Category: –

Sunday

Nests can be very old indeed. Birds often reuse nests built by earlier residents, and one gyrfalcon nest in Greenland was carbon dated at about 2,500 years old, with several other Greenland nests found to be over 1,000 years old.

Monday

Birds usually come to mind first as nest builders, but insects, mice, squirrels, rabbits, raccoons, fish, frogs, turtles, alligators, and cobras build nests too.

Tuesday

Hopefully, empty nesters have nest eggs. These idioms refer to parents living in a house which kids have moved out of, and also of having some savings for the future.

Wednesday

Even among birds, the variety in nest sizes is remarkable. The ruby-throated hummingbird makes an elaborate nest (structurally reinforced by spiderwebs, softened on the inside by plant down, camouflaged on the outside by moss and lichens) which is about the size of a thimble. Meanwhile, bald eagles, which continuously use and improve the same nest, have build nests 20 feet deep and weighing an estimated 2 tons. The sociable weaver bird builds nests which resemble upside-down haystacks in trees, can be 23 feet wide and house 400 individuals.

Thursday

Many animal and human mothers experience a late-pregnancy “nesting instinct” to energetically clean and organize the home that the baby will be living in shortly before it arrives.

Friday

Termite nests take the form of mounds which have been measured up to 28.5 feet, or 8.7 meters, tall. If humans built something this tall relative to their own size, it would be over four times taller than the world’s current tallest skyscraper, the Burj Khalifa.

Saturday

A disorganized tangle of hair is called a rat’s nest, since an indoor actual rat’s nest is often a similarly inelegant tangle made of whatever building materials can be found nearby, like paper, cloth, insulation, or cardboard.

Among the many common words spelled differently by Brits and Americans:

Sunday

Colour vs. color

Monday

Manoeuvre vs. maneuver

Tuesday

Tyre vs. Tire

Wednesday

Programme vs. program

Thursday

Catalogue vs. catalog

Friday

Organise vs. organize

Saturday

Aluminum vs. aluminum

Sunday

For most of human history, about 10% of the population was left-handed. However, because lefties were often harshly treated in the past, more people are now identifying as left-handed. Female lefties are the rarest breed, comprising only about 8% of all women, as opposed to 12% of men being lefties.

Monday

Lefties had a bad reputation in certain circles, which may explain their early reticence to reveal themselves. One biblical verse seems to indicate those near God’s right hand are saved, but those near his left hand are doomed, and the word “sinister” is indeed Latin for “on the left side.” Accordingly, some religious schools forbade lefties from writing with their preferred hand. However, other Bible verses seem to smile upon lefties.

Tuesday

Notably, this lefty stigmatization was the likely reason why now-debunked research showing that lefties die younger got it wrong. The research drew from people who lived during these lefty-shaming times, so did not account for born lefties who were forced to “convert” and hence appeared as right-handed in the research.

Wednesday

For years, lefties prided themselves on supposedly being more creative, but this longstanding belief was also recently disproven. A large 2025 Cornell University study reviewed a century’s worth of data on lefties in the creative fields, and as one researcher concluded, “the data do not support any advantage in creative thinking for lefties.”

Thursday

Lefties are overrepresented in several sports, accounting for over 25% of major league pitchers, and studies have shown disproportionate lefty numbers in tennis, table tennis, fencing, martial arts, and boxing.

Friday

In the last 50 years, a remarkably disproportionate five US presidents were naturally left-handed, including Gerald Ford, Ronald Reagan, George H. W. Bush, Bill Clinton, and Barack Obama. In 1992, every major party presidential candidate was a lefty.

Saturday

Why yes, there is an International Left Handers Day: August 13th.

Sunday

Socks are old. The oldest known socks, based on cave paintings and archaeological digs, started about 5,000 BC and were animal skins tied around the ankle. Written records from 8th century BC Greece mention socks made of matted animal hair or leather. Those were called “piloi,” but in English, those garments were called “stockings” until the first use of the term “socks” was recorded in 1690.

Monday

The term “knock your socks off” now indicates something really impressive, but originally meant beating an opponent so thoroughly in a fight that even their socks were knocked off.

Tuesday

You may have heard about attending “sock hops” from your parents or grandparents. These shoeless dances were popular in the 1950s, and though they saved gym floors from shoe scuffing, elders of the time often found this minimal disrobing and dancing to rock music uncomfortably suggestive.

Wednesday

Among the few professional sports teams named for clothing articles (don’t forget knicks = knickerbockers, or knee-length shorts), socks are popular. The Boston Red Sox were originally called the Boston Americans, but after adopting bright red socks as part of a new team uniform, they were renamed in 1908. The original Chicago White Stockings became the Cubs, but then the American League was formed and the name was reapplied to the Chicago A.L. team. The Brown Sox was a short-lived St. Louis baseball team, too. The spelling of “sox” rather than “stockings” or just “socks” was an ink-saving idea of Chicago newspaper publishers.

Thursday

Centuries before the first mechanized sewing machine, the first knitting machine was designed in 1589 to make sock and stocking production faster. Unfortunately for inventor William Lee, Queen Elizabeth I wouldn’t give him a patent, fearing too many hand-knitters would be put out of work.

Friday

You might think something as clearly practical as socks would be universally accepted by active professions, but the Russian army did not adopt socks until well into the 21st century, instead using the same simple rectangular foot wraps – known as “portyanki” – that had been used since the days of Peter the Great.

Saturday

During the Covid-19 pandemic, no clothing items was purchased more than socks, at least in the US.

Sunday

Mines are old. The Ngwenya Mine in northwestern Swaziland was mined for iron ores starting at least 42,000 years ago.

Monday

Broadly speaking, there are four main types of mines: Underground mines, which target deeper deposits, surface mines, which target shallower deposits, placer mines, which sift deposits from sediments in water channels and sands, and in-situ mining, which dissolves the target deposit (usually uranium) in place to be processed at the surface.

Tuesday

Globally, the most mined mineral is iron ore, the most mined gemstone is diamond.

Wednesday

The widest mine in the world is The Bingham Canyon Mine in Utah, an open pit copper mine stretching a remarkable 2.5 miles wide. In the other dimension, the Mponeng gold mine in South Africa is 2.5 miles deep, with temperatures so high near the bottom (as it gets close to the Earth’s hot center), it requires a sophisticated cooling system for miners to endure it.

Thursday

Though essential for modern economies, mining is dangerous business. It employs about 1% of all workers, yet causes 8% of fatal occupational accidents, and is unsurprisingly among the world’s most dangerous jobs.

Friday

Many mines are abandoned for one reason or another, often because they’re exhausted or became unsafe or uneconomical. Worldwide, the number of these “orphan” mines is estimated in the millions. These mines often create safety and environmental risks, and with the owner entities often long defunct, remediation can be difficult.

Saturday

You may not think about mineral mining much, but you likely need a lot of it to support your standard of living. The average American lifestyle, for example, requires about 40,000 lbs. of mined minerals per year for the things we use daily.

Sunday

Owls have large, intense eyes, a stoic demeanor, and were often pictured with Athena, goddess of wisdom, and for these reasons they may have become considered wise. Great hunting instincts aside, however, owls are not particularly bright among bird species, nor are they very apt learners compared to other birds.

Monday

Intelligence critiques aside, however, owls are night hunters of the highest order, with remarkable adaptions for that lifestyle. They don’t have eyeballs, but rather “eye tubes” which act as low-light telephoto lenses that can spot movement at distances and in darkness that would be impossible for humans. Their neck can spin 270 degrees to spot prey, all while pooling the blood needed to feed their brain while this twist otherwise cuts off flow. Also, their wings have feather edges furled upward on both the front and back to make their flight among the quietest of raptors, all the better to snatch unsuspecting prey.

Tuesday

You may have seen owls bob their heads while they stare ahead. Since owls cannot move their eyes, this head bobbing gives it a view from several positions so as to judge distance, triangulate, and gather a picture of the world in which they live and hunt.

Wednesday

Owl on owl violence is real. Though the vast majority of the raptor’s diet is rodents, several owl species will eat smaller owls if the opportunity arises.

Thursday

Don’t typecast all owls as hooters! They also hiss, shriek, toot, coo, cry, growl, and in the case of the Saw-whet owl, sound like a whetstone sharpening a saw.

Friday

Owls are among the bird species which regurgitate odorless pellets of undigested food, much of it hair and bones, and from these pellets you might find the bones of six or more small animals.

Saturday

Owls are poor nest builders, so they have to move into vacant nests built by other birds or use low-effort spots like cavities in trees and rocks or move into empty spots in human buildings.

Sunday

Wheat is old and popular. Cultivated for at least 10,000 years, wheat is now the most common crop on Earth, supplying about 20% of all human calories and protein.

Monday

To “separate the wheat from the chaff” means to isolate the more valuable thing in a group from the less valuable, since the edible wheat kernels were more valuable to farmers than the papery husk, or chaff. They are separated by the processes of winnowing and threshing.

Tuesday

Wheat is a member of the grass family with thousands of varieties, but six are the most common, each best for producing particular products, like breads, crackers, pasta, cookies, etc. These are known as hard red winter, hard red spring, soft red winter, soft white, hard white, and durum. The “wheat berries” or seed kernels are the part of the plant which is actually eaten.

Wednesday

The difference between whole grain wheat flour and white or “refined” flour is that whole grain is made from the entire wheat kernel, including the nutrient-dense bran and germ portions, whereas white flour is just the endosperm, which is primarily starch and some protein.

Thursday

Gluten is protein found in wheat, rye, and barley products. It makes dough from those flours stretchy (like pizza dough) and chewy when eaten. However, those with a gluten allergy, or celiac disease, have adverse reactions to this grain protein.

Friday

Globally, the biggest wheat producers are in Asia, with China and India leading the pack.

Saturday

The “amber waves of grain” described in the patriotic poem-turned-song “America the Beautiful” were vast wheat fields. These were among the many sights author Katherine Lee Bates encountered in her 19th century westward journey.

Many parts of your anatomy are named for people real and mythical. Some among the many:

Sunday

Broca’s Area of the brain, which is connected to speech processing, is named for French neurologist Pierre Paul Broca

Monday

Fallopian tubes are named for Gabriele Falloppio, Italian anatomist.

Tuesday

Achilles tendon are named for Greek mythological hero Achilles.

Wednesday

Eustachian tubes are named for Bartolomeo Eustachi, Italian anatomist.

Thursday

The Grafenberg spot (AKA G-spot) is named for Ernst Grafenbert, German-American physician.

Friday

Cowper’s Gland is named for William Cowper, English anatomist.

Saturday

Atlas, the uppermost vertebrae which supports the skull, is named for mythological titan Atlas, who bore the weight of the heavens on his shoulders.