose that boggles my children.
Bob Smith 26:14
Because you can’t remember all those words. That’s right. Isn’t that fun? Now, that’s one thing we’ve talked about before. But we’ve been doing that online since this whole thing began twice a week, we have a boggle fest. With that we we open up zoom, and we got all four of us on screen there. And then each one of us goes to website, we open up boggle and put that next to us. And we play 1011 12 rounds of boggle. We have a great time with that. But I’ve noticed the cognitive abilities you and I used to have where we used to smear our kids with boggle they’re doing it to us now.
Marcia Smith 26:46
Yeah, that’s for sure. You just love every minute of it.
Bob Smith 26:48
You don’t see the patterns of the words that you saw when you were poor. They both write a lot. And they’re both writers, too. Yeah. They’re both very good writers. So that makes a difference. Yeah.
Marcia Smith 26:57
Makes me feel better. I’m delighted that they’re whipping us. I didn’t let them beat me in Candyland, when they were kids and they’re getting back at
Bob Smith 27:07
you were just so mean that we can be competitive. Okay, I’m competitive. And that’s the end of our competition today. We
Marcia Smith 27:15
don’t want to baby kids out. So what if they’re fine,
Bob Smith 27:18
you’re still talking about that. 30 years later. Okay. I’m Bob Smith. I’m Marcia Smith. Thanks for joining us on this Coronavirus trivia show. And join us again next time when we come together with a lot of q&a. And hopefully a lot of laughs here on the off ramp.
Marcia Smith 27:34
We’ll be here we always all day.
Bob Smith 27:40
Every waking bye bye. Buy buy the off ramp is produced in association with CPL radio and the Cedarburg Public Library Cedarburg, Wisconsin.
Transcribed by https://otter.ai
