Why Do Pirates Love Parrots? Read online

  Why Do Pirates Love Parrots?

  An Imponderables®Book

  DAVID FELDMAN

  Illustrated by Kassie Schwan

  This book is dedicated to Imponderables readers, especially these five, who represent the contributions of tens of thousands:

  Susan Sherman Smith, who died tragically in a fire in 2004, was the first person to contribute an Imponderable used in a book, and it’s my all-time favorite: “Why Do Women Open Their Mouths When Applying Mascara?”

  Joanna Parker started writing warm, witty, and supportive letters from day one. Her mail is still cherished, even if it no longer comes encased in pink envelopes.

  Douglas Watkins, Jr. has sent in by far the most Imponderables of any reader, every one of them handwritten. As usual, he earned a free copy of this book.

  Ken Giesbers is the decathlete of Imponderables, often finding errors in the Letters section, but also contributing Imponderables, commenting on Frustables, and acting as a source about airplanes.

  Bill Gerk, king of the Frustables, died at the age of seventy-five in 2004. After each Imponderables book was published, Bill took it upon himself to research every Frustable. He would send several envelopes full of at least thirty to fifty pages of musings, ranging from hard research to imaginative stabs in the dark. His humor and never-ending curiosity were an inspiration, and in the true spirit of Imponderables.

  Contents

  Preface

  Why Did Pirates Love Parrots?

  Why Do Packing Peanuts Come in Such Strange Shapes?

  Why Can’t You Buy Grape Ice Cream?

  Why Don’t You Ever Hear Giraffes Vocalize? Do They Ever Make a Sound?

  Why Do Some Slot Machines Use Fruit Symbols?

  Why Does Lightning Have a Zigzag Pattern?

  Why Do Men Have Domain Over the Family Barbecue?

  Why Do Bats Roost Upside Down? What Prevents Them from Falling Down?

  Why Are Most Bibles Printed in Two Columns?

  Why Do Bottles Have Necks?

  Why Is the Pitcher’s Mound Elevated on a Baseball Diamond? And Come to Think of It, Why Is There a Pitcher’s Mound in the First Place?

  Why Are Most Psychics Women?

  Who Was Monterey Jack, and Why Is a Cheese Named After Him?

  Why Is the Moon Sometimes Visible During the Day?

  How Do They Get the Paper Tag into Hershey Kisses? And Why Are They Called Kisses?

  How Does the Vending Machine Know When It’s Sunday and That the Newspaper Is More Expensive?

  What Happens to Olives After the Oil Is Squeezed Out?

  Do Ostriches Swim?

  When You Switch Chairs with Someone, Why Does the Seat Sometimes Feel Warm?

  What Accounts for the Different Shapes of Cheeses? Why Is Cheddar Rectangular While Brie and Provolone Are Round?

  What Does the “D” in D-Day Stand For?

  Why Is an Elephant’s “Nose” Called a Trunk?

  Why Are American Football Fields 531/3 Yards Wide?

  Why Do Books, Legal and Financial Documents, Manuals, Pamphlets, Musical Scores, and Standardized Tests Sometimes Have Pages That Say: “This Page Intentionally Left Blank”?

  In Bowling, Why Is a Strike on the “Wrong” Side of the Headpin Called a “Brooklyn Strike”?

  Why Are the Number 13 and Friday the Thirteenth Considered Unlucky?

  Since Doughnut Holes Are So Popular, Why Can’t We Buy Bagel Holes?

  Is There Any Logic to the Pattern of Train Whistles? Why Do You Often Hear a Signal of Long-Long-Short-Long?

  Why Does Dog Food Have to Smell So Awful?

  In Track Events with Staggered Starts, Why Do the Outside Runners Cut to the Inside Immediately Rather Than a More Gradual, Straight Line?

  Are Brussels Sprouts Really from Brussels?

  How Did They Mark Years Before the Birth of Christ? And How Did They Mark Years in Non-Christian Civilizations?

  Why Are There More Windows Than Rows in Commercial Airlines? Why Aren’t the Windows Aligned with the Rows of Seats?

  How Do Audio Cassette Decks “Know” When To Go into Auto-Reverse?

  Do Real Artists Line Up the Object To Be Painted by Putting Up the Thumb of Their Outstretched Arm? If So, Why?

  Why Does Store-Bought Bread Often Have Two Mounds on Top with a Channel in Between?

  Why Does Water Vapor in the Sky Clump into Clouds Instead of Diffusing Evenly Throughout the Atmosphere?

  Why Is Carbonated Water Called Club Soda?

  Why Are There Holes in the Deposit Envelopes for Automated Teller Machines?

  Why Do Women’s Hips Sway When They Walk? Is This Intentional?

  Unimponderables—What Are Your Ten Most Frequently Asked Irritating Questions (FAIQ)?

  Why Do Drive-Up ATMs Have Braille Markings?

  Do Blind People Dream? If So, Do They Dream in Color?

  Why, Unlike Other Sports, Do Baseball Managers Wear the Same Uniform as the Players?

  How Many Licks Does It Take To Get to the Center of a Tootsie Pop?

  How Does the Hair on Your Head and Chin Know To Grow Long, But the Hair on Your Eyebrows or Arms Stays Short?

  Why Do We Park on Driveways and Drive on Parkways?

  Why Do They Use Sterilized Needles for Lethal Injections to Prisoners? Why Do They Use Rubbing Alcohol on Their Arms?

  Why Did Kamikaze Pilots Wear Helmets?

  Why Are “Black Boxes” Orange?

  If You Can Answer the Questions in Your Book, Shouldn’t They Be Called “Ponderables” Instead of “Imponderables”?

  Why Do the U.S. and Other Navies Use a Fouled Anchor as Their Symbol?

  Why Are Computer Circuit Boards Green?

  Why Do Wet Dogs Go Out of Their Way To Shake Off the Moisture in Front of Their Master?

  Why Is a Square Boxing Area Called a “Ring”?

  Why Does Iced Tea Get Cloudy?

  What’s Medicinal About a Medicine Ball? And What Do They Stuff in Medicine Balls To Make Them So Heavy?

  What Is the White, Usually Oval Patch Found on the Bottom of McDonald’s Hamburger Buns?

  Why Do Some Places, Such as Newfoundland, Australia, India, and Parts of the Arab World, Have Half-Time Zones? Why Do Some Large Countries Have Only One Time Zone?

  How Did the Candy Snickers Get Its Name?

  Why Do Motorcyclists, Especially Those Riding Harley-Davidsons, Rev Their Engines While Waiting at Stoplights?

  Why Are Salmon Pink?

  Why Do Parrots and Other Birds Mimic Human Speech and Other Sounds?

  Why Are Portholes Round?

  Now We Know Why Ships’ Portholes Are Round. Why Are Airplane Windows in the Passenger Cabins Oval?

  Why Don’t Trains Have Cabooses Anymore?

  Do Birds Sweat?

  Why Is the Earth’s Core Still Hot?

  Why Do More Men Snore Than Women?

  Why Do Vultures “Waste Time” by Circling Their Dead Prey Instead of Swooping In and Chowing Down Immediately?

  What’s the Purpose of the “SysRq” Key on Most Computer Keyboards?

  Why Do Taxicab Drivers Often Put Their Car in Park While Waiting at a Stoplight?

  Where Do Telephone Companies and Utilities Obtain Telephone Poles? Are They Special Logs?

  Why Do Telephone Poles Extend Far Above the Highest Wire or Crosspiece?

  Why Does a Can of Diet Coke Float in Water While a Can of Coca-Cola Sinks?

  Why Do Male Figure-Skating Announcers on Television Wear Tuxedos?

  Why Is It More Tiring To Stand Than To Walk? Why Is It Hard To Stand Still on Two Legs?

  If Thanksgiving Is a Harvest Celebration, Why Is It Held in Late November?

  Why Do Self-Service Gas Stati
ons Usually Disable the Automatic Handle on Gas Pumps?

  Can Women Use “Just For Men” Hair Coloring?

  Drug Labels List Active and Sometimes “Inactive” Ingredients. What Are Inactive Ingredients and Why Are They Used If They Don’t Do Anything?

  Why Do Peanut Butter Cookies Have Crisscross Marks on Them?

  Do Starfish Have Faces?

  Why Do We Often Find a Folded-Up Piece of Tissue Paper Inside One of a Pair of Men’s Dress Socks?

  Updates

  Why Do Fish Eat Earthworms? Do They Crave Worms or Will Fish Eat Anything That Is Thrust upon Them?

  What Exactly Are We Smelling When We Enjoy the New-Car Smell?

  Why Do Mosquitoes Seem To Like Some People More Than Others?

  Why Do We Wave Polaroid Prints in the Air After They Come Out of the Camera?

  Why Are U.S. Elections Held on Tuesday?

  Why Can’t We Tickle Ourselves?

  Why Aren’t There Any Miniature House Cats?

  Does Anyone Really Like Fruitcake?

  Why Do Older People Tend To Snore More Than Younger People?

  Why Are the Sprinkles Put on Ice Cream and Doughnuts Also Called Jimmies?

  Why Is Yawning Contagious?

  Is There Any Logic to the Numbers Assigned to Boeing Jets? What Happened to the Boeing 717?

  Why Did They Take Away Red M&M’s? Why Have They Put Them Back Recently?

  Why Do Horses Sleep Standing Up?

  When Do Fish Sleep?

  Why Don’t Crickets Get Chapped from Rubbing Their Wings Together?

  Why Does Looking Up at the Sun Cause Many People To Sneeze?

  Inbox

  Acknowledgments

  Help!

  Searchable Terms

  About the Author

  Credits

  Cover

  Copyright

  About the Publisher

  Preface

  This book attempts to answer little mysteries of everyday life, tackling subjects ranging from bottle necks to vultures, medicine balls to barbecues, and yes, parrots and pirates. Our goal is simple. To make all Imponderables walk the plank so that we may live in a world free from the nagging conundrums that plague our everyday life. The trouble is that as soon as one Imponderable is vanquished, more mysteries smack us in the face.

  We’re here for you. Almost all of the Imponderables in our eleven books come from readers, and we offer a free, autographed copy if you are the first person to pose an Imponderable we answer in a book.

  You might have noticed that this book is dedicated to our readers. Your ideas are the lifeblood of our enterprise. We identified five readers by name, but we could have just as well cited Dallas Brozik, Debra Allen, Craig Kirkland, Fred Beeman, Ariel Godwin, Gail Dunson, the Itzcowitz family, or scores of other readers whose enthusiasm brightens up our inbox. Thank you readers—this one’s for you.

  You may notice a few special features in Why Do Pirates Love Parrots? Just as some Web sites include a frequently asked questions section, we’ve devoted a section to Unimponderables, frequently asked irritating questions that may not fit the precise definition of Imponderables, but are posed to us frequently—incessantly, actually. And we’ve included an Updates section to spread the latest research about some Imponderables discussed in previous books.

  You can’t enjoy the full Imponderables experience without visiting us on the Web at http://www.imponderables.com. In some cases, we’ve expanded our discussions in this book on the site, have photos to illustrate the text here, and have comments from readers letting us have it. If we have updates on any of the Imponderables in this book, we’ll post them online. The Imponderables Web site offers a master index of all the Imponderables books and a blog written by Dave Feldman—and absolutely no popup or banner ads.

  In some discussions here, the book, we’ve added URLs of other Web sites, places to look for more information or illustrations. Web sites have a nasty habit of changing URLs, and we apologize in advance if you hit a dead end; all the links were accurate as of March 31, 2006.

  We hope you dive into the ocean of Imponderables presented here and plunder freely. If you feel like you are drowning in Imponderables, we’ll try to throw you a life preserver—the back of this book will tell you how to get in touch with us. Until we meet again, may you always have some swash in your buckle: Ahoy, matey!

  Why Did Pirates Love Parrots?

  Our image of the colorful parrot astride the peg-legged, patch-eyed pirate might come from cartoons and comic strips, but the inspiration was surely Robert Louis Stevenson’s Treasure Island, published in 1883. The beloved pet of cook Long John Silver, the parrot squawks “Pieces of eight!” with annoying regularity, and becomes the “watchbird” for the pirates after the miscreants take over the treasure hunters’ fort on the island.

  Stevenson admitted that he borrowed the idea of the parrot from Daniel Defoe’s Robinson Crusoe. After being stranded on the island, Crusoe knocks a young parrot out of a tree. He teaches the bird to speak its own name (“Poll”), “the first word I ever heard spoken in the island by any mouth but my own.”

  But did pirates really carry parrots on their ships in real life? The evidence suggests yes. Kenneth J. Kinkor, director of project research at the Expedition Whydah Sea-Lab and Learning Center in Provincetown, Massachusetts, told Imponderables that “Many pirates kept parrots and other animals, as many sailors did.” Kinkor says that parrots were most common among the Central American pirates who spent some time ashore, logging in places not under direct control of Spain, such as Belize, that possessed large parrot populations.

  David Cordingly, former curator of the National Maritime Museum in Greenwich, England wrote in his book, Under the Black Flag,

  It was common for seamen who traveled in the tropics to bring back birds and animals as souvenirs of their travels. Parrots were particularly popular because they were colorful, they could be taught to speak, and they were easier to look after on board ship than monkeys and other wild animals.

  Call us cynical, but pirates never struck us as the most sentimental of men. Perhaps some parrots were kept onboard as pets or mascots, but might there have been other, less humanitarian considerations? In the most-often cited contemporaneous account of the pirate world, Captain William Dampier’s A Voyage Around the World, written in 1697, Dampier claims that his band of privateers (pirates who are authorized by a country to commandeer ships sailing other states’ flags) ate parrots along with other birds, while cruising off of Venezuela.

  No pirate would get fat from eating parrots, so our bet is that the primary purpose of carrying parrots was financial. In his research on pirates, David Cordingly found government records from Elizabethan times indicating that pirates gave parrots to well-placed employees of government officials, presumably as bribes.