Bob and Marcia discuss the history and success rates of New Year’s resolutions, noting that 38.5% of adults worldwide set them, with only 8% achieving them. They trace the origins of resolutions to the Babylonians and highlight Julius Caesar’s significant calendar reforms in 46 BC, including the introduction of January 1 as New Year’s Day. They also touch on the cultural significance of the Chinese Lunar New Year, which involves extensive travel and traditional foods. Additionally, they mention Taylor Swift breaking Elvis Presley’s record for most weeks at number one on the Billboard Album Charts, with 68 weeks.
Outline
New Year’s Resolutions and Their History
- Bob Smith introduces the episode as an encore performance of an earlier New Year’s show.
- Marcia Smith and Bob Smith discuss the origins of New Year’s resolutions and their personal experiences with making resolutions.
- Bob Smith mentions that around 38.5% to 45% of adults worldwide set New Year’s resolutions annually.
- They discuss the success rate of New Year’s resolutions, with only about 8% of people achieving their goals.
The Babylonian Origins of New Year’s Resolutions
- Marcia Smith asks when New Year’s resolutions began, leading Bob Smith to explain their ancient origins.
- Bob Smith explains that New Year’s resolutions date back to the Babylonians, who celebrated a 12-day festival called Akitu at the start of the agrarian year.
- During this festival, the Babylonians made resolutions to their gods, including returning borrowed farm equipment and paying debts.
- Bob Smith highlights the humorous aspect of the Babylonians’ annual resolutions, which often remained the same each year.
Julius Caesar’s Impact on the Calendar and New Year’s Resolutions
- Marcia Smith asks about the most successful New Year’s resolution in history, leading Bob Smith to discuss Julius Caesar’s reforms.
- Bob Smith explains that Julius Caesar introduced significant changes to the Roman calendar in 46 BC, including making the year 455 days long to realign it with the sun.
- Caesar divided the calendar into 12 months and introduced the leap year to prevent the calendar from falling out of alignment.
- He also named January 1 as the new New Year’s Day, symbolizing a fresh start and the beginning of resolutions.
The Cultural Significance of January 1
- Bob Smith explains that the name January comes from Janus, the Roman god with two faces, symbolizing looking forward and backward.
- The Romans began offering sacrifices and making resolutions on January 1, marking the start of the new year.
- This tradition has continued for over 2000 years, making Julius Caesar a significant figure in the history of New Year’s resolutions.
- Marcia Smith and Bob Smith discuss the cultural and historical significance of January 1 as a day for resolutions.
Global TV Series and Cultural References
- Marcia Smith asks about the world’s number one TV series, leading Bob Smith to mention “Game of Thrones.”
- They discuss the popularity of “Game of Thrones” and its creator, George R.R. Martin, who was a former professor at their alma mater.
- Bob Smith shares a humorous comparison between Martin’s success and their own work, highlighting the podcast’s role at the library.
- They briefly discuss the political implications of Caesar’s calendar reforms and the challenges faced by his enemies.
The Origin of “Dixieland” and Historical Trivia
- Marcia Smith asks why the Southern United States are called Dixieland, leading Bob Smith to explain the origin of the term.
- Bob Smith explains that “Dixie” comes from the French word for ten, referencing a $10 banknote used in New Orleans.
- They discuss the historical context of the term and its connection to the Confederacy’s battle song “Dixie.”
- Bob Smith shares a humorous anecdote about the term’s origin and its use in popular culture.
Strategies for Successful New Year’s Resolutions
- Bob Smith discusses the importance of setting small, measurable goals to increase the chances of success.
- He shares his personal resolution to read entire books instead of skipping through them.
- They discuss the statistics on New Year’s resolutions, including the fact that young adults are more likely to make them than older adults.
- Bob Smith highlights the importance of age in predicting whether someone will stick to their resolutions.
Cultural Practices and the Lunar New Year
- Bob Smith discusses the Chinese Lunar New Year, which lasts 15 days and involves cleaning, gift-giving, feasts, and parades.
- They explain the significance of the number eight in Chinese culture and the traditional foods served during the Lunar New Year.
- Bob Smith shares the impressive travel statistics associated with the Lunar New Year, with an estimated 3.2 billion trips taken over a six-week period.
- They discuss the historical context of the Lunar New Year and its cultural importance in Asian countries.
Historical Figures and Their Contributions
- Marcia Smith asks about a witty poem from 1626, leading Bob Smith to explain its connection to Sir Francis Bacon.
- Bob Smith shares the story of Bacon’s death from pneumonia after an experiment with a chicken stuffed with snow.
- They discuss the humorous aspect of the poem and its connection to Bacon’s tragic death.
- Bob Smith shares additional historical trivia about the Chinese Lunar New Year and its cultural significance.
Modern Pop Culture and Record-Breaking Achievements
- Bob Smith discusses Taylor Swift’s record-breaking achievement in the Billboard Album Charts, surpassing Elvis Presley.
- They share the significance of Swift’s achievement and its place in pop music history.
- Bob Smith shares a series of quick trivia questions, including the speed of a grass snake, the water-holding capacity of an elephant’s trunk, and a biological reflex that horses and rabbits cannot perform.
- They conclude the episode with humorous and thought-provoking reflections on the new year and the importance of setting goals.
Bob Smith 0:00
Bob, this episode of the off ramp is an encore performance of an earlier New Year’s show. Hope you enjoy it. What leader made the most successful new year’s resolution in history?
Marcia Smith 0:13
That’s interesting. And when did New Year’s resolutions begin?
Bob Smith 0:17
Answers to those and other questions as we head into a new year here on the off
Marcia Smith 0:21
ramp with Bob and Marcia Smith.
Bob Smith 0:40
Welcome to the off ramp, a chance to slow down, steer clear of crazy, take a side road to sanity and get some perspective on life. That’s kind of what a New Year’s Day does for you, doesn’t it? Yeah, yeah,
Marcia Smith 0:53
it does. Do you make New Year’s resolutions? Marcia, not anymore. No. You used to do it. Yes. And why did you stop doing why do you think
Bob Smith 1:00
because you failed, you failed. Marcia,
Marcia Smith 1:03
yes, or I was so successful, it didn’t matter anymore. Oh, well, I never thought of that. They do tend to get redundant. So moving on. Well,
Bob Smith 1:11
you know, how many people do resolutions every year? How many people do you think make New Year’s resolutions? I’d
Marcia Smith 1:18
say, of the world population, 68.9
Bob Smith 1:23
No, it’s just generally around half the people. At least in the United States, it’s about 45% of Americans. But overall, 38.5% of adults seem to set new year’s resolutions yearly. Based on studies conducted over the past five years, how many of them are successful with their resolutions. Of that, of that 38 to 45%
Marcia Smith 1:46
20% 10% 10%
Bob Smith 1:49
if only it was that good, 5%
Unknown Speaker 1:52
really, 8% only
Bob Smith 1:54
about 8% of people are successful in achieving their goals. I’ve got some thoughts on how to do it right based on some research, and we’ll get to that in a moment. But first, Marcia, your question was, when did New Year’s resolutions begin?
Marcia Smith 2:08
Yes, Bob, when did they begin? Well,
Bob Smith 2:11
I imagine it goes back to old times, the old days before the landline,
Marcia Smith 2:18
before there was it such an ancient time as before the land? Yes,
Bob Smith 2:23
there was before the telegraph, before the landline, before all the technology we have today. Yeah, I would imagine it goes back 3000 years at least. Oh, that’s good.
Marcia Smith 2:33
It’s 4000 4000 years. 4000 and when the Babylonians, remember them, celebrated a 12 day festival called akatu At the start of the new agrarian year.
Bob Smith 2:46
Okay, so it’s dealt with the planting year, agrarian year. Yes,
Marcia Smith 2:49
during the festival, they would make resolutions to their gods during the vernal equinox. Okay, that was the start of the farming season to plant crops, Crown their King and make promises to Return Borrowed farm equipment and pay their debts. Return Borrowed farm equipment, that’s hilarious, and pay their debts. So that was their resolution. Wow, every year, apparently they had the same ones. So that came from
Bob Smith 3:13
the Babylonian time. So we’re talking about what is now Iraq, but 4000 years ago. Yeah.
Marcia Smith 3:18
Wow. Do we have stuff in the garage our neighbors the shovels or rakes or something? Do
Bob Smith 3:24
we owe them any shekels Marcia? All right. Well, what leader in history made what is arguably the most successful new year’s resolution?
Marcia Smith 3:33
I would say it’s got to be some head of some country that vowed to end the war, some war that year?
Bob Smith 3:42
Well, it goes back a long ways. You want to hint, yeah, let’s try 46 BC,
Marcia Smith 3:48
guru. Was he fiddling? Did he talk about getting new
Bob Smith 3:51
Was it during Nero’s time? Now? Okay, now what Julius Caesar? Yeah. Now, here’s why he was so successful. I mean, in 46 BC, he had a New Year’s resolution that was four changes that have lasted a lifetime for all time to our time. Do you have any idea what they were? Something about the calendar? Yes, that was one thing they were all about. The calendar. Action, yeah, time,
Marcia Smith 4:15
calendars, months, number of wives. Well,
Bob Smith 4:21
no, no, wait, sorry, that’s no, that’s you’re thinking of some other Oh, okay, yeah, tell me. Okay. Well, unlike our problems today, his problem wasn’t that he ate too much, or that he exercised too a little, or that he spent too much time on social media. It wasn’t any of those things. His problem was the Roman calendar, that was a 355 day calendar, and it was a combination five 355 days, a combination of lunar and ancient calendars. And it was a mess. The priests of Rome had to manipulate the calendar continually to adjust the dates to match the natural seasons. And by the time he came to power, the. Harvest fest no longer fell during the harvest times, things were really screwed up. Were screwed up. So in the year 46 BC, Julius Caesar did something unprecedented. He declared a year of transition, the longest year in history. How long was the longest year in history?
Unknown Speaker 5:15
I’ll say 375
Bob Smith 5:18
days, no longer than that. 85 385. 400 he lengthened the year 46 BC to make it 455 days long enough to realign the calendar with the sun. He wanted to make the following year begin at the right time after the winter solstice. You can only do these things if you’re a dictator. Boy,
Marcia Smith 5:39
no kidding, but he had some good guys around him that told him, this is what’s wrong, and this is how we can fix it. So he looked like a
Bob Smith 5:45
genius. That’s exactly right. He used the best astronomy and mathematics
Marcia Smith 5:49
well, he believed it. That’s what made him good leader then. And
Bob Smith 5:52
he tinkered with the calendar to make it the solar year. It followed the sun, not the phases of the moon, 365 days plus a few hours. And guess what? He divided the calendar into 12 months. So it was his regime that made that change too months whose Roman names we still use. And He also invented the Leap Year. They knew that the Calendar wouldn’t be perfect, so they added an extra day to the calendar every four years to prevent it from falling out of alignment. What is the fourth and actually most important thing he invented regarding New Year’s, um,
Marcia Smith 6:24
Jeez Louise, he invented a day that didn’t
Bob Smith 6:28
exist before. He invented january 1 as New Year’s Day, okay, deciding that was the turn of the new year. And those are four major accomplishments. You could also say we can credit Julius Caesar with making it the day of New Year’s resolutions. Why? And it had to do with the name,
Marcia Smith 6:45
January. January Janice. Janice was a, you know, Roman god, yes, very good. I like this.
Bob Smith 6:53
We’re doing our own version of what’s that game we used to play with the kids. You fill out a sentence, and the spaces Mad Lib Mad Libs funny because he named the first month January after the Roman god Janus. Had two faces, one that looked forward, one that looked backwards. So Romans believed that Janus symbolically looked backwards into the previous year forward into the new year. So they began offering sacrifices and resolving to conduct themselves better on January 1, and that’s how the real celebrations that relate to the January 1 day began. It’s been going on for well over 2000 years ago. So 4000 years ago was New Year’s resolutions, but they began being done on January 1, more than 2000 years ago. Okay, so that’s why you can credit Julius Caesar as the leader with the most successful new year’s resolutions in history. Okay? Thank you, Bob. Next question, what
Marcia Smith 7:45
is the world’s number one TV series? The world’s number one TV series today, more people watch this. It’s actually over, but it’s a series that people have watched. Oh, it’s just been completed. Then why it is complete? But it’s, what is the number one TV series in the world? From the
Bob Smith 8:05
United States? Yeah,
Marcia Smith 8:09
we never watched it. Okay? What is it? Game of Thrones? Oh, yes, of course. It’s a story about nine noble families fight for control over the lands of Westeros while an ancient enemy returns after being dormant for a millennia. And we never got into that, but it sure. Well, it’s pretty violent, but yes, I hear it’s compelling. Yeah, yeah. It’s a interesting, interesting, written
Bob Smith 8:33
by a gentleman named Martin who was a former professor at the University of Dubuque or Clark College when you and I were working there. No kidding, yeah. So he’s doing that and making billions, and you and I are here. So
Marcia Smith 8:45
hey, we got our podcast that’s right
Bob Smith 8:47
for the library. Doesn’t have a podcast for the cedar bird Public Library. That’s very funny. Back to Julius Caesar. One more thing about that. Julius Caesar doing all this stuff, changing things, and a political enemy, Cicero, joked, this man now wished to control the very stars which rose according to his new calendar, as if by
Marcia Smith 9:07
edict. Yeah, I imagine everybody being so ticked off. What’s wrong with this? He’s trying to dictate the calendar when the
Bob Smith 9:16
sun rises and sets, but it was the right thing to do, why
Marcia Smith 9:20
Bob? Why are the southern states called Dixieland?
Bob Smith 9:26
Why are the southern United States called Dixieland because they are south of the Mason Dixon Line? What’s the
Marcia Smith 9:31
first sentence I have here? It’s not because of the Mason Dixon Line,
Bob Smith 9:36
but it’s not because of the Mason Dixon Line. Okay, tell me the answer.
Marcia Smith 9:41
And that line is the boundary between the free states and the slave states, the territory south of Jeremiah Dixon’s boundary line. But according to Big Book of answers, it comes from the word Dixie, which was what southerners called a French $10 bank. Note.
Bob Smith 10:00
Oh, that’s right, I’ve heard about that D, i, x means 10 in French. Oh, okay, so a Dixie is a $10 bill,
Marcia Smith 10:05
and in New Orleans, they used the Dixie, and it was already in use in 1859 when Daniel Emmett, a northern man, introduced his song Dixie, with the South’s nickname, and somehow it became a battle song for the Confederacy. He was
Bob Smith 10:21
a white man who had entertainers, and they did black face minstrel shows and sang, and he wrote that song. But he wasn’t a black man. He was a white man, that’s right. And he wasn’t from the south. He was from Ohio.
Marcia Smith 10:33
Interesting. Okay, you knew a lot about him, but you didn’t know that. I
Bob Smith 10:36
just forgot about that aspect of
Unknown Speaker 10:38
it. All right? We were
Bob Smith 10:39
talking about resolutions that failed 88% this is from a University of Bristol study of 3000 people. One thing they say was that small, measurable goals lead to greater success. So instead of saying I’m going to lose weight, you say I’m going to lose a pound a week, or I’m going to lose a pound the first two weeks, or in my case,
Marcia Smith 10:58
I’m going to get up in the morning, not God willing.
Bob Smith 11:03
That’s your resolution. Oh, my God, a good chance. So are you in the percentage of people who resolve not to do anything Correct? Well,
Marcia Smith 11:10
I still do. I bet you do what I still feel.
Bob Smith 11:14
You know, about a year ago, I had a real long list about five things. That’s my guy. The longer the list, the worse. I think I got one of those things started. So this year, my resolution is to read entire books instead of skipping through them, which I tend to do. I think that social media and the Internet has ruined my attention, so I need to start with one book and make sure I read it all the way through before I open another one, because I usually have like five of them going at any given time. They’re
Marcia Smith 11:41
in the Smithsonian Institute in your bathroom. Okay, all
Bob Smith 11:44
right, let me ask you this question. So I do have statistics on how many people do set resolutions? 38.5% of all US adults do have a New Year’s resolution. 52.6% focus on one resolution. 47.4% do multiple resolutions. So most people do one resolution. That’s probably why it’s better. But age predicts whether you’re going to actually do them or not. Young adults do resolutions more often than older people. 59% of young adults, 18 to 34
Marcia Smith 12:17
have resolutions. And you know why? That is because they haven’t
Bob Smith 12:21
lived long enough to know it doesn’t work.
Unknown Speaker 12:23
That’s right.
Bob Smith 12:23
People over 55 are three times less likely to have resolutions compared to younger people, but 54% of parents do make New Year’s resolutions, huh? If you’re a parent, especially of young children, you’re more likely to do a resolution. Okay,
Marcia Smith 12:41
okay, Bob, a person who is extremely distraught is often said to be beside himself. Yes, where does that phrase come?
Bob Smith 12:50
Oh, that’s interesting. I hadn’t thought of that. I just when you said that, I thought of a psychological thing. You know, here you are, and here’s this other person that is you as well. You know, whoever say, Wow, well, you know it’s like, here’s what I’m gonna say, here’s what I really think. You know, it’s kind of like that two different people. Is it a psychological thing? Did that come from psychological comparisons, like Freudian or something like that?
Marcia Smith 13:13
It’s way before Freudian. Okay. Back to the ancients. They believe that under extreme distress, that the soul left a person’s body and stood beside him in human form. Wow,
Bob Smith 13:25
so you’re actually beside yourself. They thought it left the
Marcia Smith 13:30
subject literally beside himself when he would leave his body. It was believed this absence of the soul gave the devil an opportunity to fill the void. Whoa, apparently, extreme pleasure could also cause this condition. The Greek word ecstasy means to leave the body. Oh, no kidding, yeah, wow. So extreme happiness, or just
Bob Smith 13:54
extreme pleasure, could make you beside yourself, yeah?
Marcia Smith 13:58
Who’s that guy over there, smiling,
Bob Smith 14:01
who’s beside himself over there? Oh,
Marcia Smith 14:04
my goodness. Anyway, that goes back to ancient times. All right, one more
Bob Smith 14:07
thing on the New Year’s resolutions. This is from a Google Maps project called Zeitgeist. They found that in the US and Egypt, health related resolutions took priority. But if you live in Australia or Japan, you’re looking for love. Oh, really, yeah. And in India, career goals, top the resolutions. What is it in the US? In the US, it’s health related, okay? And in Russia, it’s all about education,
Marcia Smith 14:33
different countries, different needs, all right? Bob, domestic box office movies. Can you name any the top five movies of 2023 man,
Bob Smith 14:43
I have a hard time with this anymore. I would say two of the top are Oppenheimer and Barbie.
Marcia Smith 14:47
Correct. Okay, Barbie was number one, Oppenheimer, number five, following Barbie is Super Mario Brothers. We didn’t see that. Oh, geez. Spider Man across the spidey verse, okay. I. And gardens of the galaxy, which we did see. Gardens of the galaxy.
Bob Smith 15:03
Well, we sell some of those movies, but yeah, three of them. All right, I think it’s time to take a movie break.
Marcia Smith 15:08
All right, and this cat means popcorn, doesn’t it? Let’s go pop the popcorn. We’ll
Bob Smith 15:12
be back in a minute. You’re listening to the off ramp with Bob and Marcia Smith. We’re back, but we lied about the popcorn.
Marcia Smith 15:20
Bob gets mad if I chew on the microphone.
Bob Smith 15:23
Yeah, we just can’t do that when we’re doing our show. You’re listening to the off ramp with Bob and Marcia Smith. We do this every week for the Cedarburg Public Library, Cedarburg, Wisconsin, and its internet radio station. And then after it’s aired on the radio station, it goes out all over. It goes on podcast platforms all over the world. Thank you very much.
Marcia Smith 15:44
Marcia, I was off in Dream Land. We’re beside yourself there.
Bob Smith 15:49
Say, you know, if you like New Year’s celebrations, what country’s culture is best for you? Any idea what country’s culture would be the best for you? Close, China. China, really the Chinese Lunar New Year is 15 days. Wow. So you can celebrate a long time, but actually, it’s not the Chinese New Year. It’s the Lunar New Year. It’s celebrated in multiple Asian cultures. It starts with the first new moon of the year. Last 15 days. And it’s celebrated with cleaning, gift giving, feasts and parades. Spring Cleaning is the thing it’s mostly associated with. You’d love that when you
Marcia Smith 16:27
Oh, I’m all in. But
Bob Smith 16:29
it has to do with the switch over from winter to spring. Ancient farmers, when they began another season for planting crops, they would get rid of things, clean things out, get rid of the bad luck and all of that. Okay, big meals too. Marcia, yeah. How many courses you think a Chinese Lunar New Year meal might be 17? Not that big? 12, 888, is a lucky number. So many meals consist of eight courses. Wonder what they are. Do you have them listed? They may include dumplings that resemble ancient coins in northern China, sticky rice cakes in southern China. Other traditional foods include fish tangerine and uncut noodles. Uncut noodles signify a long life. Did you know that? Yeah, and lots of fireworks, lots of noise, and it culminates in the lantern festival. And this is the big statistic. I’m surprised at travel. Travel is very big during the Lunar New Year. We think in the United States, we have nightmare traffic jams and Thanksgiving and Christmas, they pale by comparison to Chinese Lunar New Year travel. An estimated 3.2 billion trips are taken, oh my word, by the Chinese over a six week period. It’s been called the largest seasonal migration of people. Where do they go? They visit friends and family, wherever they are, in and out of China.
Marcia Smith 17:48
All right, Bob, I like this one, okay. What inspired this witty little poem in 1626, all right, against cold meats. He was insured for frozen chickens he procured brought on the illness he endured and never was the bacon cured. What? What inspired that poem
Bob Smith 18:11
that sounds like some kind of infection or something based on food that wasn’t prepared, right? Well,
Marcia Smith 18:18
it’s actually about a person who died long before Clarence Bird’s Eye pioneered frozen food, which we’ve talked about on the show Sir Francis Bacon, a philosopher and English statesman of many titles, yes, gave his life to the cause. He died after contracting pneumonia during an experiment stuffing a chicken with snow to test its preservative properties. Oh,
Bob Smith 18:43
no, kidding. So, hey, maybe this will make the chicken last longer. Yeah,
Marcia Smith 18:48
he got it can I’ll read you the poem again. Oh, my God, now that you know what it’s about, against cold meats. Was he insured for frozen chickens he procured brought on the illness he endured and never was the bacon cured, wow,
Bob Smith 19:02
man. So he got pneumonia. That’s what he died from. Yeah, it was cold, yeah, oh my goodness, cold bacon. Who wants that? Okay, all right, two more things about the Lunar New Year in China. Okay. Did you know that at one point the Chinese Communist government tried to dissuade people from celebrating the Lunar New Year. They did that for years while Chairman Mao was in power from 1949 a great idea since he 49 to the mid 60s, early 70s, they tried to stop people from celebrating it, and they cracked down on lion and Dragon dances and traditional greetings. You could really get in trouble, big trouble, just by celebrating what was the holiday that had been in your history, for your country and your culture for centuries. But after he died, things were liberalized, and since 1996 the Chinese Lunar New Year has been designated as a week long vacation. So it’s okay now, now before the. Lunar New Year. No one in China knew how to tell time. They didn’t know what year it was. Okay. Did
Marcia Smith 20:05
you know that? No, didn’t they have the little place, Matt said, with the restaurants, not like we have now?
Bob Smith 20:13
No, according to history.com no one really tracked time in China until Emperor Huang D invented the lunar, solar Chinese calendar that was 2637 BC. Indeed, until recently, the Chinese never concerned themselves with numbering sequentially. They numbered things in cycles. But today, year one in Chinese history corresponds to the supposed first year of huangdis regime, which was 2698 BC. That was year one in Chinese history. Wow. And all this is related to the new year. It’s quite interesting. It’s a rich history all over the world of different cultures. But Bob,
Marcia Smith 20:52
I have a question, okay, who was the brainiac? Who invented cement pianos?
Bob Smith 20:57
What cement pianos? I never heard of that. Well,
Marcia Smith 21:01
there was a patent for it. This is in the patents that should be still pending chapter in the good old days my ass book. Oh, that’s hilarious. So who came up with the patent for cement? It
Bob Smith 21:15
has to be Thomas Edison, that’s right. I knew you’d get that because, because he invented Portland cement, the process for Portland cement, if
Marcia Smith 21:24
you’d put the two together, oh dear, yeah, not everything he touched turned to go. He had 1093
Bob Smith 21:31
patents. Bob, well, there had to be some dogs in there
Marcia Smith 21:33
among his more half baked ideas, was an obsession with making things from cement, not just building, but pianos and phonograph cabinets, he even formed there, as you said, the Edison Portland cement company, to pursue his dream of cement products, but it never lived up to a concrete reality. Oh,
Bob Smith 21:53
my God. Oh, did you actually say that it never became a concrete reality?
Marcia Smith 21:57
Now, never mind.
Bob Smith 22:01
All right, Marcia, some firsts. Where was America’s first spa now both Thomas Jefferson and George Washington visited the hot waters. Any idea where it was Thomas Jefferson and who and George Washington? Can I give you choices? Sure? Springs Arkansas, Berkeley Springs, West Virginia, moccasin Springs, South Dakota or mystic Hot Springs, Utah. We can rule the last one out. Neither one of them ever went that
Marcia Smith 22:25
far. Yeah, I’m going with the closest to them, Virginia. Well, it
Bob Smith 22:29
was Berkeley Springs, West Virginia, yeah, located in the mountains of the western portion of what was then Virginia, frequented by the founding fathers. It’s still there. Thomas Jefferson was the first to mark the warm mineral waters on a map in 1748 he labeled it medicine springs. And then George Washington visited in 1748 and it became a getaway for him. Of course, Native Americans had known about it for centuries before the Europeans arrived. Today, the SPA’s mineral waters are heated to a constant 74 degrees Fahrenheit. They fill ancient stone pools where visitors can wade. So that’s the first American spa, Berkeley Springs, West Virginia,
Marcia Smith 23:09
okay? Bob, who Bob, who were the first street cleaners in New York City.
Bob Smith 23:14
You mean by name, okay? Joe Adagio. And I think the other guy was Ricky Ramirez, or something like, Well, I don’t know, Marsh, okay, the first ones in New York City, are we talking about an ethnic group, or are we talking about animals? Were the animals? Animals? Animals, the animals that swept the streets? What were they pigs? Okay, okay, because they cleaned Wall Street, right? There were pigs. So
Marcia Smith 23:39
filthy was the growing city of New York that herds of pigs were pressed into service to scavenge the ever mounting trash. Geez. Dickens even wrote a poem about it. He came to visit and he saw all these following his carriage. There were all these pigs, and he wrote a thing about it,
Bob Smith 23:56
yeah, was there a Tiny Tim in that one too, or was a no.
Marcia Smith 24:01
God bless us, everyone. How many Bob, how many of the Seven Wonders of the Ancient World Can you name? Well,
Bob Smith 24:08
there was the Hanging Gardens of Babylon. That’s one, the pyramids of Egypt, of Giza, correct. That’s two, the lighthouse at Alexandria, excellent. That’s three. And I don’t know what the other ones were,
Marcia Smith 24:22
mausoleum of Halicarnassus, the Temple of Artemis, Colossus of Rhodes, and the statue of Zeus at Olympia. The
Bob Smith 24:34
only one that’s left today is the pyramids. Yes, isn’t that amazing? Yeah,
Marcia Smith 24:39
that is a wonder of the world for sure. Okay, well, with the
Bob Smith 24:43
turning of the new year, there’s a new record in pop music. So I’m gonna ask you this question, what solo artist has now spent more weeks at number one in the Billboard Album Charts than any other Miss Taylor Swift, that’s exactly right, for more than 50 years. The answer to that. Question was Elvis Presley, but the week the world entered 2024 Taylor Swift broke that record as the year transition she’d spent 68 weeks atop the billboard, 200 Album Charts at number one surpasses Elvis Presley for the most appearances in the top slot for a solo artist. Of all acts only the Beatles have been at number one more times on that chart.
Marcia Smith 25:24
Give her another year, 132
Bob Smith 25:26
times for the Beatles in the history of billboards, album chart that goes back to 1956
Marcia Smith 25:32
All right, I’m gonna give you three quickies. How fast can a grass snake travel?
Bob Smith 25:36
How fast can a grass snake travel? Is this in terms of miles per hour? Yeah, wow. You
Marcia Smith 25:44
wouldn’t have thought it was even a mile. No, is it? Is it half a mile per hour? Or
Bob Smith 25:49
what is it? Is it three miles per hour?
Marcia Smith 25:52
That’s nuts. Bob, okay, snake, what is it 4.2 miles per hour? Geez. Isn’t that amazing, when
Bob Smith 25:59
you think about that. That’s pretty fast for a snake to travel through the grass. I
Marcia Smith 26:03
thought about it, and that’s why I put it isn’t when you think about it, how do snakes travel through grass? They don’t have legs to propel them. They moved. It isn’t that interesting. Wiggle your butt. We should do a little story on that sometimes. How do snakes make it through the grass? How much water? How much water can an elephant’s trunk hold? Whoa,
Bob Smith 26:19
a bit. That’s significant. Let me say, I’ll say six gallons, but I bet it’s more than that. No
Marcia Smith 26:27
four, four gallons of water. It’s four gallons. Is a lot of what is heavy, yeah, and what biological reflex are horses and rabbits unable to do?
Bob Smith 26:38
What biological reflex are they unable to do? They can both move their ears. Rabbits and horses can’t do this. They can both eat. One can hop, one can trot. They can’t walk downstairs. Uh huh,
Marcia Smith 26:54
I don’t know. What is it? They can’t vomit.
Bob Smith 26:56
Well, that’s a useful thing to not have
Marcia Smith 27:00
horses and rabbits. Who knew not me, can’t
Bob Smith 27:02
throw up, they can’t vomit. What do they do then if they get sick? Well,
Marcia Smith 27:06
that’s a good question, and that’s another show. Oh, okay, any thoughts for the new year? Yes, okay, well, it’s actually from jeja Gabor. Oh, okay, yes. She said a man in love is incomplete until he is married, then he’s finished.
Bob Smith 27:25
I think it’s best that I do not say anything I don’t agree with that. That’s when life begins. Mark, oh, well done.
Unknown Speaker 27:32
All right, dinner for that. Okay, it’s time to go. That will be a
Bob Smith 27:36
first. We hope you join us again next time, when we return with more fascinating facts and tantalizing trivia for the off ramp. The off ramp is produced in association with CPL radio online and the Cedarbrook Public Library. Cedarbrook, Wisconsin, the.
Transcribed by https://otter.ai
