* It's Betty White's 98th birthday today. It's also Popeye's 91st. That's....kind of amazing. If you had asked me "Who has been around longer, Popeye or Betty White?" I'd absolutely have said "Popeye" until I read that.
Also, Ms. White was asked her "secret" to longevity and reportedly (at least a couple years ago) when asked she said "hot dogs and vodka." No, I don't know if she meant "consumed at the same time" and frankly I think a lot of times when people who have lived a really long life get asked their "secret," they probably just make stuff up and then secretly giggle about how many people are going to try to do that thing.
I said on Twitter I'd probably say the most ridiculous thing I could think of, like "I drink 8 ounces of maraschino-cherry juice straight from the jar every morning" though in reality, my continued good health (fingers crossed here) is probably a combination of lucky genetics, exercise, and eating healthfully about 80% of the time (I eat sugary things but not a lot. I try to eat a lot of fresh fruit and vegetables. I don't eat much meat. I try to eat a lot of beans. I don't eat many refined carbohydrates. And I have oatmeal for breakfast almost every day. And I don't drink or smoke...)
* Also I watched a bit of The Weather Channel this morning; they were talking about the big snowstorm hitting the central US. (Down where I am, I am just getting cold rain). Some areas are, I guess, near blizzard conditions, and the presenter was talking about people needing to drive cautiously and leave enough stopping room between cars, but she phrased it as "space out on the highway" and I was like NO NO DON'T TELL PEOPLE TO DO THAT because at least when I was a kid, "space out" meant you weren't paying attention. I guess people say "zoning out" now? But I'm sure there are enough of us who would think spacing out on the roads would be a bad thing.
* I'm wearing my badger pendant today. Last fall I ordered it from the website that helps fund the "Irish Archaeology" twitter feed I like. It's become a favorite jewelry piece: it's simple and goes with a lot of things, and also it's whimsical without screaming "look at the fifty year old woman wearing a cartoon character!" because while it's a cute, stylized badger, it's still semi-realistic and understated (cast in bronze and antiqued so the "fur lines" are dark)
I also just kind of like badgers. To me, they seem symbols of both loyalty and persistence. That may be influenced by my fondness for Trufflehunter from "Prince Caspian" ("I'm a beast, and we don't change. I'm a badger, what's more, and we hold on"). But also more recently, they are the symbol of Hufflepuff in the Harry Potter world, and I do suspect that Rowling was influenced either by Trufflehunter or the larger mythology-of-badgers that also inspired Trufflehunter.
Also, something I didn't know: the "badgers" of the UK and of the US are two very different badgers.
European badgers - which are the ones you read about in British children's books - are Meles meles, they are sort of cute. They tend to live in small groups (maybe about six animals) in large burrows called "setts." You can read more about them here and that's where I ganked this photo from:
The American badger, on the other hand, has the reputation for being more solitary, and meaner, than the European badger. They are a wholly different genus - Taxidea taxus - and I am not sure without looking how closely they are related to the European badger. More detail about them (at least in Washington state) can be found here, which is where I got this photo:
Interestingly, European badgers are about 10 pounds heavier (on average) than the American ones, I always thought of badgers as "big scary animals" (but an American badger is maybe about 15 pounds).
Though apparently the US badgers ARE less social than their European counterparts; I know I've been told they'll go after dogs* and you probably don't want to mess with them if you happen to see them on your field site; apparently in the UK some people even put food out for the European badgers and enjoy watching them?
(*Though maybe turnabout is fair play; Dachshunds were bred specifically to go into badger setts when people hunted badgers)
There was a meme making the rounds a while back with a photo of a European badger just going about its business and an American badger that was in defensive mode (so it looked meaner) and it was captioned something like "this one looks like it wants to invite you to tea; THIS one looks like it's going to mess you up" or something like that.
Oh. Found it. Though I'm not 100% convinced that "American badger" is not actually a wolverine:
(heh. another comment over there: "European badger = cottage in the forest. American badger = cabin in the woods." and again we see how differently you can hear things depending on the words used. Though "cabin in the woods" probably wouldn't seem as threatening if that horror movie never came out)
1 comment:
I'm one of those who feed both–that is, I put the leftovers out and whoever comes by that night eats them. (Except cabbage; apparently nobody likes cabbage.) Possums are cute-ish, mostly timid, and eat lots of ticks. Raccoons . . . well, raccoons are like little kids in that they do get into everything, but they're cute. And they have A LOT of teeth: I opened the front door to let the dog out one night and there were a mother and three or four kits on the porch. There was much posturing and barking/hissing before I could get Bella (the dog) back in. Since then I look out the storm door before letting her out . . .
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