Apple #575: Magnolias

The magnolia trees in my neighborhood are blooming. I know they're early bloomers each year, sometimes so early the snow is falling on the blossoms. But since we've been having summer-like weather in early March, I wondered if the magnolias are blooming any earlier than usual.



Magnolias in bloom
(Photo by the Apple Lady)

• Well, of course the answer to that depends on what kind of magnolia you're talking about.

• There are about 80 different species of magnolia, many of which have several cultivars (varieties) within each species. The Southern Magnolia, for example, has over 100 different kinds of cultivars.
  

• Not even discussing the variations among cultivars, there is all sorts of variation among the species. Those variations can affect a lot of things, including when the flowers bloom.

• Some species are deciduous (the Saucer Magnolia is one of these), some are semi-evergreen (the Jane Magnolia, for example), and some are evergreen year-round (Southern, or Magnolia grandiflora).

The Jane Magnolia is semi-evergreen, and it has tulip-shaped flowers which are pinkish-purple on the outside and bright white at the center.
(Photo from Fast-Growing-Trees.com. You can order a 3-4 ft. Jane magnolia from here for $69.)



The Southern Magnolia can grow to be 60 to 90 feet tall. Its flowers are entirely white.
(Photo from Missouri Botanical Garden)

• The Sweetbay Magnolia is a favorite among gardeners in South Carolina. But the same species may be deciduous, semi-evergreen, or evegreen depending on where in South Carolina it is grown.

Sweetbay Magnolia flowers are a creamy white and the petals tend to do this rounded, scoop-like thing. They also have a light, lemony fragrance.
(Photo by Rodger Hamner, from University of Florida IFAS Extension)

• I'm going to guess that the magnolias in my neighborhood are Saucer Magnolias. Here's why:

• Saucer Magnolias are deciduous (check).

• They can grow to about 20 to 30 feet high (check. It was difficult to get close-ups of the blossoms because nearly all of them hung at heights taller than I am.).

• The flowers are large and saucer-shaped (check).

• The petals are white with pink, purple, or lilac on the outside (well, check, I think.).

• One site has a drawing of a Saucer Magnolia tree and its flower, and the drawing shows a flower whose petals on the interior are nearly all white with a blush of pink, while the exterior of the petal is pinkish-purple (definitely check).

Close-up of what I think is a Saucer Magnolia. Looking down on the blossom from above, you can just barely make out a tinge of pink in the otherwise white petals. So you might be tempted to say these flowers are white.
(Photo by the Apple Lady)



But what fascinates me is that from underneath, these very same flowers appear to be mostly pink. The pink color seems to be confined to the outside, undersides of the petals. It's funny that more of the pink doesn't appear in the flowers when looking down on them from above.
(Photo by the Apple Lady)

• So, assuming that these are Saucer Magnolias, when do Saucer Magnolias bloom? Once again, the answer depends. This time, it seems to depend on where the tree is growing:

• In New York's Central Park, they bloom "as early as late March."

• In South Carolina, they bloom in March or April.

• In Houston, they bloom in late February or early March.

• Along the coast, they may open as early as February.

• One site generalizes it best: as early as late winter, or as late as mid-spring.

• So I'm heartened to learn that while the weather may be wackily out of season, the magnolias, at least, seem to be right on schedule.

Whenever the Magnolias bloom, they sure are a welcome sight after winter.
(Photo by the Apple Lady)


Magnolias in General

• Despite all the variations among magnolia species, there are some things you can say about the lot of them.

• Magnolias are relatively easy to care for. Most species are not bothered by bugs or other pests.

• That said, most magnolias are pollinated--not by bees--by beetles. The beetles don't bug the trees, they're just there to help out.

• Magnolias generally don't like to be transplanted once they've got a root system going.
  

• This is because, while a magnolia's roots don't run deep, they are long and ropey, so it's hard to make sure you've got them all bundled together when you're moving the tree.
  

• If you really must move a magnolia, dig as wide a rootbed as possible. It's more important to make it large in circumference than it is to dig deep, since most of the roots live close to the surface. Also, if you can, snip a few roots a year before you're going to move the tree. This will encourage the roots to branch, making it more likely to withstand being moved the following year.
  

• For the same reason, it's a good idea not to plant other flowers or shrubs around the base of the magnolia. Those other plants will interfere with your magnolia's roots.

• Most people call Magnolias trees, but apparently it is more accurate to say they are shrubs.

• The primary difference between a tree and a shrub is that trees usually have one or maybe two main trunks, while shrubs have lots of stems. Shrubs are also usually shorter than trees, but what constitutes "shorter" versus "taller" seems to vary from one shrub/tree to another.
  

This magnolia plainly has lots of main stems, so even though it is fairly tall, it should probably be called a shrub.
(Photo by the Apple Lady)

• That said, while "shrub" may be technically correct, in person, I'd probably call a 90-foot Southern Magnolia a "tree." I think in that case, its height would trump its multi-stemmed-ness.

• In the history of plants, magnolias are thought to be among the earliest, or most primitive, of all flowering plants. Some of the oldest fossils of flowers look very similar to magnolia blossoms.

Did the earliest flowers look something like this?
(Photo by the Apple Lady)


Sources
United States National Arboretum, Magnolia Questions and Answers
Southern Living, Magnolia: Essential Southern Plant
John Eustice, University of Minnesota Extension, Magnolias for Minnesota
Debbie Shaughnessy, Clemson Cooperative Extension, Magnolia
Backyard Nature, Magnolia Blossoms
Urban Forest Ecosystems Institute, Saucer Magnolia
Arbor Day Foundation, Magnolia, Saucer, Magnolia x soulangeana
Central Park Conservancy, Saucer Magnolia
Steve Nix, About.com, Forestry, How to Manage and Identify Saucer Magnolia
Greg Shelley, Saucer Magnolia churns out the blooms in early March, Houston Examiner.com, March 3, 2010

Apple #574: Kinds of Pears

When I went to the grocery store the other day, they had a lot of pears. Different kinds of them. I've eaten all three kinds before but I couldn't say which one I liked best. So I thought I'd try all three and compare. And I also decided to find out exactly what is the difference between the varieties.

3 pears. The brown papery-looking one is a Bosc pear, the red one is a Red Anjou, and the green speckled one is a Bartlett.
(Photo by the Apple Lady)

They weren't quite ripe when I bought them, and I've had only one of them so far, the Bartlett. It's been a while since I've eaten a pear, and it was a very pleasant experience. The pear was really juicy, and the flesh's grainy texture makes the whole experience at once lush and delicate.

I haven't tried the other two yet, since I'm still waiting for them to ripen. But I thought, in the meantime, I'd learn about the different varieties and then I'd know what I'm eating.

Pears in General


There are all sorts of varieties of pears -- way more than what you usually see in the grocery store.
(Photo from A World Community Cookbook)

• There are some 3,000 varieties of pears worldwide. That boggles my mind.


• Pears originally came from Asia. Europeans adopted them and grew their own varieties. Then the early colonists brought them to America.


• They grew pretty well in the colonies for a while, but then blight wiped out a lot of the trees. Now most American pears are grown west of the Rockies, where diseases are less severe.


• In fact, most USA pears grown today are from Oregon or Washington.


• Pears are one of the few fruits that do not ripen on the tree. They only ripen after they're picked.


• When you buy pears from the store, they will be mature but not yet soft. Take them home, leave them out on the table or counter. Refrigerating will only slow down the ripening process.


• To determine whether a pear is ripe or not, don't squeeze the fruit. Instead, press gently on the pear at the top near the stem. If it's soft up there and "yields to pressure," it's ready to eat.


• The only variety for which this is not true is the Bartlett. The Bartlett will show you that it's ripe. Its skin will turn from a non-ripe-looking green to a brighter green-yellow.



• If the flesh of any pear is soft, it's over-ripe. You could eat it "out of hand" as they say but it won't be at its best. A too-soft and too-ripe pear is best for cooking or baking.

Pear Varieties

All pears taste like pears -- juicy and sweet and soft. So when I describe how they taste, I'll indicate in what way they are different than other varieties.

BARTLETT PEARS


Bartletts are yellow-green when they're ripe. The skin has little brown speckles.
(Photo from Nature Hills Nursery)

• Bartletts have a mild flavor with some light citrus overtones.

• Some people call these Williams pears.

• Bartletts are probably the most common or best-known variety. They are what you'll find in cans or containers in the grocery store.

• That's kind of ironic, considering that most foodie types say that Bartletts are their least favorite for "out of hand" (raw, pick it up & bite into it) eating.

• This is the first one I ate. If Bartletts are the least favorite, the others must be fantastic.

• Bartletts tend to get mushy and fall apart when they're cooked. So if you want to make some sort of pear sauce, Bartletts are your best bet. They're also good for baking, poaching, roasting, or any other sort of cooking you might want to do with pears.

• There are also Red Bartletts, which most people list as a separate variety. People say the Red Bartlett's flavor is milder yet sweeter than the yellow-green variety. It, too, is good for canning and cooking, but it's better than the green for out-of-hand eating.

• In season: August through February

GREEN ANJOU

Green Anjou (an-SZHU) pears are similar in color to Bartletts. But their shape is smaller and more squat.
(Photo from Cook's Thesaurus)

• This green pear does not change color as it ripens. So the best way to determine whether it's ripe is to test the neck for softness.

• The green Anjou's flesh is firm yet creamy in texture. Its flavor is mild, with just a hint of citrus.

• Foodies say that if you want a raw, green pear, the Anjou is a better choice than the Bartlett. It also holds up very well when cooked.
  

• They're named after the Anjou region in France, though they're thought to have originated in Belgium.

• These are also very common in the US and are often available year-round.

• In season: September through July
  

RED ANJOU

Red Anjou pears, like their green counterparts, have a similarly squat neck and compact shape. Their skin is a dark husky red.
(Photo from Cook's Thesaurus)

• Similar in size to the green Anjou, the red has a slightly, mild spice to it and no citrus notes.

• To me, the red Anjou seems the most autumnal of pears. It's a similar difference from the green, the same way red grapes have a slightly darker, spicy tang over green grapes.

• I think these are also especially juicy if you catch them at their ripest.

• In season: September through May

BOSC


Bosc pears have long, tapered necks and that tell-tale brown papery-looking skin.
(Photo from Nicole Abdou's Destination: Unknown)

• Bosc pears look like they have something wrong with them. The skin looks like a brown paper bag. But that's how they're supposed to be. And trust me, the texture of the skin when you bite into it isn't papery at all. It's soft and yielding.

• Their sweetness is like honey, but they also have slightly darker, almost musky notes.

• These are a favorite for cooking and especially poaching because they retain their shape and the complexity of flavor doesn't get lost when cooked.
  

• In season: September through April

CONCORDE


With their tall, skinny shape, you might think Concorde pears are green Boscs. But they're not, and they taste quite different.
(Photo from USA Pears)

• Here's where the varieties tend to get less common in most grocery stores.

• Concorde pears are tall and skinny with a green skin that sometimes turns golden in places.

• The flesh has vanilla notes and its flavor tends to be rather mild.

• Concordes don't brown as quickly when exposed to air, so they make a good choice for fruit salads, especially if the salad has to sit out for a while.

• They also hold their shape and flavor when cooked.

• In season: September through February
  

STARKRIMSON


The Starkrimson looks similar to a red Anjou, but its red is a brighter, shinier red and its shape is narrower.
(Photo from The Fruit Company)

• The Starkrimson is also sweet, but everyone agrees that it has a floral aroma and flavor. Some say the floral taste is too much when eaten raw. Since roasting smooths out the floral-ness, most people recommend eating these only when cooked.

• In season: August through January
  

FORELLE


Forelle pears are red and green and speckled like a trout
(Photo from The Fruit Company)

• Forelle means "trout" in German, and that's a helpful way of identifying these, as the flesh is red shading to green and speckled like a trout.

• The official word for the speckles, by the way, is lenticles.

• Forelles are one of the few pears that change color as they ripen. The skin turns from green to a lighter yellow, and the speckles stay very visible.

• This pear has more of a tart flavor. It's probably the closest in texture and taste to an apple.

• Because of their small size, their best eaten raw rather than cooked. Some recommend drizzling honey on these.
  

• For a European pear, these are very old, dating back to the 1600s from Germany.

• In season: October through March
  

SECKEL


Seckel pears are very small. The green on their skin is almost olive-colored, and they have patches of red blush.
(Photo from the Seasonal Chef)

• Some say Seckels have crunchy flesh, others say velvety. You'll have to try one and decide.

• But most agree, they're ultra-sweet, with notes of sweet champagne.

• Because they're so sweet and small, children will eat these pears when they might turn up their noses at other varieties.

• For adults, it's recommended that these be paired with a sharp cheese to balance the sweetness and a glass of wine.

• When roasted, they become "decadent."

• In season: September through February

COMICE


Comice pears are round and short with a very short neck. They're usually green with a large red blush, though some are almost entirely red. They're often a favorite in Christmas gift baskets.
(Photo from Twisting Vines)

• I've never seen a Comice pear in my grocery store, but people rave about these.

• They say they have a mellow sweetness, with a "custardy" flesh, and then they resort to using all sorts of delicious adjectives like "luscious" and "succulent" and "buttery."

• People say these make delicious desserts on their own, but they're exceptionally good when paired with cheese.

• Their full name is Doyenné du Comice. This pear originates in France. So it stands to reason it would probably do especially well with French cheese.

• In season: September through March
  

If I ever see a Comice pear in a store, I'm eating it.


Sources
USA Pears, Pear Varieities
Anna Stockwell, Tasting Notes: 10 Varieties of Pear, Saveur, December 10, 2010
Blogging Erika on HubPages, Best Pears - What Kind of Pear Should I Buy?
Produce Oasis, Types of Pears
Molly Watson, About.com, Local Foods, Types of Pears

Apple #573: Venus' Flower Basket

I just got back from a good but tiring vacation. I must get some sleep, but before I do, I want to find out about something I encountered on my vacation -- a Venus' Flower Basket.

I was in a natural history museum when I saw the skeleton of this thing. The note next to it said that the skeleton is made of silica -- glass. My jaw dropped. A living creature's skeleton is made of glass? I must know more.



The bleached skeleton of a Venus' flower basket, or a glass sponge. The fibers are made of silica, a.k.a. glass.
(Photo from the Natural History Museum, London)

• This animal -- yes, it's an animal -- is a type of sponge.

• Venus' flower baskets (Euplectella or Eupectella aspergillum) live in the ocean where the water has lots of silica and is very cold, which often also means that it's very deep, anywhere from 10 to 5,000 meters below the surface.

• They live mainly in the South Pacific off the coast of Japan and the Philippines, but they've also recently been found off the coast of Australia.

• When they're alive, the sponges can range in color from white to creamy yellow. The "skeletons" that are often displayed in museums are typically the tissue of the sponge which has been dried and bleached to give it an even whiter color.

Three Euplectella living underwater. They don't live in colonies the way coral do; it's just that these three happened to set down roots near each other.
(Photo from telecomBlog)

• Their shape is what allows these sponges to survive in the huge pressures that exist at such ocean depths. How they make their shape has been the subject of a lot of research.
  

• Like all sponges, Venus' flower baskets are filter feeders. One of the things they filter from the water is silica.

• The sponge has special cells called spicules. The spicules extract silica from the seawater, and then they set the silica bits on top of a wire of collagen protein. So the structure gets built bit by bit, but very delicately. This process is known as biomineralization.

Looking down into the internal cavity of a Venus' flower basket
(Photo from Tecnologia e Desenvolvimento Sustentavel)

• Lots of sponges do this biomineralization thing. What's unique to the Venus' flower basket is the way in which it builds its layers of silica.
  

• The spicules themselves have three perpendicular rays, which gives them 6 points. As the sponge biomineralizes, it forms more spicules. It lays them down, layer by layer, each a few millimeters thick. Between each layer is a thin layer of "organic matrix" that functions like glue. There are seven different types of layers, each arranged concentrically and hierarchically.
  

• Outside the mesh of spicules is another set of cells. Some people call these filaments, some call it a trabecular net, others call it a synctium, still others call it a cobweb. Whatever you call it, these form an outer layer and they get wrapped around the mesh in various orientations: horizontally, vertically, and diagonally.
  

• This outer layer helps to make the structure a little more sturdy, which is very important since glass is very brittle, and this animal's entirely-glass skeleton has to survive at very pressure-heavy depths.

This image gives you a good sense of the underlying mesh and the syncytium that winds around the top of it.
(Photo from Richard L. Howey's page on the Euplectella aspergillum)

• "As yet," says one researcher, "it is not clear how a primitive organism can produce such a complex and optimized structure at all."

• But wait, there's more.

• Inside the mesh is an open cavity where the ocean waters wash through and get filtered. One of the things that floats into the cavity are tiny shrimp larvae.
  

• The shrimp larvae stay in there, eating happily away until one fateful day when they discover they've gotten too big to swim back out again. Sometimes a few get trapped in there, but often it will be a pair, male and female.
  

• So people have made up a quaint little story that the shrimp have found each other and live out their wedded bliss together until death do they part within the chambers of the sponge.

• This is why the sponge is named after Venus, the goddess of love.

• This is also why the Japanese often give each other these sponges (after they've been collected and dried) as tokens of love or as wedding gifts.

• What I find even more fascinating than that sentimental gush is the fact that a sponge which is entirely made of glass can not only survive super-high pressures of 1,000 meter ocean depths, but it can also survive little pincer bites from the pair of shrimp who take up residence inside its body. Tough little cusses, these underwater glass nets.

• And in real life, the shrimp and sponge live symbiotically. The shrimp clean the interior walls of their sponge-cage with their little pincers, and in return, the shrimp get to eat some of the food the sponge takes in.

Shrimp inside a Venus' love basket. Is it eternal love between shrimp, or is it really intraspecies cooperation -- which may itself be a form of love?
(Photo from Fresh Photons)

• Oh, did you think that was all these things can do? No no, my friends. There's still more.

• OK, so the sponge's eggs mature inside the females and get fertilized there, and when they become larvae, they get spewed out of the sponge. Released into the wide ocean, the larvae beat their little ciliae to propel themselves through the water, looking for their new home.
  

• These little freddies can swim for several days, but most tend to find their favorite spot on the ocean floor after about 12 hours. Once they've landed, a tuft of fibers at the end of the animal attaches to the ocean floor, and then they begin developing into adults.

• Here's the jaw-dropping part. That tuft of fibers is not just a mass of weird-looking hairs. The fibers are very fine and very long, sometimes up to 175 meters. Because they're so fine and they're made of silica, their composition happens to be a lot like fiber-optic cables. Exactly the same, in fact. Which means that these funny little hairs sticking out from the end of this animal can trap and transmit light.

Most of the bleached skeletons have lost the little fibers at the end, but here they're intact and very visible. This sponge has tons of those little hairs. Which can act like a fiber optic cable.
(Photo by Ryan Somma, sourced from oneworldoneocean.org)

• Wait, did I say they're exactly the same as our fiber optics? I was wrong. They actually work better than the fiber optic cables we make. And the animals are more efficient at making their fiber optics than we are.
  

• No one is sure if the sponges use their fibers' ability to transmit light for a particular purpose and if so, what that purpose might be. Some researchers speculate that those fibers are how the animal attracts one of its favorite foods, which is algae.
  

• Or perhaps the light is what attracts those shrimp larvae, which are bioluminescent. This theory is that the shrimp see the light from the little hairs and, thinking it's more shrimp, swim inside. Thus the sponge gains its symbiotic partners.
  

• Oh, and by the way, what with those bioluminescent shrimp in there and the fiber optic hairs floating off the bottom, these creatures glow in the super-dark that is the very deep depths where they live.

Like all sponges, these animals have no brain, no nervous system at all, no organs like a heart or stomach or kidney. They don't even have that many types of cells. Yet they build their own bodies in these complex, mathematical shapes, they make their own fiber optic cables, they glow in the dark, and they house a pair of shrimp for life to boot. Pretty incredible stuff.


Sources
Natural History Museum of London, Eupectella aspergillum (Venus' flower basket)
Encyclopedia Britannica, Venus's flower basket
Max Planck Research, Secrets of the Venus' Flower Basket, April 2005
Queensland Museum, Animals of Queensland, Unique features of sponges, Organic & inorganic skeletons
University of Michigan Museum of Zoology, Euplectella aspergillum
Una esponja submarina genera fibras ópticas mejores que las industriales, telecomBLOG
Peter Weiss, Channeling light in the deep sea, Science News Online

Apple #572: Leap Day

This Apple follows hot on the heels of my entry about Cheesiness, but I could not let this Leap Day pass by without talking about it.

I don't want to dig too much into the calendar reasons for Leap Day. My main interest is in finding out, since it is an oddball date on the calendar, what are some especially interesting or unusual that have happened on Leap Days in the past.


People generally associate frogs with Leap Day because of leap-frogging, but I choose the kangaroo.
(Photo from Elverado Junior High School)


The Numbers

• In short, the reason we have Leap Days is because the days need to get rounded off. The Earth takes 365.242199 days to orbit around the sun. Since our calendar doesn't allow for fractions of days, after a while those fractions build up, so we need to insert an extra day.

• If we didn't have Leap Day, after 100 years, our calendar would be out of sync with the planet's position relative to the sun by 24 days.

• It took a while before we got this figured out. Julius Caesar introduced the concept of Leap Year, but he had too many of them in his calendar. We didn't get that problem corrected until about 500 years ago.

Julius Caesar says, "I say, put Leap Day here!"
(Photo from somewhere on this bukisa page)

• All this is, of course, in the Gregorian calendar. Other calendars from around the world have Leap Years of their own too.

• If you don't have a calendar handy, here's how to figure out if year such & such was a Leap Year:
  

1. If the year is evenly divisible by 4, it is a Leap Year except see #2.
2. If the year is evenly divisible by 100, it is not a Leap Year, unless the number is also divisible by 400.

• Or you could just use this calculator.

The Lingo

• If you want to get really fancy when you talk about Leap Year, call it a bissextile year.

• The word doesn't mean anything other than Leap Year. It sounds like it has something to do with the number six because, originally, it did.

• The word comes from the Latin phrase bissextilis annis, which was the Roman way of referring to Leap Year. Except they counted their Leap Year differently than we do. Their Leap Day fell on February 24, and the phrase means "counting backwards to six days before the Calends of March."

• Or you could just remember that it means Leap Year.

• You could get fancy with the lingo another way and say that Leap Day is an example of an intercalary day.

• Intercalary means some sort of addition--a day, a month, an hour; any unit of time but usually a day--inserted into a calendar year.

• It also means, in botany, tissue growing between the upper and lower bracts on a plant stem.
  

• So if you were into grafting, you could graft an intercalary branch onto your favorite plants on the intercalary day of this year.

Except the only use I've seen of intercalary in the botanical sense is like this: a patch of cells that are different from those above and below, not a completely whole branch or stem.
(Image from TutorVista)

• Leap Year itself is a rather strange phrase. I wasn't able to find a definitive explanation for why we call it that, but it seems to be that, due to the addition of the extra day, the next day leaps ahead on the calendar. That is, if this were a non-Leap Year, the 1st would normally fall on Wednesday. But because we insert that extra day before it, the 1st leaps ahead to Thursday.

Notable Birthdays

Only about 0.07% of the world's population is born on Leap Days. Here are a few notable Leap Birthdays:

• 1736, birth of Ann Lee, founder of the Shaker religion.

• 1792, birth of Gioachino Rossini, Italian composer of such enduring hits as The Barber of Seville and William Tell.

Rossini. He's thinking, "Ho ho, I was born on Leap Day. And I write operas. Ho ho!"
(Image from Higher Revelations)

• 1904, birth of a man with 26 first names, each one starting with a different letter of the alphabet and in alphabetical order. Plus his last name was enormously long. His name: Adolph Blaine Charles David Earl Frederick Gerald Hubert Irvin John Kenneth Lloyd Martin Nero Oliver Paul Quincy Randolph Sherman Thomas Uncas Victor William Xerxes Yancy Zeus Wolfeschlegelsteinhausenberdorft Sr. That's actually the shortened version of his last name. At its full length, it weighs in at 585 letters (some sources say 590). He shortened it to Mr. Wolfe Plus 585 Sr.

• His profession? Typesetter.

• Also in 1904, Jimmy Dorsey, jazz saxophonist, composer, and conductor.

• 1916, birth of Dinah Shore, actress, singer, talk show host.

• For all you literary types, in 1920, Howard Nemerov was born.

• Also in 1920, birth of James Mitchell who played Palmer Cortlandt for decades on All My Children.

• 1928, birth of Annie Blanche Banks, except she became a star of the burlesque stage and changed her name to Tempest Storm.

Whew. A lot of photos of Tempest Storm are NSFW. This is a rather tame one (get it? Tame, in spite of the jungle print?) and it's got a bongo drum in it. She's being musical.
(Photo from Holly Graphics)

• 1940, birth of Seattle Slew's trainer, Billy Turner.

• In 1940, Peter Anthony Keogh, the first of three generations born on Leap Day. His son Peter Eric Keogh was born on Leap Day in 1964. Peter Eric's daughter & Peter Anthony's granddaughter, Bethany Wealth Keogh, was born Feb 29, 1996.

• 1944, birth of Dennis Farina, actor, most recently on Law & Order.

Dennis Farina says, "Hey. Don't try to tell me I can't celebrate my birthday each year just because I was born on the 29th."
(Photo from Hollywood Memorabilia)

• In 1948, twins Yuri and Nikolai Pimenov were born. They went on to win the silver medal in the 1976 Olympics for coxless (that means no one is in the boat yelling at them) pair rowing.
  

• 1960, birth of Heidi Henriksen. She was the first of 3 siblings born on consecutive Leap days. In 1964, her brother Olav was born on February 29. In 1968, youngest brother Leif-Martin was born on February 29.

• Lots of hockey players: Lyndon Byers (1964), Simon Gagne (1980), Cam Ward (1984), and Adam Sinclair (1984).

• And football players too: John Niland, Cowboys (1944); Gary Conklin, 49ers (1968); Bryce Paup, Packers and Bills (1968); Fabien Bownes, Bears (1972); Mark Farraway, CFL's Eskimos (1972).

If you get to celebrate the actual anniversary of your birth only every four years, your cake had better be something special like this. This is a vanilla hazelnut cake that one friend made for Katie, who was celebrating her 7th Leap-Year-Day. That thing on the frog's tongue that looks like a bandage is actually a fly.
(Photo and cake by saptally on Cake Central)


Misogynistic Traditions That I Hope Have Died Completely

• In 1960, the first Playboy club opened. Hef chose to open his club on Leap Day, because it is traditionally known as Bachelor's Day.
  

• But this doesn't quite make sense because Bachelor's Day is traditionally when women, who are culturally "not allowed" to propose marriage to men, are on this oddball day allowed to propose marriage and the man is supposed to accept. The bachelor may refuse, but only if he pays a penalty. The penalty varies depending on the country, but in many European countries it was 12 pairs of gloves, so that she will have one pair for each month and will thus be able to hide the fact that she is not wearing a wedding ring.
  

• This tradition goes all the way back to Irish lore when St. Bridget supposedly asked St. Patrick if there could be one day out of the year when women could propose marriage. He agreed, but said it had to be on February 29th.

• Similarly, this day is also sometimes known as Sadie Hawkins' Day, after a character in the cartoon strip Li'l Abner--that cultural bastion of civility. Sadie, renowned for her ugliness, was an inveterate man-chaser. Out of pity or some other equally distasteful response, it was agreed that on February 29, whatever man she was chasing at the time would have to accept her proposal.

• Let's move on.

Actual Historical Events

Some fairly major events took place in African American history on Leap Day. True, February is Black History Month, but it's pretty remarkable that three of the events which are the reason that month was so designated happened on a Leap Day.

• 1968, the Kerner Commission Report was released, which said that the recent riots that had been taking place all across the country were due to "white racism." This may seem patently obvious to us now, but at the time, some people were saying that the riots were fomented by African American political groups in a nationwide conspiracy. The report said that "our nation is moving toward two societies, one black, one white--separate and unequal." It said that major remedies should be undertaken at once, otherwise American society would face continued polarization "and, ultimately, the destruction of basic democratic values."

• In 1972, Hank Aaron signed a contract with the Atlanta Braves for $200K, which made him the highest-paid baseball player at the time. When I first read this, I thought, big deal. But then I remembered, hey, he was African American. That really was a big deal.

Also in 1972, Hank Aaron hit his 649th home run, moving him past Willie Mays on the list of most home runs. He wound up breaking Babe Ruth's record with 755 total in his career, and he still holds the record for the most RBIs: 2,297.
(Photo from This Day in Georgia History)

• 1940, Gone with the Wind was awarded eight Oscars for Best Picture, Director, Screenplay, Cinematography, Art Direction, Film Editing, and Actress. Most exceptionally, Hattie McDaniel was awarded the Oscar for Best Supporting Actress for her portrayal of Mammie. She was the first African American actor ever to win an Oscar.

Here she is accepting her Oscar. I thought you might like to hear her talk without the thick accent she adopted in the movie.

Enjoy your Leap Day to the fullest!


Sources
Collins English Dictionary, bissextile, intercalary
Nancy C. Wooten, Leap Year Round-Up, Orangeburg Times & Democrat
Honor Society of Leap Day Babies, Famous Leapers
ClassicalNet, Gioachino Rossini
Museum of Hoaxes, World's Longest Surname
TheyNow.com, 29th Leap Day
History.com, This Day in History: February 29
Bleacher Report, The 50 Greatest Baseball Players of All Time, December 17, 2009

Apple #571: Cheesy

So the other day I was reading a book and it mentioned a song, "Hazard," by Richard Marx. I said to my friend Joachim, "I don't remember a song called 'Hazard,' do you?" He said he didn't, and after a moment he said, "Didn't he sing one that went like this?" and he began to sing "Whatever it takes / Or how my heart breaks / I will be right here waiting for you."

"Yes, yes, that's right!" I said, cringing in disgust. "Ugh, that song is awful!"

A quick Google search and he'd pulled up the video his phone. Grinning, he held it up so I could see Richard Marx's coiffed hair.



"Ugh," I said, "look at that. The cheese is practically dripping out of your phone, there's so much cheese in that song."

After he realized that his phone was not leaking actual cheese, he laughed. "Yeah, that is pretty much as cheesy as it gets."

That's when the word "cheesy" struck me. "You know," I said. "I like to eat cheesy things. I think they're pretty great, in fact. So I wonder how 'cheesy' came to be a bad thing."

"Huh," he said. "Yeah, I wonder."

Thus another Daily Apple was born.

• The first meaning of cheesy is the good one: "Of or belonging to cheese; abounding in cheese."

French onion soup with Gruyere on top can be ridiculously cheesy.
(Photo and recipe from Closet Cooking)


Of course there's also cheesy pizza.
(Photo from f0o0od.tumblr)


And we certainly can't forget cheesy mac & cheese.
(Photo and recipe from Christy Jordan's Southern Plate)

• See? Abounding in cheese can be pretty fantastic.

• The second meaning of cheesy is a little less appetizing: "Resembling cheese in appearance, consistency, etc."
  

• For whatever reason, the things that have a cheesy appearance seem to more often resemble the cottage cheese variety rather than the hard cheeses. For example, will making soap, the stuff you mix together at one point would take on a cheesy consistency.

• Or, within this meaning, is the pathological sense of cheesy, meaning that something about a person's body is cheesy, or cheese-like. I don't want to gross you out to smithereens, so I won't go into detail. I'll just say, think infections, and move on.

• The third meaning is where we start getting into the slang. My Oxford English Dictionary says that this slang usage of the word meant "fine or showy." They speculate that it derived from the second meaning, resembling cheese. So, still thinking of cheese as a good thing, if you called someone or something cheesy, you'd be saying, hey, that looks pretty fine.

• Their example of the word in context is from 1858. (Specifically, the sentence reads, "To see him at Tattersall's sucking his cane, his cheesy hat well down on his nose." So very British.)

This is the sort of image that comes to my mind with this meaning: a British fellow nattily dressed with a sleek top hat on his head, and rather proud of his appearance too. This guy happens to be W. F. Candy, who in 1910 was the first captain of the University of Pretoria's soccer club.
(Photo from the University of Pretoria)

• This is where the OED entries stop. But here's where the Online Etymology Dictionary comes in. He thinks that our present slang meaning of cheesy, as in "cheap or inferior," is an ironic reversal that came after the "fine or showy" sense.

• You know how it is. For about a generation or so, people use one term to indicate that something is really great. Then the next set of teen-agers come along and they decide that they hate what the previous group thought was great, so they use the same word but to them, it means its opposite. Like how "hippie" at one time meant a person who was iconoclastic, counter-cultural, and daring. Now people use it with all sorts of scorn and derision, meaning a person who is stupidly idealistic, outdated, and also unwashed and therefore a bit dirty.
  

• Similarly, what in 1858 in Britain was fine or showy, in 1896 in the United States was cheap or inferior.

• Some dictionaries also add to this last slang definition, "blatantly inauthentic." To me, that's the one that captures best the true height of cheesiness, the uber-Richard-Marxness of cheese. Total and utter Velveeta, as it were.

Velveeta when unwrapped. Kraft says it is technically "Processed pasteurized cheese food."
(Photo from Paco Does Bacon)

• I suppose that's the fundamental difference in the two general usages of cheesy. The first sense uses actual, for-real cheese and is therefore delicious. The second sense uses processed cheese, Velveeta, American slices which are so not cheese but are rather some congealed mass of oil and other stuff masquerading as cheese. It's icky and full of all kinds of fakery and not good for you. But a lot of people like it anyway.

To get to the slice, you have to peel away the two slices of cellophane. This has always made the pseudo-cheese inside to be just another form of cellophane, only slightly more yellowy and rubbery.
(Photo from--believe it or not--Gourmet magazine)






I couldn't leave you hanging with the bad kind of cheesy. Here's some good cheesy:


This grilled cheese is made with homemade boule bread, sharp Cheddar, Dijon mustard, and about a half teaspoon of horseradish. With butter on the outside so it grills up nicely. Mmmm.
(Photo and recipe from Mad Mad Me)

See also: grilled cheese sandwiches


Sources
My Oxford English Dictionary, without which so many of these entries would not have been possible
Online Etymology Dictionary, cheesy

Apple #570: George Washington

With George Washington's birthday approaching, I thought it might be nice to find out a few facts about the man. Not the stuff you've heard a million times, but maybe a few lesser-known tidbits.


This 1857 engraving of George Washington as a young man shows him with red hair. You never see him with red hair because, in the aristocratic fashion of the day, he either powdered his hair or wore a wig. He is only one of three presidents to date who had red hair (the other two were Thomas Jefferson and Martin Van Buren).
(Photo from Discovery News)


But then, I realized, I know hardly anything about the guy. All I know is, he could not tell a lie about chopping down the cherry tree, he toughed it out in the winter with his troops, and he only reluctantly accepted the office of President and didn't want anyone to treat him like a king. Oh, and he had wooden teeth.

Beyond that, pretty much anything I learn or am reminded of would qualify as lesser-known tidbits. So I'll try to get a broader picture of the man.

• First thing, that cherry tree story? Not true. Made up. Some say the story was told to fill out Washington's biography, others say it was published simply as a way to make money.

The story of George Washington and the cherry tree is best depicted in this sappy cartoon fashion, since the story itself is a lie. Never happened.
(Image from the Beer Barrel)

• Also, that thing about the wooden teeth, that's not true either. He did have dentures--several pair of them, in fact--but none were made of wood. They were made from gold, ivory, lead, human, horse, and donkey teeth, or some combination thereof.

• So what is true about this guy?

• Executive director of the Mount Vernon Estate and Gardens says of George Washington, "Of all the founding fathers, he was the most athletic, the most adventurous and clearly a man of action."

• George came from a wealthy family and owned lots of land. He also owned slaves. Over 100 of them. He said he didn't like the practice of owning slaves, and he often performed manual labor right along with his workers. But he still kept the slaves.

• His first military experiences were with the British Army against the French.
  

• In his first campaign, he led a siege which failed, and he was captured by the French. He was released a few days later, embarrassed but pleased to see his name in the papers.

• In his second campaign, the French and their Native American allies ambushed General Braddock's troops and Washington along with them. Washington was "so ill that he had to use a pillow instead of a saddle," but he fought nonetheless. Washington had two horses shot out from under him, and he got four bullet holes in his cloak, and in the end he had to lead his troops in a retreat.

• In his third assignment, he was sent with 700 troops to patrol the frontier, but half of them were drunks so it didn't go very well and it ended with Washington being sent home with dysentery.

• In 1758, Washington quit the military in frustration and got married soon after.

This painting of George Washington was completed in 1772, during the time when he was living and thriving at Mount Vernon as a landowner. But he is wearing the uniform of his military service prior to that time during the French and Indian War, with the rank of colonel.
(Image from Awesome Stories)

• Martha was a widow when George married her. She had two children by her previous marriage, called Jacky and Patsy. Patsy died just before the Revolutionary War started. Jacky died not long after. By then, Jacky had had children of his own. George adopted two of them, making his grandchildren his children.

• He was, before the Revolutionary War, first and foremost a landowner. He owned thousands of acres (the exact amount varies from one biographer to the next) at his home in Mount Vernon. He oversaw its operations six days a week. His holdings included a flour mill, a blacksmith shop, and kilns. He employed carpenters, masons, coopers (barrel makers), and shoemakers on his property. He had a fishery and peach and apple orchards.
  

• He went visiting among his landowning neighbors and they visited him. He went fox-hunting. He liked to play billiards and cards. He smoked a pipe and took snuff, drank Madeira wine, and punch. He went to concerts and cockfights, circuses and the theatre.

Washington receiving French generals at Mount Vernon. With a home as nice as that, you'd want to get back to it, too.
(Image from the National Archives, sourced from Wikimedia)

• In the run-up to the Revolutionary War, after Washington said he would raise an army of 1,000 men and pay them himself, he became known as a radical rather than a moderate. (Shocking! One of our Founding Fathers a radical!) But though he was against submitting to the will of the British, he was opposed to total independence for several years until the War started.

• During the War, he led his troops in several campaigns, some of which succeeded, some of which failed. But he began to realize that the colonists didn't necessarily need to defeat the British in military battles to win their independence. As long as the resistance was kept alive, and as long as the Continental Congress was able to move from one location and re-form in another, the British would never entirely defeat them.

Here's Washington crossing the Delaware. This is a more grim portrait than the better-known one of Washington with his cloak all flowing, but this is probably a truer picture. It was night time, it was snowing and sleeting, several of the soldiers had no shoes, it was not a fun time. But they sneaked up on the Hessians at Trenton and defeated them. This victory didn't mean a whole lot militarily but it had the effect of greatly boosting the morale of the colonists so that they were able to hold out against the British that much longer.
(Image from the NEH Summer Institute for Teachers)

• So Washington hung on, even though the treasury was empty, the troops hadn't been paid in years and were on the verge of mutiny. The British started too many battles in cities that proved too costly with too few gains and in the end, Cornwallis surrendered.

• After the War, Washington returned to his home in Virgina and set about restoring his plantation. Things were in sorry shape since paper money had dropped in value, they couldn't export anything, and there hadn't been much cash to support the plantation's usual activities. But with a land grant from Congress in payment for his military service, he was able to rebuild. (Another shock! A Founding Father took money from the government to help himself through hard times!)

Washington resigning his position as Commander-in-Chief in 1783. This painting was completed in 1824, so it's probably full of a lot more pomp and personage than was actually present at the time. This is one of 8 paintings by John Trumbull in the Rotunda in the US Capitol building.
(Image sourced from Alex from Selden's My Hero page)

• But the new country was struggling to keep itself organized. Dismayed by various rebellions and upheavals, Washington went back to Massachusetts to get involved in drafting what would become the Constitution.

• He still wanted to go back to his old life at Mount Vernon, but the Electoral College unanimously elected him President. (That's the only time so far that the Electoral College has unanimously elected anyone.)

• He accepted the office, but (here we get the reluctant president part) he was careful not to let anyone treat him like a king or refer to him as royalty, insisting that he be called "Mr. President" rather than "your highness" or the like.

Washington taking the oath of office for the first time, 1789. Said one observer at the Inauguration, "this first of men had read off his address in the plainest manner, without ever taking his eyes from the paper. . . . He was dressed in deep brown, with metal buttons, with an eagle on them, white stockings, a bag, and sword."
(Photo from EyeWitness to History)

• He didn't want to accept the $25,000 salary (that must have been an insane amount of money at that time) because he didn't need the money. But Congress persuaded him to take it to avoid giving the impression that only an independently wealthy man could be president. Would that the same were true today.

• After he put a tax on distilled spirits, which got a lot of people mad, especially people in Pennsylvania, the Whiskey Rebellion happened. Washington personally led troops to put down the rebellion to demonstrate that this new government wouldn't be afraid to enforce the law when necessary. Can you imagine a president marching on the field and leading troops into battle today?

The Whiskey Rebellion, or Whiskey Insurrection. It was a pretty chaotic time in our country's history, and this illustration suggests that Rebellion was rife with chaos, too.
(Image sourced from Salon.com)

• During his presidency, political parties sprang up. He despised political parties, believing that "ideological differences should never become institutionalized. He strongly felt that political leaders should be free to debate important issues without being bound by party loyalty." But he couldn't do anything to stop the formation of the parties.

• He was a two-term president who had his detractors who mainly didn't like his wealthy landowner habits. Some people didn't like that he rented only the best houses, and he rode a coach-and-four (coach pulled by four horses) that were manned by lackeys wearing the finest uniforms. He accepted callers, but after becoming overwhelmed by the number of visitors, he said he would see people by appointment only. He entertained guests at dinner, but by invitation only. Some people thought this was very snooty.
  

• He was asked to serve a third term, but by this time he was really desperate to get back to his home in Mount Vernon, and he said he was done. Setting a precedent that has been followed by scads of presidents ever since, his last act was to grant an official pardon, in Washington's case, of those who had fought against him in the Whiskey Rebellion.

• In his Farewell Address, published in 1796 in newspapers around the country, he spent a lot of time and effort telling people how destructive political parties could be, pitting some people against each other, often not for the good of the country but for their own pursuit of power.

Washington's Farewell Address. In the first part of it, he talks about how he thinks he's justified in turning down the people's request that he serve for a third term. That's what "On His Declining the Presidency of the United States" means.
(Photo from Wikipedia)

. . . they [citizens of this country] will avoid the necessity of those overgrown military establishments, which under any form of government are inauspicious to liberty, and which are to be regarded as particularly hostile to republican liberty.

One of the expedients of [a political] party to acquire influence within particular districts is to misrepresent the opinions and aims of other districts. You cannot shield yourselves too much against the jealousies and heart burnings which spring from these misrepresentations. They tend to render alien to each other those who ought to be bound together by fraternal affection.

[all groups whose real design is to direct, control, or counteract the existing government] serve to organize faction; to give it an artificial and extraordinary force; to put in the place of the delegated will of the nation the will of a party, often a small but artful and enterprising minority of the community; . . . However combinations or associations of the above description may now and then answer popular ends, they are likely, in the course of time and things, to become potent engines by which cunning, ambitious, and unprincipled men will be enabled to subvert the power of the people and to usurp for themselves the reins of government, destroying afterwards the very engines which have lifted them to unjust dominion.

The alternate domination of one faction over another, sharpened by the spirit of revenge natural to party dissension, . . . serves always to distract the public councils and enfeeble the public administration. It agitates the community with ill founded jealousies and false alarms, kindles the animosity of one part against another, foments occasionally riot and insurrection.

• Let me be clear lest anyone take these words and use them to do that political finger-pointing which is so popular online. He's not saying one party is better than another. He's saying it is in the nature of political parties, whatever their stripe, to pit people against each other, to stir each other up to no purpose except to advance the party's own agenda, or the fortunes of one person in particular. Beware any political party, is what he's saying.
  

• He also talked about the importance of maintaining the separation of powers, of religion and morality, of getting along with foreign nations without favoring anybody in particular, and above all, of preserving the union, which even then he saw as prone to factions North vs. South, East vs. West.

• He closed with the following:

I am too sensible of my defects not to think it probable that I may have committed many errors. Whatever they may be, I fervently beseech the Almighty to avert or mitigate the evils to which they may tend. I shall also carry with me the hope that my country will never cease to view them with indulgence and that, after forty-five years of my life dedicated to its service with an upright zeal, the faults of incompetent abilities will be consigned to oblivion, as myself must soon be to the mansions of rest.

• Upon his return to Mount Vernon, he saw that he had a lot of work to do. In his absence, things had slacked off and his plantation was only marginally profitable.
  

Washington back in the saddle at Mount Vernon. This painting is from 1851, decades after Washington was actually there.
(Image from Wikipedia)

• Two years later, he was out inspecting his farm during a snow storm. He woke the next day very ill. The day after that, having been back home at Mount Vernon only two years, he died.

• The country mourned his death for months. Even Napoleon was upset. He ordered his French countrymen to mourn Washington's death for ten days.

• P.S. The story about the cherry tree was published in 1800, the year after Washington died. The public was hungry for more about their cherished leader, and this story about the cherry tree seemed to capture the spirit of what people were feeling about him at the time. So it was resoundingly successful and entered the public imagination as fact.

• P.P.S. It's funny that this made-up story, itself a lie, is known best for the statement, "I cannot tell a lie."
  

You might think that the story about Washington and his cherry tree sprang up from the cherry trees in DC, but that's not so, either. The cherry trees that line the Potomac are not native to the area. The first cherry trees that were planted there were a gift from the Emperor of Japan to Nellie Taft, the wife of President Taft, in 1910.
(Photo from somewhere on Quora)


Sources
Biography.com, George Washington
"George Washington's false teeth not wooden," Associated Press, 2005
The White House, George Washington 1789-1797
George Washington's Farewell Address to the People of the United States, originally September 19, 1796
Mary Trotter Kion, Washington's Cherry Tree, American History @ Suite 101, April 14, 2006
The Apotheosis of George Washington, The Moral Washington: Construction of a Legend (1800-1920s)
John Dyer and Eric J. Gislason, John Trumbull's Republicanism: The First Four Rotunda Murals