Do you know

 

                                     Do you know why a ostrich sticks it's head in the ground?

                                                           He is looking for water

Piggy bank

Why is there a piggy bank?

A popular theory is that, in fact, the original piggy bank had absolutely nothing to do with a pig! In the Middle Ages, when metal was expensive, an inexpensive, orange colored clay, called pygg, was the common media for making pots and jars, and was referred to as a pygg jar, for example. One of these jars was often used to hold coins. Eventually, the pygg jar or pygg bank used for coins, surely accidentally, became known as a pig bank or piggy bank! The general consensus is that this evolution transpired a few hundred years ago in England when crafters were hired to make pygg banks and not being familiar with pygg they made pig shaped banks.







The oldest recorded piggy bank in the shape of a pig is claimed to be 1500 years old from Indonesia. If this is so, it precedes the pygg theory by around 1000 years! 










The modern piggy bank, whether made from ceramics, plastic, or metal, has been a very popular collector’s item and gift for children due to its appealing and humorous appearance. In addition to the smile or chuckle we experience each time we drop some change into our piggy bank let us be reminded by the lesson it teaches us! Piggy banks of old didn't have a plunger on the bottom so you could easily remove the coins, you would have to break the bank to get them but the famous phrase “break the bank”, has nothing to do with the piggy bank!

This is my hubby's piggy bank from when he was a little boy and it too doesn't have a plunger and there is a little coin yet in there.

This is a bank my folks had and it is not a pig but a snoopy dog.

Never had the heart to break it so it sits and collects dust. 


My hubby doesn't like to carry dimes, nickle's or penny's so he puts them in this little bank

And right now it is nearly empty

because he gave it all to the granddaughter when she was here last week. She said she thought there was $20.00 and he said $24.00......he was right.

"A penny saved is a penny earned"

Ambulance

The other day when I was driving to the hospital I saw a ambulance parked at the back of a gas station and it got me to thinking about what do they do between calls. It is something I had not thought of before and I realize that they don't have a station to wait at so I proceeded to go online and look it up. I found this wonderful article
http://mentalfloss.com/article/90007/14-behind-scenes-secrets-paramedics
which is full of a lot of interesting information on a not always appreciated group of people. But, I still have one question.....when waiting for a call in Phoenix, Az. and it is 110 degrees outside are you sitting in that tin box without the air on? All I can say is thank-you.

Do you know

Armored knights raised their visors to identify themselves when they rode past their king.

This custom has become the modern military salute.

Sleep tight

Do you know how "Sleep tight" got started?

It comes from the fact that early mattresses were filled with straw and held up with rope stretched across the bedframe. A tight sleep was a comfortable sleep.

Tidbits

That little strawberry hooked to you pincushion

… is an emery board for your needles. Filled with tough emery sand—a combination of aluminum and iron oxides—the strawberry is historically a tool for polishing, sharpening, and removing rust from your pins and needles.

Who is the most powerful?

Power-lifting is a competitive and inclusive sport for both man and women, young and old. The main rule in this sport is to lift as much weight as you can.
But humans are not the best in the world. Other creatures of the world can handle lifting great weights too. Here is the count down from 9....

9- The grizzly bear can lift 1200lb, meaning 0.8 its body weight;

8- The ox: can pull and carry 2000lb, approximately 1.5 times its body weight;

7- The elephant: can carry 20,000lb, 1.7 times its body weight;

 

6- The tiger: 1200lb, 2 x its body weight;

5- Human: the strongest man in the world, Zydrunas Savickas, managed to lift 2,3 times his own body weight, meaning almost 900lb.

4- On the fourth place we have a bird, the African Crowned Eagle. This bird can lift 36lb. That’s
4 times its body weight.

3- The gorilla 4600lb. Ten times its body weight;

2- The leafcutter ant. This little insect can lift 20 times its body weight. That is the equivalent of a man lifting a family car.





Drum roll please........................................

And the winner is.................The Dung Beetle. A little insect that feeds only of feces.
It can lift 1000 times its own body wieght.
That would be equivalant to a average 150 lb man lifting six double decker busses!




 

Do you know?

What is the only animal besides a human that can get a sunburn?

                                                                                                                       a pig..............






And here are a few more facts: Pigs are extraordinarily intelligent. They are curious and insightful animals who are widely accepted as being smarter than young children of at least 3 years of age, dogs, and even some primates.

Pigs are extremely social animals. They form close bonds with other individuals and love close contact and lying down together.

Pigs are very clean, keeping their toilet area far away from where they lie down and eat. Even newborn piglets will leave the nest to go to the toilet within hours of birth.

Pigs are very peaceful animals, rarely showing aggression. The exception, as with many animals, is when a mother (sow) with her young offspring is provoked or threatened.

Do you know?

Do you know what this is????
























A banana tree flower....................

Giant lock

This is a working lock!

Location: Nishan-e-Manzil Park, Gujranwala Cantonment, Pakistan
Constructed: 2002

Weight: 890 kg or 1962.11 pounds
It resides in a public park in Pakistan and this massive padlock was built by Haji Javed Iqbal Khokhar from Gujranwala. It’s giant key weighs 80 kg or  176.37 pounds and takes two people to lift. It was briefly the centrepiece of the Lucky Irani Circus.
 

Mistletoe

Do you know the history of the mistletoe?

 A parasite, I would have never guessed.

 

Did you know?

Can you pass?

New Exam, you only need 4 correct out of 10 questions to pass. 1) How long did the Hundred Years' War last? 2) Which country makes Panama hats? 3) From which animal do we get cat gut? 4) In which month do Russians celebrate the October Revolution? 5) What is a camel's hair brush made of? 6) The Canary Islands in the Pacific are named after what animal? 7) What was King George VI's first name? 8) What color is a purple finch? 9) Where are Chinese gooseberries from? 10) What is the color of the black box in a commercial airplane? Remember, you need only 4 correct answers to pass. Check your answers below .... ANSWERS TO THE QUIZ 1) How long did the Hundred Years War last? 116 years 2) Which country makes Panama hats? Ecuador 3) From which animal do we get cat gut? Sheep and Horses 4) In which month do Russians celebrate the October Revolution? November 5) What is a camel's hair brush made of? Squirrel fur 6) The Canary Islands in the Pacific are named after what animal? Dogs 7) What was King George VI's first name? Albert 8 ) What color is a purple finch? Crimson 9) Where are Chinese gooseberries from? New Zealand 10) What is the color of the black box in a commercial airplane?Orange (of course) What do you mean, you failed? Me, too! (And if you try to tell me you passed, you LIED!)

 

 

 

Do you know?

I found the answer....
http://www.alibaba.com/product-detail/Running-race-rubber-track-epdm-rubber_759676865.html?s=p

Think it would be expensive but indeed impressive.


Do you know how they made this???

 

All these people are on it and it isn't messing it up so what is it made of?

 

Pigs

After reading the recent post on "Fools Rush In" where she made this statement "Pigs have long symbolized progress. A pig can't turn his head to look back without turning completely around, so it's believed that pigs are always looking to the future." I became more curious about pigs so did some checking and found some of the most amazing facts.....

Did you know that pigs are ranked #4 in animal intelligence? Chimpanzees are ranked at the top together with the gorilla, orangutan, baboon, gibbon and monkey. Dolphins and killer whales are ranked #2. Elephants are #3. Pigs are #4 They are very intelligent and can learn to do tricks faster than dogs. They have learned to push a lever in the barnyard to get a drink of water or a dish of food, and have been taught to tumble, dance, and even pull a cart.

 

Mostly know as “pig, hog, porker or swine” but to be more precise, a male pig is a boar. A castrated male is a barrow. A female pig who has not been bred yet is a gilt. And a female pig who has had piglets (baby pigs) is a sow. A sow can give birth to a litter containing 7 to 12 piglets about twice a year and only requires a little less than four months to do so.

A full grown pig can drink up to 14 gallons of water a day and Pigs have four toes on each foot and each toe ends in a hoof. They only walk on the two middle toes on each foot so they look as if they are on their tiptoes.

A pig's squeal can range from 110 to 115 decibels. Compare that to the take-off sound of a jet engine - about 112 decibels

 

Pigs like to wallow in mud so most people think they are dirty but the fact is pigs do not have functional sweat glands, so they can't perspire to cool themselves. They roll around in the mud to cool their skin and to protect their skin form sunburn, flies and insect bites.

 

 

 

 

 

Ever see a pig with a ring in its nose?

 

There is a reason for this.....You see pigs have a powerful sense of smell. and some farmers put rings in pigs' noses to keep them from rooting, or digging up the earth with their snouts and causing damage to their farms. In fact soldier pigs have gone to war. On battlefields, they have used their sensitive snouts as mine sniffers.  In the forests of Europe and North America some pigs are trained to root for truffles, a delicacy that grows underground.

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Here is the reason for some well known sayings:

 

 The saying "living high on the hog" started among enlisted men in the U.S. Army who received shoulder and leg cuts of pork while officers received the top loin cuts. “ The top brass was living high on the hog.



 "Don’t buy a pig in a poke?" That comes from the 17th century England when it was a common trick to try to give away a cat to an unsuspecting shopper buying a suckling (young) pig. Upon arriving home when he opened the poke (sack), he "let the cat out of the bag," and found he had been cheated.

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Think pork fat is a waste? Here are just a few of the many products made from it: Cosmetics, floor wax, crayons, chalk, weed killers, anti-freeze, glass, china, adhesives, plastics, paint, chewing gum, shoes, and many more.

.

Here area a few more amazing things derived from pigs...Pig heart valves have been used to replace damaged human heart valves.
Insulin and more than 40 other pharmaceuticals and medicines are derived from pig products.

and of course we wouldn't want to forget our piggy banks...

 How they got their names? You can discover here.

 

There are around 2 billion domestic pigs on the planet

 

and when we were in Hawaii the hotel where we stayed had a little pot belly pig

who greeted us with a wiggling tail and stole my heart.

 

 

Hope you too have a little different view of a pigs now like I do.

 

 

 

 

 

Bubble gum pink

Well yes, I have to admit, I love bubble gum but what I am talking about here is a most unusual Lake......

Lake Hittier

It can only be seen from the sky since it is prohibited to walk on Middle Island in Western Australia. The reason for this permanent pink color remains undetermined.

Despite the unusual hue, the lake exhibits no known adverse effects upon humans. From above, the lake appears a solid bubble gum pink, but from the shoreline it appears more of a clear pink hue. The shoreline is also covered in salt crust deposits. It is said that even if water is removed and clear water added to it ...it still remains pink.

Famous

Do you recognize this young woman?

She is known all over the world....

 

 How about in this picture?

 

Maybe this one?

Now you know for sure:)

 

By the 1970s Mother Theresa  had become internationally famed as a humanitarian and advocate for the poor and helpless, due in part to a documentary, and book, Something Beautiful for God by Malcolm Muggeridge. She won the Nobel Peace Prize in 1979 and India's highest civilian honor, the Bharat Ratna, in 1980 for her humanitarian work.

 

Mother Teresa said "By blood, I am Albanian. By citizenship, an Indian. By faith, I am a Catholic nun. As to my calling, I belong to the world. As to my heart, I belong entirely to the Heart of Jesus."

What a heart that was....By 1996, Mother Teresa was operating 517 missions in more than 100 countries. Over the years, Mother Teresa's Missionaries of Charity grew from twelve to thousands serving the "poorest of the poor".


Mother Teresa suffered a heart attack  in Rome in 1983, while visiting Pope John Paul II. After a second attack in 1989, she received an artificial pacemaker. In 1991, after a battle with pneumonia  while in Mexico, she suffered further heart problems and died at the age of 87,  in 1997.

Just one woman who touched so many....here are a few of her quotes:

If you can't feed a hundred people, then feed just one.

Loneliness and the feeling of being unwanted is the most terrible poverty.





 

Island of Hawaii

 

 

When you think of the islands of Hawaii you think of  great beauty, perfect weather and ocean waves and although I have been to all the islands but one,  I didn't know that the one I have not visited was once a leper colony.  Kalaupapa was originally a Hawaiian fishing village but the first leper colony that was established in Kalwao in 1873 moved here and remained in effect until 1969. .

At its peak there were about 1,200 exiled here. Now there are only a few who are living out their life thanks to entertainer Don Ho and a few others that encouraged  the state legislature to keep the facility from closing entirely. There are no active cases of leprosy now but many of those that suffered from it were physically scarred to an extent that coming back into the mainstream society would be very difficult

Leprosy, which is also know as Hansen's disease is a chronic infection cased by a certain bacteria and treatment for it is now successful with certain drugs. Until this was discovered and understood in the 1940's this disease effected millions of people all over the world.

Being sent to a leper colony was simply a death sentence even in Hawaii.

 

Liberace

 

 

You may not have like him but the man could sure play a piano

 

He quickly learned that if you added glitz, glitter and zany to talent you created famous. After one of his two year tours he made the statement he hated to take the money because he had such a good time but to the bank he went and later even laughing said he bought one.

 

In 1978, Liberace built a museum to himself and to his opulent tastes in Las Vegas.

 The museum contained Liberace's collection of smaltzy cars, a gold casting of Liberace's hands, dozens of candelabras

 a painting of his mother, a rotating rhinestone-covered piano,

 the multi-million dollar stage wardrobe,

his collection of rare and antique pianos,

the glittering stage jewelry,

 not to mention the world's largest rhinestone.

 

and all other things that glittered and sparkled

 

even rare Moser crystal from his home country of Czechoslovakia. Liberace owned service for 12, with 14 individual glasses for each setting

 

Even nine years after Liberace's death from complication of aids on Feb. 4, 1987 the Museum remained one of the most popular tourist attraction in Las Vegas.

 but after 31 years of operation, the Liberace Museum  closed its doors Sunday, Oct. 17, 2010

 

 So the big question................where is it all now?

 

 

 

When Liberace passed away in February 1987 he left the majority of his estate to the Liberace Foundation and the museum was a key source of funding. Aside from getting to learn about the famous entertainer and see some of his lavish costumes and cars up close, guests who visited the museum helped donate to the foundation through their admission. Since its creation the foundation has awarded more than $6 million in scholarships to 2,700 students.

 

This was the last I could find and it was not dated.....

The good news is that Liberace’s collection including his exotic cars and a million-dollar wardrobe will still see the light of day. The memorabilia will continue to be maintained, and a national touring exhibit is being planned. The Liberace Foundation will also still continue to operate and raise money for scholarships.