Rik Mayall (off topic entry of the passing of Rik Mayall)

With the passing of Rik Mayall, I have to say that my life has been altered in some way. I didn't know him personally but feel a connection with him because he came into my bedroom so frequently. The "Young Ones" always made me laugh to the point of having to have a respirator to gain air into my lung from laughing disgustingly hard that I would cough up phloem. He shaped my view on life not only as a human but also my humor. The stuffs that people do not find to terribly funny I find ridiculously funny. 

From the "Young Ones" he went on to write and preform in other BBC series suck as the "Blackhadder" and joining forces with his long time writing partner. He made his way into movies, staring as the imaginary friend in "Drop Dead Fred", which still is one of my all time favorite movies. His presence on screen grabbed your attention and never wanted to look away because his train wreck punkish antics that encouraged you to make faces in the mirror while getting ready for school. Rik Mayall had a serious bike accident that left him with a head injury in 1998. Since then he has been braising everyday with life in life. All I know is, the world has lost a very sincere and articulate comic who believed in laughter until you cried. He added catch phrases to a whole disenfranchised youth, The GenX majority and those generations that followed. 

I know I am going to miss Rick the Poet political activist, and Fred, the one that made me do it. I suppose my evening will be made of The Young Ones if anything just to laugh! 

91: Knives, spoons, and forks

Ever wondered where cutlery came from? Or how it came to be? 

Once made of rock, and wood, now can be made of one plastic combination; Ladies and Gentlemen, I give you one of the most under appreciated inventions of all times: the knife, the spoon, and the fork (and I believe that this is the only entry on the list that contains 3 items that are related).

Knives are the oldest utensils in the cutlery arsenal. The knife is known to have been around since cavemen and women. The Knife was used for killing and made an easy transition for cutting meat and tough veggies sitting around the cave, the hearth, or the royal dinning table. It was fashioned out of stone and tied to sticks. Then during the iron age they were made of metal, much into the shape that it is today; a long pointed piece of metal with a rise in the edge. The Knife to royalty was being used much like the fork. The point of the knife was used to left meat to the mouth. The abundance of knives on the royal table were not out of place. During King Louis the XIV the knife was removed by Cardinal Richelieu. He told King Louis that he felt nervous with all the knives laying around. And then the fork was introduced even further through royalty of Western Europe.

The Fork

The fork has been around for at least a 1000 years. the Egyptians are the first to have any record of using the utensil. Actually, it was the Egyptians that appreciated flatware! Buried in the tombs of the wealthy, scientist have found flatware made of gold and decorated. However, the fork did not gain any popularity until the courts of royalty of Europe began to using them. Catherine da Medici was recorded to use the fork at her wedding reception which fell flat on her guest. It was not until Cardinal Richelieu that the fork finally took its place on the dinning room table. The fork cured a few problems: it replaced the knife (which makes paranoid monarchies even more suspicious of their guest), it also picked up other foods. the fork has not lost its shape as well. It has long prongs sharp enough to be stuck in meat. The prongs are not long making it ideal not to be used in assassination attempts at the dinning room table or stab an unruly family member. It was the spoon, however, added versatility in the kitchen as well at the dinning room table.

The Spoon

The spoon is the best out of the three because it really did solve a simple problem: how to eat hot liquid foods. It did not take long before the first man and woman to figure out that humans cannot hold hot liquids with their hands to eat it. The first spoons were contrived from shells. they had the perfect shape for dipping. They were tied to a stick and then used as well. The shell was perfect but what if there were no shells? Man and woman figured out how to fashion spoons from rock and wood. The rock and wood would be carved into bowls  and much like shells, then tied to sticks. When the Bronze Age came around, just like knives, spoons were being pressed from metals. The spoon has not lost its shape and it is much like the same as the shell on a stick. 

Why is flatware important? It helped civilize the world. Like any style or fashion it begins at the top and then filters down to the masses. Just like any other other invention,it took years and years for the knife, fork, and spoon to make it to most tables. Because most people were poor, they would eat with their hands until flatware was inexpensive to afford. During the renaissance an increase of flatware was being bought and sold. 

92: Beer

This was a complete accident. Some say it was the mother of inventions or it was Devine intervention! Others have made the argument that it has saved the world. Number 92, Beer, makes my list.

Back in the cave man days, when men and women were out gathering grains and placing them in an earthen vessel, they would leave these containers outside. After a rain and gathered in these vessels, it made a mash or a mead, which they eventually eat or drank. I am sure they were more concerned about not having much grain left but they had a drink. When man finally had more time on his or her hands, they began to experiment with the combinations and timing of the ingredients to make what will become known as the modern beer. Barley, wheat, hops, and yeast were the final grains used yielding a drink that the whole family enjoyed. In the beginning, the beer was not as alcoholic as the beers of today. 

Beer has been given the credit of saving the world from utter collapse, not as drink to celebrate the signing of a treaty. It was used as an economic source, bringing people together for trade, and as solvent to disputes as well. Beer spread from the fertile crescent to was is now eastern and Western Europe. It even spread throughout Asia. Even the colonists brought it with them to the Americas. Only later to be replaced by whiskey and then being banned constitutionally, which we all know how that worked out. 

Beer became a favorite for monks in Western Europe. One reason being that they had the means to grow the ingredients and had the temperatures in cellars to keep it from season to season. They also saw the profit for their efforts as well. In most European countries, breweries, which began in some cloisters, are still in business today (not all cloisters made beer and not all cloisters that did, are still brewing today). There is nothing in this world than to drink a beer which is still brewed in the same manor since 1100 BCE, 1200 BCE, or 1300 BCE. Beer was a favorite for our ancestors because it was cleaner than water and unknown to them, it killed germs. It was a healthy drink of the day. Nearly every household had beer. Even little Johnny drank beer. Beer also has nutritional value as well and was even used to during the Bubonic Plague as a cure, though not successfully. 

Beer has been hated and loved for many centuries and I am sure it will be for centuries to come. I do find it a bit strange and awesome at the same time that beer was brewed by a religious sect that later would condemn the act as sinful. But what's new, huh? 

Today beer is just beer and comes in many forms, tastes, and catchy names. Beer saved the world and yes, in this posters mind, it really did come from the Devine to save the world! 

Beer Links:

How to make beer -http://youtu.be/oobHoJYRezw

 

How Beer saved the world - http://topdocumentaryfilms.com/how-beer-saved-the-world/

93: Barbed Wire (AKA bobbed wire)

93: Barbed Wire (AKA Bobbed Wire) 

All the inventions so far have been uniquely globe, that is, they are all inventions that were developed in certain regions and

spread quickly through out the world or they were being developed in different areas at the same time. This invention is the first on my list that is uniquely American.

Fencing to keep cattle and other livestock separate in the west was nothing new. In the 19th century, not only in the west, but in other sections of America,. farmers were using hedgerows, stones, and wooden fences. The problem with these methods did not keep cattle and other livestock within the fencing or kept thieves out.

The unique problem of having cattle in the west was to keep cattle separate from cattle drives. Most cattle farmers in the west had the Open Range policy of raising cattle. That is, the farmers did not have fencing and allowed their livestock to graze openly on the land. However, with cattle drives, this caused a problem of mixing one farmers cattle with another farmers cattle. Some cattle farmers did not brand, and it was hard to prove the ownership of some of the cattle and it was stolen either on purpose or accidentally.  New fencing was needed to help with two primary problems: 1. keeping cattle in, and keeping cattle drivers out. Barbed wire was the answer to these two problems. 

Fencing consisted of flat wire, which was easy to break or pass through if animals charged through it. A farmer in Ohio, Lucien B. Smith, developed a new wire which consisted of two flat wires that had barbs (or bobs) twisted into the wire at intervals. With this wire, the animals would be conditioned not to run into it. Likewise, if cattle thieves were out during the night, their horses or themselves were more than likely to be caught in the wire leaving both rider and horse in pain or worse condition. Smith was given a patented in 1863. 

Years later in 1874, an Illinois Farmer, Joseph F. Glidden, made modifications on Smiths design and was given a patent on his barbed wire. The west and most of the United States were revolutionized by barbed wire. Not only did the wire keep animals in and thieves out, it also defined division of land by giving more of a physical boundary, which had been rightfully claimed. 

It was not very long when barbed wire was being used to keep humans in or trap humans within its barbs. During World War I, barbed wire was used to build the boundary of the tops of the trenches to keep the enemy out. During World War II, it was used at concentration camps as well as battle. Modern prisons also use a relative of barbed wire, razor wire, which is made the same way but with razors attached. There are many different types of barbed wire for different uses other than human captivity. 

Barbed Wire makes my list because of the simple genius about it. Before electrical fences were used to keep livestock in pens, it was just simple wire and barbs that did the job. 

Video of a barbed wire machine at slow pace making wire

Video of a barbed wire machine at pace making wire

94: The Candle

        Since man came to earth, we have been trying to see at night. When we discovered fire, this was used to warm foods, and light the way, it wasn't until we could harness the light and that place it in various places in the cave. The candle made that possible and makes the list at number 94.

Candles date back over 5,000 years and they are one of the first forms of artificial light being used in homes and in travel. When we think about the Egyptian and Roman rule, we think about torches and oil lamps, which is true, however, candles were being developed at this time. Animal fat was used to creat the candles waxy, greasy outside while cotton, flex, and other fabrics were used for its wick. The candles were expensive, and they did not burn well by today's standard but their function was more important to produce light in a given area giving the end user light to see by. 

In the Middle Ages candles became more suffocated and were used mainly in religious ceremonies. Remember, the Middle Ages is known as the dark ages because of a plague going on, which killed 1/3 of the population. Candles, by this point, were being made of other materials such as beeswax, and berries. The wicks were composed still of cotton and other fabrics placed in the middle of the waxy, greasy outer layer. Candles were still used by the wealthy and by those who could afford it. Hour candles were also becoming popular to keep time in the night hours as well. Oil lamps, and fire were still being used by most of the population for artificial light in their homes, and huts!

The American colonists found candles to be extremely important. Candlemakers in America used more natural wax such as those found in bay-berries. Not only did the berry have a wonderful smell, they also burned a bit longer. It wasn't until the 1700's that the candle became less expensive finally being mass produced, bringing more light into homes. Whale oil made it possible. Whale oil was cheap, and it was harder than previous candle casings and it held allowed the candle to keep its shape in the summer months.

During the industrial revolution, a candle making machine was developed that used a wax mix made of various waxes, and lipids, which reduced the awful smell of animal fat. The wax is more or less is still being used today. The wick also went under a major change that maximized the usage and illumination from the wick. The wicks has been made from fabrics or threads, which had been twisted together. It wasn't until the late 1700's and early 1800's that the wicks were being made of braided cotton. This technique allowed the wick to curl back under into the flame, allowing i the wick to be burned completely. This braided technique also allowed the wick to burn brighter giving more sustainable light.

Candles were displaced, however, havingcome full circle in the west. The candle holds more importance in religious ceremonies than they do as an artificial light source in homes. I am sure, dear reader, you have candles throughout your home but do you use them everday as artificial light? The death of the candle came with Edison and his electric light. The candle has left its mark. All illuminates are measured in candle strength! The next time you buy a flashlight read the package! 

To watch videos on candle making click the links below: 

Dublin Candlemaker Part One - http://youtu.be/98tTYmbvtcs

Dublin Candlemaker Part Two - http://youtu.be/08b3va22eak

Okay, okay!

Okay, kids! I will start back with my top 100. I have been somewhat busy and kept forgetting about this awesome blog. Look for new post coming soon within the week!