Bob and Marcia discuss their Christmas traditions, including the origins of electric Christmas lights and the popularity of ‘Jingle Bells.’ They delve into the history of coffee, sharing interesting facts and trivia. They also explore funny laws in the US, such as donkeys sleeping in bathtubs and camels driving down main hallways. Bob shares NFL trivia, including the league’s origins and the oldest franchise in continuous operation. Marcia adds to the conversation with her knowledge of the NFL and a quote about sleep. The speakers then pivot to nature and human behavior, discussing Mount Everest’s height, wrinkled fingers, and weather-related trivia. They provide valuable insights into these mysteries, making the conversation informative and engaging.
Outline
Christmas traditions and song origins.
- Edison’s assistant Edward Johnson popularized electric lights on Christmas trees in 1882.
- Marcia and Bob discuss the origins of the popular Christmas song “Jingle Bells,” which was originally written for Thanksgiving.
Google trends and most Googled words in 2020.
- Marcia and Bob discuss a new ice cream machine that makes adult ice cream cones with alcoholic spirits.
- Marcia and Bob discuss the most Googled words in 2020, including Coronavirus, election results, and Kobe Bryant.
Patent medicines, biology, and Mount Everest’s height.
- Bob and Marcia discuss patent medicines, including Dr. Miles compound extract of tomato, and Marcia shares interesting facts about pastries, including that the number one pastry in the world is a type of cake considered a pastry.
- Bob and Marcia discuss their love for croissants, with Bob expressing his preference for the way they are pronounced in Paris.
- Scientists recently remeasured Mount Everest and determined its height to be 29,031.7 feet, two feet higher than previously thought.
Weather folklore and its significance.
- Bob Smith and Marcia Smith discuss the scientific explanation behind why fingers wrinkle when submerged in water for too long (blood vessels constrict for protection) and how this phenomenon can be used to pick up wet objects more easily.
- Farmers can predict bad weather by observing their dogs and roosters, as a change in barometric pressure can cause gas bubbles to form in animals’ body fluids, leading to sickness.
- Bob Smith explains why Roman senators made decisions based on weather patterns, specifically lightning in the west vs. east.
- Marcia Smith shares the origins of wearing wedding rings on the fourth finger of the left hand, citing an ancient belief in a direct vein to the heart.
Coffee, weather, and history.
- Marcia Smith shared a weather-related old wives tale about bees getting lost in cloudy weather due to the loss of polarized light navigation.
- Bob Smith provided two more old wives tales about fish biting best after a rain, with the explanation that decaying matter on the bottom of the lake forms bigger bubbles and rises to the top, attracting fish.
- Marcia Smith and Bob Smith discuss the origins of the term “cup of Joe” for coffee, with theories ranging from Undersecretary of the Navy Josephus Daniels to the combination of “Java” and “Mocha.”
- Bob Smith wonders who came up with the idea to brew beer, highlighting the detailed processes involved in ancient history.
Pseudonyms, funny laws, and NFL history.
- Marcia and Bob play a game of guessing the real names of famous musicians using pseudonyms.
- Bob Smith shares funny laws in the United States, including a law in Brooklyn making it illegal for a donkey to sleep in a bathtub.
- Marcia Smith asks Bob about the NFL’s origins, and he explains that it began in Canton, Ohio in 1920.
- Bob Smith shares a fun trivia fact about Mary Had a Little Lamb, including its true origins and the real person behind the nursery rhyme.
- Marcia Smith and Bob Smith discuss the never-ending nature of political upheaval and end the show with a humorous quote about sleep.
Bob Smith 0:00
We can trace one of our modern Christmas traditions to the workshop of a famous inventor. What tradition?
Marcia Smith 0:07
What popular Christmas song was actually written as a Thanksgiving tune
Bob Smith 0:12
answers to those and other questions coming up in this edition of the off ramp with Bob and Marsha Smith.
Welcome to the off ramp, Jingle Bells all the way, a chance to slow down steer clear of crazy take a side road to sanity and get some perspective on life. Our perspective today is we’re approaching the holidays and we have a few questions about that. And some other fun things too. So Marcia, we can trace one of our modern Christmas traditions to the workshop of a famous inventor. What tradition is that?
Marcia Smith 1:00
Well, when I think of inventor and workshop, I think of
Bob Smith 1:05
Santa right? Yes. Well, no, that’s not the answer. No,
Marcia Smith 1:09
no. I think of Edison, Thomas
Bob Smith 1:12
Edison. Yeah. And it is from that workshop. Okay. But it wasn’t Edison himself,
Marcia Smith 1:17
who came up with one of his little minions one of his little workers. Yes.
Bob Smith 1:21
What was that modern tradition that we have that we can trace back to Edison’s workshop?
Marcia Smith 1:26
Oh, gosh, I know putting a wreath up. No door.
Bob Smith 1:30
What did Edison help popularize? Marcia?
Marcia Smith 1:33
The light bulb? Yes, lights on a tree. That’s
Bob Smith 1:35
exactly right now, lights had been on dies before. The Germans brought that tradition of candles on trees very dangerous. But that was where that began. And as a matter of fact, I was born in Wooster, Ohio, which supposedly was the sight of the first lighted Christmas tree in the United States by German people there. But 1882 That’s when the first electrically lighted Christmas tree was decorated. And we can trace that to the workshop of Thomas Edison. It was Edison’s chief assistant, Edward Johnson. And he put the invention of the electric lamp to work as home. He set up a Christmas tree in his parlor in New York with at twinkling red, white and blue bulbs, each the size of a walnut and that was the first Christmas tree with light bulbs on it. Well, electric lights.
Marcia Smith 2:22
Okay, so Bob, yes, Robert? Yes, honey bunny. Oh, no, no, stop. Okay, Bob Betty. Yeah, what popular Christmas song was actually written to be a Thanksgiving song.
Bob Smith 2:35
You know, I think it was. I don’t know if it was the Christmas song, the chestnuts roasting Beethoven. Or if it was something I think it was actually the one that Irving Berlin wrote
Marcia Smith 2:48
White Christmas. Yes. No. Oh, what was it? It was Jingle Bells. Same one you would talk about first published in 1857. It was written by James Lorre Pierpont to be sung on Thanksgiving in Medford, Massachusetts, where sleigh rides were a huge deal back in the 1800s. So everybody would go on sleigh rides around Thanksgiving and so little a Dashing through the snow.
Bob Smith 3:14
So they were doing it, but it wasn’t for Christmas. It was for you. Yeah,
Marcia Smith 3:18
you don’t hear any Christmassy in there. But it was taken up for Christmas. Well, I
Bob Smith 3:22
would think because of the bells. Yeah. But very festive. It is and slays had bells. So Jingle Bells actually originally written for Thanksgiving.
Marcia Smith 3:31
That’s correct. You say that was such?
Bob Smith 3:35
Well, it’s amazing. I had no idea that it takes it takes away from the meaning but it adds a different kind of meaning to Yes. Well, I think it’s raining less actually. Taking away and it’s meaningless. Okay. All right. I have one for you. What would you pay for an ice cream cone? Marcia. What would you pay for an ice cream cone? Wow.
Marcia Smith 3:53
Just you mean today? Yeah. Oh, I don’t know buck and a half.
Bob Smith 3:58
What if I said $20? No, I would not. What if I said it was alcoholic ice cream. Okay, maybe
Marcia Smith 4:06
Brandy Alexander and a cookie cone. Okay,
Bob Smith 4:08
maybe? Well, $20 a cone is what some customers are paying for cones from a special ice cream dispenser developed by below zero. This is a Illinois firm started by a catering company executive. He’s built an ice cream machine whose frozen treats pack and alcoholic punch. Alcoholic spirits from vodka to Bourbon or any flavor of beer can become adult ice cream cones. This story is from the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel and the machine spits out a basically an ice cream cone. And it depends on what you put into it if you put in barrel aged stout at 12% alcohol by volume. That’s what your cone will be like. Technically there deserts would you like to try one of those? Yeah, okay, well, do you have $20 Would you buy me one to $20 Wow, that is it better be more than just a dessert.
Marcia Smith 4:58
I think you’d be happy especially In winter with a Tom and Jerry Yes,
Bob Smith 5:02
I like that better than you do your dad’s favorite. His recipe from his bar this to such a great trick
Marcia Smith 5:08
it is, isn’t it? So Bob, let’s talk Google. Okay. What do you think were the most Googled words in 2020?
Bob Smith 5:15
The most Googled I bet pandemic was one Coronavirus was another one. Good but
Marcia Smith 5:20
you got one right Coronavirus one. The top two were Coronavirus and election results. Oh, of course. Yeah. In the United States especially. Yeah, it’s an interesting time capsule. Google is of the year that we’re in or behind us. It really tells you like, Who do you think were the top people Googled for 22? I’d
Bob Smith 5:41
say Donald Trump was one of them.
Marcia Smith 5:43
Because not that not the top tops. Or Joe Biden. No, yes. Oh, so he was number one. Okay. And other top people were Kobe Bryant and Chadwick Boseman. Both of whom died. Remember? Chadwick Boseman. From the Black Panther. That’s
Bob Smith 5:56
right. He’s the black.
Marcia Smith 5:57
I googled him. Yeah, afterwards. Very good. I googled Kobe Bryant bit because I wanted to see how old he was when he started and all that when I first heard about the plane crash. And the word insomnia. Bob was Googled more in 2020 than ever before. Yeah, because people were stressed. Yeah. And the other phrase that was looked at more than ever before how to help acid reflux. Isn’t that interesting? Yes, acid reflux and insomnia. But there is hope for 2021 and for positive change this year, how to be anti racist uncle was searched more than How to Be a Millionaire. Well, that’s unusual. That’s what they said that’s quite interesting. And the words quote, how to help unquote were searched more than ever before and proceeded everything from the Australian fires how to help how to help how to help Australian fires or how to help poor people or food drives how to help so
Bob Smith 6:59
all kinds of questions about how to help with this how to deal with that but the first three words how to help Yeah, were the most some of the most Googled words
Marcia Smith 7:06
more than ever before. That’s really amazing. That gave gives you a little hope there.
Bob Smith 7:11
I got a couple of quick wins here. What substance that we often place on food was what sold as a patent medicine in the United States. This is something you got in your refrigerator, you’ll pull it out what substance that we often place on food Okay. Was once sold as a patent medicine in the United States.
Marcia Smith 7:29
Well, gosh, those guys traveling the countryside with their potions this
Bob Smith 7:34
was Dr. Miles compound extract of tomato. Oh, it was ketchup. That’s exactly right. Yeah, in the 1830s. Ketchup enjoys a measure of popularity as Dr. Miles compound extract of tomato or tomato. Was
Marcia Smith 7:49
it supposed to heal? Well, it’s
Bob Smith 7:52
like all patent medicines. It was supposed to cure everything. Yes. Joe Namath?
Marcia Smith 7:58
Oh god, it’s funny.
Bob Smith 7:59
I got one more here. This is just a little biology question. Why are victims of disease buried underground when their bodies are infected with germs? Won’t the germs spread underground?
Marcia Smith 8:09
Well, that’s a very interesting question. Yeah. No, they won’t spread because once you’re dead they stop No.
Bob Smith 8:22
Once you’re dead I stopped you with that? Close but basically it’s just basic biology is germs are destroyed by the bacteria and other microscopic organisms living in the soil. It’s part of nature. Yeah, not your body. No soil has all kinds of stuff in it. Yeah, kill that’s why I like to roll in it every morning. You’d like to Royal in the soil? No.
Marcia Smith 8:44
Okay, Bob in case you missed it What’s that? We didn’t sell it Thanksgiving. Oh, no. No, that we didn’t miss. National pastry day was December 9. We didn’t celebrate that day either. Didn’t have family over
Bob Smith 8:57
No. Didn’t have a doughnut hole for that. But pastries
Marcia Smith 9:01
in case you didn’t know go back to ancient Egyptian time as as many things do. But anyway, you want to guess the number one top pastry in the world?
Bob Smith 9:12
In ancient Egypt, no. Oh, now? Yeah, the donut. That’s number two. Number two is the donor is the doughnut hole number one. Just a question. No. Okay. The first pastry the number one pastry, something baked something is a cake considered a pastry. It’s
Marcia Smith 9:29
something that I love more than you do. And you bought me one the other day and it was filled with almond paste croissant. Oh,
Bob Smith 9:37
I like croissants. But I really liked I liked them as much as you do. Well, okay, I liked him more than Chris on I love the way they pronounce it across all yes. Yes, that’s croissants actually do taste great because they have a Christmas to them and you can put all kinds of invasives inside. It’s
Marcia Smith 9:55
worth it. plane fare to Paris just for croissants. said, well, their coffee.
Bob Smith 10:01
It’s a pretty hefty price to pay for a croissant when they just go down to the bakery.
Marcia Smith 10:05
I know but there’s something about Paris and their coffee that that breakfast that first thing in the morning.
Bob Smith 10:11
Hey, that makes you feel better. Doesn’t it? Make you feel taller? healthier? Speaking of taller mark, that was a segue. That’s my segue. What made your mountain just got taller. And this was just a couple of weeks ago, it’s officially became taller. What mountain? Tell me Mount Everest. It’s now officially two feet taller than most measurements. Why? Well, China and Nepal have always claimed that and the boys claimed two different measurements. They’ve had different measurements for its altitude part of that is because nobody can go up Mount Everest with a stringing a tape measure and say, Hey, here’s what it is. Exactly. No, that’s not the way you do it. There’s various sciences, triangulation global positioning satellites and, and something called gravity measurements to determine how high it is. And they both got different answers. But recently, scientists said You know, there was an earthquake in 2015 that may have altered Everest’s profile. So Nepal decided to take another measurement. And China said, let’s do that together. So they did. And they conducted a joint survey and on December 8 2020, Mount Everest officially became 29,031.7 feet high, two feet higher than Nepal’s older figure. Now that we got that settled, how about the name? Is it Everest or Everest? Because Mount Everest was actually named after the Welsh geologist.
Marcia Smith 11:34
So George Everest, well, that’s probably reverse then. Or could it be
Bob Smith 11:38
Sega mother, which is the name and the Polly’s or Qomolangma. While they’re Tibetan, there are Tibetan? Let’s first discuss, compare and contrast. They’re
Marcia Smith 11:49
all right. They’re all correct. Correct. Okay. Yeah. But here’s another thing I ponder, okay. Is there any good reason why your fingers are wrinkled up when they’re submerged in water too long? A good reason. Yeah. Because your blood vessels constrict. And that happens, but you think there’s a reason for that?
Bob Smith 12:09
It’s something to protect you is that like a self defense mechanism? According
Marcia Smith 12:13
to Scientific American, the constriction has the evolutionary power to make it easier to pick up wet objects. With wrinkled fingers, you can pick up other wet things more easily.
Bob Smith 12:27
I never noticed this. I never noticed this phenomenon.
Marcia Smith 12:33
No, I never did either. But now that I have, I’m gonna, I’m gonna get pick up wet. Things get wrinkly and pick things up. People with nerve damage, don’t prune up and they have a harder time picking up wet objects. So people with nerve
Bob Smith 12:47
damage don’t prune up now.
Unknown Speaker 12:49
Really? Yeah,
Bob Smith 12:50
I had no idea because
Marcia Smith 12:51
it’s it’s blood vessels, constricting nerve damage.
Bob Smith 12:56
That doesn’t happen. So you just remain big and bloated and wet. That’s right. I’m here to teach you but I am here to teach you Marcia I’m here to teach you about some old wives tales about the weather that
Marcia Smith 13:06
are true. Are these marshes tales? No, these
Bob Smith 13:09
are tales. This is true. Let me let me read this to you. Okay. Farmers can tell if there’s going to be bad weather by watching their dogs and their roosters. dogs will eat grass. Roosters will crow at night. Why is that?
Marcia Smith 13:23
Because there’s been a shift in the barometric pressure. That’s
Bob Smith 13:27
exactly right. Of course, a big drop in the atmospheric pressure will lead to bad weather and it can also make animals sick. That’s because it causes gas bubbles to form in their body fluids.
Marcia Smith 13:36
Well, we talked about dots. You can feel the bad weather coming ahead of time.
Bob Smith 13:42
That’s why they eat grass when when bad weather is coming. They tend to eat grass so they can vomit. They feel sick. So eat grass and throw it but
Marcia Smith 13:50
I didn’t know about the roosters. And yeah, roosters
Bob Smith 13:53
never grow in the evening. But if they cry in the evening, that’s because they feel this bad barometric pressure. I didn’t know this is comes from farmers an article weather folklore that’s not all wet. Theresa, my sewer. And I have another one. Did you know Roman senators put off making decisions if they saw lightning in the West, but they went on if they saw it in the east? Why is that?
Marcia Smith 14:16
Because weather moves from west to east.
Bob Smith 14:19
That’s right. And lightning tended to indicate a storm was on its way and if so, and a lot of Roman business was conducted outside so I got to write in
Marcia Smith 14:29
you did. That’s amazing. Okay, Bob, why do we wear wedding rings? On the fourth finger of the left hand?
Bob Smith 14:36
I know the answer to this, which makes you disappointed whenever I know the answer. But you just answered two of my questions did from what I understand is that finger was the one that ancient people felt had a line directly to the heart. That’s exactly
Marcia Smith 14:49
right. They had it was a vein. They thought a very thin vein went directly to the heart and influenced where they put their rings back then and it can see used in the western part of the world today. Isn’t that fascinating? Yeah. Things that traditions and bride magazine.
Bob Smith 15:07
That’s where I got my information.
Marcia Smith 15:10
I tried to read it as often
Bob Smith 15:12
as it just kind of a nostalgic thing for you now. Okay, what did the Bank of England once not let its bookkeepers do if a certain weather condition came about? If there was a certain weather condition that came about, this is back in the 1700s. The Bank of England would say, we’re not going to let the bookkeepers work today on there. Well,
Marcia Smith 15:34
what were they doing?
Bob Smith 15:34
They discovered that once the barometric pressure dropped, the accountants were not as accurate as they could be on days. Yeah, they made more mistakes than usual sense people with rheumatism feel discomfort, and since people feel toothaches and corns more during low atmospheric pressure, the bank officials probably knew what they were doing when they gave their accountants the day off. Is it really, it’s a bad day for you to work out? I’d love to have bosses doing that to me and say, We’d like you to take the day off. I would say they’re firing me. Yeah, what did I do wrong? Wow. But it’s just a low barometric pressure day for the Bank of England in the 1700s. They
Marcia Smith 16:10
took that stuff very soon. You know what they say today get over it. Yeah, get over
Bob Smith 16:14
and get to work and get better. Now you got a computer and that’s not going to be affected by the low barometric pressure. That’s
Marcia Smith 16:19
here’s here’s a question near and dear to your Mayflower past. Oh, okay. Okay, who was the last survivor of the Mayflower passage to America idea? No.
Bob Smith 16:31
No, I really don’t. It isn’t a famous name.
Marcia Smith 16:35
I didn’t know this person, Brewster or Winslow. No, it was Mary Allerton, Mary Allerton. She arrived at Plymouth Rock when she was four years old and died at Plymouth colony at the age of 83. So she lived there her whole life. And she bought eight children. So she probably has a lot of ancestors still floating around. She was born in Leiden Holland in 1616. Okay,
Bob Smith 17:03
Marcia, let’s take a break. We’ll be back in just a moment. You’re listening to the off ramp with Bob and
Marcia Smith 17:08
Marcia Smith. Okay, we’re
Bob Smith 17:12
back with the off ramp. I got two more old wives tales about the weather that are true. Did you know this that bees never get caught in the rain. And why is that? These rarely get caught in the rain.
Marcia Smith 17:24
Is that right? Yeah. Again, are they feeling the weather shift? No,
Bob Smith 17:28
it’s something different for bees. They get lost in cloudy weather because they guide themselves by polarized light. And when it gets cloudy, the polarized light is shut off so bees can get lost. They lose their navigation so they tend to stick close to home when it gets cloudy and cloudiness is what the sky always looks like when it rains right. Yeah, so you don’t find these very often. I’ll
Marcia Smith 17:48
be darned good day for you to go out.
Bob Smith 17:51
And one more. Why do fish bite best after a rain? Or that
Marcia Smith 17:56
I grew up knowing but I can’t remember why dead? We’d go fishing on vacation especially after it rained. I remember asking my dad that and I don’t remember the answer. Well, because
Bob Smith 18:08
the low pressure right before the rainfall makes decaying matter on the bottom of the lake form bigger bubbles and it makes it rise to the top so
Marcia Smith 18:17
there’s a lot of food going on. So
Bob Smith 18:18
the fish follow the food and they feed closer to the surface. Right about the time of it of rainfall.
Marcia Smith 18:23
I don’t remember if that’s what he told me. He probably just said it is what it is. Shut up.
Bob Smith 18:29
It just happened. What asking questions.
Marcia Smith 18:32
Okay, you ready? I’m ready. Remember the movie? The 12? Angry Men?
Bob Smith 18:37
Yes. The belt the jury? Yes. Yeah. Well,
Marcia Smith 18:40
here’s a trivia question. How many of those 12 Angry Men can you name?
Bob Smith 18:44
What do you mean? How
Marcia Smith 18:45
many can I name their actor’s name? Oh, you mean the people who played them in the original film? Just give me I have a list here of them. Well, who was the star? I can’t remember Henry Fonda Henry Fonda okay. And Jack Klugman. Jack Warden, Martin Balsam Ed Begley, eg Marshall. Big names. Yeah. And the name of the guy who was the last one to change his mind. To change the verdict was Lee J. Cobb. Yeah, that
Bob Smith 19:18
was actually a TV play before it became a movie. It was it was live television. Play. That’s Can you imagine 1957?
Marcia Smith 19:25
Yeah, they had a lot of lies. Terry young then but live TV.
Bob Smith 19:30
It would have been compelling to watch a live TV show back in those days. So much compelling feeling that it was real, you know? Yeah. I have a question to you, Marsha. Something you love every morning is a cup of coffee. Why do we call coffee a cup of joe?
Marcia Smith 19:49
Kappa Joe. Does it go back to Army days? GI Joe? No,
Bob Smith 19:54
that’s a good one. That’s what I would have thought.
Marcia Smith 19:57
Oh, then I have no idea. There’s
Bob Smith 20:00
a couple of theories. Some people think it did come from us Undersecretary of the Navy who banned alcohol from US ships. His name was Josefus Daniels, and people he banned alcohol. So they said, I guess I’ll just have to have a cup of joe. That’s what some people say. But most likely, it’s a combination of the words Java and mocha. And it goes back a long, long time ago. Yeah, those are two coffee producing regions in the world. Java is an island in Indonesia, where coffee has been produced since the well since the 1600s. By the Dutch, and Mocha is a city in Yemen, where some of the first coffee was exported to Europe, and combining Java and mocha led to the slang word Jumoke. Haha, lose three letters of that word you got Joe. So that’s how many people feel coffee became a cup of Joe, how
Marcia Smith 20:50
long has coffee been around? Oh, since
Bob Smith 20:52
the late 1500s, early 1600s.
Marcia Smith 20:55
I know who figured that out to roast the bean and then make coffee that wonderful. There’s
Bob Smith 21:01
a lot of stuff like that. Like who came up with the idea to brew beer? Where did that come from? Because you at any time in history, those things were very detailed processes you had to follow in order to get the resulting drink.
Marcia Smith 21:14
All right. Here’s some rock and roll pseudonyms. Okay. I’ll tell you their real name. All right, and you tell me if you can guess who they are. Okay, I’ll just give you a few. We’ll start with an easy one that most people know. All right, John. Dusseldorf, John.
Bob Smith 21:29
Dusseldorf, that’s John Denver. That’s
Marcia Smith 21:31
right. Yeah. Okay. How about Jerry Dorsey? Jerry
Bob Smith 21:35
Dorsey. And I know this Jerry Dorsey is Jerry Taurus. He
Marcia Smith 21:38
chose a ridiculous name in history. It’s been a popular,
Bob Smith 21:43
Jerry Dorsey. Yeah, it’s not a Gilbert Humper whatever it is. Okay. Yeah. I mean,
Marcia Smith 21:47
who would have thought to, you know, go from a common name like Jerry Dorsey to? Oh, I think I’ll call myself
Bob Smith 21:53
Engelbert Humperdinck. That was the name of a classical composer, I believe. Yes, yes. Yes, it was. So it was almost like a little musical joke of his Yeah,
Marcia Smith 22:01
I guess. How about Frank Costello? lucido
Bob Smith 22:04
Frankie Valli. That’s it of the four seasons. That’s it. Okay. Okay.
Marcia Smith 22:09
This will be tough for you. Eric. Clap.
Bob Smith 22:13
Eric Clapton. Yeah, if I had a name Eric Clap. I would change it. I would add something on to that. Yeah. And I didn’t know that was his name. Yeah, I
Marcia Smith 22:23
didn’t either. Janice Fink. Janis Joplin. No, that’s what I guess. But it’s Janice. Ian. Oh, really? chuckles I used to call her. I
Bob Smith 22:33
loved her music though. And 17 Yeah, yeah, yeah, it was kind of dour.
Marcia Smith 22:37
It was Oh, God. If I was down at nothing made me feel downer then. Good old Janice is
Bob Smith 22:43
okay. Okay. I have a question for you. When Swedish scientists developed a nicotine chewing gum to help smokers. What was the unintended consequence that they discovered in Sweden? Developed a nicotine chewing gum to help smokers what was the unintended consequence?
Marcia Smith 22:59
They threw up they turned yellow. Oh, they got addicted to the gum.
Bob Smith 23:05
Well, children started using the gum and they got addicted to nicotine. Yeah, well, that’s terrible. Then they’d switched to cigarettes. So it’s just like the opposite of what the attention was. So the product was quickly withdrawn from the market or I have a couple of funny laws. You have those all those names? Here’s some funny laws, odd laws in the United States. In Brooklyn, New York, there’s a law making it illegal for a donkey to sleep in a bathtub. None of us want our donkeys to sleep in our bed. That’s I can understand why they came up with it. In Nevada, it’s against the law to drive camels along the main hallway,
Marcia Smith 23:37
I can understand. So it is a desert.
Bob Smith 23:41
Apparently somebody tried to get the camels out.
Marcia Smith 23:44
There always has to be somebody that made this law happen, right? Yes, there’s
Bob Smith 23:48
a some there was a need for a law. They don’t just come up with laws. And it makes you wonder what these needs were Marcia? In Baltimore, it’s against the law to mistreat an oyster. But in Illinois, an animal can be sent to jail. In old law, really. And in Gary, Indiana, a statute making it illegal to attend the Public Theater within four hours after eating garlic. There was definitely a reason for that. It’s funny. Those are some funny funny laws.
Marcia Smith 24:19
Let’s talk a little football. Okay, when and where did the NFL officially begin? Canton?
Bob Smith 24:25
Ohio? 1925.
Marcia Smith 24:27
You say that was such authority. It’s true, isn’t it? No, but it’s that far. It was Canton, Ohio. Yeah, it
Bob Smith 24:33
was 1920 Yes,
Marcia Smith 24:36
it’s 100 years ago. Yeah. Yeah. For my Well,
Bob Smith 24:39
I’ve been to the Football Hall of Fame. Ben and I were there a few years ago and there was a lot of they have some of the original materials there the original agreements there and that was there were all these different teams got together and George Halus and currently Lambeau, Curly Lambo were there and they, they kind of made the agreement and started the whole shebang. And
Marcia Smith 24:58
the oldest no fell franchise in continuous operation in the same location is the Green
Bob Smith 25:05
Bay Packers that
Marcia Smith 25:07
Yeah, but
Bob Smith 25:09
the bears are pretty close behind them
Marcia Smith 25:11
yeah but in the same I don’t think they’re in the same no they moved locations
Bob Smith 25:15
they were in Decatur Yeah. They were the Staley searchers or something.
Marcia Smith 25:18
It’s something like Staley starch Cup and the cheese’s they were founded in 1919. They were known as the Packers the Acme meat
Bob Smith 25:26
packers. Yeah, yeah. We always seem to mention the Packers on this show. Oh,
Marcia Smith 25:30
no. Ball. There’s so much NFL history around those boys. Yeah, yeah. What are you gonna do?
Bob Smith 25:35
All right, I’m gonna ask you. What? singsong nursery rhyme is based on a true story about a real person. Most of those aren’t
Marcia Smith 25:43
Humpty Dumpty. No, that’s not the one. Okay, tell
Bob Smith 25:45
me Mary Had a Little Lamb. There was a Mary. She was a real person, Mary Sawyer, and she indeed did have a little lamb. She was born in 1806. And her lamb followed her to school one day, and 1860 when she was 10. And Mary, what’s with the lamb? The lamb out of here. And when she arrived at school, she wrapped her lamb in a blanket that she placed at her feet until it made a noise, which that’s when the teacher discovered. What do you got there? There’s a lamb in the classroom. So the teacher laughed and put it out and young John rule, Stone had just arrived in town. He witnessed Mary sneaking the animal into school, and he wrote a poem about it, and he delivered it to her. You know, Mary Had a Little Lamb. Everywhere Mary went, the lamb was sure to go. She has and then a woman named Sarah Josepha Hale published it in 1830. In a book, so that’s where it came from. There’s some argument as to who wrote it, but there’s no argument about Mary Sawyer. She was a real person. She had a lamb. She did take it to school one day, and that was bad. That was bad. All right, you got something to wrap us up March.
Marcia Smith 26:50
Okay, Bob, let’s finish off this week of political upheaval that never seems to stop.
Bob Smith 26:58
With that, you don’t even have to explain what we were talking about. going on forever. It
Marcia Smith 27:03
has. Okay. All right. I’ll finish up with this with this fabulous quote, by an unknown person. I don’t know person. I like sleeping because it’s like being dead without the commitment.
Bob Smith 27:22
Well, that’s a different take on sleep. It’s like being dead without the commitment. All right. Well, we’ll commit to being back again next week with more fun trivia. Sounds good to me here on the off ramp with Bob and Marsha Smith. Join us next time. The off ramp is produced in association with CPL radio and the Cedarburg Public Library Cedarburg, Wisconsin.
Transcribed by https://otter.ai
