Peeing on Plants

Ancient Egyptians in the 1350s were the first to record a pregnancy test that had a basis in science. A papyrus from the time describes how an expectant woman could pee on a barley and wheat seed over a series of days and if it grew then the woman was pregnant. It is possible that higher levels of estrogen in the urine of pregnant women encouraged plant growth. In 1963, a study was done to test this method. the study found that about 70 percent of the time pregnant women's urine caused plants to show growth while men's and non pregnant women's urine did not. If you are interested in the study you can find it here.
http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC1034829/?page=2

Trial by combat: Dog Vs. Maquer

In early 1400s France it was acceptable to have trial by combat. Presided over by  royalty, the idea was that God would let the innocent live. In this same time period and man named Montdidier and his gentle greyhound lived happily together, until someone murdered Montdidier, buried him, and left a very unhappy Greyhound to his own devices. The hungry, lonely dog journeyed to London and sought out Montdidiers friend Ardilliers. Ardilliers finding it strange that the dog would show up alone payed a visit to Montdidier, and the dog lead Ardilliers to the grave site. The dog dug at the site until Ardilliers got the idea and exhumed the body of his friend. When the dog later saw Maquer, his masters killer, he attacked him. Each time the dog saw this man he would attack with a vengeance, which was strange for a dog that had always been so well tempered. The dogs attacks made Ardilliers suspicious and so he brought the matter before the king. The king ordered a trial by combat, Dog Vs. Maquer, mono a mono. When the dog attacked Maquer couldn't stand it and admitted to murder, leading to his hanging.

J. Wootton, 1738, A Grey Spotted Hound

Pink is more decisive and better for boys

For a very long time both boys and girls were dressed the same up until about six or seven years old. They wore white and they wore gowns. This was practical for a lot of reasons but mainly because you can bleach white clothing and babies are very messy little creatures. Gender norms are constantly being redefined and marketing departments like to take advantage of this. When colored baby clothing became widely available stores and magazines began giving suggestions for how you should dress which sex baby. In 1918,an article in Earnshaw's Infants' Department, suggested that, "The generally accepted rule is pink for boys, and blue for girls. The reason is that pink, being a more decided and stronger color, is suitable for the boy, while blue, which is more delicate and dainty, is prettier for the girl." Their were all kinds of suggestions about who should wear what color and eventually, just because, pink became the color for girls and blue for boys. Blue versus pink didn't matter so much to marketing companies, the differentiation did. Companies could now sell pink and blue furniture, when a couple had a girl baby they would buy all pink furniture and when they had a boy a year later they had to buy all new accessories, making for more sales.

Cheerleading practice: no girls allowed!

Cheer leading began in the late 1800s as a males only activity. The young men attending sports games yelled organized cheers from the bleachers. A few years later a Princeton graduate moved to the university of Minnesota and started organized cheering there. Princeton announced three official cheer leaders in 1987, they were all men. Eventually an area of the bleachers was designated for cheer leaders. Women began joining cheer leading in the 1920s. During World War I and II, when large numbers of men were away at war, women became the primary cheer leaders. When men returned from war, their was a push to ban women from cheer leading at many schools. People argues that it was too masculine of a sport for women and promoted male qualities such as a loud voice and harsh language. The women were not daunted and continued to participate in cheer leading. Because of the feminine stereotype cheer leading had been changed from masculine and gallant to cute and feminine so many men left the sport. Throughout the rest of the 20th century cheer leading became progressively more dance oriented and in the 1980s ever more dangerous elements of gymnastics were incorporated.

What can I blow up >:) Fireworks Laws

Fireworks season is coming up and you may be wondering what can you blow up on your street without spending a night in jail. This blog post is only about consumer fireworks. The federal regulations involve how much explosives are used in the firework and are rather complicated. This website gives a basic description: https://www.atf.gov/publications/factsheets/factsheet-fireworks.html
Within the federal regulations states and towns make their own laws. In green states on the map above, if your area does not have any additional laws, all of the federally legal consumer fireworks are legal without local approval. Which means if you have them you don't have to ask to light them off on your own property. In blue states, if your local area doesn't have any additional regulations, you can light off more than half of the types of federally legal consumer fireworks without asking permission. In yellow states you need to ask permission to light off more than half of the types of consumer fireworks that are federally legal. In the red states you may not light off any fireworks without getting approval from your local area and possibly the state. Fireworks include pretty much anything that is supposed to combust, but they have been conveniently been grouped into categories:
Bottle Rockets
Sky Rockets
Roman Candles
firecrackers
sparklers (that's right, if you live in a red state every child has probably broken this law)
smoke and punk (this includes snakes and smoke bombs)
Fountains
Missiles
Novelties Crackle and Strobe
Parachutes
Wheels and Spinner
Sky Flyers
Display Shells
Aerial Items (cakes)
Laws change constantly so their might be and probably are errors in this list, on top of this I have not included areas smaller than states which often make their own regulations. My map is based off of this website: http://www.usfireworks.biz/legal/legal.htm the best thing you can do is look up your state and towns specific laws, Connecticut's are very clear, sparklers, fountains, and nothing else. http://www.ct.gov/despp/lib/despp/public_information_files/brochures/tipsfireworks.pdf

How macho are your high heels?

I have met very few men who would be caught dead wearing heels, even if they are willing many profess the improbability of being able to walk in them at all without practice. Heel's started off with functionality in mind, but they weren't for walking. Small heels on the back of one's shoe were perfect for staying steady in stirrups. These heels made it much easier to stand and shoot a bow from horseback. European men and a few women adopted these heels for multiple reasons, they made one taller, they were a fad, but most of all they were not functional. The ability to wear frivolous footwear conveyed  status. In fact one of the men most well known for his stylish high heels was King Louis XIV. He was so obsessed with the shoes as a status symbol that he made it a law that only nobility could wear red heeled high heels. The shoes were completely impractical in the muddy streets of the time period. Women adopted high heels more popularly in the 1630s when they began adding masculine elements to their clothing.

I say what I want? school edition

Students often “cleverly” counter teachers attempts to stop inappropriate comments with “it’s a free country” I can say what I want. Can you really? The answer is no, here is a progression of court cases where you can watch freedom of speech being limited in schools. If you aren’t interested in what happened and just want to know student’s rights read the bold print.

The Bill of Rights: Amendment I

“Congress shall make no law respecting … or abridging the freedom of speech, or of the press; or the right of the people peaceably to assemble…”

1969, Tinker v. Des Moines

The Supreme Court tells us in Tinker vs. Des Moines, students do not "shed their constitutional rights when they enter the schoolhouse door."  But, school administrators can restrict student’s speech for educational reasons.

In 1969 a small number of students and their parents decided to wear black armbands for the holiday season to demonstrate their disapproval of the Vietnam War. The school heard about this and was afraid that it would cause disturbance, the school made a rule that anyone wearing an armband would be suspended until they came to school without the armband.  Five students were suspended. Schoolwork was not disrupted. Wearing the armbands did not interfere with other student’s rights.

The Court decided that the First Amendment protected the right of the high school students to wear black armbands in a public high school, as a form of protest and “symbolic speech”.  The Court ruled that school administrators could, only prohibit this form of free speech, if they could show that it would cause a serious disruption of the student’s education.

Bethel School District v. Fraser, 1983

High school student Matthew Fraser, a student at Bethel High School in Pierce County, Washington, made a speech nominating a fellow student for student government. Around 600 high school students attended. During the speech, Fraser referred to his candidate using sexual innuendoes.

Two teachers, who knew about the speech before told him that the speech was "inappropriate and that he probably should not deliver it," and that his delivery of the speech might have "severe consequences." Fraser admitted to purposely giving a speech with sexual innuendo and was suspended for three days.

The final decision by the Supreme Court sided with the school. “The process of educating our youth for citizenship in public schools is not confined to books, the curriculum, and the civics class; schools must teach by example the shared values of a civilized social order.” Teachers and older students are role models and must teach by example. Students using vulgar and lewd speech undermine the educational role of public schools so schools may make rules against students using this type of language.

Hazelwood School District V. Kuhlmeier, 1988

The principal of a high school removed two pages of a high school newspaper written by a journalism class before it went to print. The first page contained a story about three pregnant girls who had attended the high school. Even though their names had been changed the principle was afraid they might be identified from the story and that the content may have been inappropriate for the younger students at the school. The second page contained an article about how divorce affected students, one of the students accused her father of not spending enough time with her family among other things, the principal thought that the father should have been allowed a response. It was too close to the end of the school year to make revisions so the pages were removed.

            The students sued the school, the Court ruled in favor of the school. The school could restrict the content because: the newspaper was a supervised learning experience for journalism students not a public forum; including this content in school sanctioned publications might make it seem like the students opinion was the schools opinion; and the articles might have violated other students or parents rights.

Morse v. Frederick, 2007

The Olympic torch was scheduled to pass by Juneau- Douglas High School (JDHS) during school hours. The principal allowed teachers to take students to stand along the road in front of the school to see the torch pass. Frederick, a high school student had not shown up for classes that day, he showed up at the event and stood across the street from the school with his friends. When the camera crews and the torch passed by he unfurled a 14-foot banner with the help of some of his friends. The banner read “Bong Hits 4 Jesus” which the principal interpreted as encouraging illegal drug use. The students were asked to hand over the sign which all of them except for Frederick did.  Frederick said that the banner was not a political statement about the legalization of marijuana, and the student could not come up with any explanations for his phrase other than referring to marijuana. Frederick was suspended for 8 days.

The court decided in favor of the school. Schools have the right to discipline students who present messages that conflict with stated anti-drug policies; even without evidence of disruption of school activities.

Some states have additional state laws limiting or protecting students rights, and your student hand book gives even more limitations or protection, while it is debatable if the school handbook is a “legally binding contract” you can get kicked out of private schools and punished in public school for not obeying school rules. If you feel like your schools rules are in conflict with the Supreme Court check out this website. http://www.splc.org/

http://law2.umkc.edu/faculty/projects/ftrials/conlaw/studentspeech.htm

What was an explosion?

The word explosion comes from the Latin explosio— the act of driving off by clapping. (this only makes me think that Monty Python must have known this) The first recorded use of the word in English takes place in the Glossographia in 1665; the word is defined as meaning “ a casting off or rejecting, a hissing a thing out.” The definitions of scorn or driving away with a loud noise are the only usages until the mid 1700s. The first time explosion is used to refer to something blowing up is in 1762 when the definition changed to,  “The action of ‘going off’ with a loud noise under the influence of suddenly developed internal energy; an instance of this; also used of electric discharges. Of a boiler, bomb, gun, etc.: The action of suddenly bursting or flying in pieces from a similar cause.” Oxford English Dictionary and Miriam Webster

http://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:AIM-9_explodes_F-89_ground_target_1979.jpeg

Where did Memorial Day come from?

The origins of Memorial Day are a little hazy, more than 20 places claim the original Memorial Day occurred in their area. They all agree that is was to honor the fallen from the civil war. In 1966, Lyndon B. Johnson and Congress declared Waterloo, New York, held the original Memorial Day on May 5^th 1866. (Notice that would have made it the centennial)  Originally called Decoration Day, Memorial Day was to honor Civil War soldiers by decorating their graves. Some places in the South used the day to honor confederate soldiers specifically, or held a separate day just for them, but it was more widely used to honor soldiers from both sides. Virginia still calls the last Monday in May “Confederate Memorial Day”. Some time after World War I the day was extended to honor soldiers from all wars. In 1971, the day was declared as a national holiday. Why the last Monday in May? Many people suspect this date was chosen because flowers would be blooming all over the United States. In 2000, congress created an act encouraging all Americans “to pause at 3:00 pm on Memorial Day and hold a minute of silence to remember and honor those who have died in service to the nation.”

http://www.va.gov/opa/speceven/memday/history.asp?utm_source=3birds&utm_medium=Web&utm_campaign=AUBURNVW_Fun+Facts+About+Memorial+Day

Fruity mixed drinks are for risk takers only

One of the earliest definitions of a cocktail as an alcoholic drink appeared in the May 13, 1806, edition of The Balance and Colombian Repository, where the editor answered the question "what is a cocktail?"" a Cock-tail is a stimulating liquor, composed of spirits of any kind, sugar, water, and bitters.” The fruity mixed drinks we are more familiar with today began developing during prohibition. During prohibition lower quality alcohols were available. Moonshine that could literally make you go blind, or kill you, sometimes made it into the speakeasies. People started adding fruit juice, honey, sugar, or whatever else they could think of to cover up the taste of some pretty raunchy alcohols. The sweeter taste also made it easier to throw back quickly if your speakeasy got busted.  The harsher the alcohol = the fruitier your drink had to be to cover it up. It makes sense that only the real risk takers would be willing to drink the fruitiest mixed drinks.

Capri pants are for "manly men"

Sonja de Lennart purportedly invented capri pants in 1948. These pants are worn largely by women, but are also sported by men in many countries. While often seen viewed as “feminine,” lumberjacks sported pants that cut off between the ankles and knees much earlier than the recognized invention of Capri’s. A 1916 edition of field and stream mentions “stagged” pants as the lumberjack norm. The article defines these as “Trousers amputated somewhere between the instep and knee.” They are cut off in order to avoid dragging through brush and mud. In addition, if a branch catches up a person’s pant leg, without hemmed bottoms the pants will tear instead of dragging the lumberjack down with the branch. 


http://www.richwooders.com/industries/logging/richwood-lumberjacks.htm