April 2010 – Airline Seating, Ants, Red Hair Nicknames, April Fools Day & more …

More great questions today – our listeners never cease to surprise us with the things they want to know!

Steve wanted to know a comparison of costs for the New Gateway compared to the Old Gateway.

The old Gateway cost approx $140 million to complete.  The new Gateway Project including 16km upgraded roads & 7 km new roads will cost $1.88 billion to complete.  An interesting fact is the old Gateway took 2 years longer to build than the current one.   Amazing!   There are 6,000 workers on the new project.  If anyone knows how many people worked on the old Gateway project please let me know?

Helen told us that when she was travelling on Qantas and Thai Airways all planes started their seating at Row 11.  She was curious as to why this was?

The rows 1-10, or thereabouts, are usually reserved for first class and/or business class.  Most planes are similar but there are differences with all airlines.  For a look at most airlines you can find the seat layout here at Seatguru.  Thai Airlines and Qantas on some planes do start at row 11, but not many other planes do.  They usually have 1st class and/or business class taking up the rows to 11.   They probably do this so the seats on all types of planes line up – whether they have 1st class/business class or not.

Betty wanted to know what day of the week two of her grandchildren were born on?  One was 22/9/1983 and the other 7/5/1987.

Betty both of your grandchildren were born on a Thursday.   I thought I’d include that lovely little poem from years ago about the days your child was born.

Monday’s child is fair of face,
Tuesday’s child is full of grace,
Wednesday’s child is full of woe,
Thursday’s child has far to go,
Friday’s child is loving and giving,
Saturday’s child works hard for a living,
But the child who is born on the Sabbath Day
Is bonny and blithe and good and gay

This rhyme was first recorded in A. E. Bray’s Traditions of Devonshire in 1838 and was collected by James Orchard Halliwell in the mid-nineteenth century.

Mary wanted to know how ants find their way back to their nest?

This question has such an interesting answer and can vary depending on the type of ant.    Many ants leave a chemical trail which they follow to and from the nest.  It is a slow way to travel because the ant needs to walk with it’s antennae to the ground.  The ant also has the ability to look around and store images (landmarks) along the way to use for the trip back.  Ants can store many memories.

The trails are just made by chemical glands in the back of the ant. As it drags its bottom along the floor, the compounds are released. Some ants have a sting which almost acts like a nib.  Once on surface, the compounds start to evaporate into the air.  The antennae can then pick up these signals.  Antennae are like ant noses.

In the case of desert ants, the University of Ulm in Germany wanted to see if they used their eyes or their legs to measure distance.    To test whether their eyes were used they put them on a conveyor belt and moved a visual pattern underneath them and it didn’t alter the distance measurement of the ants.

They decided to test whether they count their steps.  Scientists attached stilts to some ants’ legs as part of an experiment to determine how the insects know how far to run when returning to their nests. Other ants had their legs shortened.   With their modified, longer strides, the stilt-walking ants overshot their nest, while the stunted ants stopped too soon. The results suggest ants have a kind of inborn pedometer, or step counter.   I’m sure you don’t believe me, but it’s true.   Here is a link to the story and a picture of an ant with stilts in the National Geographic

Janelle wanted to know why people with red hair are called Red Heads!  Her son has “red” hair but he says red hair isn’t red it is really orange and why aren’t we called “orange heads”?

You are right, the hair colour is definitely closer to orange than red.  The actual pigment that causes this colour is a reddish pigment called pheomelanin, which is why hair is called red.  I guess that redhead is also a lot easier to say than orange head.   Thanks Bundynelle from Twitter!

Margaret wanted to know the origin of April Fool’s day and why tricks are played?

There were a number of theories, however this one seems to be the most plausible.

Before the introduction of the Gregorian calendar by Pope Gregory I in 1582 AD, New Years Day was on March 25th with celebrations which lasted for about eight days! These ended on April 1st, possibly at 12 noon (this is not verified). This may be why trick playing is supposed to cease at 12 noon on April 1st.

The custom appears to have originated in France, where people traditionally exchanged New Year gifts on April 1st. After the adoption of the new calendar, many people held on to the old traditions in spite of ridicule by the more progressive members of society. They became the butts of jokes, which gradually extended to the whole community playing tricks on each other such as sending apprentices on useless errands and the like.

Here is a list of the Top 100 April Fool’s gags of all time from the Hoax Museum.

Allan asked if authors were paid for using product placement in their books the way it is paid for in movies?

At this stage payment for product placement in books is not commonplace.  However on occasion payments have been made, such as a fee that novelist Fay Weldon received from Bulgari for including references to the brand’s jewellery in her book The Bulgari Connection, published by Nelson in 2004 (International Journal of Advertising, 2008, 27 (4), pp. 495-509).  (thank you to Schmoozyfox for that snippet)

Lynette wanted to know how many times does a mosquito have to bite a human before it has enough blood and does it then die afterwards?

The female mosquito is the only sex that drinks human blood.  She needs our blood to nourish her so she can lay eggs.  She needs .01 of a millilitre to fill her up.  Obtaining that can sometimes be taken at once or in many attempts – it depends how often she is shooed away.