The ovens on airplanes only reach 200 degrees Fahrenheit.

Source: Food Network

Yes, that is Marc Summers, former host of Nickelodeon’s Double Dare that you are seeing on the Food Network.

Firefox, if you didn’t know, has a built in spell-check function. (And judging by some of your comments, not all of our readers were aware of this fact.)

Having built-in spell check is great, but I have on several occasions accidentally clicked “add to dictionary” when I meant to select one of the correctly spelled options.

Never Fear, you can remove them.

Here’s how:

1. Go to start–> run and paste the following into the run window: %APPDATA%\Mozilla\Firefox\Profiles
2. Hit Enter
3. Open the .default folder
4. Use Notepad to open persdict.dat
5. Delete the misspelled word
6. Save the file
7. Restart Firefox, and you’re all done

Source: This Site

You can fit an entire Ikea bookshelf system (in boxes) plus 4 adults in a Pontiac Torrent. Not comfortably, but it can be done.

Folks who were around in the late 90’s (or have seen Home Alone 3) are familiar with the Billboard #6 hit Tubthumping by Chumbawamba.

It was #12 on Rolling Stone’s 20 most annoying songs list. I think it should have been higher.

Though you undoubetedly recognize the song, I bet you didn’t know that Chumbawamba has been around since the mid 80’s, and considers themselves an “Anarcho-Punk” band- a band that promotes Anarchist policies. They are also anti-corporation (despite being signed to a major record label).

Tubthumping, which is mostly about drinking, is described as “an anthem written to celebrate ordinary people’s ability to have a good time despite being constantly knocked down by poverty and inequality.”

And since I know you’ve been wondering: a tub-thumper is a slang term for a politician in the UK.

Source: wiki

The proper time to trim your finger nails with a nail clipper is when they are wet. Doing so will help prevent rough edges.

Source: The back of the package of the new nail clippers that we bought today

One of the more annoying Christmas Tunes is Do They Know It’s Christmas (”And there won’t be snow in Africa this Christmastime…”)

The song was recorded as a fundraiser for Africa by a group of mostly British stars. But did you know there are 3 distinct versions of this obnoxious song?

The first was recorded in 1984 and featured (among others) Duran Duran, U2, Kool & The Gang, Paul McCartney, and Phil Collins on drums.

The second, from 1989, was quite a bit less star-studded, featuring Kylie Minogue, Technotronic, and the guys from Bananarama.

The third was recorded in 2004 for the 20th anniversary of the travesty. It featured some updated British stars like Dido and Chris Martin from Cold Play, but Bono, Paul McCartney and George Michael came back for an encore.

Do they know it’s Christmastime at all?

Dressing, or more specifically Corn Bread Dressing, is a traditional Christmas/Thanksgiving Dinner side dish that is enjoyed mostly in Southern states like Texas. It is kind of similar to stuffing, but has a different taste and texture.

Today was my first attempt at making Dressing, but the reviews were generally positive. However, that could be because everyone was in the Christmas spirit and far too polite to say it sucked.

Here’s the recipe, for future reference:

Corn Bread Dressing
1 Package Corn Bread Mix* – About 4 cups crumbled
Minced Onion (2 Handfuls)
Chopped Celery (2 Handfuls)
Sage (a few pinches)
2 tbsp Butter
2 Eggs (beaten)
2 1/3 Cups Chicken Broth
Salt and Pepper (To Taste)

1. Make the Cornbread according to the package directions. Do this the day before you want to make the Dressing.

*I used a Betty Crocker cornbread mix that produced an 8 inch round pan’s worth of cornbread. You need about 3-4 cups of crumbled bread for the recipe. According to the reviews I read, you aren’t supposed to use Jiffy brand, since it includes sugar. Traditional Southern Corn Bread Dressing (so I read) uses unsweetened cornbread, so if you’re cooking for a southerner, you’ll want to steer clear of the sweetened bread.

2. Crumble the bread and put it in a large bowl. You want the pieces to be about dime sized.

3. Use the Butter to saute the onion and celery in a large pan. Saute until the celery is mostly soft.

4. Add the Chicken Broth to the pan and heat it until it is warm.

5. At this point, add the salt, pepper, and sage to taste. Sage is very powerful, so add slowly.

6. Add the beaten Eggs and the Broth Mix to the bowl with the crumbled bread and mix together.

7. Grease a 13×9 glass pan and add the dressing.

8. Cook at 350 for about 30-40 minutes, until the top is golden brown.

Enjoy.

Before I get crap from Christmas Dinner Purists for making stuffing from a box instead of making it from scratch, I need to point out that I’ve never had home-made stuffing that can even come close to Stove Top’s high quality tastiness.

So why mess with perfection?

Anyway, despite the fact that we had 16 people, and each box made 4 servings (4×4=16, right?), we had about 2 whole boxes worth left as leftovers. And leftover stuffing does not improve with age.

But now I know. And now you do too.

The Carat, a unit of measurement used in precious gemstones, was originally based on Carob Seeds.

Back in the day, people believed the seeds of a Carob Tree (a tree found in the Mediterranean) had uniform sized seeds. So they became the standard for weights.

But in actuality, the seeds did vary in size and weight. Unscrupulous merchants figured this out and had 2 baskets of seeds, one filled with heavier seeds for buying, and one with lighter seeds for selling.

Today, a carat equals 200 mg.

The term karat, used to signify purity in gold is related to the whole carat/carob thing. The weight of the gold being measured is compared to the weight of the same volume of pure gold.

The formula below is used to get the karat rating:

Mg is the weight of pure gold, and Mm is the weight of the sample being rated.

So 24 Karat Gold is almost totally pure. (Mg/Mm would equal a number very close to 1. Multiply times 24 for 24 karat.)

Source: History Channel and wiki for the assist.