Weird Universe Blog — July 30, 2020

Burger King’s Secret Ingredient

It's people!!!

Tallahassee Democrat Sun - Feb 28, 1999

Posted By: Alex - Thu Jul 30, 2020 - Comments (6)
Category: Cannibalism | Advertising | Junk Food | 1990s

Chief Long Hair

The modern-day Vietnamese man named Tran Van Hay reputedly had hair "over 22 feet long."



Other modern record-holders are in the 18-ft range.

But they can't hold a patch to Chief Long Hair of the Crows.

Itchuuwaaóoshbishish/Red Plume (Feather) At The Temple (born ca. 1750, died in 1836) A Mountain Crow leader during fur trade days and signer of the 1825 Friendship Treaty. Traders and trappers called him Long Hair because of his extraordinarily long hair, approximately 25 feet long. At his death, his hair was cut off and maintained by Tribal leaders.


Now because Long Hair lived before photography, there is no visual record of this. However! Supposedly his tresses are part of the exhibit at Chief Plenty Coups State Park in Montana. (Plenty Coups was a descendant of Long Hair.)



Source of quote.

If any WU-vie is passing by the museum, perhaps he or she can confirm!

Here's a photo of another Crow tribe-member named "Curley."



Posted By: Paul - Thu Jul 30, 2020 - Comments (1)
Category: Human Marvels | World Records | Eighteenth Century | Nineteenth Century | Hair and Hairstyling | Native Americans

July 29, 2020

Mother Heart

Japan's "crazy inventor" Hiroshi Majima invented this odd device:

It is like a mother's real breast. A baby grabs hold of the facsimile, its nipple in its mouth, its cheek against a simulated heart that beats 70 times regularly every 60 seconds.

The tot apparently feels secure and reassured, stops yelling and drifts off to sleep without another whimper.

Bed-wetting is also greatly reduced, inventor Majima finds.

"Mother Heart" now sells abroad, not just on Japan's domestic market alone. Ready-made markets, Majima says, have been found in the Mediterranean countries, like France, Italy, and Spain, where mothers are especially close to their infants, and vice versa.



Allentown Morning Call - Sep 16, 1965



We previously featured another one of Majima's strange inventions on WU: the Cat Mew Machine.

Posted By: Alex - Wed Jul 29, 2020 - Comments (0)
Category: Babies | Inventions | 1960s

Follies of the Madmen #484

Somehow not quite as humorous nowadays.



Source.

Posted By: Paul - Wed Jul 29, 2020 - Comments (2)
Category: Business | Advertising | Death | Family | Photography and Photographers | 1960s

July 28, 2020

Farting in an operating room

If someone farts in an operating room, will he/she contaminate the room with germs? Dr. Karl Kruszelnicki and microbiologist Luke Tennent of Australia together devised an experiment to find out:

[Tennent] asked a colleague to break wind directly onto two Petri dishes from a distance of 5 centimetres, first fully clothed, then with his trousers down. Then he observed what happened. Overnight, the second Petri dish sprouted visible lumps of two types of bacteria that are usually found only in the gut and on the skin. But the flatus which had passed through clothing caused no bacteria to sprout, which suggests that clothing acts as a filter.

Another source (below) claims that the 'colleague' who supplied the farts was, in fact, an eight-year-old boy:

Sydney Morning Herald - July 16, 2001



Incidentally, Dr. Kruszelnicki has been mentioned before on WU. See 'falling cats'.

Posted By: Alex - Tue Jul 28, 2020 - Comments (5)
Category: Hygiene | Flatulence | Experiments

Pronouncing the Scientific Names of Seashells of North America



You can download the MP3 files here. Note: clicking the link does not initiate the download. You choose to do so at the new page.

R. Tucker Abbott begins with a statement sure to dissuade us from listening further. "Actually, there are no official correct pronunciations of these Latin names..."

Source.

Posted By: Paul - Tue Jul 28, 2020 - Comments (2)
Category: Boredom | Languages | Nature | Oceans and Maritime Pursuits | 1960s

July 27, 2020

Porpoise in toilet

I've heard of alligators in the sewer, but not porpoises in toilets.

I haven't been able to find out if there was ever a solution to the mystery of how a porpoise came to be in the toilet of the Glasgow train station. I'm assuming student pranksters were probably involved.

Ottawa Journal - Dec 7, 1965

Posted By: Alex - Mon Jul 27, 2020 - Comments (3)
Category: Animals | Fish | Bathrooms | 1960s

The Gone Away

Posted By: Paul - Mon Jul 27, 2020 - Comments (0)
Category: Cryptozoology | Dreams and Nightmares | Food | Avant Garde | Pop Art | Surrealism | Absurdism and Dadaism

July 26, 2020

Of course, unmarried girls can use them!

Davenport Quad-City Times - June 14, 1959

Posted By: Alex - Sun Jul 26, 2020 - Comments (2)
Category: Advertising | Gender | Body Fluids | 1950s

Frestonia

CHAZ? Nothing new in the world.



Good article here.

Posted By: Paul - Sun Jul 26, 2020 - Comments (0)
Category: Government | Stupid Criminals | Unauthorized Dwellings | 1960s | United Kingdom

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