Tidbits has drawn up quite a few quick facts about these foods all beginning with “Q.” • Mix up some seasoned ground fish or meat with vegetables and eggs, form into a dumpling, and poach it, and you will have a quenelle. The dumplings are served with a crayfish sauce or a cream sauce. • A quahog is an edible hard-shell clam. The white-shelled American quahog is found off North America’s Atlantic coast from Canada to Florida. The 5-inch-long (12.7 cm) clams are especially abundant around New Jersey, Cape Cod, and Rhode Island. Rhode Island supplies 25% […]
November 2022
Spacesuits
– OUT OF THIS WORLD – Nice outfit! How about these Tidbits facts about the suit worn by astronauts in space? • The primary purpose of a spacesuit is to provide a stable pressurized environment for the normal function of an astronaut’s body. It gives them oxygen to breathe, and protection from radiation, along with space dust that flies at incredible speed. Specialized gold-lined visors shield the eyes from bright sunlight. The suit protects the astronauts from the wide variety of temperatures in space which can vary from -250 degrees F (-156 C) to as hot as 275 degrees F […]
TIDBITS® Counts on the Number Eight
by Kathy Wolfe Five, six, seven, eight! This week, Tidbits is counting up the facts on the number eight. • The Latin word for “eight” is “octo,” a prefix that lends itself to numerous English words. An octosyllable is a word with eight syllables. In poetry, an octonary is a stanza of eight lines. An octahedron is a three-dimensional shape having eight plane faces, while an octagon is a polygon with eight sides, such as a STOP sign. • In the world of music, there are eight tones in an octave, which is the distance or interval between […]
Kitsault, Canada
• Molybdenum is a metal which normally is found mixed in with other minerals. It has the 6th highest melting point of any element, which is why 80% of the world’s production is used in steel alloys. • In 1979, the Phelps Dodge corporation of the U.S. bought a molybdenum mine in a remote coastal region of British Columbia, Canada, about 500 miles (900 km) north of Vancouver, and two hours away from the nearest neighboring town. Anticipating a mining boom, the company proceeded to build an entire town from scratch, fit to house an estimated 1,200 people which […]
Comets Asteroids Meteors
– OUT OF THIS WORLD – • The difference between asteroids and comets goes back to the way they were first formed. Although they were ‘born’ at the same time, they formed under different circumstances. • The solar system started out as a rotating cloud of gas and dust. At the center, the Sun formed through gravitational collapse, which released heat. At the center of this dusty gaseous nebula, the region was hot and dense, while the outer regions were cooler. Asteroids formed near the center where only rock and metal could remain solid. Comets formed at the outer reaches […]
TIDBITS® Eats Vegetables
by Janet Spencer Come along with Tidbits as we eat our veggies! IN THE BEGINNING • About 43 million people across the U.S. maintain vegetable gardens. The top veggie grown is tomatoes, followed by cucumber, pepper, beans, carrots, squash, and onions. • The average American eats 92 lbs (42 kg) of vegetables each year. • A fruit is the fertilized ovary of a flower: tomatoes, squash, pumpkins, cukes, beans, peas, peppers, and corn are fruits. A vegetable is any part of a plant that is edible that is not a fruit: flowers (cauliflower, broccoli); stems (asparagus); tubers (potatoes); bulbs […]
Movie Cowboys
Movie goers have been in love with cowboys for decades. Let’s take a look at some of the most famous on-screen cowboys who brought the Old West to life. • Tom Mix was the first movie cowboy, with his debut film “The Cowboy Millionaire” released in 1909. The following year came “Ranch Life in the Great Southwest,” a documentary that showcased Mix’s skills as a cattle wrangler. During the 1920s, he made upwards of 160 cowboy films, and Mix, along with his horse “Tony the Wonder Horse,” always saved the day. Between 1909 and 1935, he appeared in 291 […]
Air
– OUT OF THIS WORLD – Breathe in, breathe out, and focus on these facts about air. • What is air? It most often refers to the Earth’s atmosphere, a mixture of assorted gases and tiny dust particles. Its composition is about 78% nitrogen and 21% oxygen. Tiny amounts of other gases make up the remainder — 0.9% of argon, 0.04% carbon dioxide, along with trace amounts of neon, hydrogen, helium, methane, and krypton. • Although air is primarily gases, there are also large quantities of tiny particles referred to as aerosols. These include dust and pollen, but […]
TIDBITS® Hits the Trail with Cowboys
by Kathy Wolfe Yee-haw! Tidbits has rounded up these facts about cowboys, the heroes of the American West. • Although we tend to think of cowboys as figures of the Old West, they actually had their origins in Mexico. In the early 1500s, the Spanish who were migrating to North America were developing ranches to raise cattle and other livestock. Spanish explorer Hernando Cortes imported horses to begin horse-breeding in Mexico, and by 1553, there were an estimated 10,000 free-roaming horses there. • Mexico’s native cowboys were hired by ranchers to care for the livestock, and became known as “vaqueros,” […]
Foreign Language Fact
• There are about 2,700 languages in the world. India has the most languages and dialects (around 1,600). • Mandarin Chinese is spoken by more people than any other language in the world. English is spoken as an official language in 44 countries, more than any other language. French is the official language in 27 countries and Spanish is spoken as the official language in 20 countries. • About 10% of people living in the U.S. speak a language other than English in their home. • About half of all English words came from other languages. • […]
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