What Do You Know About Urinals?

     If you’re a man you have used them, but what do you really know about them? 
     Since its appearance in the United States following the Civil War, the urinal has played a role in a variety of important changes in American history, many of which involve social progress. 
     First patented by Andrew Rankin in the United States immediately following the Civil War, he introduced an upright flushing apparatus in 1866 and they were an immediate hit. 
     Originally they were the cost effective trench model...just what the name implies, they were long trenches, but the single unit was a hit even though they were not as cost effective as the no flush trench models with a single drain.
     For businesses, especially factories, there was more to it than that though. In the long run single urinals were more cost effective because they drastically reduced the amount of space required for a men’s restroom because several urinals could occupy the same square footage of a single, sit-down toilet stall. Also, it was discovered that workers spent less time using a urinal than a sit-down toilet. 
     During the late 1800s, theories regarding worker productivity abounded, the most common of which was Taylorism which highlighted the need to maximize efficiency by standardizing methods and practices while minimizing interruptions. Moving restrooms closer to the factory floor and creating space for the easy to use urinal made them a hit with cost conscious factory managers. 
     The growth of cities also meant an increased need for public restrooms. During the early part of the twentieth century, European city planners sought to capitalize on the popularity of the urinal and designed outdoor public urinals known as pissoirs. Also called vespasiennes, these public booths were quite popular in France and other large European cities. Pissoirs were only available for use by men. Following World War II, urinals for women were experimented with but were found awkward to use. 
     Urinal design has only increased in the last thirty years. The increased tendency of children to accompany their parents necessitated the manufacture of smaller urinals for children and even larger than normal urinals were created for tall people. Sometimes in airports one sees urinals set at three different levels, and it’s not uncommon for may public places to have them at two different levels. 
     The no-touch urinal, which utilizes an infrared motion proximity sensor to activate the flushing mechanism are the cutting edge of urinal technology. There’s also a health benefit by minimizing contact with germs. 

     The most recent innovation is the water-free urinal. What will they think of next? They claim savings of up to 40,000 gallons of water per year simply by switching to water-free technology. 
     You'll find waterless urinals in crowded public restrooms. Building owners saw that by using dry urinals, they'd save money on water and sewer charges for thousands of flushes. They're installed in the New York Mets Citi Field Stadium and the Shedd Aquarium in Chicago.  Waterless urinals are also popping up in states that suffer droughts. Arizona made waterless urinals mandatory in its state buildings in 2005 . 
     You can also buy a waterless urinal for your home. They’re money savers if you have a house full of males. A family with four males, each flushing the 1.5-gallon toilet three times a day will save 6,552 gallons of water a year by installing and using a waterless urinal. To put that in perspective, somebody figured out that the average American uses 17.2 gallons of water every day just to shower. So, all that water dad and his three sons would use to flush the toilet after peeing means enough water would be saved so that dad could shower 381 times for “free.” 

     How do they work?  Waterless urinals look like regular urinals without a pipe for water intake. Men use them normally, but the urinals don't flush. Instead, they drain by gravity. Their outflow pipes connect to a building's conventional plumbing system. In other words, unlike a composting toilet, which leaves you to deal with your waste, these urinals send the urine to a water treatment plant. 
     Urinal designs differ by the technology in the drain. Basically, they are a plastic basin whose pipe plugs into the wall plumbing. Other companies put a trap (it's a cup) in the drain, which they say stifles urine odors. 
     You fill the trap/cup with water and a proprietary liquid, usually oil. The liquid simply has to float on the water. The urine sinks, and gases can't rise through the oil. You do have to replace the traps, from every three months to 7,000 flushes, which costs money. In any case you periodically clean the urinal by pouring gallons of water down the drain and replacing the proprietary oil, which is neither cheap nor entirely waterless.

Chicken Feet...Yummy!

     Most everyone is familiar with the health benefits of homemade bone broth which is valued for its nutritional significance, versatility and overall deliciousness. Bone broth has been known for centuries to aid in joint health, immunity, gut health, and it’s rich in vitamins and minerals. 
     Few are aware that adding chicken feet increase all those benefits because they are comprised of entirely bones, tendons, and cartilage. Chicken feet contain zero actual muscle, which is known in the culinary world as “meat.” Two, they’re basically all skin and tendons. 
     They’re very gelatinous, which is a texture that’s popular in Asia but not nearly so common in America. So before eating them realize it could be an acquired taste. Basically though they taste like chicken. 

     Before preparing chicken feet it’ a good idea to peel them. Why? Because when chickens are walking around the barnyard they aren’t particular about where they step and their feet are covered with, well, you know what it is. Second, the skin can tend to give the stock a bit of an odd taste. 
     They can also be fried and served with soy sauce, garlic, vinegar, sugar, and/or Asian seasonings. They should be eaten like wings...just gnaw away. 

Deep Fried Chicken Feet Recipes

Rootie Kazootie

 
     Rootie Kazootie was the principal character on the 1950s children's television show The Rootie Kazootie Club. 
     The show featured human actors along with hand puppets. The show first aired locally as The Rootie Tootie Club on the New York NBC affiliate on October 14, 1950. 
     Since the title character regularly used a magical kazoo, which he called his "Magic Kazootie," the kids began calling him "Rootie Kazootie." Following the kids' lead, the names of the show and the character were changed with the December 26 show. NBC began broadcasting the show nationally on July 2, 1951. 
     Rootie Kazootie was a boy "keen on sports" who played his "magic kazootie" and wore his signature baseball cap with the oversized bill turned up. A puppeteer controlled his movements, along with those of the "great Mexican catador" called El Squeako Mouse. 
     Life-sized human characters included host and "chief rooter" Todd ("Big Todd") Russell, and the non-speaking policeman Mr. Deetle Dootle. 
     The show was performed live in front of a studio audience of schoolchildren who also were active participants. They joined in singing the theme song, proclaiming at the beginning of each show, "Who is the boy who is full of zip and joy? He's Rootie Kazootie!" A regular feature was the "Quiz-a-Rootie" in which audience members received prizes for themselves and home viewers for answering simple questions.

Living In The 1950s

     Most Americans think of the 1950s as a time when babies were booming, jobs were plentiful and the country was flourishing. And, people living in the 1950s had reason to feel the same way because the average yearly income rose from $3,210 in 1950 to $5,010 in 1959. It was also a time when post-war Americans were enjoying access to products and services that were scarce during World War II. More disposable income lead to consumerism. 
     Back in the 1950s, most families owned only one car and that saved on insurance, gas, and maintenance. There was no central air conditioning, internet, or cable bills. TV, if you owned one was free, and many families didn’t own a television; they listened to the radio in the evenings. There were no dishwashers and even in homes that had a washer there was no dryer. People hung clothes outside to dry and in bad weather clothes were hung on racks or clotheslines indoors. 

Not all ads would be acceptable today

    Eating out? It was rare and fast food was not “normal.” A lot of people grew gardens and some even canned fruits and vegetables. Few had freezers. My father used to buy hamburger, roasts and steaks and they were stored in a rented freezer room at a place called Mack’s. Women did the ironing and the cleaning and the cooking. If you got sick you went to the doctor, but if you got really sick, you died. 

     The American dream of owning a home began in the 1950s. There were 16 million returning WWII veterans looking to buy homes and the GI Bill offered them liberal home loans. Home builders began applying assembly-line methodology by using panel construction and drywall rather than wet plaster creating lookalike cookie cutter tract housing and giving birth to suburbs. 
     The average size of a new single-family home in 1950 was only 983 square feet. Compare that to the average new home built in 2004...2,349 square feet. In those days people thought it was normal for 2-3 kids to share a bedroom. The median home price in the United States in 1950 was $7,354 ($71,360 in today's dollars), compared to 2015 when it was $281,500. 
     The standard was to have just one car. At the beginning of the decade, the average sticker price for a new car was $1,510 ($14,650 in today's dollars). Modern new car prices average $33,560 in 2015. 

     On the downside, cars of the 1950s had shorter lifespans and required a great deal more maintenance than modern cars do. You had to adjust ignition points and timing, which started going south the moment you drove it. 
     And they rusted. Many people owned cars with holes rusted through the floor which is why my father always paid extra for undercoating. Cars typically lasted no more than 60,000 to 80,000 miles. 

     TV sets were expensive...around $200 in the 1950s ($1,600-$1,950 in modern dollars). TV shows from the 1950s often depicted people living in homes that were atypical for most Americans and it caused people to yearn for their own homes to look like those seen on TV. 
     Advertising agencies realized that teens were a lucrative group to target since they had leisure time and spending power, unlike previous generations of adolescents. So television commercials were geared toward the new demographic, teenagers. Television created a desire for houses, cars, and anything else advertised, not just for teens but for adults. 

Best 1950's vintage TV commercial ads

Alternatives to Wikipedia

     Wikipedia is a nonprofit organization that began in January 2001 and is a repository of knowledge, maintained on servers in various countries and built by anyone in the world with a computer and an Internet connection who wants to share knowledge about a subject. Literally hundreds of thousands of people have written Wikipedia entries. 
     Wikipedia describes itself as “the free encyclopedia that anyone can edit” and so it’s no wonder that it has garnered so much bad press because how can millions of anonymous contributors be completely factual and unbiased?
     Supposedly studies show Wikipedia is 99.5 percent accurate, but are only bout 84 percent complete and show that it nine out of 10 of its health entries, and should be treated with caution. Scientists in the US compared entries about conditions such as heart disease, lung cancer, depression and diabetes with peer-reviewed medical research. Journalists consulting Wikipedia have occasionally been embarrassed by repeating mistaken or fake information. On the plus side, a study in the journal Nature said that in 2005, Wikipedia's scientific articles came close to the level of accuracy in Encyclopedia Britannica.
     There are alternative sources of information that can be used independently or for crosschecking information contained in Wikipedia. 

Scholarpedia 
Scholarpedia is written by scholars. Experts must be either invited or elected before they are assigned certain topics and, although the site is still editable by anyone like a wiki, updates must first be approved before they are made final. Articles are peer reviewed. 

Citizendium 
With what the site refers to as “gentle oversight”, all articles are subject to approval by the site’s editorial team. Articles that haven’t been approved will have an accompanying disclaimer, which helps to prevent people from taking potentially false information to heart. Also, you must register under your real name to become a contributor, unlike Wikipedia. 

Encyclopedia Britannica Online 
This is probably the best option. The Encyclopedia Brittanica has been transferred to Web format, in addition to multimedia features and an easy search tool. Updates to the site’s entries are made by professionals. Full access isn’t free, a subscription fee costs $69.95 a year. Major universities will accept the site as a reliable source when citing information in a research paper, something Wikipedia can’t claim. 

Infoplease 
Infoplease is a free online encyclopedia that is a part of Pearson Education, the largest educational book distributor in the world. All of the information found on the site is gathered from trusted sources. Entries may be limited in size when compared to Wikipedia, but you can be sure that all the information is accurate and incapable of being edited by outside users. 

Conservapedia 
Some may want to view this site with caution because it is a conservative, Christian-influenced wiki encyclopedia that was created as a response to Wikipedia’s alleged left-wing bias. The information found on this site is free of foul language, sexual topics and anything else deemed offensive by the site’s editorial staff. If you feel that Wikipedia shows a strong bias toward liberal views, then Conservapedia may well present the opposite side. 
     An interesting feature is the site’s free resource for conservative courses. You do not need permission to use and copy these materials for educational purposes. Course are: 
American Government and the Constitution 
World History 
American History 
Economics 
Government and Politics 
     These courses are complete, with lectures, homework assignments, model answers and exams, ut you do not have to sign up or obtain approval to use these materials for educational purposes. Home school groups are particularly welcome to use and distribute these materials.

Don’t Wash That Dirty Coffee Cup!

     There’s probably no need to wash out that stained mug. According to infectious disease experts it’s perfectly safe to refill your dirty cup provided you’re not sharing it with others. But, as you read on, you’ll see that if you wash the cup at work you probably are indirectly sharing it with others. The only caveat is if you leave cream or sugar in your mug over the weekend, that can certainly cause mold to grow. 
     Of course there are germs crawling all over your dirty coffee cup, but they are yours, so there’s no danger you’re going to infect yourself from the cup. And, if it’s your coffee cup at work, washing it in the office sink with a communal sponge is not a good idea because the sponge in the break room probably has the highest bacteria count of anything in the office. 
     What about fecal bacteria? A study published in The Journal of Dairy, Food, and Environmental Sanitation noted that 90 percent of office coffee mugs were coated with germs and 20 percent actually had fecal matter on them. Your chance of coming into contact with E. coli actually increases if your mug has been wiped down with the office dishcloth or sponge. 
     It’s probably not surprising that a 2012 study led by Dr. Scott Kelley of the University of California found men’s offices had significantly more bacteria than women’s. The bacteria they discovered came from skin, nasal, oral and intestinal cavities. 
     But, nasty fecal bacteria is found everywhere...office furniture, phones, fast food chains, public places, gym weights and even money. As one clinical professor of microbiology and pathology put it, “We are bathed, as a society, in human feces.” Usually after going to the toilet we have around 200 million bacteria per square inch on each hand and can transfer them to five more surfaces or 14 other subjects. Bottom line...at work you’re safer not washing your cup.

Rick Bayless Makes Mexican Tacos

The grilling mats are available from Home Depot for $10 and are a good investment.

Sports and Ugly Parents

     Research shows parents’ aggressive behavior on the sidelines is embarrassing to young athletes, making them lose confidence and even quit the sport. 
     In a recent high school basketball game one young star player repeatedly complained to the referees that his opponent was hanging onto him and fouling him and at one point asked the referees to, “Keep that kid off me.” They ignored they request. And, when the star took a forearm to the throat, that was enough. Several lightening blows to the offenders face put him on the floor. When he struggled to his feet and attacked the star, the star’s 12-year old brother came out of the stands and landed a few punches that caused the attacker to have second thoughts about continuing the fracas. As the 12-year old explained, “I was just helping my brother.” 
     The aftermath was that both players were benched by their coaches, but some adults in the stands were threatening the 12-year old to the point that he and his father needed a police escort out of the gym. 
     In most sports activities, fathers are behind their kids and many are willing to help in any way they can. But, all too often parents (mothers, too) are aggressively living their sporting fantasies through their kids and exhibit what researchers call the Ugly Parent Syndrome or Parent Rage. 
     In Australia, Flinders University has done research on this subject and has determined that parents' behavior had a profound impact on their child's participation in sports, both good and bad. 
     The report said parents' verbal behavior towards children, officials and coaches, which is quite common, can be problematic and there is a clear emphasis on performance, playing well and, for some parents, winning. For some parents, it's much more serious than having fun or participating and they lose sight of the fact that it’s just kids. 
     Some parents are prone to providing excessive instruction and putting down their child in front of others, coaching from the sidelines and verbally harassing their child. The research found that children did not prosper under these conditions and they lose motivation, which resulted in immediate or future disengagement from sports. 
     I remember being at a chess tournament and seeing a mother shaking her daughter who looked to be 8 or 10 years old by the shoulder and screaming at her for losing because she did not play the opening the way her mother had told her. The poor girl was sobbing uncontrollably. The whole incident was disgusting.
     For kids, parents’ behavior can result in physical ailments ranging from headaches to stomach aches and muscle pains and psychological disturbances typically including emotional volatility, prolonged depression and a lowering of self-esteem. 

     It's hard for me to grasp a situation where a 12-year old kid needed a police escort from the gym because he was being threatened and harassed by adults for what was basically a fight between kids...something we all had in our youth.

Sister Rosetta Tharpe performing Didn't It Rain

Sister Rosetta Tharpe performing Didn't It Rain in 1964 in Manchester, England as part of The British Tours of "The American Folk Blues Festival. 

     Rosetta Tharpe (March 20, 1915 – October 9, 1973) was an American singer, songwriter, guitarist and recording artist who attained popularity in the 1930s and 1940s with her gospel recordings, characterized by a unique mixture of spiritual lyrics and rhythmic accompaniment that was a precursor of rock and roll. 
     She influenced early rock-and-roll musicians, including Little Richard, Johnny Cash, Carl Perkins, Chuck Berry, Elvis Presley and Jerry Lee Lewis. 
     As a pioneer in guitar technique she was among the first popular recording artists to use heavy distortion on her electric guitar, presaging the rise of electric blues. Her guitar playing technique had a profound influence on the development of British blues in the 1960s. 
     Her performances were curtailed by a stroke in 1970, after which one of her legs was amputated as a result of complications from diabetes. On October 9, 1973, the eve of a scheduled recording session, she died in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, as a result of another stroke.

At the Horse Auction

Somebody bought a race horse for $9.5 million.