September 10, 2012
‘I would rather cry in a BMW‘ is a quotation that became an online sensation in China in 2010. It originated from Ma Nuo, a 20-year-old female contestant on the television show ‘Fei Cheng Wu Rao’ (also known in English as ‘If you are the One’).
The line was in response to a question by an unemployed suitor who asked if Ma would ‘ride a bicycle with him’ on a date. The series of events have been summed up in the media with the quip ‘I would rather cry in a BMW than laugh on a bicycle.’
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September 10, 2012
Kale is a form of cabbage, green or purple, in which the central leaves do not form a head. It is considered to be closer to wild cabbage than most domesticated forms. It is in the same family as broccoli, cauliflower, collard greens, and brussels sprouts..When baked or dehydrated, Kale takes on a consistency similar to that of a potato chip, and is a much healthier alternative to regular potato chips. The chips can be seasoned with salt or other spices.
Kale is very high in beta carotene, vitamin K, vitamin C, lutein, zeaxanthin, and reasonably rich in calcium. Kale, as with broccoli and other brassicas, contains sulforaphane (particularly when chopped or minced), a chemical with potent anti-cancer properties. Boiling decreases the level of sulforaphane; however, steaming, microwaving, or stir frying do not result in significant loss.
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September 10, 2012
Double-yolk eggs occur when ovulation occurs too rapidly, or when one yolk becomes joined with another yolk. These eggs may be the result of a young hen’s reproductive cycle not yet being synchronized. Some hybrid breeds of hens also produce double-yolk eggs by default. Such eggs are produced in India. Heavier poultry breeds such as the buff Orpington have been known to lay triple yolk eggs in their lifetime. Although heredity causes some hens to have a higher propensity to lay double-yolked eggs, they occur more frequently as occasional abnormalities in young hens beginning to lay. Double-yolked eggs usually only lead to observed successful hatchlings under human intervention, as the chickens interfere with each other’s hatching process and die.
Eggs without yolk are called ‘dwarf’ or ‘wind’ eggs. Such an egg is most often a pullet’s first effort, produced before her laying mechanism is fully ready. In a mature hen, a wind egg is unlikely, but can occur if a bit of reproductive tissue breaks away, stimulating the egg producing glands to treat it like a yolk and wrap it in albumen, membranes and a shell as it travels through the egg tube. An archaic term for a no yolk egg is a ‘cock’ egg. Since they contained no yolk and therefore can’t hatch, it was traditionally believed that these eggs were laid by roosters.
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September 10, 2012
Amazon.com has been criticized for collecting sales taxes from customers in only the five states it has a major presence in. Several states have passed or are considering ‘Amazon tax‘ laws designed to compel Amazon to collect local sales and use taxes from customers. The U.S. has no federal sales tax. In most countries where Amazon operates, a sales tax or value added (consumption) tax is uniform throughout the country, and Amazon is obliged to collect it from all customers.
Proponents argue that Amazon has a comparative advantage over brick-and-mortar retailers, and the online company is under increasing legal and political pressure from state governments, traditional retailers and other groups because of its refusal to collect sales tax in 40 of the 45 states with a statewide sales tax. Those 40 states include at least 12 where Amazon has a clear physical presence via distribution centers and wholly owned subsidiaries.
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September 10, 2012
LifeLock Inc., founded in 2005, is an American identity theft protection company based in Arizona. The company charges $10 a month for the LifeLock identity theft protection system intended to detect fraudulent applications for some forms of credit and non-credit related services.
LifeLock’s CEO Todd Davis was the victim of identity theft 13 times during 2007 and 2008, after he publicly posted his Social Security number on billboards and in TV commercials as part of a campaign to promote the company’s identity theft protection services.
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September 9, 2012
Uber (formerly UberCab) is a venture-funded startup company based in San Francisco that makes a mobile application that connects passengers with drivers of luxury vehicles (e.g. Lincoln, Cadillac, BMW) for hire.
The company arranges pickups in the San Francisco Bay Area, New York City, Los Angeles, Seattle, Chicago, Boston, Washington, D.C., Vancouver, Toronto, Paris, and Philadelphia. Cars are reserved by sending a text message or by using a mobile app. Using the apps, customers can track their reserved car’s location.
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September 8, 2012
The core concept of the Online Disinhibition Effect refers to a loosening (or complete abandonment) of social restrictions and inhibitions that would otherwise be present in normal face-to-face interaction during interactions with others on the Internet. Because of the loss of inhibition, some users may exhibit benign tendencies; people may become more affectionate, more willing to open up to others, less guarded about their emotions and may speak to others about what they are feeling in an attempt to achieve emotional catharsis.
According to psychologist John Suler, this particular occurrence is called benign disinhibition. With respect to bad behavior, users on the Internet can frequently do or say as they wish without fear of any kind of meaningful reprisal. In most Internet forums, the worst kind of punishment one can receive for bad behavior is usually being banned from a particular site. In practice, however, this serves little use; the person involved can usually circumvent the ban by simply registering another username and continuing the same behavior as before. Suler calls this toxic disinhibition.
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September 8, 2012
Hot sauce refers to any spicy sauce made from chili peppers and other ingredients. A group of chemicals called capsaicinoids are responsible for the heat in chili peppers. The peppers are infused in anything from vinegar, oil, water, beer and alcohol to fruits and vegetable pulp. Additional ingredients are often used, including those used to add extra heat, such as pure capsaicin extract and mustards.
Mexican hot sauce typically focuses more on flavor than on intense heat. The sauces are hot, but the individual flavors of the peppers are pronounced. Vinegar is used sparingly or not at all. Chipotles (smoked chili peppers) are a very popular ingredient of Mexican hot sauce.
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September 8, 2012
The term brain fitness reflects a hypothesis that cognitive abilities can be maintained or improved by exercising the brain, in analogy to the way physical fitness is improved by exercising the body.
Although there is strong evidence that aspects of brain structure remain plastic (changeable) throughout life, and that high levels of mental activity are associated with reduced risks of age-related dementia, scientific support for the concept of ‘brain fitness’ is limited. The term is virtually never used in the scientific literature, but is commonly used in the context of self-help books and commercial products which first came into play in the 1980s.
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September 8, 2012
Paul Bacon (b. 1923), is an American book and album cover designer and jazz musician. He is known for introducing the ‘Big Book Look’ in book jacket design, and has designed about 6,500 jackets and more than 200 jazz record covers. His first big hit came in 1956 with ‘Compulsion,’ a novel by Meyer Levin.
This cover also marked the inception of the ‘Big Book Look’ that Bacon became known for. This look features a large, bold title, a prominent author’s name, and a small conceptual image. Instances of this ‘look’ include ‘Catch-22’ by Joseph Heller, ‘Visions of Cody’ by Jack Kerouac, and ‘Bullet Park’ by John Cheever, along with countless others.
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September 8, 2012
George Dantzig (1914 – 2005) was an American mathematical scientist who solved two unsolved problems in statistical theory, which he had mistaken for homework after arriving late to a lecture of UC Berkeley statistician Jerzy Neyman. Dantzig was the Professor Emeritus of Transportation Sciences and Professor of Operations Research and of Computer Science at Stanford.
Born in Portland, Oregon, George Bernard Dantzig was named after George Bernard Shaw, the Irish writer. His father, Tobias Dantzig, was a Baltic German mathematician and linguist, and his mother, Anja Dantzig (née Ourisson), was a French linguist. Dantzig’s parents met during their study at the Sorbonne, where Tobias studied mathematics under Henri Poincaré.
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September 8, 2012
Poka-yoke is a Japanese term that means ‘fail-safing’ or ‘mistake-proofing.’ A poka-yoke is any mechanism in a lean manufacturing process that helps an equipment operator avoid (‘yokeru’) mistakes (‘poka’).
Its purpose is to eliminate product defects by preventing, correcting, or drawing attention to human errors as they occur. The concept was formalized, and the term adopted, by Shigeo Shingo as part of the Toyota Production System. It was originally described as ‘baka-yoke,’ but as this means ‘fool-proofing’ (or ‘idiot-proofing’) the name was changed to the milder poka-yoke. More broadly, the term can refer to any behavior-shaping constraint designed into a process to prevent incorrect operation by the user.
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