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October 9 - 15, 2015 Issue 00243

TIDBITS® TUNES UP

TOILETSby Janet Spencer

Tuning up your toilet can save water. Come along with Tidbits as we appreciate toilets!

TWEAKING TOILETS• In 1995, the National Energy Policy Act required

that all new toilets must be able to flush using a maximum of 1.6 gallons (6 l) of water. Older models used up to six gallons (22 l) per flush.

• Japanese National Railways wanted to save water by cutting down on the amount of water used per flush in the restrooms. But the tiny amount of water used in the flush led users to think the toilets weren’t working properly, and they would flush over and over. Officials subsequently installed an electronic device that broadcast the sound of huge amounts of water flushing so the toilet sounded normal, and the extra flushing ceased.

• It’s been estimated that one out of every four toilets leaks. One method of telling if your toilet leaks is to put a drop of food coloring in the tank and see if it shows up in the bowl over the course of about 20 minutes without flushing. If your toilet is leaking, replace the flappers and adjust the fill valves. If the toilet runs long after flushing, adjust the length of the chain attached to the float.

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I read that when you flush a toilet in Australia, the water goes the opposite way to toilets over here.

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Page 2 TidbitsVernon.com Cosita Publishing For Advertising Call (250) 832-3361

WORD ORIGINS• The French word ‘toile’ means cloth or net.

When the French began covering their dressing tables with cloth, the tablecloth was also called a toile, and the dressing room was called a toilette. When the first flushing potties were invented, they were located in the dressing rooms and became known as toilets.

• The Dutch word ‘krappen’ meaning ‘to pluck or cut off’ and the French word ‘crappe’ meaning ‘siftings’ and the Latin word ‘crappa’ meaning ‘chaff’ are all related to the current word ‘crap.’ They all refer to the part that is thrown away after the part that is useful has been gathered.

• Thomas Crapper was a plumber in London in the mid-1800s. Contrary to myth, he did not invent the toilet, but he did improve it. He also improved the sewer systems of the city. The toilets he manufactured and installed, as well as the manhole covers he fabricated, were all stamped with his name: Crapper.

• The Latin word ‘lavare’ meaning ‘to wash’ is where we get the word ‘lavatory.’

• On board ships, the original toilets were just a simple board with a hole cut out, which were hung over the front part of a ship where the waves would wash everything away. The front of the ship was called ‘the head.’

• In medieval times, chamber pots would be emptied out the window into the street below. The story goes that in France, they would call out, “Gardez l’eau!” meaning, “Watch out for the water!” in order to warn pedestrians before hurling the refuse into the street. In England, this was Anglicized to ‘gardy-loo’ before being shorted to simply ‘loo.’

• The Middle English word ‘poupen’ or ‘popen’ originally meant ‘fart’ because that’s what a fart sounds like. Eventually it gave us the word ‘poop.’ This is not to be confused with the Middle French word ‘poupe’ meaning the stern of a ship, giving us ‘poop deck.’

BY THE NUMBERS• Average number of times a typical human uses

the bathroom every day: 7

• Average number of years a typical human spends on the toilet in a lifetime: 3

• Percent of Americans who use their phone on the toilet: 75%

• Number of phones dropped in the toilet in an average year: 7 million

• Percent of people who crumple their toilet paper rather than fold it: 60%

• Percent of household water use that goes down the toilet: 38%

• Number of toilets in the White House: 35

• Number of times a baby will need a diaper change before being potty trained: 10,000

• Life expectancy of a toilet: 50 years

• Cost of the world’s most expensive toilet: $19 million

• Location of the world’s most expensive toilet: international space station

• Number of rolls of toilet paper the average American family use each year: 119

• Percent of people who put the toilet paper roll “over” instead of “under”: 75%

• Percent of women who will wash their hands in a public restroom if there is someone else present: 90

• Percent of women who will wash their hands if they are alone: 16

• Average cost per day to flush a toilet: 5 cents

IT’S A FACT• In the mid-1960s, the Indonesian rupiah was

valued at 325 to the dollar. The cheap paper that was used to print one-sen notes (worth 1/100th of a rupiah) was perfect for being used as toilet paper, and was much less expensive than the commercially made tissue paper, since you could get 32,500 pieces for a buck.

FACTS & FASCINATION• The combination of Sani-Flush toilet bowl cleaner

and Comet cleanser can explode. Comet is sodium hypochlorite and Sani-Flush is sodium bisulfate. Many people assume two cleansers are better than one and use them both at the same time.

• 23 people were hired to do nothing but flush toilets at the Gator Bowl in Jacksonville, Florida before Christmas in 1989 in an effort to keep pipes from freezing.

• When Hank Aaron was on the verge of breaking Babe Ruth’s home run record, the Atlanta Journal stationed a reporter outside the men’s room in the stadium so they could get an interview of the tragedy of a man who went to the restroom at the wrong moment.

• The U.S. Navy was preparing to hit Makin Island in the Pacific during WWII. First they needed to know how many Japanese men were there. They knew the Japanese army usually had one latrine for every 40 soldiers. So they ordered pilots to make aerial surveys of outhouses in the area. They counted a hundred latrines— so there must be 4,000 soldiers. They were correct to within 40 men.

• A guide dog in Kent, England was told by his male master to lead him to the restrooms in the railway

For Advertising Call (250) 832-3361 TidbitsVernon.com Cosita Publishing Page 3was tasked with the chore of imagining how the full size fixtures would look in their house.

• This was also a day and age when it was thought that going to the bathroom indoors was unhygienic, a myth Thomas Crapper worked hard to dispel.

• His business got quite a boost when Edward Prince of Wales hired Thomas to install 30 bathrooms in his newly purchased estate, Sandringham House. When Edward became king, more plumbing jobs were handed to Thomas Crapper, followed by more work commissioned by King George V. Eventually Crapper installed bathrooms and plumbing fixtures in Windsor Castle, Buckingham Palace and Westminster Abbey. The public thought that any plumber good enough for royalty was good enough for them, and Crapper’s business boomed.

• Along the way, Crapper invented many plumbing improvements and was awarded nine patents. However, the flush toilet had been invented by others long before Thomas Crapper came along.

• Crapper’s inventions included a method of fitting underground drain pipes together which helped reduce disease by reducing leakage from sewer pipes. He also invented improvements to the float valve that helps regulate the flushing and refilling action of the toilet tank.

• At one point he invented a spring-loaded toilet seat, which would automatically rise up when the seated person stood up. The lifting motion of the toilet seat triggered rods that automatically flushed the toilet. This design suffered from the unfortunate flaw that when the rubber gaskets began to age, they became sticky and would fail to lift until the pressure from springs became too great to resist. At this point the toilet seat would fly upwards, often smacking the unfortunate user on the rear. It became known as “the bottom slapper” and died an ignominious death.

• Because Crapper also owned his own foundry, he was able to manufacture his own pipes, fittings, and manhole covers. Today, the Crapper manhole covers in front of Westminster Abbey, which are inscribed: ‘T. Crapper & Co., Sanitary Engineers’ are a favorite stop for tourists who enjoy taking rubbings from them in the same way people take rubbings from tombstones.

• When soldiers during World War II saw the word “Crapper” stamped all over toilets throughout Europe, they began calling bathrooms by that name.

• Thomas Crapper died in 1910 and the business continued under the care of his nephew and his partner. In 1963 it was acquired by another firm.

QUICK QUIZ: TISSUE• When brothers Irvin and Clarence moved to

Philadelphia and started a paper business in the 1870s, they sold butcher paper, paper bags, and stationery from a push-cart. When they moved into a storefront, sales dropped. They needed a product that would be constantly in demand.

• Just at that time, indoor plumbing was becoming popular. In private homes, people used catalogs in the bathroom. But hotels and restaurants, after going through the trouble of installing indoor plumbing, couldn’t bring themselves to put catalogs in bathrooms.

• So Irvin and Clarence started experimenting with toilet tissue, an idea that had been around a while but had never caught on. First they manufactured stacks of individual sheets, but it was difficult to keep the pile neat. So they tried wrapping it around a cardboard tube. It worked.

• They set up a factory, named the business after themselves, and started selling toilet paper directly to merchants since the issue was too delicate to bring up in polite society.

• Gradually, they introduced their product to the public through advertisements aimed at snob appeal: “They have a pretty house, Mother, but their bathroom paper hurts.”

• In 1907 an uncut roll of defective toilet paper

station. Unfortunately, the dog was unable to read “men” and “women” on the doors, which resulted in some upset ladies. Why they were upset when the man couldn’t see anything is not known.

• When Gordon and Jasmine Geisbrecht decided to open a new restaurant in Winnipeg in 1986, they wanted to make it really different. They decided to make toilets the theme of the restaurant. Called “The Outhouse,” toilet bowls were placed here and there in the decorating scheme, and menus featured a toilet bowl logo. Health inspectors suspended their license when it was found that their restroom facilities were inadequate.

Noteworthy Inventions

THOMAS CRAPPER• Thomas Crapper, born in Yorkshire, England,

in 1836, became an apprentice to his brother at the age of 14. His brother was a Master Plumber in London.

• By 1861 Thomas had completed his training and set up his own plumbing shop. In that day and age, proper people didn’t speak about bathrooms or the things that happened in bathrooms. So Thomas Crapper caused quite a stir when he advertised his business by displaying, right in his front window and in full view of everyone passing by, the complete collection of bathroom fixtures he offered for sale. According to legend, ladies became faint when viewing the porcelain bowls in his showroom.

• In order to overcome the prevailing attitude of prudery, Crapper outfitted his salesmen with tiny dollhouse-sized replicas of the toilets, sinks, and tubs he was selling. The customer

1. THEATER: Which musical featured a song with the lyrics, “I feel pretty, oh so pretty”?2. MEDICAL: In human beings, what causes a goiter?3. GEOGRAPHY: In what city would you find the Brandenburg Gate?4. MUSIC: Which Southern rock band had a hit single with “Imaginary Lover”?5. MOVIES: In which movie did longtime game host Bob Barker make his debut?6. SCIENCE: What does an ornithologist study?7. COMPUTERS: What kind of computer file car-ries the extension “.wav”? 8. ANIMAL KINGDOM: What is the adjective used to describe horses?9. LANGUAGE: What is a pangram?10. FAMOUS QUOTATIONS: Who once said, “Outside of a dog, a book is man’s best friend. Inside of a dog, it’s too dark to read”?

Answers1. “West Side Story”2. Usually a lack of iodine3. Berlin4. Atlanta Rhythm Section5. “Happy Gilmore” with Adam Sandler6. Birds7. Audio8. Equine9. A sentence that uses every letter of the alpha-bet. 10. Groucho Marx

(c) 2015 King Features Synd., Inc.

* Spring bulbs need a few weeks in the ground to get established before the first of the frosts. If you’re just getting around to planting your spring bulbs, here is a great garden design tip: Use kebab skewers to figure out the bulbs’ place-ment in the garden.

* “Place an ice cube (or ice chips) in carpet div-ots left behind by furniture legs. This will help the fibers “plump up,” and the spot will disap-pear!” -- A.I in Utah

* Felt circles are great for putting under small ap-pliances on the kitchen counter. They are easi-er to move around, and they won’t scratch the countertops. You can find them at the hardware store, or make your own by cutting out what you need from a piece of felt and attaching it to the bottom of your appliance with double-stick tape ... or even a drop of glue!

* Running a washing machine that isn’t full not only wastes energy and water, it also wastes money because you’re paying to run more wash-es. Always fill the machine -- but remember not to overload it! This applies to your dishwasher, too.

* “To help repel the dust on baseboards between cleanings, wipe with a used dryer sheet. To make this even easier, you can put the dryer sheet over a Swiffer-type floor cleaner. This way, you don’t even have to bend down.” -- M.E. in Alabama

* “You can use plain alcohol on a paper towel to wipe down your house telephone. I do this a couple of times a week during cold season. Also, purchase a pack of electronics wipes, so every-one can keep his or her cellphone screen clean. Think about it: We constantly touch the screen with our fingers, then stick it right up to our face!” -- W.R. in New YorkSend your tips to Now Here’s a Tip, 628 Virginia Drive, Or-lando, FL 32803.(c) 2015 King Features Synd., Inc.

Page 4 TidbitsVernon.com Cosita Publishing For Advertising Call (250) 832-3361material was delivered to their factory. It was heavy, wrinkled, and unsuitable for toilet paper. It was about to be returned when someone suggested marketing it as disposable ‘paper towels.’ Hotels, restaurants, and railroad stations bought them because they were more sanitary than cloth towels.

• Irvin and Clarence’s business became the largest paper goods maker in the world, and was bought out by Kimberly-Clark in 1995. What’s the name of their company? (Answer below)

QUICK QUIZ: MORE TISSUE• During World War I, cotton was used for surgical

dressings and as filters in gas masks. As the war progressed, demand outstripped supply and it became urgent to find a substitute material.

• The Kimberly-Clark company, a paper manufacturing firm based in Wisconsin, came up with a substitute called Cellucotton that was made from wood fibers. It made an excellent cotton substitute not only for gas masks but also for bandages.

• When the war ended, Kimberly-Clark had huge surpluses of Cellucotton on hand. Searching for a peace-time use for their product, in 1924 they came up with a tissue designed to remove cold cream make-up used by actors. It was a far better alternative than using towels and handkerchiefs to remove makeup. They called them Celluwipes at first, before settling on a new name.

Answer: Scott, as in Scott Tissue and Scott Towels.w• Ads using movie stars convinced ladies that

the tissues were the best way to remove makeup at the same time that Hollywood movie stars were convincing the American public that wearing makeup was acceptable.

• In 1928 the pop-up tissue dispenser was invented and the tissues began to be used as a disposable handkerchief, an idea proposed by a researcher who suffered from hay fever. The company introduced the slogan, ‘Don’t carry a cold in your pocket’ while pushing the sanitary benefits of using the product. Today the product is used worldwide and the name has become a nearly generic term for tissue. What’s it called? (Answer below)

FACT• To stifle a sneeze, press the area between the

upper lip and the nose.

Answer: Kleenex.

For Advertising Call (250) 832-3361 TidbitsVernon.com Cosita Publishing Page 5

Grocery Line: 250-275-8845

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Page 6 TidbitsVernon.com Cosita Publishing For Advertising Call (250) 832-3361

Baked Caramel-Apple Pecan PieIf you have the apples -- we have the recipe! If you are like us, autumn is the time to savor fresh

apple desserts. Here’s one to get you started!

1 purchased refrigerated unbaked 9-inch pie crust

1 (4-serving) package sugar-free vanilla cook-and-serve pudding mix

1 cup water1 teaspoon apple pie spice or ground cinnamon4 cups cored, peeled and sliced cooking apples

1/4 cup chopped pecans1/4 cup fat-free caramel topping

1/2 cup reduced-calorie whipped topping

1. Heat oven to 375 F. Place pie crust in a 9-inch pie plate and flute edges.

2. In a medium saucepan, combine dry pudding mix, water and apple pie spice. Stir in apples. Cook over medium heat until mixture thickens and apples start to soften, stirring often. Remove from heat. Add pecans and caramel topping. Mix gently to combine. Spoon hot mixture into

prepared pie crust.3. Bake for 40 to 45 minutes. Place pie plate on a wire rack and allow to cool. Cut into 8 pieces. When serving, top each piece with 1 tablespoon

whipped topping.

* Each serving equals: 221 calories, 9g fat, 1g protein, 34g carb., 206mg sodium, 2g fiber; Dia-betic Exchanges: 1 1/2 Starch, 1 Fruit, 1 1/2 Fat.

(c) 2015 King Features Synd., Inc.

Cat’s Shedding a Hairy IssueDEAR PAW’S CORNER: My cat “Chester” has al-ways been a big shedder with his long hair. I’ve pretty much kept up with it by brushing his coat every evening. But lately I’ve noticed a lot more hair deposited on the furniture and carpet, and when I comb him I have to clean out the brush several times. What could be causing this in-creased shedding? -- Cherie K. in Dubuque,

Iowa

DEAR CHERIE: To start, make an appointment with Chester’s vet for a complete physical exam. Excess shedding doesn’t always have a concrete explanation, but it can signal a change in his health, especially if it wasn’t a problem before.

Excess shedding can have a cause as benign as changes in the season -- shedding in spring and fall, for example. Or it could be triggered by al-lergies to dust, pollen and molds, which can ir-

ritate his skin and make him scratch more.Skin diseases such as ringworm can be anoth-er cause -- it’s something the vet will certainly check for, along with flea infestation or other ir-

ritants.Excess shedding also can signal much more serious conditions, such as diabetes or hyper-thyroidism, something that a vet can diagnose. Ahead of the appointment, watch Chester’s be-havior: Is he drinking excessively? Does he seem agitated? Is he eating as much as he used to? Write down anything that seems unusual and

shared it with the vet.If Chester has developed a health condition, the vet can prescribe the right medications and ad-vise you on the best diet to feed him. If allergies or some unknown irritant is at work, the exam will rule out other possible causes so you can fo-

cus on finding a shedding solution.

Send your questions or tips to ask@pawscorner.com.(c) 2015 King Features Synd., Inc.

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by Samantha Weaver

* It was 20th-century Swiss playwright and novelist Max Frisch who defined technology as “the knack of so arranging the world that we need not experi-ence it.”

* In the 1830s you could give someone a blizzard. Back then, of course, the word wasn’t referring to a snowstorm; rather, that phrase meant to give someone a piece of one’s mind.

* Men certainly aren’t lacking in the self-confi-dence department. A survey found that 76 percent of men believe they are “somewhat” or “very at-tractive.”

* Thanks to arrangements made by his very pow-erful family, Theophylactus of Tusculum became Pope Benedict IX in 1032, at the age of 20. It seems he wasn’t suited to religious life, and he was ac-cused of “many vile adulteries and murders.” The Catholic Encyclopedia calls him “a disgrace to the Chair of Peter.” After 12 years he was forced out of Rome, but he returned the following year, 1045, and ousted Pope Sylvester III. Later that same year, a pious priest named John Gratian offered Bene-dict a large sum of money to vacate the post, which he did, allowing Gratian to become Pope Gregory VI. Unsurprisingly, Benedict soon changed his mind, and with Sylvester III still claiming the papal seat, there were now three popes vying for supremacy. Finally, at the end of 1046, the Council of Sutri declared Benedict and Sylvester deposed, Gregory was encouraged to resign, and a German bishop was proclaimed Pope Clement II.

* Farmers in California are responsible for 95 per-cent of broccoli production in the United States. Now we know whom to blame.***Thought for the Day: “One dog barks at some-thing, the rest bark at him.” -- Chinese proverb

Wanted: Purchasing old Canadian & American

coin collections & accumulations.

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For Advertising Call (250) 832-3361 TidbitsVernon.com Cosita Publishing Page 7

Wanted: alfalfa grass mix hay.

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Please call (250) 803-3443 or email scgoat-

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Full Set TaylorMadeClubs with bag, Big-

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for next year. $100Ryobi gas lawn trim-mer $45 (250) 542-

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BuyingUnwanted Guns

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The Vernon Jubilee Hospital Auxiliary’s October general meeting will be on Tuesday, October 13 in the hospital education rooms at 1:30.Guests are very wel-come, come to the gift shop by 1:15 and you will be directed to the meeting.

You know an odd feeling? Sitting on the toilet eating a chocolate candy bar. - George Carlin

Page 8 TidbitsVernon.com Cosita Publishing For Advertising Call (250) 832-3361