Bob and Marcia Smith discuss various trivia and facts in their show. They reveal that 33% of lightning deaths occur indoors, and explain the origin of the term “blackball” from 17th-century voting practices. They clarify that “Happy Birthday” is the most money-making song, earning $50 million in royalties before entering the public domain in 2016. They also note that 17 million Americans skip work the day after the Super Bowl, and that Max Martin has written 27 number one hits. Additionally, they discuss the reintroduction of squirrels in US cities and the impact of Thomas Midgley’s inventions on the environment.
Outline
Lightning Strikes Indoors
- Bob Smith asks Marcia Smith about the percentage of lightning strikes that occur indoors.
- Marcia Smith clarifies the question: what percentage of lightning strikes kill or injure people indoors.
- Bob Smith mentions he avoids showers during storms.
- Marcia Smith reveals that 33% of lightning deaths occur indoors, not 10%.
- They discuss various scenarios where people can be struck by lightning indoors, including holding a lightning rod.
Voting Practices of 17th Century Men’s Lodges
- Bob Smith asks Marcia Smith about two words originating from 17th-century voting practices of men’s lodges.
- Marcia Smith identifies “ballot” as one of the words, explaining its origin from the Italian word “Balata” meaning “little ball.”
- They discuss the use of colored marbles (white for yes, black for no) in voting, leading to the term “black ball.”
- Marcia Smith humorously notes that the term “black ball” is used in various contexts, including sports.
Reader’s Digest Brain Teaser
- Marcia Smith introduces a series of fact or fiction questions from Reader’s Digest.
- They discuss various trivia, including the legality of Mardi Gras float writers wearing masks, the first product Nintendo sold, and the origin of the term “black ball.”
- They also cover the impact of looking at a photo of a loved one on pain relief, the origin of pineapple on pizza, and the number of stars in our galaxy.
- Marcia Smith and Bob Smith debate the number of Americans skipping work the day after the Super Bowl and the middle name of Michael J. Fox.
Animal Trivia
- Bob Smith asks Marcia Smith about an insect that can be trained to detect explosives.
- Marcia Smith correctly identifies honeybees as the insect trained to detect explosives.
- They discuss the cartwheeling wheel spider of Namibia, which can cartwheel away from danger at 44 times per second.
- Bob Smith and Marcia Smith share their amusement at the wheel spider’s evolutionary adaptation.
Music and Songwriting
- Bob Smith asks Marcia Smith about the most hit songs written by a single artist.
- Marcia Smith reveals that Paul McCartney holds the record with 32 number one hits, followed by Max Martin with 27 hits.
- They discuss the origin of the phrase “run amok” and its historical context in Malaysia.
- Bob Smith shares that “Happy Birthday” is the most money-making song of all time, earning $50 million in royalties before entering the public domain in 2016.
World War II and Polish Bats
- Bob Smith asks Marcia Smith about how Polish bats benefited from World War II.
- They reveal that the abandoned Nazi underground fortification in Poland now serves as a hibernation spot for 37,000 bats.
- The steady temperature and humidity of the fortification make it an ideal hibernation spot for the bats.
Most Listened to Song of All Time
- Bob Smith asks Marcia Smith about the most listened to song of all time.
- Marcia Smith reveals that “Blinding Lights” by The Weeknd holds the record with over 5 billion downloads on Spotify.
- They discuss the significance of the song’s name and its popularity.
Thomas Midgley and Environmental Impact
- Bob Smith asks Marcia Smith about an inventor whose work seriously damaged the planet twice.
- They discuss Thomas Midgley, who developed leaded gasoline and chlorofluorocarbons (CFCs), both of which had significant environmental impacts.
- Midgley’s leaded gasoline contributed to air pollution, while his CFCs led to ozone depletion.
- Despite his contributions to refrigeration, Midgley’s legacy is marked by the environmental damage caused by his inventions.
Nobel Prize and Fruit Flies
- Bob Smith asks Marcia Smith about the connection between the Nobel Prize and fruit flies.
- They reveal that six Nobel Prize winners won their prizes through research involving fruit flies.
- Fruit flies are frequently used in biomedical research due to their genetic similarities to humans.
- The use of fruit flies in scientific research has led to significant advancements in understanding and treating diseases.
Highway and High Seas
- Bob Smith and Marcia Smith discuss the origins of the terms “highway” and “high seas.”
- They explain that “highway” comes from the Latin word “via,” meaning way or road, and was used to describe public roads built higher and better than private roads.
- “High seas” refers to the part of the ocean beyond any country’s three-mile limit of sovereignty.
- Both terms indicate general or public use, reflecting their historical contexts.
Squirrels in US Cities
- Bob Smith asks Marcia Smith about a common animal that was once a rarity in US cities but is now ubiquitous.
- They reveal that squirrels were reintroduced to US cities in the 1850s to bring more nature to city parks.
- Squirrels were once considered a novelty and were reintroduced in mass to enhance urban environments.
- The reintroduction of squirrels has led to their widespread presence in American cities today.
Marcia Smith 0:00
What percentage of lightning strikes people inside the house?
Bob Smith 0:05
Whoa, that’s a good question, and what two words originated in the voting practices of 17th Century men’s lodges? Answers to those and other questions coming up in this episode of The Off Ramp with Bob and Marcia Smith.
Bob Smith 0:35
Welcome to the Off Ramp, a chance to slow down, steer clear of crazy and take a side road to sanity with fascinating facts and tantalizing trivia. Well, lightning striking inside the house?
Marcia Smith 0:48
Yes. The question is more precisely, what percentage of lightning strikes – kills or injures people.
Bob Smith 0:53
In the house?
Marcia Smith 0:56
indoors, yeah.
Bob Smith 0:58
The only time I’ve worried about that is, I just don’t take a shower during a storm.
Marcia Smith 1:02
That’s good advice, because I came upon that one.
Bob Smith 1:04
Oh, really?
Marcia Smith 1:05
It does – it’s not a good place to be in a lightning storm.
Bob Smith 1:08
Ooh, so what’s the percentage you’re saying?
Marcia Smith 1:10
Yeah, just, you know, one to one hundred – what’s –
Bob Smith 1:10
I’d say one in 10 people who die from lightning die in the house. 10%
Marcia Smith 1:17
No, Bob, it’s 33%.
Bob Smith 1:20
Really, a third of the people who die from lightning are struck in the house?
Marcia Smith 1:23
Die or are injured
Bob Smith 1:24
Die or are injured in lightning strikes are inside?
Marcia Smith 1:27
Yeah.
Bob Smith 1:28
Tell me!
Marcia Smith 1:28
Could be on the phone, it can happen. You could be in the tub, it could happen, or the shower, or sitting in your lazy boy in the front room.
Bob Smith 1:37
Jeez!
Marcia Smith 1:37
Holding a – what are those things at the top of high rise buildings to attract …
Bob Smith 1:43
Holding onto a lightning rod? That would be, that would be a tell. How did he die? He was inside holding the lightning rod!
Marcia Smith 1:51
In front of the bay window.
Bob Smith 1:52
Oh, my God! Okay. Marcia, what two words originated in the voting practices of 17th Century men’s lodges. I’m talking about Masonic lodges. I’m talking about fraternal organizations, men’s clubs.
Marcia Smith 2:07
What two voting practices are?
Bob Smith 2:09
Two words originated from the voting practices. Two words we use today.
Marcia Smith 2:14
One is the privacy like a blind ballot.
Bob Smith 2:18
A ballot is one. That comes from the Italian Ballota, b, a, l, l, o, t, a.
Marcia Smith 2:24
I thought as much!
Bob Smith 2:25
It means ‘little ball.’ And in the 17th and 18th century, men’s clubs, and the 19th century – and the 20th for that matter -clubs, lodges and fraternal societies, members used little colored balls to vote on things like whether to admit a new member. And the term Balata, which meant little balls or marbles, led to the term ballot, which is the instrument we use today.
Marcia Smith 2:46
Okay, there’s a lot of jokes there, Bob, but I’m letting them all go.
Bob Smith 2:49
All right. So, all right, let’s, let’s move ahead here.
Marcia Smith 2:52
Alright.
Bob Smith 2:52
So Ballota means little balls – marbles. What color were those little balls?
Marcia Smith 2:57
Well, I bet you they were black and white.
Bob Smith 2:59
That’s exactly right.,A white marble meant yes, a black marble?
Marcia Smith 3:05
Meant no.
Bob Smith 3:05
That’s right.
Marcia Smith 3:06
That’s called deductive reasoning.
Bob Smith 3:08
And since most decisions in a lot of those lodges had to be unanimous, a single black ball could decide an issue in secret. So that’s where the term black ball came from. They used wooden boxes with white and black marbles. And the box had a board that covered your hand when you dropped your marble inside, so nobody could see.
Marcia Smith 3:08
Yeah, yeah,
Bob Smith 3:10
What marble.
Marcia Smith 3:13
Yeah.
Bob Smith 3:22
And when it was open, if there was a single black marble, the project failed, or the person who wanted to join the club was black ball.
Marcia Smith 3:35
Black balled!
Bob Smith 3:36
Black balled – that’s where the term comes from. They were rejected. And if the vote was truly secret, you never knew who voted that way or why. You didn’t know who blackballed you.
Marcia Smith 3:46
Yeah, all right, Bob, Reader’s Digest, brain teasers – fact or fiction? Some very fast questions, and you just answer Fact or Fiction.
Bob Smith 3:55
Okay, gotcha.
Marcia Smith 3:55
All right, fact or fiction? By law, Mardi Gras float riders must wear masks.
Bob Smith 4:01
Fact.
Marcia Smith 4:02
Correct. Fact or fiction? The video game console Nintendo 64 was the first product Nintendo sold.
Bob Smith 4:10
Fiction.
Marcia Smith 4:10
That’s right.
Bob Smith 4:11
Weren’t they a card company back in the day?
Marcia Smith 4:13
Well, yes!
Bob Smith 4:14
They made playing cards.
Marcia Smith 4:15
That’s correct.
Bob Smith 4:16
Yes.
Marcia Smith 4:16
That’s right.
Bob Smith 4:17
In the 19th century.
Marcia Smith 4:19
1889. Looking at a photo of a loved one can relieve pain. Fact or Fiction.
Bob Smith 4:26
Fact.
Marcia Smith 4:26
That’s correct, Hawaiians were the first to offer pineapple as a pizza topping. Fact or Fiction?
Bob Smith 4:33
Fiction it was the Canadians.
Marcia Smith 4:35
Yes, it was Canada.
Bob Smith 4:36
Yeah.
Marcia Smith 4:37
See, this show has made you a lot smarter.
Bob Smith 4:39
Thank you.
Marcia Smith 4:40
Just just having this okay, fact or fiction? there are hundreds of 1000s of stars in our galaxy.
Bob Smith 4:46
Fact, oh, no, wait a minute, stars, no, there’s one star in our galaxy. No, no, wait a minute, yes, there are hundreds of 1000s of stars! Fact.
Marcia Smith 4:54
Fiction. There’s hundreds of billions.
Bob Smith 4:57
Oh, my God.
Marcia Smith 4:58
Hundreds of billions. Okay, about 17 million Americans skip out of work the day after the Super Bowl. Fact or Fiction?
Bob Smith 5:07
Fiction.
Marcia Smith 5:08
No, it’s a fact.
Bob Smith 5:09
Really? 17 million people make sure they have the day off the next day?
Marcia Smith 5:14
No, they skip out the next day.
Bob Smith 5:16
Well.
Marcia Smith 5:17
Fact or fiction. Michael J Fox’s middle name is Jedediah.
Bob Smith 5:21
Jedediah?
Marcia Smith 5:22
Yeah.
Bob Smith 5:23
That sounds so odd. I’ll say fact.
Marcia Smith 5:25
Fiction.
Bob Smith 5:25
Oh.
Marcia Smith 5:25
His real name is Andrew. It doesn’t even start with a J.
Bob Smith 5:29
Oh, Michael. J, Andrew Fox?
Marcia Smith 5:31
Isn’t that funny? OK fact or Fiction? Groundhogs are excellent prognosticators.
Bob Smith 5:37
No. Fiction.
Marcia Smith 5:39
The average success rate of groundhogs predicting the end of winter is 37% the answer is fiction.
Bob Smith 5:47
Okay.
Marcia Smith 5:47
And lastly.
Bob Smith 5:48
Yes?
Marcia Smith 5:48
King Louis the 19th ruled over France for 20 minutes.
Bob Smith 5:52
I don’t think there was a Louis the 19th, so I’ll say fiction.
Marcia Smith 5:55
No, he was. On the same day. Both he and his father abdicated the throne, so he was only on for 20 minutes. That’s why you don’t remember Louis the 19th.
Bob Smith 6:05
I guess. All right, Marcia, I have some animal questions.
Marcia Smith 6:08
Oh good. Arp, arp, arp.
Bob Smith 6:10
What insect – and it doesn’t bark – What insect can be trained to detect explosives.
Bob Smith 6:17
Dogs.
Bob Smith 6:18
An insect Marcia. I even said insect.
Marcia Smith 6:21
I know.
Bob Smith 6:21
I said they’re animals. You barked. I said it doesn’t bark. I even said insects – and you still barked. No!
Marcia Smith 6:26
I wasn’t listening. Okay, insects, I will say – can be trained to detect what?
Bob Smith 6:31
Explosives?
Marcia Smith 6:32
Aha. Grasshoppers.
Bob Smith 6:37
It’s similar.
Marcia Smith 6:38
What is it?
Bob Smith 6:38
Honeybees?
Marcia Smith 6:39
Really
Bob Smith 6:40
Honeybees can be trained to detect explosives. They are exposed to the smell of explosive materials and then given sugar, which they drink through their proboscises.
Marcia Smith 6:50
Their nose?
Bob Smith 6:50
Their noses, and the bees are then taken into a field. And if they extend their noses, explosives may be present. They kind of train them to do it by exposing them to the explosives.
Marcia Smith 7:01
Oh, isn’t that curious?
Bob Smith 7:02
Well, I don’t know. It seems kind of cruel to me, but –
Marcia Smith 7:05
Yeah.
Bob Smith 7:05
All right, here’s one. What animal can cartwheel as fast as 44 times a second?
Marcia Smith 7:10
What can do what?
Bob Smith 7:11
An animal can cartwheel 44 times a second?
Marcia Smith 7:15
Would that be the hummingbird?
Bob Smith 7:16
No, that’s a good one. That’s a good guess, because it’s a fast thing, right?
Marcia Smith 7:19
Yeah.
Bob Smith 7:20
Dragonfly would be another potential thing, right?
Marcia Smith 7:22
I don’t think of them flipping.
Bob Smith 7:24
Or the wheel spider of Namibia.
Marcia Smith 7:26
You know, that was my next guess.
Bob Smith 7:27
Oh, yeah, right. It escapes danger by going on one side and cartwheeling away!
Marcia Smith 7:33
Really?
Bob Smith 7:33
Yeah, isn’t it a great evolutionary way to –
Marcia Smith 7:33
Yeah.
Bob Smith 7:35
Move fast.
Marcia Smith 7:37
Wow.
Bob Smith 7:38
Yeah, it goes onto its side and it cartwheels away. And it can spin 44 times a second.
Marcia Smith 7:43
I gotta look that up on YouTube. I wonder if there’s a
Bob Smith 7:46
A video of it.
Marcia Smith 7:46
That.
Bob Smith 7:47
Probably is. I got that from britannica.com so chances are there’s a video somewhere showing that .
Marcia Smith 7:51
That’s very good. Okay, Bob, I think we covered this one. You know who wrote the most hit songs in history, of all time?
Bob Smith 7:57
Hmm, I don’t know about that. Do I know who wrote the most hit songs? I don’t know. Who?
Marcia Smith 8:04
Bob! Paul McCartney.
Bob Smith 8:06
Oh, really.
Marcia Smith 8:07
He had 32 number one hit singles, either with the Beatles or wings or solo. Yeah, number two was always John Lennon. He was 26 number one hits, but he was recently surpassed by what modern songwriter?
Bob Smith 8:21
Taylor Swift?
Marcia Smith 8:23
No.
Bob Smith 8:24
Okay, not Taylor Swift. Was it one of the rap artists?
Marcia Smith 8:27
No.
Bob Smith 8:28
Who?
Marcia Smith 8:29
Max Martin?
Bob Smith 8:30
Who’s Max Martin?
Marcia Smith 8:31
Yeah, what’s wrong with us? He’s from Stockholm, Sweden, and he’s had 27 number one hits. Shake It Off by Taylor Swift. I thought she wrote that.
Bob Smith 8:40
Yeah.
Marcia Smith 8:41
Katy Perry’s, I Kissed a Girl. And Maroon Five with One More Night, so I didn’t have –
Bob Smith 8:47
Wow, I didn’t know one person wrote all those. That’s
Marcia Smith 8:48
All those hit songs. I think Taylor writes a lot of her own. But apparently, not that one.
Bob Smith 8:52
Those are all great songs. Really, very catchy.
Marcia Smith 8:54
So Max Martin, remember that name number two so far.
Bob Smith 8:57
Max Martin.
Marcia Smith 8:58
Yeah.
Bob Smith 8:58
All right. Marcia, what expression for wild behavior traces its origins to a South Sea native tribe? What expression for wild behavior traces its origins to a South Sea native tribe?
Marcia Smith 9:13
All right, all right. Wild be – bizarre.
Bob Smith 9:16
No.
Marcia Smith 9:18
Crazy. The crazy tribe of –
Bob Smith 9:20
Two words. The second word starts with an A. The first word starts with an R.
Marcia Smith 9:25
Rambunctious. No, that’s not right,
Bob Smith 9:27
No, but it’s close.
Marcia Smith 9:28
Okay, tell me – rabble rouser?
Bob Smith 9:30
Run –
Marcia Smith 9:30
Run?
Marcia Smith 9:31
Run –
Marcia Smith 9:32
Away?
Bob Smith 9:33
Amok.
Marcia Smith 9:34
Amok!
Bob Smith 9:36
That term, it refers to wild or erratic behavior, and it became a medical term at first. Did you know that? No, I didn’t. It’s sort of like nostalgia was a medical term originally. But this run amok can be traced to the 18th and 19th centuries, when European visitors to Malaysia learned of a peculiar mental affliction that caused otherwise normal tribes people to go on brutal and seemingly random kill. Oh, my God, they were amok. The word Amok am okay derived from the amoko am you CEO, a band of Javanese and Malay warriors who had a reputation for indiscriminate violence. So Lord, the phrase run amok was a translation of the melee mega muck. Ah. And writing in 1772 Captain James Cook, the famed explorer, wrote that to run amok is to sally forth from the house kill the person or persons supposed to have injured the amok and any other person that attempted to impede his passage.
Marcia Smith 10:32
Good Lord in heaven. 1770 something, huh? Yeah, that
Bob Smith 10:36
wild, erratic behavior that once was thought to be due to evil spirits is now considered a mental condition.
Marcia Smith 10:42
Oh, really, so kind of ran in the DNA of that tribe. It ran amok at that tribe. Yes, that’s just that was in Hawaii. No, it was Malaysia. Okay, yeah, all right, Bob, what was the most money making song of all time?
Bob Smith 10:55
The most money making song of all time has been happy birthday. That’s right. It was written by, I think, two sisters, and then it was copy written, and it’s been for a long, long time they were being paid royalties, or whoever owned it, by anybody who played it at a place where people had to pay to get in.
Marcia Smith 11:12
That’s right, it made $50 million in royalties before it entered the public domain in 2016 The song was first copyrighted in 1935 so that’s around 80 years of royalty.
Bob Smith 11:26
I thought that song was older than that happy birthday was, but
Marcia Smith 11:29
it wasn’t copyright. I see until 35 there was a tune, and then there was some words. And I know
Bob Smith 11:35
the sheet music. I’ve seen the sheet music for it, and it had a copyright, yeah, and
Marcia Smith 11:39
other lucrative songs. Bob, in case you’re wondering, were White Christmas and you’ve lost that loving feeling, and yesterday,
Bob Smith 11:46
oh yes, today, absolutely. Another Paul McCartney song. That’s right, that guy’s got some change in his pocket. Does jeez. All right, how fast can turkeys fly? Marcia, oh, they can’t. Can they No, they can, this is amazing. Wild turkeys, they can fly up to 60 miles per hour. Yes, really up to 60 miles per hour. And they often roost in trees. We only see them on the ground, yeah. But wild turkeys can fly up to 60 miles seriously damage your windshield. I would think they could damage a lot of things if they’re flying at 60 miles
Marcia Smith 12:19
per hour as hell, just looking at them, don’t they? They look so well, they’re
Bob Smith 12:22
prehistoric looking. Yeah, yeah. All right. Marcia, another expression, okay, what term meaning just in time goes back to the 1600s This is an era when people used wood as a tool to track debts. That gives you your clue. Apparently, you didn’t realize that, but let me say that again. It’s an expression, meaning just in time, and it goes back to an era when people used wood, yeah, wood as tools to track debts and keep track of things. Aha.
Marcia Smith 12:51
Aha, don’t know in the nick of time. Oh, in the Nick Yeah?
Bob Smith 12:56
It relates to notches on wood carved into wood, yeah, they called Nicks. And a Nick was a precise notch. It was used to mark time, keep scores, record transactions. And then the early 1600s they were carved into tally sticks or other pieces of wood. Even watches and strings of musical instruments had pre marked nicks, really, to keep them in order. And Shakespeare and his contemporaries used in the nick to mean at the precise instant I see And guess what? What? The 21st Century has seen a spike in the use of that expression. In the nick of time is used four times more now than it was only 40 years ago in the 1980s I
Marcia Smith 13:32
wonder why that? I don’t know. Hey, Bob, what musician recently sold his entire song writing catalog for $300 million million dollars, okay?
Bob Smith 13:43
And I know of three people who’ve done that recently and made a lot of money. Elton John was one. The other two were, let’s see. Give me a moment. Give me a moment here. Bruce Springsteen, ah. And then the third one was Bob Dylan,
Marcia Smith 14:00
that’s the answer. $300 million that’s a fair piece of change.
Bob Smith 14:06
How much money I’m gonna get for my songs? Well, you know, that’s a lifetime of work, and so I guess it’s worth it, right? I mean, look how influential it’s been. Okay? One more animal question, okay, I like that. How did Polish bats benefit from World War Two?
Marcia Smith 14:22
Well, I was just thinking about this morning, and I forgot what I thought.
Bob Smith 14:26
Well, the answer is coming after we take this break. You’re listening to the off ramp with Bob and Marcia Smith. We’ll be back in just a moment. How did Polish bats? What benefit from Nazis? Jeez. Okay, we’re back. You’re listening to the off ramp from Bob and Marcia Smith. We do this each week for the Cedarburg Public Library, Cedarburg, Wisconsin, and then put it on platforms where we are heard all over the world. That’s right, Marcia. Now, how did Polish bats benefit from World War Two Nazis? Not a clue. You. This is one of those unintended consequences. Okay, just before World War Two, Nazi Germany built a massive underground fortification spanning more than 40 miles and 130 feet deep in present day Poland, and then it was abandoned. It saw little use during the war, but today it’s steady temperature and humidity make it an ideal hibernation spot for, guess how many 37,000 bats live there? Oh, from October to April, thanks to the nonsense.
Marcia Smith 15:31
Wow, there. Yeah. Well, unintended consequences, absolutely Okay, last song question, Can you name the most listened to song of all time,
Bob Smith 15:42
the most listened to song of all time. Yes, okay, I would say White Christmas. That’s always one I bring up, but I don’t know if that’s it. White Christmas. Let me but let me say, No, that’s not it. Let me think of another one. Okay, I don’t know. Happy birthday.
Marcia Smith 15:56
It came out in 2020, what? Yep, it’s called blinding lights. By the weekend, it had over 5 billion downloads on Spotify
Bob Smith 16:07
by the weekend, really, yeah, it’s a strange name for an act.
Marcia Smith 16:11
Yeah, blinding lights. And, you know, it sounds pretty good. I want to listen to it, and you should, too.
Bob Smith 16:16
Oh, well, wonderful. Okay, all right. Oh, you speaking of songs, I have one now. All right, what song that was aptly named was recorded while the artist was wearing a back brace.
Marcia Smith 16:27
Okay? What song or what artist? What song, what song I don’t know
Bob Smith 16:33
it was called, I will survive by Gloria Gaynor, yeah. She recorded it in 1978 while wearing a back brace. She had just had spinal surgery, and she credited the adversity she went through with adding conviction to the song. But she was wearing a back brace when she was singing, I will survive.
Marcia Smith 16:52
That’s such a great song, it is, isn’t it? Okay? Let’s see now, if you were listening to me and the kids talking recently, okay, Bob, what is the biggest Indian tribe in America. That is the Navajo, isn’t it? That’s right, that’s correct. As of 2021 the Navajo Nation had nearly 400,000 enrolled members. Its reservations are located in the Four Corners region of Arizona, New Mexico and Utah.
Bob Smith 17:19
Okay, what nation is the number one provider of assisted dying in the world? Say again, what nation is the number one provider of assisted dying in the world?
Marcia Smith 17:31
I would think it’s some kind of place around Sweden and then par
Bob Smith 17:36
Scandinavia. So yeah, that’s what I would have thought. But no, no, it’s our near neighbor, Canada. That’s right, no kidding. In recent years, one out of 20 people who died in Canada chose a physician assisted death. Wow, more than 15,343 people in one of the most recent years for statistics, that makes Canada the number one provider of assisted dying in the world. When you measure total figures, wow. Don’t know if that’s a good thing or a bad thing.
Marcia Smith 18:03
Well, I don’t know either it’s it’s debatable, isn’t it? It certainly is worth discussing.
Bob Smith 18:08
Speaking of big, I have another question. This just goes to the size of a business you’re familiar with, the QVC home shopping network. Yes, yes. Where you go all the time. I don’t think you’ve ever bought anything now, no. Well anyway, that started broadcasting in 1986 with a single channel. It now has 15 channels. How? How come? Well, because there’s that popular they sub segmented it to different types
Marcia Smith 18:32
of merchandise. This is jewelry
Bob Smith 18:34
on one channel. Oh my God. And they have 17,000 employees. Oh my god. Last year, they fielded 80 million calls and shipped more than 200 million products. Some shopping network.
Marcia Smith 18:45
There’s a lot of insomniacs out there.
Bob Smith 18:48
Things were bought about three in the morning. Why did I buy that? Oh, my God, that’s nuts. Yeah, I thought so.
Marcia Smith 18:56
Okay. Bob ready for AKA, yeah, also known as okay, my favorite little card game, I give you a category, and you have to guess what I’m talking about when I give you a clue, okay, that category is put on your thinking cap. Types of trucks. Okay, so if I said flame, what kind of trucker Am I
Bob Smith 19:16
talking? A flame truck. A fire truck, very good.
Marcia Smith 19:19
Okay, a Loch Ness creature, a
Bob Smith 19:22
Loch Ness creature, a dragon truck.
Marcia Smith 19:25
No, what kind of monster truck? Very good. Okay, appendage on your foot,
Bob Smith 19:31
a foot truck, a foot truck, a feet truck. Appendage on my foot, a finger truck, a tow truck. That’s There we go, I’m sorry,
Marcia Smith 19:43
I love you. Meeting out
Bob Smith 19:44
the answer, well, it’s not spelled that way. It’s not spelled.
Marcia Smith 19:48
Do we say it had to be spelled correctly? I’m just saying, what kind of truck? Okay, ah, singles bar line. What kind of trick? What? What kind of truck? Singles bar what’s another? What? That’s another way to what’s a pickup truck. Okay, very good. I didn’t think you’d get that one.
Bob Smith 20:05
Well, thanks a lot.
Marcia Smith 20:06
Well, did you ever use a pickup
Bob Smith 20:08
line? I had very nice pickup. Did you You look nice tonight?
Marcia Smith 20:11
Oh, that’s how do you know? You know you never saw me before tonight? No, no. Okay, half what kind of truck am I talking about? A half truck, a half truck, a semi truck, that’s it. And the last one play thing, what kind of truck? A toy truck, that’s it. Very good.
Bob Smith 20:27
Those are not too hard. No, that was pretty good, yes, except for the tow truck.
Marcia Smith 20:32
That’s right, let’s do forget the appendage on your foot. Sorry.
Bob Smith 20:36
All right. Marcia, this is an interesting question. You ever heard of Thomas Midgley, no, this is a question from Encyclopedia Britannica, so I’ll tell you the answer now. But the question is, what inventor’s work seriously damaged the planet twice, and it’s Thomas Midgley. He had more than 100 patents as an engineer working for companies like General Motors and Dow Chemical, two of them arguably did more damage to the planet than any other inventors were. The first one came in the 1920s that’s when he developed a way to prevent car engines from knocking. He added lead to gasoline that solved the engine knocking problem. But you know, we had problems in the atmosphere as a result of that. But by the 1970s governments were beginning to act on that, saying, No, this lead isn’t good for the environment. So strike one against Thomas Midgley. The second invention yielded similar problems. The leaded gasoline was in the 20s, and this one in the 1930s also went decades without people noticing it. Thomas Midgley introduced chlorofluorocarbons known as CFCs, for refrigeration. Yeah, revolutionary breakthroughs in refrigeration. They replaced ammonia, sulfur dioxide and methyl chloride, which were also either toxic, flammable or both. But in the 70s, scientists began discovering something very bad about this Midgley invention, and that was what led to the Montreal Protocol to phase out CFCs and other ozone depleting substances 1970s Thomas Midgley, what did he think of this? He had no comment. He died in 1944 but unfortunately, that’s his legacy. Today, he will always be remembered as the man whose invention seriously damaged the planet twice.
Marcia Smith 22:18
Okay, Bob, what’s the origin of the phrase, don’t shoot the messenger.
Bob Smith 22:23
I would assume that in some authoritarian past, when somebody came with bad news for the king, they killed that guy. You made the king mad.
Marcia Smith 22:32
Yeah, that’s my first thought, too. But the phrase, if you can believe it, goes back to 442
Bob Smith 22:37
BC, Oh, really. So it does go way back.
Marcia Smith 22:41
That phrase actually was don’t kill the messenger, because it was before guns, so don’t kill the messenger. Yeah, okay, it evolved to don’t shoot the messenger in the American West in the 19th century. The expression arose during a time when messages between opposing armies, such as terms of surrender or whatever, were delivered by hand, an angry reply often resulted in the return of a murdered messenger.
Bob Smith 23:08
Oh, my God, that was your person. I know. Hey, George, would you take this? I want to take it to see if white flag. I have to just go over the hill there and just deliver this. Deliver the terms, and then they delivered. George, Mr. Custer, I don’t want to go, oh my goodness, yeah,
Marcia Smith 23:25
that it goes back to 442, BC, well,
Bob Smith 23:29
you know, anything that’s a cliche is true, yeah, sometimes it’s been true for a long, long time. Yeah, that’s correct. All right. Marcia, what does the Nobel Prize and fruit flies have in common. There’s something that they both have in common.
Marcia Smith 23:46
Maybe Alfred Nobel discovered the fruit fly and wrote extensively on it.
Bob Smith 23:50
No, okay, that’s good, as you called it, deductive reasoning, but it is six Nobel Prize winners won their prizes through the research of fruit flies, really? Yeah, they’re frequently used in biomedical research. 75% of the disease associated genes in humans have analogs in fruit flies. So that’s why they’re used by science to study diseases and so forth. Oh, well, you saw fruit flies. Yeah, and the fruit flies, they don’t get any prizes, but they’re very annoying the scientists do they get the prizes. So six Nobel Prize winners are fruit fly scientists.
Marcia Smith 24:26
All right, last question before my quotes, okay, why is a road called a highway and the ocean the high seas?
Bob Smith 24:34
Well, I would assume a lot of the big civilizations built roads and they were elevated, or they built them a little bit on a platform, you know, to so they would sustain themselves, you know. But I would assume part of that might be because there were highways where the bridges and so forth were up high, like I was thinking about the Andes, you know, in the up in the mountains, yeah, the roads. So maybe that’s where the term highway came from. What about high seas? High Seas is when the ocean got taller. I. I don’t know.
Marcia Smith 25:00
Yeah, no, they both have the same meaning, actually. Okay, when Romans built the public roads, they were raised higher and built better than the other private local roads. Okay, like you said, they were built high
Bob Smith 25:12
and some of them still exist in places like Italy and France and in
Marcia Smith 25:16
England and high seas defines the part of the ocean beyond any country’s three mile limit of sovereignty. Oh, really. So in both cases, the high means for general or public
Bob Smith 25:29
use. No kidding. So it’s like in the public domain, yeah, high
Marcia Smith 25:32
seas, yeah, and the highway, yeah, I’ll be darn so there you go. I didn’t know that. That’s why I’m here to enlighten you.
Bob Smith 25:39
Robert, okay, Marshall, if I told you, there’s a common animal that was once a rarity in US cities, but is ubiquitous now. They are everywhere in America. In America, squirrels, that is exactly right.
Marcia Smith 25:52
How did they become ubiquitous? Well, in 1856
Bob Smith 25:56
the sight of a squirrel in a New York tree was written about in a newspaper, no kidding, it caused a commotion. That squirrel was, in fact, an escaped pet. Squirrels were reintroduced in mass to bring more nature to city parks. You’re kidding. Would it be nice we had some squirrels here. Where did they get them? I don’t know, but those people should have
Marcia Smith 26:15
been shot. How many we got in our backyard? Oh, my goodness, my flower everywhere. They’re nuts. Oh my
Bob Smith 26:22
goodness. So squirrels were once considered a novelty, and it’s like, you know, if we had some squirrels that might make things nice around here, make it a little more nature, like, yeah, unintended consequences.
Marcia Smith 26:33
Here’s an unknown quote. Autumn shows us how beautiful it is to let things go. I love that. That is nice, the beauty of the season changing. And finally, question for you, what do you use to fix a broken pumpkin?
Bob Smith 26:50
What do you use to fix a broken pumpkin? Is this a pun? No, okay, well, I guess broken pumpkin. Maybe it is pumpkin broken I don’t know. What would it be, a pumpkin patch. Oh, dear God. Okay, well, that’s it for
Marcia Smith 27:04
today. There are kids that listen to this.
Bob Smith 27:06
Okay. Thank you so much, Marcia. Thank you for everything, and we hope you’ve enjoyed this half hour of Fun and frolic here. I’m Bob Smith. I’m Marcia Smith. Join us again next time when we return with more fascinating facts and tantalizing trivia here on the off ramp pumpkin patch.
Marcia Smith 27:25
Jeez. Well, you know we, I know kids and and people 95
Bob Smith 27:29
years old. Well, were they like stupid jokes? Is that what kept them
Marcia Smith 27:33
alive? I like,
Bob Smith 27:35
is that what you’re saying? Then I have a long life ahead of me. I’ve been subjected to many, many kinds of strange jokes from you. The off ramp is produced in association with the Cedarburg Public Library, Cedarburg, Wisconsin. Visit us on the web at the offramp dot show at.
Transcribed by https://otter.ai
