Whenever you hear the name of something that really doesn’t fit, it may bring you out in a cold sweat or perhaps agitate you to a state of aggression and hostility. Fear not, most people feel the same way when incorrectly named products are thrust upon them.

The incorrect name for an object is known as a misnomer, and can become such a thing due to various reasons. Old names remaining as a product changes, anachronisms, regional names and people calling things by stupid names for humorous effect or because they invented it are just a few.

An example of this could be smooth peanut butter. Maybe we can accept that smooth peanut butter is smoother than chunky peanut butter, but it hardly smooth compared to cream. Smoother peanut butter would be a better name, so I expect every label to now add those two simple letters to their product for a more accurate description.

White cabbages? These are just smaller, more pale green cabbages without all the leaves. They are cabbages that have had all the good bits ripped off, now just a hard ball of tightly-wound pale green leaves. Anyone who had every eaten cabbage will understand the colour of cabbage is not relevant, the taste will always be upsetting.

American football is a sport, that has taken the British age-old game of football and ruined it beyond all recognition. It really shouldn’t be allowed to be called football as the feet are rarely used, and players are covered by massive pads and guards. More similar to rugby, American football is not related to football and should stop masquerading as some sort of second cousin.

The woolly manmoth was a hairy elephant creature when dinosaurs used to walk down the street. The names suggests a man has mated with a moth and created a man-sized moth or a moth with a little man head. Surely, the hairy elephant would have been a more accurate title - but then again maybe the manmoths liked the idea of being descendants of humans and moths and picked the name themselves. It’s a free world.

Eggplants are aubergines i think. So, when I next go to America and order an eggplant I will know what I am getting. But, why did it take me to order one to realise that I don’t like aubergine so shouldn’t have ordered it. You can’t grow a plant by placing an egg in soil. I tried. It just went rotten and didn’t flower at all.

There are many common misnomers that people will always shout at you when they want to feel intelligent. Peanuts are not nuts, coconuts aren’t nuts and many other nuts that aren’t actually nuts. Brazil nuts are nuts so don’t say this one or risk looking rather foolish.

So, next time you call something by its name, think to yourself about how accurate you are actually being. Don’t follow the crowd and you could be the most clever guy on your bowling team with witty remarks such as ‘the strawberry isn’t even a fruit’. Those moments will elevate you to a level of almost dreamlike existence.

Patrick is an expert Research and Travel consultant. His current interest is in Heathrow airport hotels (http://www.holidayextras.co.uk/heathrow-airport-hotels.html), and the Hilton Heathrow (http://www.holidayextras.co.uk/airport-hotels/heathrow/hilton.html).

An airline passengers’ bill of rights was passed September 5, 2008. If your plane is delayed 4 hours, you’re entitled to a meal voucher. If it’s delayed 8 hours, you’re entitled to a hotel voucher. If the delay occurs after you’re on board, you have the right to disembark after 90 minutes. Unfortunately for Americans, “Flight Rights” was passed by the Canadian government. Although the bill can’t make airlines responsible for weather, a time limit for tarmac delays is an idea all airline passengers would like to see fly.

The concern for animal rights has had animal welfare groups outraged by the cruel treatment of horses sold for meat and they’ve been seeking federal regulation since 2001. Although they forced the closure of the last 3 U.S. slaughterhouses, many states don’t have laws prohibiting new slaughterhouses and 100,000 horses a year are still exported to Canada and Mexico for slaughter. In September 2008 the House Judiciary Committee approved the “Prevention of Equine Cruelty Act”. It would make possession or transportation of horse meat or horses for human consumption a crime punishable by up to 3 years in prison. Although it’s uncertain if the act will pass this year, its sponsors aren’t horsing around.

The right to have shelter influenced the 2008 awarding of the Curry Stone Design Prize, given annually to an individual or group who has developed a design solution with potential to create beneficial change in a vital community. The $100,000 prize went to MAA Architects, a South African firm that designed a $6900 house to replace dilapidated structures in Cape Town shantytowns. The 54-square-meter, 2-story house is built with sandbags supported by a wood frame and requires little or no electricity or skilled labor to build. In fact, MAA plans to build10 houses with volunteer help from the community - plans that won’t be sandbagged.

Finally, after more than 20 years of peaceful protest and a few violent battles, the last two tree-sitters came down from the California redwoods they’d been protecting for almost a year. They came down because the Pacific Lumber Company, the largest private owner of old-growth redwoods, has new owners. Humboldt Redwood Company (owned by Dan and Doris Fisher of The Gap, Inc.) acquired Pacific Lumber in bankruptcy court. They pledged to spare any redwood born before 1800 with a diameter of at least 4 feet. That’s a pledge tree-sitters can take sitting down.

Knight Pierce Hirst takes humorous looks at life. Take a minute to make yourself smile at http://knightwatch.typepad.com

Is it just me or is there always another computer program to learn? Now I’m meant to learn how to protect my e-mails with encryption software. A friend suggested I buy the “PGP” program because its developer was mentioned in the “The DaVinci Code”. PGP stands for Pretty Good Privacy - cute; but I wasn’t convinced. The program requires both the sender and receiver to have an encryption key. Frankly, I could develop a much simpler, free program. Every time people write e-mails, they should pretend their mother is reading over their shoulder and then it wouldn’t matter who else read it.

When I think wireless access, I think about being able to use my laptop in more places; but some cities are using wireless technology for surveillance. Oklahoma City has installed the world’s largest, municipal, surveillance network, linking hundreds of video cameras. Chicago has installed the largest network of bus surveillance in the U.S., putting cameras on its 2,000 buses. Seventy-five percent of cities and towns with active or planned wireless networks will use them for public safety. That’s an increase of 10% from 2006. When asked about the potential to violate peoples’ privacy, a spokesman for the Office of Emergency Management and Communication said videos are destroyed after 30 days - but when he said that did his nose get longer?

Because the small, Texas town of Harold is 30 minutes from the county sheriff’s office, school trustees worried about security in regard to school shootings. Their solution was to let staff carry concealed weapons. The staff must have a Texas license for a concealed weapon, be authorized by the district, receive crisis training and use bullets that minimize ricocheting. Of course, the 120 students might want the teachers to have anger management training too.

Although Iraq has more than 500,000 men in its security forces, the country’s conservative beliefs have prevented women from joining. As of September 2008, however, 21 women are in the police force. They wear blue shirts and black trousers like the men, but their heads and necks are covered by a hijab. Because Iraqi men aren’t allowed to search women, Al-Qaida has increasingly used female suicide bombers - 14 in Diyala province alone since November 2007. The primary job of the policewomen will be to search women at checkpoints. Two hundred more Iraqi women want to be policewomen - that’s 200 more steps in the right direction.

Knight Pierce Hirst takes humorous looks at life. Take a minute to make yourself smile at http://knightwatch.typepad.com

The biggest investment most people make is a house. Then there’s the cost of maintenance, repairs and improvements. After a few years remodeling is a possibility, but insurance is a must. With a house it’s always something; but as long as the interest on mortgages is tax deductible, homeowners can sleep in a tax shelter.

Those who are skittish about investing in the stock market can let their money ride - on tractors. Antique tractor collecting became popular in the 1970’s. Some names are familiar - John Deere and Case - and some aren’t - Oliver and Silver King. Some are already restored and others are waiting for hope to be restored. As the number of tractor aficionados has grown, prices have increased. Prices drastically increased in recent years because of European investors benefiting from the exchange rate. Prices of older tractors can double in a year - making tractors a down-to-earth investment.

Then there’s Elon Musk’s out-of-this-world investment. Musk is the 37-year-old, mega-millionaire co-founder of PayPal, who invested $100 million of his own money in Space X, a low-budget rocket company. His goal is to radically reduce the cost of putting objects into space. Unfortunately, Musk’s three attempts to put a Falcon rocket into orbit have failed - so it seems some things do require a rocket scientist.

No rocket scientist is needed to get to Mars - Mars, the chocolate manufacturer, that is. That Mars is investing $10 million to study the genetic makeup of cocoa. The world’s cocoa supply is produced by 6 1/2 million subsistence farmers in Africa and the Americas; but their plants are suffering from disease, pests and climate change. Knowing cocoa’s genetic makeup will enable more resistant plants to be grown and Mars is willing to provide its information to anyone - even to the Hershey Chocolate Company. That is an offer that should be sealed with a kiss.

Finally, the owners of an upscale supermarket in Chevy Chase, Maryland have sealed the deal on investing $7,000 a year in a car wash for their shopping carts. According to the supermarket owners, shopping carts are more germ-infested than pay phones, soap dispensers and toilet seats in public restrooms. By spraying a peroxide-based mist on the carts, the system supposedly eliminates 99.9% of the germs. The company that makes the cart wash system has sold 20 units in the U.S. and South Korea. Unfortunately, that is far from a clean sweep.

Knight Pierce Hirst takes humorous looks at life. Take a minute to make yourself smile at http://knightwatch.typepad.com

It takes 21 days to form a habit. If you say you can’t change your diet because it is too hard, and then consider this, in 21 days time you can have broken one habit and started another one.

You need to look at your diet not in terms of starvation or deprivation, but of changing bad habits and replacing them with good habits. This always makes it easier to achieve the goals.

Take away one bad habit and replace it with a good habit and after 21 days you wouldn’t even think about the bad habit.

Let’s take a very simple example. Suppose you eat too much sugar. You drink 10 cups of coffee a day, and in each cup you put 2 teaspoons of sugar. You decide that you no longer need sugar in your coffee. You make the first cup, and slowly you take a sip. You immediately think how disgusting it tastes. You think you need sugar, but then you tell yourself you don’t need sugar. It isn’t good for you. You drink the worse cup of coffee in your life. You think you couldn’t get used to coffee without sugar.

Maybe on that first day your coffee drinking drops to 5 cups and suddenly each one taste a little better than the one before. It isn’t great but it is improving.

You persevere and by the time you reach day 21, you haven’t even thought about sugar in your coffee. Way before the 21st day you have changed your habit. You might have found it changed on the 21st cup. But it changed. Now you no longer need sugar in your coffee. You are proud of yourself, because it was so disgusting the first few cups, and you never thought it would be possible to give up.

Now you try a small experiment, you try one cup with sugar, and suddenly this is disgusting to you. You can’t drink it, as it is too sweet. One habit dead and buried and this is how you get to change your eating habits. One habit at a time, and see them all changed to good habits. No longer are you eating 5 bars of chocolate a day, but 1 bar of chocolate a week.

All habits can be broken, but they take time. Habits took time to develop and they take time to be broken.

We hope that you enjoyed reading this article. If you are looking for additional information on health related articles or free niche articles, please be sure to check out our website at http://www.verysimplearticles.com

What do you do when confronted with the sight of a CCTV security camera? Do you go on as if it is a speck on the wall worthy of your attention as a, well, speck on the wall? Do you ponder it for a moment, wonder who is watching you watching him and then wander somewhere else with nary a second glance?

Whatever you do, never ever do these things if you value your sanity, your dignity, your levity, and most important, your life. (Unless of course, you are inside Big Brother’s house relishing the presence of 24/7 surveillance cameras and losing all of the above will get you noticed by TV viewers, in which case, this could be turned into “Things You Must Do To Win the Grand Prize”)

Make Funny Faces

With your face so near the CCTV security camera your nose hairs are visible from the security monitor, at that. If you think the security personnel will be amused with the sight of your scrunched-up, cross-eyed, wrinkled-nose, tongue-out face, you have another fist coming.

Did I say fist? I meant think. And even if the fist does not come, you will be certainly marked for life as easily as if a fist has broken your wrinkled nose and set it straight. Or whatever. You know what I mean.

Do a Striptease

Well, your male viewers will enjoy the show. Maybe they will sit back, prop their feet on the security console, relax and drink beer. After all, your performance might rival Big Brother 9 Natalie’s striptease only better because they have exclusive viewing options. Maybe, they will zoom the CCTV security camera on your lady parts for a better view. Yum yum.

Then again, do you really want to be slapped on with handcuffs after the show? Or even clothed again, only with a straightjacket? And did you know footages from the CCTV security camera can be rewound again and again and again for your fans’ perverted pleasure?

Rant and Rave

You will get nowhere on ranting and raving unless you and your viewers either know sign language or adept at charades or proficient in lip reading. You never know if the CCTV security camera can capture your here-comes-the-four-horsemen-of-the-Apocalypse voice!

Why? Simply because not all CCTV systems are sophisticated enough to capture sound and even if they do, they would run into trouble with the law. Another impertinent why? Well, because in many states, sound recordings taken off video cameras are inadmissible in a court of law unless you are the law itself.

If you really want to tell your boss to go (insert vulgar euphemism of choice for intimate relations) with himself, you are better off telling him to his face. Get inspiration on how to do it from Wesley Gibson of “Wanted” fame. And three million dollars in the bank should help with the self-confidence.

The list goes on and on – give the dirty finger, show your shiny-as-a-baby’s-head butt, simulate masturbation and sex, and flaunt what should best be hidden for the sake of the viewers’ sanity, to name a few - but these three are the worst things you can do in front of a CCTV security camera.

Or the best, if you are one of the top contenders in Big Brother!

For authoritative opinions on CCTV systems and CCTV equipment, visit Video-Surveillance-Guide.com and choose the perfect CCTV security camera for your home and office.

Tamien Bain was fourteen when he and two friends robbed a McDonald’s. Tamien was tried as an adult and served twelve years in prison. Unlike some prisoners, he didn’t find Jesus. He found music. Now twenty-nine, Tamien is known as Miami rapper “BAING The Locksmith”; and he knows it’s never too late to be a hero. BAING started “Real Talk”, a program which brings rappers to youth detention centers to talk about their mistakes and to share their music. BAING’s latest music is a jingle which qualified him as one of five contest finalists. When BAING turned his life around, he turned in a complete circle. The jingle was for McDonald’s.

Joel Armstrong was sitting in his second-floor, Spokane office when he saw that a duck had laid ten eggs in the awning outside his window. The day after the eggs hatched the mother duck jumped ten feet to the sidewalk. After the first duckling jumped, it lay limp on the sidewalk. That’s when Joel jumped into action. With a friend telling him when each duckling jumped, Joel caught the remaining nine. Then, after the first duckling surprisingly revived, Joel put them all in a box and carried them to the river. When the mother duck waddled into the river, all ten ducklings followed. Obviously, this would be a better world if none of us ducked responsibility.

Sean Tevis is a Web designer who wanted to run for political office. After being told he needed $26,000 to campaign against the incumbent Kansas state representative, Sean went door-to-door. Two weeks, $25 and two dog bites later he decided to use his Web skills. Sean posted a stick-figure cartoon on line. In “Running for Office” a political advisor tells Sean it’s easy to raise $26,000. He just needs fifty-two people to donate $500 each. Unconvinced, Sean keeps breaking $26,000 down until he gets to three thousand people donating $8.67. Less than a day later Sean reached his goal - proving small change can make big change.

Rochelle Behrens is a 25-year-old Washington lobbyist by day. By night she literally bridged the gap to clothes designer. Tired of having a gap between the buttons of her dress shirts, Rochelle designed a shirt with hidden buttons. Because these buttons button through the interior side of the shirt’s placket, the shirt looks normal from the outside. Rescuing women from bra-showing gaps made her a her-o.

Knight Pierce Hirst takes humorous looks at life. Take a minute to make yourself smile at http://knightwatch.typepad.com

The law for taxing cell phone use was written 20 years ago. That’s when cell phones were the size and weight of bricks - when they cost $4,000 and were used only by top executives. Today they’re smaller, lighter, cheaper and used by almost everyone - but the law hasn’t changed. Personal calls made on company mobile phones are still taxable. The IRS considers them part of an employee’s compensation package. Just like using a company car, employees are expected to document all use, indicating which was personal use. Obviously, a new law is called for - but not from a company cell phone.

Ken Smith, senior lecturer at Bucks New University in England, is calling for new spelling. He thinks some misspelling should be considered variant - not wrong. Among the 10 words he proposes for variant spelling are Febuary for February, twelth for twelfth and truely for truly Joe Pickett, executive editor for American Heritage Dictionary, says spelling changes aren’t accepted until they become mainstream in print publications. Fantasy became an accepted variant for phantasy in the early 1900’s. In 1996 consideration was given to alot as a variant for a lot - but for now it’s still rong.

Most fisheries still operate on a simple system - when regulators declare opening day, fishermen catch fish as fast as possible. In the past few decades this has caused a 30% collapse in commercial fisheries worldwide. Now federal regulators are considering a catch-share system. Fishermen would be given a quota for fish to fill in a year and that quota could be sold. A survey of 11,000 fishermen worldwide found that fisheries using the catch-share system are only half as likely to collapse and that likelihood decreases the longer they use the system. Because this survey was published in Science magazine, it’s obviously a fish story without exaggeration.

Unfortunately, not all change is good. The number of fireflies worldwide is decreasing. Although researchers attribute this to urban sprawl and industrial pollution, increase in artificial lighting is another factor. It interferes with females seeing and being wooed by flashing backsides of males. The severity of the decrease isn’t known because among the 2,000 species of fireflies, many females spend most of their time on the ground and other females don’t flash. Further complicating the count is their 1-3 week lifespan. Nevertheless, because these insects are key to understanding the health of an ecosystem, fireflies count.

Knight Pierce Hirst takes humorous looks at life. Take a minute to make yourself smile at http://knightwatch.typepad.com

Marijuana users have always sought legal loopholes in countries where it is illegal to own or smoke it. Many people choose to buy marijuana seeds (which is legal in many places), then grow and smoke their own (which is not!) But every marijuana smoker has probably dreamed at one point or another of living in a country where marijuana is legal – or at least where the “rules” concerning possession are so lax that it is effectively legal.

Most people know about Holland’s famously relaxed laws regarding marijuana (which is why it doesn’t feature on the list below!) While no other country has achieved such high profile recognition for making marijuana legal, a number of places around the world have quietly relaxed their laws concerning possession for personal use. In most of these countries, possession still remains technically illegal, but penalties are not enforced if you are within certain guidelines – this is known as decriminalisation.

So, if living in a country where marijuana possession isn’t punished by the law sounds like heaven, here are five places you should consider emigrating!

Argentina

After a recent court debate about whether or not to punish those who buy and grow marijuana, Argentina has effectively made marijuana legal if it is in small quantities for personal use. A leading judge in Argentina even decided that it was “unconstitutional” to legislate against marijuana possession! Those who buy marijuana seeds and grow their own are also leniently treated, so long as they are growing a small number of plants. The country is also notably supportive of several medical marijuana programs.

Australia

Before you go booking a one way ticket to Sydney, make sure you do your research. Different regions have different rules, but Western Australia, Southern Australia, Tasmania, Victoria and Queensland have all decriminalised marijuana to a certain degree. In Tasmania, Victoria and Queensland, police have taken to “ticketing” those caught with less than 50 grams of marijuana rather than arresting them, and Western and Southern Australia have instituted on the spot fines for minor possession rather than official warnings or arrests.

Belgium

Since 2003, the Belgian government has made the possession and use of marijuana legal under the following conditions:

• The amount possessed is 5 grams or less

• You are over 18

• You do not smoke in the presence of minors

• You do not smoke in public

You can buy marijuana seeds and grow them in Belgium without penalty – however, you are only allowed to own one female plant. The purchase and sale of marijuana is still illegal, but most Belgians simply get their marijuana in Holland.

Colombia

Colombia, has had relaxed laws concerning drug possession for over ten years. Possession of less than 20 grams of marijuana, one gram of cocaine and one gram of heroin is not considered to be illegal, although things may change – recent conservative governments have considered repealing this law to combat Colombia’s drug culture.

Nepal

Unlike the other countries on this list, Nepal doesn’t have an actual decriminalisation policy towards marijuana – it’s rather that the laws they have are hardly ever enforced! Marijuana used to be legal in Nepal, making it a hippy Mecca in the 1960’s and early 70’s. It has been illegal since 1973 – not that you’d notice. Marijuana is widely available and used, especially by Nepalese holy men. Note that smuggling and growing are punished, but possession and personal use rarely are – if the police catch you smoking they will stop you, but only to collect a small bribe!

Robert Kane is the managing director of Sensible Seeds.com, where you can buy marijuana seeds and informational books online. The website sells its products to customers all over the world.

Despite Darwin’s theory of evolution, there are people who don’t seem to have evolved mentally. A man from Tennessee booked a hotel room so he and his girlfriend could celebrate the first anniversary of the day they met. To make the room more romantic, he arranged candles on the floor to spell “I Love U”. After lighting the candles he went to get his girlfriend. By the time he got back, the carpet had burned and the television had melted. The Tennessean had to pay for damages, but he’d proved that romantically no one could hold a candle to him.

Then there was the man in Greenville, South Carolina who went to the BB&T bank and gave a note demanding money to one of the tellers. After getting an undisclosed amount of cash, the man left the bank and got into a waiting taxi. Moments later, after asking the cab company where the man had been dropped off, police arrested him. However, because the taxi driver wasn’t involved in the robbery, it wasn’t a taxi-ng case.

“Men on a Mission” - a calendar featuring shirtless, male missionaries - has sold almost 10,000 copies. This caused the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints to officially reprimand the publisher. In defense, the publisher explained his projects are about stepping outside stereotypes; but considering he’s a Mormon, he’d stepped too far.

According to a judge in New Zealand, parents went too far when they named their nine-year-old daughter “Talula Does The Hula From Hawaii”. When the couple appeared before the judge in a custody dispute, he ordered them to change the name to something that would cause less ridicule. Since then the judge has turned down two names suggested by the parents - “Sex Fruit” and “Fish And Chips” - but I’m sure he’s thought of appropriate names for the parents.

Finally, People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals has asked Ben & Jerry to keep cows from suffering by using breast milk instead of cow’s milk in their ice cream. La Leche League International, the world’s oldest breast-feeding support organization, said it would be difficult to make ice cream with breast milk because every woman’s breast milk is different. Considering it takes 1 1/2 gallons of milk to make 1 gallon of ice cream, every woman who has used a breast pump is painfully aware breast milk ice cream is udderly impractical.

Knight Pierce Hirst takes humorous looks at life. Take a minute to make yourself smile at http://knightwatch.typepad.com