Spaghetti harvest

When I was a kid and new to TV, there were usually farm reports first thing in the morning. This was the era where TV stations signed off each night and didn't boradcast again until the morning. One such morning there was nothing else to watch so I viewed a segment about how spaghetti is harvested. About seven years later I was watching the Jack Paar show and he introduced what he called a "hilarious" film hoax about spaghetti growing on trees. It was not until that moment when I saw it and recognized that it was the same one from my youth that I realized how stupid I was.


On April 1, 1957 the British news show Panorama broadcast a three-minute segment about a bumper spaghetti harvest in southern Switzerland. The success of the crop was attributed both to an unusually mild winter and to the "virtual disappearance of the spaghetti weevil." The audience heard Richard Dimbleby, the show's highly respected anchor, discussing the details of the spaghetti crop as they watched video footage of a Swiss family pulling pasta off spaghetti trees and placing it into baskets. The segment concluded with the assurance that, "For those who love this dish, there's nothing like real, home-grown spaghetti."

The Swiss Spaghetti Harvest hoax generated an enormous response. Hundreds of people phoned the BBC wanting to know how they could grow their own spaghetti tree. To this query the BBC diplomatically replied, "Place a sprig of spaghetti in a tin of tomato sauce and hope for the best."

To this day the Panorama broadcast remains one of the most famous and popular April Fool's Day hoaxes of all time. It is also believed to be the first time the medium of television was used to stage an April Fool's Day hoax.

Go here to view the video. http://news.bbc.co.uk/onthisday/hi/dates/stories/april/1/newsid_2819000/2819261.stm

Will the earth's core ever cool and solidify?

Our friends invited us to a wonderful Thanksgiving dinner last light. I got into a conversation with their son Jeff, a PhD Geologist and professor, and started asking about the kind of stuff I watch on the Discovery and National Geographic channels. Jeff was talking about volcanoes being the method the earth uses to cool its mantle so I asked if the earth's molten core would ever cool down. He said yes, but the sun would run out of fuel before the earth cooled down to a solid rock. I slept much better last night knowing that geothermal energy is so abundant.

αναίσθητο παιδί

When I took Greek-language lessons growing up, we had a strict teacher named Mrs. Barkas who was very passionate about her ethnicity and religion. Whenever any of us messed up in class or didn't know an answer or weren't payong attention, she would shake her finger at us and say "αναίσθητο παιδί". "παιδί" means child but I wasn't sure about the first word. Just recently I saw that word translated as "dull" and then it came to me that the English word anesthesia comes from the Greek word I was wondering about. So, our teacher was calling us the walking anesthetized children - zombies, if you will. Sad thing is, she was right. We just wanted to go home and play.

Beyond Sherwood Forest

There is an obscure show that will be on Syfy network this weekend - Beyond Sherwood Forest. It caught my eye because it stars people from other shows I like to watch like Sanctuary and Smallville and the now-defunct Stargate SG-1.

This Robin Hood retelling stars Sanctuary’s Robin Dunne as Robin (who says he might be the only actor ever to play Robin Hood in a movie who actually is named Robin) and Smallville’s Erica Durance as Marian.

The lovely Ms. Durance is married in real life to actor David Palffy, who played not one but two creepy bad guys in SG-1: Sokar and Anubis. In Beyond Sherwood he plays a semi-creepy, semi-bad guy (a Sylvan Elder). In another synergistic move, he gets to wear a big collared costume and carry a staff very similar to the Ori, the Arthurian villains in SG-1’s last two seasons. To get really obscure, he was in the Lone Gunman episode "Tango de los Pistoleros" (2001), one of the better eps in a short-lived series.

Cleveland needs a Statue of Liberty

I think the Feds should have a one-time increase in the immigrant quota of 100,000 people (no criminal records, hard-working, skilled people go the head of the line) and send them all to Cleveland. The city should give them free land in blighted areas and maybe a few gift cards to Loews or Home Deport to spruce up the place. Maybe some of 100,000 can be illegal immigrants already here that have shown their ability to work and stay out of trouble. The strength of Cleveland in its past was the diversity of its ethnic neighborhoods, all but gone now.

Do not mistreat an alien or oppress him. Exodus 22:21

Swim Meet

I watched my first swim meet today. It was held at the top-notch Cleveland State University Natatorium. My cousin Alex from Upper St. Claire, PA competed in his usual faster-than-thou fashion. Alex, you da man!

Political Action Committe

My company held a reception after work to extol the virtues of its political action committee. I don't doubt the need, but for me the neatest thing is the initials - "PAC". What a great set of initials. Lucky is the man whose name coincides with those initials.