Bathroom Readers' Institute's Blog, page 146
February 24, 2014
AUJA – Who is John Doe?
Uncle John knows pretty much everything—and for what he doesn’t know, he has a massive research library. So go ahead: in the comments below, ask Uncle John anything. (And if we answer your question sometime, we’ll send you a free book!)
Why are unidentified people referred to as “John Doe” or “Jane Doe”?
Until their identity can be ascertained, crime victims or unknown suspects are usually referred to by police (and the media) as “John Doe” (for men) or “Jane Doe” (for women). The generic name can also be used as a phony name in court cases to protect anonymity. The John Doe custom was born in 13th century England. The name was used in legal proceedings to protect witnesses. Based on an old Roman custom, the specific name of “John Doe” was chosen because it is both an unremarkable name, and also not a common name.
John Doe continued to be a part of the English legal system via a legal matter called an action of ejectment. Landlords could avoid lengthy and complicated hearings to eject squatters or tenants who didn’t pay via an ejectment on behalf of a secretly fictional third party who had issue with the defaulting tenant or squatter, but acting anonymously out of a fear of repercussions.
The names became the go-to in the American court and legal systems, too, except when a matter involves more than one anonymous party—then Roe is used, as in the landmark Roe v. Wade trial in the 1970s.
Bonus: ever wonder where the phrase “John Q. Public” comes from? Meant to refer to a hypothetical common man, working man, taxpayer, or man on the street, John Q. Public was an editorial cartoon character created in 1922 by Chicago Daily News cartoonist Vaughn Shoemaker, and also used by Jim Lange of The Oklahoman. For decades, John Q. Public was a highly recognizable everyman (sometimes labeled “Mr. Voter”), because he looked like a midcentury man: with glasses, a mustache, and a fedora.
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February 21, 2014
Power Laces: Auto-Lacing Sneakers On the Way
Coming soon to stores: self-lacing sneakers like the ones in Back to the Future Part II. Really.
Back to the Future Part II offered many predictions about what the year 2015 might look like…through the lens of 1989, the year it was made. Among the things we’re supposed to technically have by next year: hoverboards, rehydrated pizzas, and interpersonal communication via fax machines. And when Marty McFly (Michael J. Fox) first arrives in the year 2015 (just before he hits the ‘80s Café), he puts on a pair of sneakers and their automated laces tie themselves.
So most of that stuff probably isn’t going to happen, or at least not by 2015. Except for Marty McFly’s fantastic sneakers that tied themselves. Designers at Nike are currently hard at work on MAG High Tops, complete with “Power Laces.”
Back in 2011, Nike released 1,500 hundred pairs of Back to the Future Part II replica MAG High Tops, without Power Laces, to help benefit The Michael J. Fox Foundation For Parkinson’s Research. The shoes earned over $6 million for the organization. (Currently, the average pair can resell for hundreds on eBay.) Now designer Tinker Hatfield says the company will be ready to roll out the real deal in 2015. Rumors about the MAG High Tops have been floating around since 2009, when Nike submitted paperwork for an “automatically lacing trainers” patent.
But while Nike can claim that it got the Power Laces done in time to make BTTF’s prophecy come true, it can’t boast that it created the world’s first self-tying shoe. San Francisco inventor Blake Bevin already did that in 2010, when she installed an “Arduino microcontroller” into a Converse sneaker. When she puts it on, a sensor activates two motors, which yank on the laces.
Now if only somebody would get started on those hoverboards. Oh, wait, they have!
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February 20, 2014
How the FAA Stole Valentine’s Day
Amazon announced last year that it would soon be delivering packages via unmanned flying drones. A Michigan company just beat them to the punch, or it least it would have if not for those spoilsports at the Federal Aviation Administration.
FlowerDeliveryExpress.com, as you may have guessed, delivers flowers, and with the usual methods of trucks and delivery guys. Earlier this month, the suburban Detroit-based company decided to see what would happen if they used an unmanned mini-helicopter to transport some Valentine’s Day floral arrangements. For their experiment, they prepared several dozen rose bouquets. They were eager to find out how many of them their drone could deliver to a series of “customers” in a test group within a set period of time on Valentine’s Day.
On Saturday, February 8th, FDE performed a test flight and sent a drone with a bouquet to a test house in the Detroit area. Possibly the world’s first flower delivery via flying robot, the test was a success and the company posted a promotional video of the trip on YouTube.
Unfortunately, it was also illegal. Before the company’s could proceed any further, CEO Wesley Berry was contacted by a Grinchy government official with a heart that definitely didn’t grow three sizes that day. Berry was told to cancel delivery plans for Valentine’s Day.
Current FAA regulations don’t allow drones to perform commercial deliveries, although the organization is currently trying to hammer out guidelines that would allow them. They could be cleared for takeoff as early as 2015. Berry and his company are already preparing for when that day comes. “When the time is right, we’ll be ready for orders to be delivered, not by an address, but by GPS coordinates,” he said. “It’s exciting to plan the future of the business based on this emerging technology.”
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Impossible Questions: Presidential Honors Edition (Answers)
Have you got an answer? Read on to see if you’re right.
What honorific has been bestowed on five different Democratic U.S. presidents…but no Republican U.S. presidents? (It’s not as politically charged a question as you think…or maybe it is?)
The voters spoke…the voters of the National Academy of Recording Arts and Sciences. The Grammy Award for Best Spoken Word Album has been awarded to several former or sitting presidents: Barack Obama, Bill Clinton, Jimmy Carter, John F. Kennedy, and Franklin Roosevelt. Narration of audiobook version of books are eligible for this category, and it’s here that these former presidents have thrived.
In 2008, three of the five nominees would be president of the United States. Clinton was nominated for Giving, and Carter for Sunday Mornings in Plains. Both lost out to The Audacity of Hope, an audiobook version of a title written by some Illinois senator named Barack Obama—who’d won the same award in 2006 for his memoir Dreams from My Father. In the year in between, Carter won for Our Endangered Values. In 2005, Clinton won for his memoir My Life.
As for Roosevelt, he died in 1945, 14 years before the Grammys even existed. Nevertheless, a collection of old, inspiring FDR speeches was compiled for a record called FDR Speaks. It won the Grammy for Best Spoken Word Album in 1961. In 1965, two of the five nominees were for recordings of Kennedy. The Kennedy Wit, narrated by David Brinkley lost out to the BBC Tribute to John F. Kennedy.
The only Republican president to ever garner a Grammy nomination in this category is Richard Nixon, co-nominated in 1979 with David Frost for the latter’s combative interviews compiled onto a record called The Nixon Interviews with David Frost.
Want more impossible questions? Check out Uncle John’s Impossible Questions.
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February 19, 2014
Dirty Pasta
Careful what kind of pasta you order, because you might just be inadvertently saying something dirty.
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Impossible Questions: Presidential Honors Edition
Think you know what bizarre achievement links these presidents? Come back tomorrow to see if you’re right.
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February 18, 2014
5 Classic Movie Songs That Should Have Won Oscars
Some of the most beloved and popular songs were written for and first appeared in movies, even if the movie itself has been completely forgotten (e.g. you probably know “Lullaby of Broadway,” but probably don’t remember Gold Diggers of 1935). The Academy Awards recognizes movie music with the Best Song prize. In retrospect, sometimes the right song wasn’t always given the Oscar. Here are some songs that should have won Oscars.
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Amazing LEGO Facts and Trivia
You’ve seen The LEGO Movie—Now Enjoy These Amazing LEGO Facts.“Everything is awesome” about this article.
Be correct: LEGO is properly written in all caps. And the plural form of LEGO? It’s also LEGO.
No real LEGO were used in the computer-animated The LEGO Movie. To render The LEGO Movie’s world of LEGO, the film’s production designer Grant Freckleton and his crew used free software, LEGO Digital Designer to create all the bricks they’d need. In all, 3,863,484 individual LEGO bricks are used in The LEGO Movie. Many were reused to create the film’s different scenes, so the total number of actual LEGO used: 15,080,330.
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February 17, 2014
AUJA: Why is “Fido” a generic name for dogs?
Uncle John knows pretty much everything—and for what he doesn't know, he has a massive research library. So go ahead: in the comments below, ask Uncle John anything. (And if we answer your question sometime, we'll send you a free book!)
Why is “Fido” a generic name for dogs?
The post appeared first on Uncle Johns Bathroom Reader.
Discontinued Oscar Categories
The list of individual awards handed out at the Academy Awards can change. Here are several categories at the Oscars that no longer exist.
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