Z is for Zebras

Zebras are the name given to several species of African equids best known for their distinctive black and white striped coats. Their stripes come in different patterns, and each are unique to each individual. Unlike their closest relatives, horses and donkeys, zebras have never been truly domesticated.

So let's ask the question - what colour is a zebra? It was previously believed that zebras were white animals with black stripes, since some zebras have white underbellies. Recent studies, however, shows that the animal's background colour is black and the white stripes and bellies are the additions. Under their fur, their skin is black!

Y is for Yawning

Yawning (also known as oscitation) is something that occurs before and after sleep, as well as during tedious activities. It is said to come from "primitive reflexes in the primary motor cortex — an area of the brain responsible for motor function," according to a press release from the University of Nottingham.

It can be contagious and can be triggered by seeing other people yawning. This reaction has also been observed in chimpanzees, dogs, cats, birds, and reptiles, amongst other species.

Approximately 20 psychological theories for yawning have been put forward by scholars, but experts are still debating. One popular theory is that when the level of oxygen in the body depletes, we yawn to get the necessary influx of oxygen. A new study released in 2014 has now suggested that yawning works in order to cool down our brains and help us think a little clearer.

On average, a person yawns 240,000 times in his or her lifetime.

X is for X-words

Five interesting words, beginning with the letter X:

• xenon: a colourless gaseous element occurring in trace amounts in air - used in radio valves and bactericidal lamps.
• xenophile: a person who likes foreigners or things that are foreign
• xylophonic: describing the sound made by xylophones
• xylography: the art of engraving on wood
• xerothermic: An adjective used to describe dry and hot climates.

W is for Water

Here's seven fascinating facts about water...

1. Water comprises 71% of the Earth's surface, mostly in seas and oceans. Because the oceans reflect blue light, the Earth appears blue from space. 
2. 97% of the water on Earth is salt water, with an average salinity roughly equivalent to 34 grams of salt in 1 kg of seawater.
3. The balance therefore represents fresh water, which is rather unevenly distributed on the Earth. 68.7% of this fresh water is trapped in glaciers, ice caps and permanent snow. Of the liquid surface fresh water, 87% is contained in lakes, 11% in swamps, and only 2% in rivers. Small quantities of water also exist in the atmosphere and in living beings.
4. The human body contains anything between from 55% to 78% water, depending on age, health, weight, and sex. To function properly, the body needs to be hydrated - the NHS tell us that we should drink about 1.2 litres (six to eight glasses) of fluid every day to stop us getting dehydrated.  If the weather is hotter, the body will need more than this. We also get some fluid from the food we eat. 
5. 70 -75% of the human brain is water.
6. Water is unusual in that its solid form, ice, is less dense than its liquid form, which is why ice floats. 
7. Water is often called the "universal solvent" because it dissolves more substances than any other liquid.

V is for Veganism

I've been reading and studying a lot lately about the Vegan lifestyle and diet. Veganism is the practice of abstaining from the use of animal products, particularly in your diet, and with an associated philosophy that rejects the commodity status of animals. That means - no meat, milk, eggs, wool, leather, honey and so on.

The word ‘vegan’ was coined by Donald Watson in 1944: he took the first and last letters of ‘vegetarian’ – because it was ‘the beginning and end of vegetarian’.

I am not currently a vegan, or even a vegetarian. But I am interested in understanding their radical lifestyle choices...

U is for Unicorns

The unicorn is a legendary creature that has been described since antiquity as an animal, often horse-like, with a single large, pointed, spiraling horn projecting from its forehead. The unicorn was mentioned by the ancient Greeks in accounts of natural history by various writers. Its popularity reached its peak in the chivalry novels of the Middle Ages.

While the unicorn legend evolved in the West, a Japanese creature called a kirin was a fierce creature that sought out criminals, punishing them by piercing them through the heart with its horn. In China, there was a similarly named qilin which reportedly didn't harm anyone, and even appeared to Confucius' mother before he was born.

If you’re looking to hunt down a unicorn, but don’t know how or where to begin, try Lake Superior State University in Sault Sainte Marie, Michigan. There's a list of their Unicorn Hunting Regulations here.

T is for Trousers

Many Victorians thought the word 'trousers' so rude that they often used euphemisms instead of mentioning that vulgar word.

These included ‘sit-upons’, ‘inexpressibles’, ‘unutterables’ and ‘unwhisperables’.

S is for Space

Of course! We are one big, happy fleet! Ah, Kirk, my old friend, do you know the Klingon proverb that tells us revenge is a dish that is best served cold? [pause] It is very cold in space!
Khan, from Star Trek II: The Wrath of Khan (1982)

So, is it true that space is always cold?

Actually, you are asking the wrong question. Space is mainly empty - no air, no matter, nothing. It’s only when you put something in space, like an asteroid, a satellite, or even an astronaut, that you can measure temperature. If you're in total darkness at the coldest spot in the known universe, the vacuum of space can get down to -270.45 degrees Celsius (reportedly the temperature of the cosmic microwave background radiation, which permeates the entire Universe). Which is as cold as it can get.

However, in direct sunlight near Earth, temperatures can vary wildly. A piece of bare metal in space, under constant sunlight can get as hot as 260 degrees Celsius. This is obviously dangerous to astronauts who therefore take great precautions to protect themselves if they are called to carry out an EVA (extravehicular activity, or spacewalk). That's why astronauts wear reflective white spacesuits, complete with both heaters and cooling systems.

R is for Ravens

There is a superstition that states that if the Tower of London's six ravens are lost or fly away, "the Crown will fall and Britain with it". Undoubtedly, this is just a piece of British legend - the Tower's official historian has himself stated that the "tower's raven mythology is likely to be a Victorian flight of fantasy".

According to that legend, they have kept ravens here ever since the reign of Charles II - and reportedly against the wishes of the king's astronomer at the time, John Flamsteed, who complained the ravens impeded the business of his observatory in the White Tower. (The Observatory was subsequently moved to Greenwich.)

Nevertheless, the modern-day Beefeaters are not taking any chances. As of 2018, the names of the current Tower ravens are Jubilee, Harris, Gripp, Rocky, Erin, Poppy and Merlina. There are seven ravens at the Tower - the required six, plus they keep one as a spare! Their wings aren't clipped - the Tower's Ravenmaster occasionally trims some of the ravens' primary and secondary flight feathers to encourage them to stay at the Tower. All the ravens are thus able to fly but are happy to call the Tower their home. The ravens are free to roam the Tower precincts during the day and can be seen during the tour of the building.

Q is for Queen Victoria

During the course of her 63-year-long reign, Queen Victoria was attacked on at least seven separate occasions by men. Because of the seriousness of this, all are recorded in history as assassination attempts. Many happened while the Queen was travelling in her carriage, and at least four of the attempts involved a gun. In one case, someone struck Victoria in the head with his cane. The blow was so strong that it reportedly drew some blood.

None of the men who attempted to assassinate the Queen were sentenced to death. Most were found to be of unsound mind and were either banished to a penal colony or held in custody for the duration of Victoria’s reign.

P is for Pirates

The traditional literary image of a pirate is of a seafarer who stole great sums of money and buried it on a desert island, with its location marked by a treasure map.

Not so. There are very few documented cases of pirates actually burying treasure, and no documented cases of a historical pirate treasure map. Most of what we know about pirates and buried treasure comes from the pages of Treasure Island.

It's true, pirates raided many ships, but most of the time the items stolen were practical things - food, water, alcohol, weapons, or clothing. These things were be needed immediately, so weren't buried. In many cases the ship itself was taken or scavenged.

The pirate most responsible for the legends of buried treasure was Captain William Kidd. The story was that Kidd hid valuables (gold and silver) from a plundered ship called the Quedah Merchant on Gardiner's Island, near Long Island, New York.  He was subsequently captured and returned to England, and the buried loot found and used as evidence against him. Kidd was then put through a very public trial and executed in 1701.  Although much of Captain Kidd's loot was recovered from his wife and various others who were given it for safe keeping, there was still much speculation that a vast fortune remained, buried in another location. None has ever been found. Some are still looking for it...

O is for Owls

Three fascinating facts now about owls:

The eyes of an owl are unusual - they have fixed eyes that go far back into their skulls, giving them excellent binocular vision — however, they have to turn their heads to change view. These gives them the fantastic depth perception necessary for low-light hunting. Their close-up vision is not as good, so once they catch their prey they use filoplumes - hairlike feathers on the beak and feet - that act as "feelers".

In many cultures, owls are seen as a symbol of death, and many see their appearance as a sign of impending death. An owl was said to have predicted the death of Julius Caesar! That's possibly why they've been linked so often with Halloween...

Owls are often depicted in fiction as being wise. This possibly stems from Greek mythology, where the owl is the symbol for Athena, the goddess of wisdom. A group of owls is called a parliament, and this is the term used by C.S. Lewis for a meeting of owls in The Chronicles of Narnia.

N is for Nursery Rhymes

Do you remember some of the nursery rhymes you were taught as a kid? ... many of the meanings are lost or disputed, but here's a few that made me think...

Many scholars agree that Baa, Baa, Black Sheep is a reference to a tax on wool introduced in 1275 by King Edward I. Under these rules, a third of the cost of a sack of wool went to the Crown, another third went to the church and the last to the farmer. The wool of black sheep is said to have been especially prized as it could be made into dark cloth without dyeing.

Here We Go Round the Mulberry Bush is often sung as part of a nursery game. According to historian R. S. Duncan, a former governor of England’s Wakefield Prison, the song originated with their female prisoners, who were exercised around a mulberry tree. "On a cold and frosty morning..."

Jack and Jill is commonly seen as a nonsense verse, particularly as the couple go up a hill to find water, which is usually found at the bottom of hills. However, an woodcut that accompanied the first recorded version of the rhyme showed two boys (not a boy and a girl) and used the spelling Gill not Jill. This may be related to the fact that a Gill is an Imperial unit of fluid measure, defined in the Imperial system as a quarter-pint. In the same system of measure, a Jack is defined as a half-gill. So, Jack and Jill (Gill) represent a eighth-pint and quarter-pint respectively. It has therefore been suggested that the rhyme records the attempt by King Charles I to reform the taxes on liquid measures. Curious...

And finally, Ring A Ring O' Roses  (in the US Ring Around The Rosie)- the most popular contention is that this verse refers to the 1665 Great Plague of London. Sorry, no - even Snopes labels this as false now, and quotes folklorist Philip Hiscock with a more likely suggestion: That the nursery rhyme probably has its origins in the religious ban on dancing among many Protestants in the nineteenth century. The debate continues...  https://www.snopes.com/fact-check/ring-around-rosie/

M is for Marriage

What finger does the wedding ring go on?

It used to be pretty well accepted most people in English-speaking countries wear their wedding ring on their left hand ring finger. This reasoning can be traced right back to Roman times, and even before that. It was believed that the vein in the ring finger (technically, the fourth finger) on the left hand ran directly to one's heart. Because of this, the Romans called that vein the vena amoris or vein of love. To reinforce the fact that the union was based on love, they'd place the ring on that finger that housed the vein of love to signify the romance the newly married couple shares.

Our modern-day understanding of biology suggests that all your fingers have vein connections to the heart.

There are, however, other cultures with their own traditions about wedding rings. People in many other countries wear a ring on their right hand (including Austria, Denmark, Poland, India, Venezuela and Chile). German couples place a gold band on the left hand before the wedding. After they’re married, they move it to the right hand as a symbol of unity. In The Netherlands, Catholic people wear it on the left, all others on the right. Greek people, many being Orthodox Christians, also wear the wedding rings on the right hand in keeping with Greek tradition. There are bound to be other exceptions.

So, the answer is ... it depends...

L is for London

One of the key stops in a tour of Central London are the Houses of Parliament, which is situated on on the north bank of the River Thames in the City of Westminster.

The buildings are actually officially known as the Palace of Westminster and it is actually the largest palace in the country. It is the meeting place of the House of Commons and the House of Lords, the two houses of the Parliament of the United Kingdom. It has been a Grade I listed building since 1970 and part of a UNESCO World Heritage Site since 1987.

The Elizabeth Tower and the clock contained within it are both commonly referred to by the name of its main bell, Big Ben, which is itself an iconic landmark of London and the United Kingdom in general.

The Palace of Westminster has eight bars, six restaurants, 1,000 rooms, 100 staircases, 11 courtyards, a gymnasium, a hair salon, and a rifle-shooting range. Despite persistent rumours to the contrary, it has not been permitted to smoke anywhere inside the Palace since 2005. Members of Parliament may not eat or drink in the Parliamentary chamber; the exception to this rule is the Chancellor of the Exchequer, who may have a beverage of the Chancellors' choice while delivering the Budget statement. Traditionally this is an alcoholic beverage, although recent Chancellors have opted for water.

K is for Kangaroos

The word kangaroo to describe the Australian marsupial comes from the Aboriginal word gangurru which described the Grey Kangaroo. The name was first recorded as "kanguru" on 12th July 1770 in an entry in the diary of Sir Joseph Banks. Lieutenant (later Captain) James Cook first referred to kangaroos in his diary entry of 4th August 1770.

If you have heard the story about the name being a misunderstanding - it's not true, it's an urban myth. This story was finally debunked in the 1970s by linguist John B. Haviland in his research with the Guugu Yimithirr people.

J is for July 4th

The fourth of July is a day my wife and I remember well - it's the day that Chris and I were married, over 26 years ago! And many around the world celebrate along with us, as it is also the anniversary of the signing of the United States Declaration of Independence...

... except, of course, it isn't...

It's now generally accepted that the Declaration of Independence wasn't actually signed on the Fourth of July — the Second Continental Congress had officially voted for independence on July 2nd 1776. The final text was agreed and officially adopted on July 4th 1776 and copies given to be various political committees, but the majority of the 56 people who signed the official (and larger print) copy did so on August 2nd 1776, with others following at a later date. John Hancock (president of the Congress) signed his name on the earlier drafts and again on the official version (and was the largest and therefore most visible name - hence why his name is now a popular pseudonym for a signature).

There you go...

I is for The Incredibles

Leading highlight of our recent trips to the cinema has to be 'Incredibles 2', the sequel to the original Pixar movie that has been a long 14 years in the making (the length of time between films one and two. I'm eagerly awaiting the third film some time in the future).

Apart from showing us all what a full-length animated version of Marvel's Fantastic Four could look like as a blockbuster movie (sigh) - it also shows how each ability in the Parr family reflects their individual roles within the family - and more... According to creator Brad Bird, “Men are always expected to be strong, so I had Bob have super strength. Mothers are always pulled in a million different directions, so I had [Helen] be elastic. Teenagers are insecure and defensive, so I had Violet have force-fields and invisibility. Ten-year-old's are energy balls that can’t be stopped. And babies are unknown — maybe they have no powers, maybe they have all powers, we don’t know.”

That's awesome. So, Jack-Jack's varied abilities are a metaphor for how young children have infinite possibilities ahead of them in life. Very true.

H is for Hitch-hiker’s Guide to the Galaxy

It's always interesting to know how someone first came up with the concept of a long-running series. It's frequently something particularly random.

The idea for The Hitch-hiker’s Guide to the Galaxy first came to Douglas Adams as he was lying drunk in a field. It was 1971, and Adams was stargazing one night in a field in Innsbruck, Austria. He was strapped for cash, hitch-hiking from London to Istanbul with a stolen copy of Ken Welsh’s Hitch-hiker’s Guide to Europe. Adams later admitted to Welsh, “I got frantically depressed in Innsbruck ... When the stars came out I thought that someone ought to write a Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy because it looked a lot more attractive out there than it did around me." The radio series that kicked off the franchise first aired in 1978.

G is for Guitar

The evolution of the modern guitar can be traced right back to the stringed instruments played across Central Asia and India at least 5,000 years ago. The oldest picture of an instrument is a 3,300-year-old carving of a Hittite bard playing an instrument.

The name ‘guitar’ dates back to the Latin word cithara. By the year 1200 we get the Guitarra Moresca (Moorish Guitar, with a rounded back, multiple sound holes and wide fingerboard) and Guitarra Latina (Latin Guitar, with a more narrow neck, a flat back and one sound hole). Both were four-string guitars.

The earliest six-string guitar dates back to 1779, and is believed to have been made by Gaetano Vinaccia, a member of the family of Italian luthiers (stringed instrument builders). The dimensions of the modern classical guitar were first introduced in the 19th century by Antonio de Torres Jurado, a Spanish luthier.

The electric guitar was first made by George Beauchamp in 1936.

F is for Flag

It's an iconic image, isn't it? The Stars and Stripes on the moon.

Except, you won't see this if you go there now.

NASA has now confirmed any American flags that are still in situ on the moon are now totally white.

According to lunar scientist Paul Spudis:

For forty-odd years, the flags have been exposed to the full fury of the Moon's environment – alternating 14 days of searing sunlight and 100° C heat with 14 days of numbing-cold -150° C darkness. But even more damaging is the intense ultraviolet (UV) radiation from the pure unfiltered sunlight on the cloth (modal) from which the Apollo flags were made. Even on Earth, the colours of a cloth flag flown in bright sunlight for many years will eventually fade and need to be replaced. So it is likely that these symbols of American achievement have been rendered blank, bleached white by the UV radiation of unfiltered sunlight on the lunar surface. Some of them may even have begun to physically disintegrate under the intense flux.

The NASA website about this can be read here.

E is for the English

Here are a list of five slang terms for people from England. [however, often these terms can also be applied to people hailing from Great Britain (England, Scotland and Wales), the United Kingdom (Great Britain + Northern Ireland), or the British Isles (the geographical grouping for the area off the northwest coast of Europe comprising Great Britain, the whole of Ireland, and adjacent smaller islands)].

Limey
The term is thought to have originated in the 1850's as "lime-juicer", later shortened to "limey". A derogatory term for sailors in the Royal Navy, because of the Navy's practice since the beginning of the 19th century of adding lemon juice or lime juice to the sailors' daily ration of watered-down rum (known as grog), in order to prevent scurvy. The term is used mainly in North America.

Pommy
The terms Pommy, Pommie and Pom, in Australia, South Africa and New Zealand usually denote an English person (or, less commonly, people from other parts of the United Kingdom). Etymology unknown, although there are several theories.

Tommy
This term is derived from the name "Tommy Atkins", used as a generic name for a soldier for many years (and even used as an example name on British Army registration forms). It is known to have been used as early as 1743.

Sassenach
Deriving from the Scottish Gaelic, the term is still used by Scots to refer to English people, frequently negatively. Used regularly since the 18th century (as a noun), although it's probably goes back much earlier...

Rosbif
A common humorous French term for an English person, rosbif refers back to the English tradition of cooking roast beef. It's been in use since the 18th Century.

D is for Dali

Salvador Domingo Felipe Jacinto Dalí i Domènech, 1st Marquess of Dalí de Púbol, known professionally as Salvador Dalí,was a prominent Spanish artist.

He could be extremely surreal in his life as well as through his work. Here's one bizarre example (there are lots to choose from!):

• In 1936, he delivered a lecture titled "Fantomes paranoiaques athentiques" ("Authentic paranoid ghosts") while dressed in a deep sea diving suit, carrying a billiard cue and walking a pair of Russian wolfhounds. Apparently he nearly suffocated during the presentation, as Dalí had to be rescued by the young poet David Gascoyne, who arrived with a spanner to release him from the diving helmet.

C is for Carrots

What colour are carrots?

The clue is in the picture. These are orange. In fact, I was brought up with the idea that carrots are orange. Modern day carrots are!

However, carrots can also exist in yellow, purple and white varieties.

There are many claims that Dutch growers specifically created orange carrots in the 17th Century to honour the Dutch flag at the time. However, there is a lack of convincing evidence for this. Many scientists simply say that is the way they have been cultivated over the centuries. The Dutch were at the forefront of agricultural innovation in the 17th Century, so may have favoured this variety, which produces a nicer tasting carrot - but they didn't create the orange carrot.

When checking this fact, I discovered the wonders of the Carrot Museum!

Check this out: http://www.carrotmuseum.co.uk/history5.html

B is for Bronze

The modern definition of the word 'bronze' is an alloy consisting primarily of copper and some other metals. There's a whole period of history named after 'bronze', designating the period when this brown alloy was most in use. We refer to people who have a deep brown tan as being 'bronzed' - and understandably so. Apparently, the first recorded use of bronze as a name of a brown colour in English was in 1753.

And yet, I have been told that the Ancient Greek scholar Homer wrote about the sky being 'bronze' in colour - meaning blue. Really? It was on a TV show, a radio show, in a reference book. So, plenty of evidence. And yes - indeed, Homer did refer to the sky as bronze. Curious...

So I did some more checking - and in addition to finding a couple of sources reporting that it was a reference to blue, there was an interesting article from a Greek scholar who insisted that Homer's writings including a poetical reference to bronze, not one related to colour. Another website insisted that Homer was in fact colour-blind. Yet another told me that Homer's colour description usage was a cultural phenomenon common among the Greeks at that time.

So can we say that Homer saw the sky as 'bronze'? Possibly... did he think it was blue? Probably not.

And I've even found an additional reference to a bronze sky in Scripture:

Deuteronomy 28:23 New International Version (NIV)
The sky over your head will be bronze, the ground beneath you iron.