7.9.12 Get me to the Geek

Pleasingly, I am not the biggest Social Media geek I know. I mean, sure, I tweet, I Facebook and obviously I blog, but I have many many friends who are just better at it than I. I’ve also got a fair few friends who, by one means or another, have got involved with jobs that revolve around Social Media/Social advertising. One friend in particular, Chris Wilson, simply cannot get enough of the stuff – He even builds Social apps.

As a result of this passion, he is self admittedly geeking out and going to Culture Geek, a one day conference for social media enthusiasts. As a result of this I felt it my want to demand that he bring me back an interesting learning that I could indeed share with you fine folks. Amazingly, one of the most interesting facts reported back came courtesy of BBC Worldwide who have conducted the BBC’s Annual Review and found that:

“Around 1/2 of iTunes users discover content on iTunes then watch it again on TV”

Simply incredible that a application developed by Apple has grown to the size where it can drive viewer behaviour. It’s makes it even more clear why driving digital growth is the BBC’s primary strategic objective for the coming year!

DC

6.9.12 Narrowing the Field

So we’ve recently discussed a penis headed fish, before that we got into the detail of a koala’s sexual organs, I may as well just come out and brazenly address some ore sex learnings. We’re all 21st century here, right? So no one is going to feel awkward if start discussing insemination? Oh, ok, a few might be. Well unfortunately for them, today’s learning is all sperm, all of the time.

Before we go any further, I’d like to point out that this learning was part of a wonders of the modern world style programme, not some creepy Internet search history. I promise. Believe me this was an incredibly insightful and also slightly disturbing research topic to verify.

The topic of said programme was the incredible odds one sperm from male ejaculation faces to reach and then fertilise a female egg. The average male ejaculate contains around 250million sperm, of that figure around 200 approximately make it to a female egg. Of this number obviously only one is successful in fertilising the female egg and starting off the conception of a life.

Quite simply those odds to be the one are staggering, it’s like winning the lottery. Fortunately, it’s probably easier to find someone who likes you enough to get in the situation and 250million is a large number of chances to be successful. So kids, what started off sounding like I was going to get a little seedy, is actually the best advert for contraception that I could give. Stay safe kids.

DC

5.9.12 Stew a Little

I’ll admit it, I have been watching some truly awful television as of late. I don’t know whether September is a programming grave yard because everyone is waiting to release things in autumn or Christmas time, but there is nothing on at the moment to relax in front of after a hard days work. All of this lead me to watching some ludicrous contest where two small market stall food producers get a chance to produce home made ready meals in the hope of getting a contract to mass produce them. It’s a bit like an even worse version of Dragon’s Den.

Although not a great show, it did appeal to my enjoyment of cooking. In particular, one of the teams was from Nigeria, a country who’s cuisine I’m not too familiar with, and produced what looked like an amazing black eyed bean stew. So I thought I would find and learn a recipe for such a dish. The below is courtesy of whats4eats.com:

Ewa Dodo black eyed bean stew with plantain

Ingredients
Black-eyed peas — 2 cups
Oil — 2 or 3 tablespoons
Onion, finely chopped — 1
Chile peppers, minced — 2 or 3
Tomatoes, seeded and chopped — 2 cups
Fish fillets, cut into 1-inch pieces (optional) — 1 pound
Salt and pepper — to taste
Oil for frying
Green plantains, peeled and cut into 1/2-inch rounds — 3

Method
– Rinse the black-eyed peas, and then soak them in enough water to cover by about 2 inches for 8 hours or overnight.

– Drain and rinse the soaked peas and add them to a large saucepan with enough water to cover by about an inch. Bring to a boil and simmer for 1 1/2 to 2 hours, or until the beans are just cooked through and tender. Add water as necessary to keep the beans covered.

– Heat the oil in a large pot over medium-high flame. Add the onion and chopped chile peppers and saute until the onion is cooked through and translucent.

– Stir in the chopped tomatoes and simmer for 3 or 4 minutes to cook them down a bit.

– Add the black-eyed peas and their liquid to the pot and bring to a boil. Stir in the fish, salt and pepper, reduce heat to low and simmer for about 10 minutes, or until the fish is cooked through.

– Adjust seasoning and set aside while you make the dodo.

– Heat about 1/4 inch of oil in a large skillet over medium flame. Fry the plantain rounds in batches, lightly browning them on each side. Remove to a paper towel-lined plate as they are done.

– Serve the ewa stew with the fried dodo on the side.

Give it a go… You might surprise yourself.

DC

4.9.12 Step Inside the Hexagon

Near enough every morning I have the same routine for breakfast, a large bowl of porridge with either banana or fruit and nut in topped off with smatterings of honey. I’ve tried without the honey, I really have. It would be a little bit healthier or lower in calories but the reality is that with the piping hot porridge, the honey makes the dish. As a result I really do owe a debt of gratitude to the aforementioned honey bee (who is very different from a wasp), for essentially making my breakfast a reason to smile in the morning.

There is, however, another reason to be remarkably impressed with bees and it extends to a peculiar reach of wisdom – They are excellent mathematicians! The particular reach of maths at which the honey bee excels is in fact one that many find very difficult, geometry. I am referring in particular to the building of their honeycomb, home to all of that delicious amber nectar. The honeycomb cells all sit neatly together to form one big honeycomb structure. But here’s the rub: To an almost faultless extent, bees build their honeycomb cells into a perfect hexagon. The only distortion comes from when worker built cells meet with drone built cells and then there can be some misshape, but apart from that they are near exact. It seems that it is an innate quality for these exacting standards but the theory goes that the shape allows for the maximum storage results whilst requiring the minimum amount of work for the bee.

At least now I know that even bees are better at maths than I.

DC

3.9.12 And then…

There are only 26 letters on the alphabet. That is one of my longest held understandings. From an early age at preschool, we are taught this fact. Indeed, I’ve never had reason to believe otherwise. But today I actually learnt that that’s not the case, there used to be 27.

The lazy among us constantly look for ways to shorten down words, the exceptionally lazy among us, shorten words that are already pretty short. This is indeed the case with the former 27th letter – &.

The ampersand denotes the word and, and was once a common part of the alphabet – we really shorten 3 letter to 1! The origins of the word are actually from roman times where they wrote the Latin word for and (et) in cursive (in joined up, to you or I) and in essence they ended up becoming squished together to form the & shape.

At the time the name ampersand didn’t exist, but when school children had to recite their A,B,Cs they had to finish with &, or and. This lead to the students saying ‘Y,Z, and per se and’, per se meaning by itself. This all ended up running together to create one word, which in language is referred to as a mondegreen.

Such a small symbol, or word if you will, but thanks to Dave Gorman’s Twitter feed, I now know the interesting story behind the symbol.

DC

2.9.12 Shake, Rattle and PWO

Many of my American football playing friends are enjoying a well earned off season with a little downtime and some hard work in the gym after a tough season. Unfortunately for me, I’m back playing rugby so for me there literally is no offseason. I’m now training twice a week, playing a match once a week and still in the gym 3-4 times. I’m not complaining but it does place a large strain on the body and as a result my diet and nutrition needs to support this volume better.

A lot of people think I eat a lot as it is but I don’t want to waste away and I certainly don’t want to pick up injuries from poor recovery. It has been suggested by more in the know friends that I need to stop with the ‘no late night carbs rule’ and ensure that I get carbs as well as protein post workout. I know this is a widely accepted axiom for recovery but I was intrigued as to the actual process behind the suggestion so thought I would read up a little.

When the body intensely works out, it burns glucose and glycogen in the body as its energy stores or fuel. There comes a certain point where all of this is used up and the body secretes a hormone called cortisol. Cortisol has a catabolic effect on the body and brings about a process known as gluconeogenesis, in essence the body converts muscle into glucose to use as fuel. As a result this can cause muscle wastage/loss.

Consumption post workout prevents this by enabling your body to release insulin, an anabolic hormone. It is important for this process to restore glycogen in the muscles. So instead of draining your body and the minimising all of that hard, muscle building work grab a nice, protein packed, sugary drink. The recommended amount of carbs is between 40 and 70g – just more research to support my earlier post-workout chocolate milkshake claim.

DC

1.9.12 That’s Just Terrine

Man changes and adapts, it’s a carnal law of nature. Only the strong survive as Darwin noted. Through the years these adaptations have been far ranging and important but sometimes these adaptations are much more refined and, although not a huge contributor to our evolution as homo sapiens, they can be equally epic.

In the case of today’s learning, one can only imagine a man (or woman) in times many years ago struggling to cook a terrine by placing it in a round tin and then, as it cooked, it slowly shrivelling inwards and losing its initially created shape. Oh the humanity. But with a round or square tin these were indeed the only option. That was until someone created the terrine mold/tin.

The terrine mold, as in the picture above, is rectangular from the top edge but then has sloped sides that get closer as it goes lower. I never understood why this was, but now, fortunately, I know. This shape is designed so that as the terrine cooks and shrinks, the terrine falls but due to the sloped sides, the terrine remains in uniform shape.

Quite simply one of man’s greatest advancements.

DC

31.8.12 It’s Just a Thriller

Throughout my childhood, certain musicians were huge. I mean legitimately massive. And I don’t know whether I’m just getting old or whether that’s just not the case anymore, but nowadays there aren’t as many megastars. Those appeal to all superstars that all generations love.

Well when I was a child, Michael Jackson was just that. I mean, yeah he was a bit of a fruit loop, but people went nuts for him and his music. Beat It is still one of my favourite songs of all time. There’s something else that synonymous with Jackson (No, not that thing), and that’s the now legendary Thriller dance. Whilst I’m learning things what better thing to learn than the entire thriller dance?!?

As I am by no means a dance teacher, let’s leave it to wikihow.com to explain the simple steps:

1. Take four steps forward starting with your right foot first. Then take four steps back with your right foot first. Repeat.

2. Nod your head to one side on beat 1 and skip on 2 and again on beat 3 and 4. This part should begin right when MJ starts to sing.

3. Turn to the side and stick your arms out straight: One if front and one behind and bend your knees. Stick your butt out and wiggle it up and down. Then take a step forward and wiggle. (I know it sounds stupid but there’s no other way to describe it.)

4. Stick your hands out like claws and pull like your ripping through a bush or something. Do that two times then switch sides you’re pulling at.

5. Now you are just standing straight. Throw your head back and lean back a bit with one leg out in front. Then take two hops forward. You start in the MJ pose,knees bent slightly, one leg out, the other to the side and stick your hand on your belt NOT your crotch!! The other hand will be out straight to your side.

6. Go down with your whole body. The reason it is called ‘down ha!’ is because when you come back up you make a face like you are yelling “HA!”. Do that move 4 times.

7. Right after “down ha!” bring your hands up and clap your hands right over your head. Bring them down slowly and drag your feet to one side. Shrug your shoulders and turn your head to one side and repeat the move going the other way.

8. There will be an 8 count pause where you just go zombie crazy for a second. (In the actual video they are spreading out since there’s like 50 zombies.) Next shake your hands in front of you and do a kind of disco pose with one hand up and one down then do that famous with…

9. Claws up, out to the side start walking forward 3 counts then turn to the other side then back then back and now you should be walking the direction you came from first (the opposite your going now) and go 3 counts.

10. Jump! Then bend over and basically touch your toes two times. Look cool for 4 counts then turn around and look cool for 4 counts then come back around and throw one hand over your head and come back down to “air guitar position.” Swivel your feet a beat and then bring your arm back up and bring it down but this time it should stop and take 5 counts to make it down. Grab the air on one side of you then punch it four times on your other side.

11. Turn your head 4 times then turn your body around with 6 steps until you are facing the other direction. Look behind you and slap your leg then take 10 steps backwards. You’re trying to time this to exactly before he starts the chorus for the second time in the song because that is where your next step comes in. So go slower or faster depending on how close you are.

Ok, I’ll admit, it’s a relatively lengthy one and is gonna take some practice. I can’t help but feel that I would be much better at it if I stopped shouting ‘Thriller…. thriller na’ at the top of my voice.

DC

30.8.12 Wasp vs Bee… Fight!

There are two key pieces of knowledge that you need before going into today’s learning. I love honey, and I hate getting stung. In fact I once put my knuckle down on the floor in training straight on a wasp sting! What I really want to know though is, apart from making honey, what are the differences between bees and wasps?

The below table from the insect section of about.com shows us how we can tell the two apart:

The critical difference in terms of behaviour is that wasps are much more aggressive. If you are out In the park and get stung, it was most likely a wasp. They are attracted to food and drink and won’t die if they sting you. Bees are much more inclined to go for the pollen of lovely flowers. You can also tell the difference between where they live, with bees that aren’t in farms living in trees and wasps living in rounded, papery, pulpy nests in hidden away locations (think under decking or guttering/roofs. Wasps are also predators who kill other insects etc to feed to there young.

Proof if ever proof be needed – Bees good, wasps bad.

DC

29.8.12 An Unfortunate Facial Appendage

We’ve covered some weird and wonderful animal facts and learnings here on TIL, we’ve even got down to the nitty gritty of koala’s sexual organs, but I never thought we’d go this far. And I certainly didn’t think sexual organs would come up again. I guess it’s just a sign of the crass literary times in which we live that these are the things that come up in everyday life now. Or it could just be my warped mind.

Without further remittance, I present to you the Phallostethus cuulong. The Phallostethus cuulong is a fish recently discovered by scientists in Vietnam’s Mekong Delta, all normal so far, right? The reason this was ‘newsworthy’ is that the fish has an abnormally placed appendage. The fish’s penis is located on its chin, and what’s more, it has a spiked hook to latch onto females.

As you can imagine the media has had a field day with dick head references. The penis of the fish also contains its anus and the females sexual organs are also located on the chin. I guess it gives a whole new meaning to ‘taking it on the chin’.

DC