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Archive for April 25th, 2006

Bananas in Lilliput?

April 25, 2006 @ 8:17 am | Filed under:

It is possible that I and everyone I know have been peeling bananas from the more difficult end all these years. Monkeys, it seems, peel from what we humans call the bottom end. This article by an economist tackles the issue. (Calling it an “issue” tickles me just as much as the article did.)

An excerpt:

Petal’s method is counterintuitive and thus instantly appealing to economists, who love nothing more than to overturn conventional wisdom. Multiple experiments (well, two experiments, actually, since we only had two bananas) quickly convinced a majority of the department that Petal’s way is—surprisingly—easier than the traditional method, though the econometricians thought you’d need to test at least 30 bananas to report that result with confidence. The labor economists immediately resolved to apply for a grant.

So what are you: a Top-Endian or a Bottom-Endian?

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A Rabble of Butterflies

April 25, 2006 @ 6:16 am | Filed under: ,

Did you know rabble was the collective noun pertaining to butterflies? According to this site, swarm also applies. Neither one quite fits, if you ask me. Hmm…a blessing of butterflies? A rustle of butterflies?

Whatever you call it, Cindy’s got it. She found some forty-odd monarch butterfly chrysalises (and correspondingly bare milkweed plants) outside her home yesterday. Neat pictures, especially the last one.

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When Your Husband Says

April 25, 2006 @ 3:39 am | Filed under:

“Don’t use the white grape juice container in the fridge,” what he means is: “Don’t use the white grape juice container in the fridge.” NOT: “Pour two ounces of homemade mint syrup (which I am storing in an old juice bottle) into Wonderboy’s fruit yogurt smoothie before you realize you are in fact pouring mint syrup and not white grape juice.”

Plain yogurt + fruit juice + mint syrup = UGH, in my book. Wonderboy didn’t seem to mind, though.

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The Home Epic

April 25, 2006 @ 2:53 am | Filed under: ,

George Eliot on marriage:

Marriage, which has been the bourne of so many narratives, is still a great beginning, as it was to Adam and Eve, who kept their honeymoon in Eden, but had their first little one among the thorns and thistles of the wilderness. It is still the beginning of the home epic—the gradual conquest or irremediable loss of that complete union which makes the advancing years a climax, and age the harvest of sweet memories in common.

—Middlemarch, chapter 87, by George Eliot

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Which Narnian Are You?

April 25, 2006 @ 2:23 am | Filed under:

As Jewel, you are slightly stubborn and a tad head-strong, but you are valiant, brave and daring. Admired for your free spirit and adventurism, you are the subject of much respect.

HT: Alice

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