Apple #268: Zombies

Your very own Apple Lady might have the chance to be a zombie extra in a zombie movie. Some friends of a friend are supposedly making this movie, and it's one of those things that's so far-flung, I may never hear anything more about it again. But the other night, somebody asked me if I wanted to be an extra in a zombie movie, and I said, immediately, "Yes."


Zombies from Shaun of the Dead
(Image posted by Reeling Reviews)


Part of the reason I want to do this is that certain zombie movies freak me out completely. Not the body-parts-falling-off kind of zombies, but the ones where you don't really know who's a zombie and who's not. I'm talking mainly about the Invasion of the Body Snatchers remake with Donald Sutherland. That movie scares the crap out of me, largely because I've had nightmares -- far worse than any movie -- that involve hard-to-identify zombies who are taking over people's souls.


My nightmares involve trying really hard not to stand out and thus avoid setting off this type of alarm. Oof, terrible.
(Photo from Invasion of the Body Snatchers 1978
posted by creature from the blog lagoon)


Enough revelations about your Apple Lady's psyche. Let's find out about zombies.

• Zombies are re-animated human corpses. They have been brought back to semi-life through some sort of curse, or by some scientifically complex interaction, usually involving nuclear waste. They're usually very stupid.
  

• Zombie movie aficionados will claim that the nearly-dead do not qualify as zombies. Though they may be operating in a befogged, near-mindless state due to some form of possession or illness, they have not died and so they are technically not zombies.

• Philosophers and folks who study human consciousness disagree. The zombies they believe in are only the nearly-dead. In fact, the word "zombie" became a part of Western theoretical discourse in 1974 when a philosopher, Robert Kirk, described creatures looking very much like human beings but lacking consciousness, and applied the term "zombies."

Robert Kirk, now an Emeritus Professor at the University of Nottingham in England, recently published a book about zombies, called Zombies and Consciousness.
(Photo from U of Nottingham)

• The concept of zombies has existed, however, for far longer than that. Haitian voodoo, which is rooted in West African traditions, says that a sorceror, or bokor, can turn someone into a zombie. A law in Haiti condemning zombie creation was enacted in 1835, so lots of people must have been aware of and not liking the zombie thing as long ago as that.

• Most people's ideas about Haitian voodoo and zombies comes from a movie, The Serpent and the Rainbow, which was based on a book of the same title written by then-doctoral student Wade Davis.
  

• Davis went to Haiti to investigate a reported case of zombification and said he discovered that the bokor had given people a powder that was a combination of puffer fish, poisonous toad, jimson weed, and other toxins. The toxins paralyzed people until they appeared to be dead, the people were buried, and when the toxins wore off, the bokor dug them up, and the people believed they had been turned into zombies.

• However, other researchers, from anthropologists to pharmacologists, have scrutinized Davis' research and called it bunk. One of the main flaws in his research -- though not the only one -- is that the amount of paralyzing toxin present in the powder he brought back for analysis is too small to have the effect he claimed.
  

• Regardless of opinions to the contrary, Davis is to this day a respected ethnobotanologist who works for National Geographic Explorer and also gives motivational speeches.

Wade Davis, anthropologist and lecturer-at-large
(Photo from UC Santa Barbara)

Enough of the high-level thought about zombies. In the movies, zombies are generally:

• Slow-moving
• Clumsy
• Expressionless
• Moaning
  
• In search of living human flesh or brains to eat
• Seen traveling in large groups
• In various states of decay
• Contagious; can turn healthy humans into zombies
  
• Difficult to kill, except by decapitating or otherwise destroying the brain, usually in a violent or pyrotechnic manner -- which is kind of strange if you think about it because zombies apparently have very little of the brain at their disposal.

Exceptions to these generalities do exist, of course.


In this game, Stubbs the Zombie in Rebel Without a Pulse, you play the zombie.
(Photo from V's Recommended Games Wiki)


Now here are some notable zombie movies -- notable primarily in the sense that I've seen them, and other people refer to them a lot.

Invasion of the Body Snatchers, 1956

• In black and white, this original movie tells the story of a doctor who struggles to keep his fellow small town residents from being turned into zombies. Mysterious pods arrive and in the pods grow a duplicate of the person who is to be overtaken. Soon, pods are being shipped in to the town by the truckload. The whole thing is a symbol for the McCarthyistic paranoia about Communism.

Invasion of the Body Snatchers, 1978

• This remake uses the whole duplication-by-pod mechanism, but the zombification has more to do with mindless consumerism and the pervasive sense that the post-Watergate United States of the 1970s is bankrupt of emotion and morals.
  

Night of the Living Dead, 1968

• George Romero's classic established a lot of the rules for zombie behavior that most zombie-movie makers followed afterwards. These zombies are created when a NASA satellite, covered in radiation, comes back from Venus.

• He followed this up with more zombie flicks, including Dawn of the Dead, and Day of the Dead.

The Evil Dead, 1981

• Fully utilizing the friends-stuck-in-the-woods ploy and picking people off one by one, this zombie movie is notable for its herky-jerky special effects and its tongue-in-cheek attitude. The friends find the Book of the Dead in the basement, and reading the book unleashes demons that possess the friends one by one. To protect themselves, they must destroy their zombified friends.
  

• Director Sam Raimi made this into a trilogy, including Evil Dead II and Army of Darkness. I can't remember whether it's in the first Evil Dead or the second that the hero cuts off his zombified hand and attaches a chainsaw to his stump and uses that the fight the evil.

Apparently it's in Evil Dead II that his hand becomes zombified and tries to kill him in increasingly wicked and taunting ways.
(Image from Rifftrax forum)


Pirates of the Caribbean: The Curse of the Black Pearl, 2003

• A rare breed: a zombie movie that's also a crowd pleaser with a romantic storyline. The pirate-zombies have been made undead by their unrelenting quest for gold, and only those who pursue their true love with unwavering devotion can escape the pirate-zombie curse. Mercifully cutting the Hollywood shlock is Johnny Depp as the rogue pirate Jack Sparrow. In some ways, he is more in limbo than anyone else in the movie -- and we are grateful to him for it.

• Two sequels followed this one as well: Pirates of the Caribbean: Dead Man's Chest, and Pirates of the Caribbean: At World's End. Let's move along, shall we?

Shaun of the Dead, 2004

• The zombie movie that asks, what happens when a couple of British slackers have to fend off a hoard of zombies? The people who survive the zombies in this film are the ones who know the true value of friendship. Lots of references to classic zombie movies.

Grindhouse, 2007

• The first part of this double feature is an unapologetic zombie extravaganza. Way over the top and aware of it, this movie employs everything -- chainsaws, motorcycles, sawed-off shotguns, syringes that inject paralyzing substances, radiation, vats of chili, and the government. I'm not sure what the zombies represent in this movie. Maybe just plain directorial glee.
  

And of course, right now the latest Resident Evil is playing at a movie theater near you.


(Image from Random Musings)


Movies you wouldn't normally think of as zombie movies but which technically could be include:

• The Monkey's Paw
• The Terminator
• The Hills Have Eyes
  
• End of Days
  
• A Nightmare on Elm Street
  

Here are some lesser-known zombie movies with titles that I especially enjoy:

• Hey You've Got Zombies in Your Backyard
• Better Off Undead: A Zombie Musical
• Guinea Pig: Android of Notre Dame
• Attack of the Mutated Killer Chickens
• Dusk of the Recently Living
• Resident Evil Without Jill
• Botched Surgery
• Breakfast
  

By the way, some of these are shorts that can be found on YouTube.

If you want a bigger list of zombie movies, check out the Zombie Movie Database.

Sources
Monstrous, Zombies Central
Tom Polger, Duke University, Zombies
Brains: On Mind and Related Matter, Kirk Takes Zombies Back, June 25, 2006
Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy, Zombies
Howstuffworks, How Zombies Work
Robert Lawless, review of Wade Davis' The Serpent and the Rainbow, Latin American Anthropology Review, 1989.
Leslie Desmangles, Zombie powder, March 21, 2001

Apple #267: Yom Kippur

I see by my calendar that Yom Kippur is coming up this Saturday. I know that it's a Jewish religious holiday, but I don't know much more about it than that.

• The words "Yom Kippur" mean "Day of Atonement."

• It is considered the most sacred of Jewish holy days, the "Sabbath of Sabbaths." People who don't usually attend services the rest of the year often attend services on Yom Kippur.

• Supposedly on this day, the books of judgment are sealed. Actually, 10 days earlier on Rosh Hashanah, the names of the chosen are written in the Book of Life. On Yom Kippur, that book gets sealed for the year. So this day is your last chance to do all you can to try to get your name entered in the Book of Life.

• To make this happen, you must atone for sins between you and God. That is essentially what the services on Yom Kippur are all about.

• If you want to atone for sins committed between you and another person, you must seek out that person before Yom Kippur, reconcile your differences, and right the wrongs in whatever manner is appropriate. The 10 days between Rosh Hashanah and Yom Kippur are especially reserved for this type of reconciliation.
  

Mushka (age 4) and Rochel Goldman (age 2) help their mother light candles in preparation for Yom Kippur. It is also customary to light candles and bless the challah (traditional bread) the night before Yom Kippur.
(Photo from CrownHeights.info)

• Atonement happens on this day in particular to commemorate the time, back in the day, when Moses yelled at the Israelites for worshiping the golden calf and threw the Ten Commandment tablets to the ground, breaking them. After Moses went up the mountain and sought and gained God's forgiveness, Moses came back to the Israelites with a list of things they should do to atone for their sins. And they had to do these things "for all time."

Moses loses it.
(sourced from Graham Phillips)

• The main thing on Moses' list is to keep a full fast for 25 hours, from sunset the evening before, until nightfall on Yom Kippur.

• Not only are you to abstain from eating or drinking, you should also refrain from
• working
  
• washing and bathing
• anointing your body -- no perfumes, lotions, oils, deodorant, etc.
• wearing leather shoes (presumably because an animal had to die for them)
• any sexual relations

• Current Jewish law has added a couple of exceptions. For health reasons, children under 9 years old and pregnant women are not allowed to fast. Also, if you're especially sick or if you've just had a baby, you could be granted an exception.
  

• In addition to keeping to Moses' list, it is also customary to wear white to symbolize purity of the soul, and to spend most of the day in the synagogue.

• Yom Kippur services generally include a group confession and displaying the holy scrolls of the Torah. Because the scrolls are sacred, out of respect, worshipers stand through the entire service, which is quite lengthy.

• The majority of the service is characterized by repentance and heartfelt prayers for forgiveness.

• The service ends with a very long blast of the shofar, which is a kind of trumpet supposed to be made from a ram's horn. After the shofar blast, the people respond: "Next year in Jerusalem!"

Blowing the shofar at the end of Yom Kippur services
(Photo from Britannica.com)

As I type this, there are five days left until Yom Kippur. . . .


Sources
Judaism 101, Yom Kippur
Holidays.net, The Jewish Holiday of Yom Kippur
Howstuffworks, Yom Kippur

Apple #266: Three Sheets to the Wind

Some of you may have noticed an erroneous post here. I maintain another blog elsewhere, and I accidentally posted an entry I meant to go there onto the Daily Apple. It was, not coincidentally, about being drunk -- on Bell's Two Hearted Ale, by the way, which is my beer of choice when I can find it.

(Ben at SevenPack.net, where this photo comes from,
agrees with my opinion of this way-tasty beer.)

Someone alerted me to blogging my error this morning, and in my reply thanking him, I said, "that's what happens when you're sheets to the wind."

Then, of course, Apple Lady me wondered where that phrase, "three sheets to the wind," comes from.

• It is a nautical term, dating back roughly to the 1820s. Contrary to what I had always thought, "sheets" are not sails but the ropes that secure the sails.

• If the sheets (ropes) are to the wind, they are flapping loose, and so are the sails.

• One or two loose ropes is not great but it is not chaotic either. But three ropes flapping in the wind, that's out of control.

• The ropes and/or sails and/or ship that's out of control is a metaphor for a really drunk person.

• And in fact, the phrase reflects a ratings system that sailors used to use to quantify the level of drunkenness.

• One sheet = tipsy
• Two sheets = sloppy drunk
• Three sheets = reeling drunk
• Four sheets = unconscious
  

On a ship this complicated, if the majority of its sheets were not under control, it would be complete chaos on board.
(Diagram from Power Moby-Dick)


So that's the short answer. But the Apple Lady who likes specifics and who likes to understand things as completely as possible wants to know, is it the ship that's out of control, or is it the sails? I mean, are we meant to see the drunk person as the ship, or the sails? And in what way is the ship out of control -- rolling and pitching? Listing too much to one side? Blown about in any direction whatsoever? I want to know because I want to know how we're meant to see the drunk person: staggering? Wobbling about? Weaving side to side?

• Various sources have offered all of the above and more as the true definition of the phrase. But the answer, I think, will lie in understanding how the ropes (sheets) and sails work on a ship.

• Sheets are not just any ropes, but they are lines used to pull the sails taut (trimmed) or eased to give them slack.

• A boat or ship of small size has two primary sails: the mainsail (pronounced mainsuhl) and the jib (or sometimes the Genoa). The mainsail has one sheet that controls it, and the jib has two sheets that control it.
  

This diagram shows only one jib sheet on this small craft. But there is another jib sheet on the other side of the boat.
(Diagram from Building Sailing Skills)

• And, by the way, the original saying was "three sheets in the wind." Which actually makes more sense, now that I'm learning more about sails and wind and such. But let's press on.
  

• If the sails are not trimmed or slackened appropriately depending on the wind condition, they will luff.

• Sometimes luffing is okay, and it's unavoidable for a bit when the wind changes direction or with a change in boat speed. But the vigilant sailor will adjust the sails, usually by tightening the sheets, when luff occurs, thus keeping the sails in a position to make the most of the available wind.

Luffing, or flapping, means the sails are not making the most efficient use of the wind. See how, in the diagram above, the lines of the sail are wobbly, as opposed to the tight, clean, brisk lines of the sail shown in the diagram below of sailing across the wind, with the sails trimmed appropriately.


(Drawings from MacGregor's How to Sail)

• If luffing continues, or if multiple sails are luffing, that essentially means you're not steering the boat.
  

• And "to the wind" or "in the wind" suggests to me that not only are the sheets loose, but they are completely untied and flapping in the wind.
  

• If one sheet is united, that's not good but probably correctable. Two sheets, it's getting dicey. Three sheets -- which would probably be the mainsail sheet and both jib sheets -- sounds like bad news. This means that the mainsail and jib have absolutely nothing guiding them at all and they are at the complete fancy of the wind.

• So I'm picturing the sails completely slack or sagging, now and then rippled or flopping in a gust of wind. And because the boat is barely moving, it's not skimming over the waves, but it's getting slapped by them and pitching and tossing willy-nilly.

• So a three-sheets-in-the-wind drunk person is still up and about, but he or she is moving almost at random, rolling and pitching, swerving in a way that makes very little sense. Bad news, way-gone drunk.

Looks like this guy and his friends are working on untying their third sheet.
(Photo from The Drunken Blog)

• On a larger ship or a spinnaker, there is a fourth sail, called the spinnaker. It, too, has its own sheet to control it. So, on a larger ship, which is probably what most sailors back in the day were sailing, if all four sails are under zero control, the ship is going to be dead in the water. Not moving. And in drunken terms, this would be unconscious, passed-out. Zip.

For the record, I was not at three sheets. More like two.


This is what sailing is supposed to look like. Whoo, that looks good, doesn't it?
(Photo from Macgregor's Photo Gallery)



Sources
Word Detective, Lemmings Ahoy!
World Wide Words, Three sheets in the wind
The Phrase Finder, Three sheets to the wind
.NET Hobbyist Programmer, Nautical Terminology: Three Sheets to the Wind
Bartleby.com, The New Dictionary of Cultural Literacy, Third Edition, three sheets to the wind
Ask Yahoo! How did the phrase three sheets to the wind come to refer to being drunk?
Wikipedia, Sheet (sailing)
IdiomSite, Three Sheets to the Wind
About.com, What Do You Call the "Ropes" In a Sailboat?
Roger MacGregor, How to Sail
UK-Halsey's Encyclopedia of Sails, Mainsail Trim and Genoa Trim
wikiHow, How to Sail a Boat

Apple #265: Muscle Twitches

I broke my toe about a week and a half ago (right foot, pinky toe) and I've been walking gimpy to keep from putting weight on it or bending it. It's been sore and when I'm sitting, it often feels like the blood is rushing to my foot, so I've had to change my position a lot and find a way to put my foot up off the floor. The past day or two it hasn't hurt as much or as often, though.


I'm not sure whose toe this is, but it's pretty close to what mine looked like about 10 days ago. Best thing to do for a broken toe, by the way, is tape it to the toe next to it.


I looked up how long it takes a broken bone to heal, and the best estimate I found, specifically for toes, was three weeks.

So that's not my question. My question springs from something related to the broken toe. Usually when I have my foot propped up or when I'm lying in bed trying to fall asleep, various muscles in my foot twitch like crazy. Sometimes for as long as ten minutes.

I've been getting muscle twitches elsewhere too, like in the back of my hand where it's all bony and you don't even really think about muscles being there, or another time in some strange tissue deep under my skin, or in my eyelid, or another time, right next to my ear. Little flutters happen in all sorts of places, one after another. It feels almost like tiny little fireworks are going off all over the place under my skin.


Like these, except much, much smaller.
(Photo from a July 4, 2007 entry of The Big Picture)


The muscle twitching has been happening often enough, I'm curious to know, what makes your muscles twitch?

• Some muscle twitching -- especially if it's severe and prolonged -- can be related to neurological problems, or diseases like Parkinson's or Huntington's disease. Thinking of the recent interviews with Michael J. Fox, whose Parkinson's has progressed alarmingly, I know the kind of twitches I'm talking about are nowhere near this league.

• Also, some facial twitching can be accompanied by severe facial pain. This can be a symptom of facial neuralgia. Again, I'm not talking about anything like this.

• I'm also not referring to tics. Tics are brief, rapid, and repetitive involuntary movements, usually involving the face or mouth. Most people think of Tourette's syndrome in conjunction with tics, but people -- primarily children -- can develop tics under many other circumstances. While anxiety can increase the frequency of tics, the true cause or set of causes is unknown.

Still of a person with Tourette's syndrome, from a documentary about Tourette's, called Twitch and Shout

• No, what I'm talking about are low-level, everyday kinds of twitches. Little muscular flutters that can happen in various and sometimes odd little places around the body. If you point them out one of these twitches to other people, most of the time, they can't see it.

• The medical term for these twitches, by the way, is muscle fasciculation.

Sometimes the muscles that twitch are "deep muscles" like the ones indicated here.
(Image from Health.Allrefer.com)

• Occasional, involuntary muscle twitches are most often responses to too much stress. Most commonly, it happens because your nervous system is overwrought by anxiety or lack of sleep, or you have over-exercised and your nervous system is trying to unload its built-up impulses.

• (I think in my case, stress and anxiety are definitely a factor at the moment, and probably since I'm using my foot in weird ways when I walk, odd exercise might be contributing especially to the twitches in my foot.)

• The place where people most commonly experience muscle twitching is around the eye.

(Image from Michelle Miller's marketing blog)

• Usually the twitching occurs during periods of rest, when the body is no longer being required to respond to immediate stress.

• Another thing that can give you the twitches is too much caffeine. By stimulating your system, caffeine can trick your body into thinking it's operating under fight-or-flight / high-stress circumstances. If your body is forced to perform under those circumstances for too long, or at very high levels, your nervous system and muscles will simply get tired and start twitching on you.

• If you get dehydrated, your muscles can twitch as a response. Things that can make you dehydrated include exercise and caffeine.

Too much caffeine can make you twitchy.
(Image from Sovrana Coffee Trading Corporation)

• Other drugs may also have this effect, including estrogens and corticosteroids. Cortisone and Prednisone are two types of corticosteroids. Other types of corticosteroids may be used in inhalants that treat asthma.
  

• What I find interesting here is that when your body is under stress, your pituitary gland releases the body's own version of these drugs, cortisol. When the stress goes away, the cortisol leaves your system. So maybe if you're taking a corticosteroid which mimics cortisol, your body thinks it's under stress and sets the muscles twitching? That's just my guess.

• Sometimes deficiencies in various minerals or vitamins may be the cause. It's hard to know exactly which mineral or vitamin may be in short supply, though. Taking a supplement or eating foods that include the following components may help:

• Potassium (bananas) and magnesium (nuts) help to control muscles and the nerves that live in them. This is why Gatorade and other sports drinks contain potassium.

• Calcium (dairy, figs) is also necessary for muscle control, and it is important for muscle growth, something that happens as a result of exercise.

• Vitamin B12 (meat, dairy, fish) helps to calm the nervous system and, in my experience, can help to set a lot of things back in balance. Doctors often give B12 to people who are malnourished, or who have lately overdone it with the alcohol.

Eating these foods may help you fight off the shakes.
(Image from Medline Plus)


So it sounds like the best thing to do when my muscles are twitching like a pack of otters under my skin is try to relax and drink a lot of water. And maybe eat a few pieces of cheese for good measure.


By the way, my favorite quote from that Michael J. Fox interview (see above link) is this:

Everything is a slippery slope. Getting up in the morning is a slippery slope.

Sources
Diagnose Me, Muscle Cramps / Twitching
Medline Plus Medical Encyclopedia, Muscle twitching
Health Scout, Muscle cramps
Carol & Richard Eustice, The Facts of Corticosteroids, About.com, May 26, 2006
Encyclopedia of Medical Disorders, Tic disorders
Georgetown University Hospital, Magnesium in diet
BCHealthFiles, Food Sources of Calcium and Vitamin D
Health for the earth, Healthful Calcium Sources
NutriStrategy, Vitamin B12 - Sources and Functions

Apple #264: Rubber Duckies

Some pretty unpleasant things have been happening in my personal life lately. Unlike other bloggers, I don't want to go into details here. Suffice to say, it's sad.

Some time has passed and I'm able to contemplate making more Daily Apples. But it's been hard to come up with an idea. So I tried to think of a topic that is the exact opposite of sad. First thing that came to mind: rubber duckies.



(Image from Wikimedia)


I mean, how much more innocuous does it get?

Maybe part of the reason this came to mind so quickly is that my previous entry was something from Sesame Street. Regardless, the first thing to say about rubber duckies is that they were Ernie's favorite toy and the subject of another hit Sesame Street song. (It's just a little too cutesy for me to post here. But if you want to watch him sing his song, here it is on YouTube.)


Then I found this other little tidbit about some rogue rubber duckies that have been traveling the world's oceans since 1992:

• A cargo ship departing from China lost its container of 29,000 bath toys -- plastic yellow ducks, blue turtles, red beavers (I know), and green frogs -- in January 1992. The toys have been bobbing in the ocean ever since.

• Because they are so much easier to spot than the current-tracking floats scientists typically use, people are more likely to report seeing them, and thus scientists have collected some especially interesting data about currents thanks to the floating rubber duckies.

• In fact, they had been in the ocean so long and sightings of them had become so valuable that by 2003, the US company that had them made, The First Years Inc., was offering a $100 US savings bond reward to anyone who found them. (That offer ended in December of 2003)

• By June 2007, the toys had traveled an estimated 17,000 miles. Here are some of the highlights of their journey:

(Diagram from the Daily Mail)

• January 1992 - shipwrecked in the Pacific Ocean, off the coast of China

• November 1992 - half had drifted north to the Bering Sea and Alaska; the other half went south to Indonesia and Australia

• 1995 to 2000 - spent five years in the Arctic ice floes, slowly working their way through the glaciers

• 2001 - the duckies bobbed over the place where the Titanic had sunk

• 2003 - they were predicted to begin washing up onshore in New England, but only one was spotted in Maine

• 2007 - a couple duckies and frogs were found on the beaches of Scotland and southwest England.

This is Curt Ebbesmeyer, who's been tracking the bath toys since they busted loose in 1992.
(Photo by W. James Ingraham of NOAA, sourced from The Lede)

• In all, roughly 125 of the toys have been found, nearly all in Alaska. Though some were a bit mangled, most were only sun- and salt-bleached.

• If you think you've found one of the world-traveling rubber duckies, look for the words "The First Years" stamped on it. If it doesn't say that, it's not one of this lot.

Now here are some general facts about rubber duckies:

• Rubber ducks are believed to have been made sometime in the early 1800s. They did not squeak, and they were made of actual rubber, which made them less than flexible and would probably hurt if you threw one at another kid's head.

• Rubber ducks today are made of vinyl plastic that looks like rubber, but is more flexible and durable (the world-traveling rubber duckies being a good demonstration of their durability).

• Rubber ducky races are held frequently as a means of raising money for charity.

The launch of a Derby Duck Race in 2006 for Montgomery Hospice in Rockville, Maryland.
(Photo from Montgomery Hospice.org)

• One of these races, the Derby Duck Race in Tempe, Arizona, is coming up on September 15.

• People will purchase the right to race one of 20,000 rubber duckies across Kiwanis Lake.

• The person whose duck reaches the other side first will win four round-trip tickets anywhere in the United States from US Airways.

• Proceeds will benefit the Make-a-Wish Foundation which helps children with life-threatening medical conditions.

• So if you're going to be in Tempe, Arizona on September 15, go race a duck!

If you want to play some wacky online rubber ducky games, try Rubber Duck Land.com. I especially recommend the Pin the Beak on the Ducky game -- but be sure to move the beak to all sorts of places and very fast to experience the true cacophony.


Sources
Ben Clerkin, "Thousands of rubber ducks to land on British shores after 15 year journey," Daily Mail, June 27, 2007
Simon de Bruxelles, Plastic duck armada is heading for Britain after 15-year global voyage," Times Online, June 28, 2007
"Rubber Duckies Map the World," CBS Evening News, July 31, 2003
Peter Ford, "Drifting rubber duckies chart oceans of plastic," The Christian Science Monitor, July 31, 2003
Seabean, Plastic Duckies aka Rubber Duckies
Rubaduck, Rubber Ducks Circumnavigate the Globe, August 21, 2007
Rubber Ducks.org

Apple #263: Sesame Street, Pinball Number Count

I have a certain song in my head right now. It arrives often. It's an old, old friend.

This one is a medley of several of the skits put together.

And this version highlights Number 7.


One of the things I remember for sure is how the blimp at the very end never makes it to the right edge of the frame. Every time I'd watch and hope, but of course, every time it would stop just short of the frame. Maybe in heaven, that will be one of the things that gets completed and I will sigh and say, "Ah, thank you."


THE SONG

• The song's official name is Pinball Number Count and was released in 1972.

• It was performed by The Pointer Sisters -- all four of them.

• Although the song is meant to teach children to count from 1 to 12, and there are different variations for each number, they never made a version for the number 1.

• Music and lyrics were composed by Walt Kraemer.

• Kraemer worked for a company called Imagination Inc., which was based in San Francisco. He says, "forgive me if I'm a bit hazy as to some of the particulars" about how the song was conceived.
  

• Originally, Mr. Kraemer said, he wanted to write a song in 12-4 or 12-8 time, but that didn't work out.

• He also said he wasn't aware, until the song was completed, that they had used the first five notes from the Woody Woodpecker Song.

THE ANIMATION

• Jeff Hale was the director and main creator of the animation.

• Hale studied at England's Royal Academy of Art before co-founding the San Francisco-based Imagination Inc. animation company with his wife, Margaret.

• Imagination, Inc. produced several animations for Sesame Street, including
• There Are Chickens in the Trees
• Consonant Poem
• Typewriter Guy (at least the R - Rope short)
  
• Harry the Horse
• Edgar Turtle sings "Hey Diddle Diddle"
• Over, Under, Around and Through
• The Ringmaster, #4
• R for Rhinoceros
• S for Snail
• W for Witch
  

• I have to say, while many of these are slightly odd and funny, none of them approach the funkeriffic-ness that is the Pinball Number Count.

• Other animations Hale has directed or helped produce include The Charlie Brown and Snoopy Show (Academy Award nominee), Here Comes Garfield (Academy Award nominee), Thank You Mask Man, and several episodes of Transformers.
  

Family Guy parodied the Pinball Number Count, briefly. I'm surprised to see that they seem to have used the original Pointer Sisters soundtrack.

If you want to own the Pinball Number Count to watch over and over, you can buy it on this collection of gems from the first five seasons of Sesame Street, which is from 1969-1974.

Sesame Street - Old School, Vol. 1 (1969-1974)
is a 3 DVD set and can be yours for $26 from Amazon.


You can also learn how to make a clock that looks like the one at the beginning of the video, from Instructables.com.

What your own Pinball Number Count clock could look like
(Photo from Instructables.com)


Sources
Ninjatune, Solid Steel Presents Sesame Street
Ballofstringtheory, A Letter from Walt Kraemer, September 10, 2003
"ASIFA-SF Co-Founder Margaret Hale Dies," AWN, February 24, 2003
Curious Artist, Walt Kraemer's Pinball Number Count, May 4
IMDB, Jeff Hale (II)
Milk and Cookies, Pointer Sisters: Sesame Street Pinball Number Count
JocTV, Pinball Song #6 - Sesame Street
daddytypes.com, Sesame Street "Jazzy Spies," August 30, 2006
Q Daily News, The Pinball Number Count Lives! April 19, 2006
Webomatica, Deconstructing Sesame Street Animations, December 26, 2006
Moviegrooves, C is for Cookie
Press Release Network, "Rob Coleman, Animation Director for Star Wars Episode I: Phantom Menace Gives Keynote Address," October 16, 1999
Muppet Central Forum, Sesame Street Fairy Alphabet
Muppet Wiki, various episode entries

Apple #262: Chuck Woolery

Let me just get this out of the way: I watch the Game Show Network. Before I had cable, I hooted with disbelief that there was such a channel and that anyone would watch it. Now that I have cable, I watch. That's TV, I guess.

But there's a new game show on that channel, called Lingo. I like word games, and this is a pretty good one. And I have to admit, one of the reasons I like it is that it's hosted by Chuck Woolery. He does look like he's done a bit of hard living. But he still seems to be pretty relaxed up there and when he laughs, it doesn't seem fake. Or at least, most of the time it doesn't. Which is more than I can say for most game show hosts. And I liked that other word game show he did for a while, Scrabble. I liked the sound effects.

His thing is to say, before a commercial, "We'll be back in two and two," and he holds up two fingers, palm facing the camera, then flips his hand around and back again. It refers to the amount of time of one commercial break: two minutes for the commercials plus one second before and one second after.


Chuck, now
(Photo from Game Show Network)


So let's find out a little more about Chuck Woolery. But first, just to get us oriented a bit, I'll list the TV shows he's hosted.


Chuck, then, in his Wheel of Fortune days
(Photo from Gameshow Galaxy)

• Your Hit Parade (1974)
  
• Tattletales (1974)
• Wheel of Fortune, as the original host before Pat Sajak (1975-1981)
• The $1.98 Beauty Show which was a lot like the Gong Show (1978-1980)
• Love Connection (1983-1994)
• Scrabble (1984-1990, 1993)
• Playboy Playmate Playoffs (1986)
• The Dating Game (1998-2000)
• Ultimate Fan Search (1999)
  
• Greed (1999-2000)
• Lingo, co-hosted by Shandi Finnessey, who was Miss America 2004 (2002-present)

He's also appeared on a few episodes of Hollywood Squares.


If you've never seen it, this picture gives you an idea of the format of The Love Connection. It was like letting you be the fly on the wall in a video dating service. You got to watch people's video ads, then hear the couple talk about what their date was like. Sometimes it didn't go well at all, and sometimes, as in this episode, the couple hit it off.
(Photo sourced from Neil Kramer's blog, Citizen of the Month)


Other TV shows where he has appeared include:

• Melrose Place, 2 episodes
• 227, 1 episode
• It's Garry Shandling's Show, 2 episodes
• Late Night with David Letterman, 1 episode
  
• CHiPS, 1 episode
• Love, American Style, 1 episode in 1973
  
• The Tonight Show Starring Johnny Carson, 1 episode in 1972
  
• New Zoo Revue as Mr. Dingle the toothless mailman, 1972
  

Here's a sample of the show Scrabble. I picked this one because you get to hear a lot of the sound effects, and also the guy Rick is a bit of a nut. With his tarantula.

Now here are some facts about Chuck's life outside of TV:

BEFORE THE SHOWS YOU KNOW

• Chuck's full name is Charles Herbert Woolery.

• He was born in Ashland, Kentucky on March 16, 1941.

• He joined the US Navy and afterwards, went to college in Kentucky.

• Post-college jobs included off-shore tuna fishing and working as a sales rep for Pillsbury.

Making use of his long-time love of fishing, Chuck has a DVD on bass fishing techniques.

• He finally decided to be a singer and songwriter and moved to Nashville. With Elkin "Bubba" Fowler in a pop duo called The Avant Garde, he wrote and performed a song called "Naturally Stoned." The song hit #40 on the Billboard charts in 1968.

• In 1972, after leaving Fowler and carrying on with a solo singing act, he appeared on the Johnny Carson show as a singer. Merv Griffin approached him after the show and asked if he'd ever thought about being a game show host. That conversation ultimately led to Woolery being signed as Wheel of Fortune's first host.

• In 1981, shortly after Woolery had been divorced from his second wife, Jo Ann Pflug, he asked Griffin for a raise from $300,000 to $500,000. Griffin gave Woolery the boot and Pat Sajak his job.

• Two years later, Woolery was hosting The Love Connection, the dating show for which he is best known.

I tried to find out what made him look so haggard, like maybe was he a big drinker or something once upon a time. I couldn't find anything that said either way. So maybe the four wives and eight kids and the quadruple bypass is what accounts for it.

AFTER

• In 1996, he had quadruple-bypass heart surgery.
  

• In an interview from about four years ago, he said he reads the Bible every morning.

• He's on his fourth marriage, and he has 8 children, two of them twins and one son adopted.

• 1st wife: Margaret Hayes. One of their three children, Chad, died in a motorcycle accident at age 19, in 1986.

• 2nd wife: Jo Ann Pflug, best-known for The Fall Guy

Jo Ann is on the far right
(Photo from TV Magazine.com)

• 3rd wife: Teri Nelson, step-granddaughter of Ozzie and Harriet Nelson of early TV fame

• 4th wife: Kim Barnes

Wedding photo from Chuck's fourth marriage in July 2006
(Photo from People)


I also found Chuck's MySpace page. On this page, he says he's only been married three times. Since his fourth marriage took place in 2006, he either hasn't updated his profile recently, or . . . something. He also talks a lot about how much he likes his Lingo co-host, Shandi.


Chuck and Shandi in a Lingo promo shot
(Photo from TV.com)


Here are some, er, highlights from his profile:

Combining strong looks with casual wit and unbounded charm, I have since become one of the most respected and liked game show hosts in the business.

[I'd like to meet] more future Lingo contestants so I can secretly ridicule their stupidity on the show.

In the shows I've seen, he's usually pretty complimentary of the players who whip through the puzzles in no time flat. But apparently when the camera isn't rolling, it's another story.

Supposedly, the Guinness Book of World Records says that the biggest Bobble-head doll is of Chuck Woolery. I leave you to draw your own conclusions.


Later addition:
By the way, lots of people have been searching the web to find out who is the politician who appeared on The Dating Game in 1972. Actually, this person is now a governor, and he was on The Dating Game in 1974.

See this You Tube clip.


Sources
Internet Movie Database (IMDB), Biography for Chuck Woolery
TV.com, Chuck Woolery
NNDB, Chuck Woolery
"Chuck Woolery...still making love connections," Askmen.com
Wikipedia, Chuck Woolery
filmreference.com, Chuck Woolery Biography

Apple #261: Wilkes-Barre, PA

The other night, I was out with a few friends, and someone mentioned the city of Wilkes-Barre, Pennsylvania. I don't remember why it came up, I just know that it did. And then -- well, I'll give you the details in dialogue form because the pronunciation is important.

ALBERTINA: . . . all the way to Wilkes-Bar.

BRIGID: It's Wilkes-BARRIE, you dolt.

ALBERTINA: ha-ha, (dripping with sarcasm) Wilkes-Barrie. I don't think so. It's Wilkes-BAR.

BRIGID: No, it's not. It's Wilkes-BARRIE. I've known two people from there, one my cousin's friend who was born there and moved away, and another was a friend of my brother's who was also born and lived there until he was five, and they both pronounce it Wilkes-BARRIE.

ALBERTINA: Really?

BRIGID: Yes. Really. It's the same way people from Lancaster pronounce it LANG-kustir.


Wilkes-Barre is in the northeast corner of Pennsylvania, almost directly west from the pointy part on the NE edge of the state.
(Map from the Weekend Guide)


So I had to find out. Is it true what Brigid says? Because I have always thought of it as Wilkes-BAR. And why is the name hyphenated, anyway? Did it get married and choose hyphenation?

• The American Heritage Dictionary says it should be pronounced Wilkes-BARRIE.

• The website called "You know you are from Pennsylvania when" says that Pennsylvanians pronounce it Wilkes-BARRIE.

• And the AP newswire says it should be pronounced Wilkes-BARRIE. That settles it. Wilkes-BARRIE, it is. The AP folks do their research.

Other "mispronunciations" by residents

• Lebanon, Pennsylvania: Leb-a-NON
• Schuylkill County, Pennsylvania: SKOO-kul
• Ghent, West Virginia: JENT
• Talladega, Alabama: Tall-a-DIG-ah
• Louisville, Kentucky: LOU-uhvul
• Des Plaines, Illinois: DEZ PLAINS (as opposed to the French DAY PLAHN)
• Dumas, Arkansas: DOO-mus
  
• El Dorado, Kansas: el dor-AY-doh
  
• Moscow, Idaho: MOSS-koe
• Spokane, Washington: spoh-CAN

Some pronunciations people might think are incorrect, but they are said this way because that's how the British said them to begin with:

• Worcester, Massachusetts: WUH-stir
  
• Reading, Massachusetts: RED-ing
• Stoneham, Massachusetts: STONE-em
• Greenwich, Connecticut: GREN-ich
  

However, the folks in Reading, Pennsylvania, pronounce their town REED-ing.

Here are some other towns with the same name that are pronounced differently depending on what state you're in:

• Monticello (Jefferson's home in Virginia): Mont-ih-CHELL-oh
• Monticello, Minnesota: Mont-ih-SELL-oh

• Lafayette, Louisiana: Lah-fee-ET
• Lafayette, Georgia: Luh-FAY-ette

• Beaufort, South Carolina: BYOO-furt
• Beaufort, Missouri: BOH-furt

• Cairo, Egypt: KYE-roh
• Cairo, Ohio: KAY-roh
  

But, I should say in response to all of this, that in the case of proper nouns, the correct pronunciation is that which the owner of the name wants you to use. So if the town wants to be called Wilkes-Barrie, then so be it. And if Brett Favre wants to be called Brett Farv, that's correct too.


Oh, and I found out the origin of the name Wilkes-Barre (pronounced Wilkes-BARRIE). It's actually kind of interesting: a thumb to the nose of the British king.

• Wilkes-Barre was named after two people, John Wilkes and Isaac Barre.

• Isaac Barre was the son of a French refugee (who probably pronounced his name BAR), and was a lawyer in Dublin, Ireland until he joined the English army in 1746. After various commissions, he was sent to the Colonies (the US, today) in what is now Pennsylvania.
  

• John Wilkes was a politician in England who spoke up for the rights of the Colonists.

• Barre liked what Wilkes stood for and when he went back to England, a Lieutenant-Colonel, he supported Wilkes in a speech to the House of Commons.

• Barre got dismissed from the Army with loss of his rank and Wilkes lost his seat in Parliament for saying things unpopular with the British government.

• Back in the fledgling Pennsylvania, the mayor of a just-forming town started referring to his residence in his letters as Wilkesbarre, in honor of his friend and his friend's sympathizer across the ocean.

• People started writing letters back to England using the name Wilkesbarre, mainly as a way to tick off the English, and the name stuck.

Who knew that Wilkes-Barre, Pennsylvania was the site of such controversy? Yeah, I know. Wilkes-Barrians.


Sources
American Heritage Dictionary, Wilkes-Barre
Palmyra, PA, You know you are from Pennsylvania when
City Data, General US Forum
AP News Pronunciation Guide, A-E, E-M, N-Z
Wilkes University, History, Naming Wilkes-Barre

Apple #260: Yo-Yos

I was on the phone with a friend of mine the other day, and he mentioned yo-yos. I hadn't thought about yo-yos in years.


Mini glitter yo-yos in Halloween colors.
(Photo from Costume Express)

• The oldest known yo-yos are from 550 BC. According to paintings on Greek vases, Greek boys were given yo-yos, probably at coming-of-age ceremonies.

• In the 1700s, yo-yos were called "quizzes."

• In the 1800s, yo-yos were called "bandalores."

• The first actual yo-yo was manufactured in 1928 by Pedro Flores, who was from the Philippines, where they called quizzes and bandalores "yo-yos." In Tagalog (language of the Philippines), the word means "come come," or "come back."

 

Pedro Flores, with one of his yo-yos that he manufactured in the United States
(Photo from Yo-Yos.Net)

• Four years later, Donald F. Duncan bought Pedro Flores' yo-yo business and started making more yo-yos, and in more styles and of various materials, but primarily wood.

• By 1962, due to Duncan's switch to plastic and with the help of TV commercials, yo-yos skyrocketed in popularity.

• In 1965, a lengthy court battle over whether the word "yo-yo" could be trademarked resulted in Duncan losing the right to trademark the term, and the subsequent bankruptcy of both Duncan and the company that sued it.

• In 1968, a company called Flambeau bought the rights to Duncan-brand yo-yos. They are the ones who make Duncan yo-yos today.

 

Diagram showing how plastic yo-yos are made
(Image from How Products Are Made)

• The longer you can get a yo-yo to "sleep" or spin at the end of its string without winding back up the string, the more tricks you can make the yo-yo do. So people have made lots of innovations to yo-yos over the years, mainly to make them sleep longer and to make it easier for people to perform tricks with them.

• Some of the innovations have included changing the spindle in the middle from wood to metal, thus reducing the friction.

• Another innovation was inverting the two outer halves of the yo-yo so that the bulk of the material was on the outside and less material on the inside (the Butterfly).

 

This is John, and he did some of his own experiments about how to increase a yo-yo's sleeping time.
(Photo from PBSKids)

• More recent innovations have included adding ball bearings, as well as a clutch. Yo-Yos are getting almost as complicated as cars!

• Currently, the favorite type of yo-yo among champion yo-ers is called the freehand. In this model, the yo-er does not loop the end of the string around the finger but instead holds a counterweight (like a six-sided die). This helps keep the string taut but not to the point where the yo-yo wants to snap back up the string. In addition, the yo-er can move or drop or adjust the counterweight as needed while performing a series of tricks.

The Duncan Freehand Zero,
(Photo from Product Wiki)

• A long-time competitive yo-champion is Stephen D. Brown, who worked at Duncan for years and patented several new yo-yos. He has since left Duncan and is pursuing a full-time career in yo-yo performance.

Here is a video of one of Steve Brown's performances. It's pretty entertaining. And, when you realize that with the exception of when he clutches the yo-yo in his fist, the yo-yo is spinning the entire time, it's quite impressive.

But then, this guy, Hiroyuki Suzuki, the 2006 World Yo-Yo Champion, kicks Mr. Brown's ass.

[edit: I'm not sure what video I had originally posted here, but it went away. This may not be the same video, but it is Hiroyuki Suzuki, showing off his unreal yo-yo skills.]

• You can buy a Duncan yo-yos today for anywhere from $3.49 for the Butterfly or the Imperial to $21.49 for the FH (Freehand) Zero.

Sources
Duncan Yo-Yos
Lucky Meisenheimer's Yo-Yos.Net
Tom Harris, Howstuffworks, "How Yo-Yos Work"
Peter Weiss, "Reinventing the Yo-Yo," Science News Online, April 17, 2004

Apple #259: Skull Removal

I know, this one sounds gory and maybe fantastic. And for some readers, it might be too gory. But it comes from a genuine concern and a medical question.

About a month ago I think it is now, a friend of a friend suffered a fairly severe stroke. She was taken to the hospital and despite their efforts to stop or slow the stroke, the pressure in her brain continued to build. To keep anything else from rupturing and causing irreparable damage, the surgeons operated and removed a portion of her skull to relieve the swelling.

She survived the stroke, has regained consciousness, and is able to talk. She still has problems with motor coordination in her right arm, sometimes she can't identify what day it is, and once she was convinced she was in Panama. She will have to go through a pretty long and probably arduous course of physical therapy before she will be able to return home. But the removal of part of her skull seems to have prevented even worse damage and, perhaps, her death.

In asking people about how she is doing, I also burn with curiosity to know about this opening in her skull, and the bit that was removed. These are not the sort of questions you can ask people who are wound tight with worry over her survival and her basic abilities to function. But still, I want to know, does she still have a hole in her skull? Some equally concerned and curious friends have suggested that maybe her skull will mend itself, the way a broken leg can knit itself. I'm skeptical about this, but I really don't know the answer. Other friends said the doctors kept the piece of skull they removed and at some point will put it back in, and that piece will knit to the rest of her skull. But where do you keep a piece of skull? And how long do they wait before putting it back in?


STROKES

• The term "stroke" means that something has happened in the brain to disrupt blood supply. That disruption in turn causes brain cells to suffer damage or die. There can be a lot of different kinds of strokes, occurring due to many different causes.
  

• Because strokes can vary quite a lot from one patient to another, some procedures are more appropriate than others given the type of stroke that has occurred.

• Most strokes are called ischemic strokes. In these, a blockage or a clot occurs in a brain blood vessel, and that obstructs blood flow.
  

Diagram of an ischemic stroke, showing the site of blockage up close and the damage to surrounding cells.
(Diagram from University of California, San Francisco Neurovascular Medical Group)

• In my friend's case, she had the far less common variety, a hemorrhagic stroke. In this type, a blood vessel actually bursts, and blood flows out into the surrounding tissue. This can cause damage to the nearby tissue which is not getting its necessary oxygen and nourishment.
  

Diagram of a hemorrhagic stroke, showing the site of rupture up close and bleeding at the surrounding tissue.
(Diagram from University of California, San Francisco Neurovascular Medical Group)

• In addition, the blood pouring out of the ruptured vessel begins to fill the brain cavity and puts pressure on the surrounding tissue.
  

• Left untreated, the buildup of blood can put so much pressure on the brain that it no longer fits comfortably within its protective coverings of the tough but flexible dura and the far less flexible skull surrounding that. Under such pressure, the brain can shift or re-settle within the dura, seeking more space. That re-positioning can force the all-critical brain stem to move and sometimes twist along with it. If such twisting occurs, blood flow to the brain can be cut off, resulting in extensive and severe neurological damage, and sometimes even death.

TREATMENT OPTIONS

• Methods of treating stroke vary depending on the type of stroke, as well as the extent of the damage at the time the patient arrives for care.

• Medications can be used to reduce the patient's blood pressure and so reduce the bleeding. Other very specific types of drugs can reduce swelling in the brain; and anti-seizure, anti-anxiety, and even more familiar pain relievers can be used to reduce any associated spasms, anxiety, or headaches.

• Many surgical methods of stopping the bleeding are also available. A surgeon can insert a clip (I picture this looking like those black office supply clips, but I'm sure they're far more sophisticated than that) over the site of the bleeding, essentially applying a tourniquet. They can also remove the piece of damaged blood vessel and replace it with healthier tissue. If a blood clot has formed, they can remove the clot itself and thus reduce the swelling that way.

Diagram of a surgical clip being placed at the neck of a ruptured blood vessel in the brain to stop the bleeding. (From the San Diego Neurosurgical Medical Clinic)
I knew it had to be more sophisticated than one of these:

• But in some cases -- apparently very severe cases, and when the patient's age and other factors would help him or her to recover sufficiently -- surgeons decide that the only way to reduce the swelling fast enough is to remove a piece of the skull. This is what the doctors decided to do in my friend's case.

DECOMPRESSIVE CRANIECTOMY

• The medical term for the procedure used in my friend's case is decompressive craniectomy: "cranium" referring to the skull, and "-ectomy" or "-otomy" indicating surgical removal.
  

• Surgeons practiced craniectomies as far back as the 1800s, but the technique became used less and less often when doctors believed that it resulted in too much damage, and that less invasive techniques might be preferable.

• It never fell entirely out of use, though, since emergency surgeons continue to use it as a last-ditch effort to assist victims of severe head injuries. Now some neurosurgeons who treat strokes are beginning to perform more craniectomies again.

• Specifically, here are the steps:

• Surgeon removes a part of the skull to relieve pressure.

• To provide some protection over the opening, the scalp is sewn to the dura, the inner membrane under the scalp. This allows some flexibility to accommodate any additional swelling, but also provides some protection to the exposed area.

• After the crisis of the stroke has passed, it can take about three months for the swelling in the brain to subside. The dura is left sewn to the scalp during those three months, and the patient may also wear a helmet for that time period.

• The piece of skull is kept in one of two environments to ensure that the bone marrow survives so that it can knit with the remainder of the skull later. One option is to keep the piece of skull frozen. Another option is to surgically place the skull in the patient's abdomen, in between the layers of muscle and fat. This keeps the piece of skull alive and healthy and acclimated to the patient's body.

• After the swelling has subsided, the piece of skull is either unfrozen or removed from the patient's abdomen, and re-inserted in its former place.

(Image from the Detroit Medical Center, sourced from Wayne State Medicine)


Bizarre, isn't it? But it's true.

Roy, of Siegfried & Roy, underwent this very surgery, following his near-fatal mauling by a white tiger. Surgeons removed about 1/4 of the right side of his skull to reduce pressure on his brain following lots of internal bleeding. They put the removed part of his skull into a pouch and inserted it into his abdomen. Nearly a year later, and after they had re-inserted the piece of bone into his skull, he had recovered enough to return home. He can now speak and write and walk with a cane.


Roy Horn in February 2005, a year and a half after the tiger attack and decompressive craniectomy.
(Photo from the Las Vegas Review-Journal)


By the way, this friend of mine is a long-time and deeply committed smoker. It is also a fact that smoking seriously increases your risk of getting strokes. Which means that quitting smoking will do a lot to help you avoid going through something like this yourself. The same could be said for not provoking any white tigers.


Sources
Pamela Linton, "Time and Space Heal Head Injuries," Wayne Medicine 1999
Ricker, Polsdorfer MD, Emory Healthcare, Surgical Procedures for Stroke, 2007
Treatment of Hemorrhagic Stroke at Mayo Clinic
Stroke from MayoClinic.com, reprinted at CNN's Health Library, July 5, 2006
"Hemicraniectomy for Subarachnoid Hemorrhage from a Giant Middle Cerebral Artery Aneurysm," Mount Sinai Clinical Program for Cerebrovascular Disorder, 2007
Tazbir et al., Decompressive Hemicraniectomy With Duraplasty: A Treatment for Large-Volume Ischemic Stroke," Medscape abstract, September 27, 2005
Ketter et al., "Outcome of patients after hemicraniectomy in malignant middle cerebral artery infarction after first rehabilitation," DGNC meeting abstract, April 23, 2004
Attia et al., "Decompressive Hemicraniectomy as a Lifesaving Procedure in Severe Acute Ischemic Stroke," Israel Medical Association Journal, September 2003
Stephen M. Silverman, "Report: Part of Roy's Skull Removed," People, October 16, 2003
Joelle Babula, "Roy awaits surgery to restore his skull," Las Vegas Review-Journal, October 16, 2003
IMDB, Roy Horn biography as of July 2004