My Empire of Gurt

So, my mother-in-law Anne came to town for a few days and we had a great time. We made the rounds, did all the Champaign stuff, and saw some historic places. Before I get into all of that, though, we're going to talk about Sunday, the last day of vacation.

Cheesemaking 101
I'm following the trail blazed by Dr. Fankhauser of the University of Cincinnati Clermont College. He's a Biology professor and homesteader who's also into folk dancing. During the 60s, he marched with the Freedom Riders in Alabama and Mississippi for civil rights. Interesting guy. As a homesteader, he makes his own cheese, slaughters his own meat, and milks his own goats.

This is his full website:
http://biology.clc.uc.edu/Fankhauser/

And here's his Homesteader Skills page:
http://biology.clc.uc.edu/fankhauser/homesteading/Homesteading_skills.html

Yogurt
He has you make yogurt first. You use yogurt as a starter for cheese and learning to make yogurt helps teach you sterile processes since you have to use bacteria, but only the right bacteria. I'm just going to give you a brief overview of the process, since you can get the details from the good Doctor's site.

First, I sterilized the jars.

Then, I scalded the milk, bringing it almost to boiling, but not quite. Scalding the milk kills bacteria that might out compete the yogurt bacteria added later. This isn't as important in our modern age of pasteurized milk, but scalding also denatures (or unfolds) the proteins in the milk.

To make my yogurt, I needed to inoculate the scalded milk with active bacteria cultures. The bacteria used for making yogurt, Lactobacillus acidophilus and Streptococcus thermophilus, are lactic acid fermenting bacteria. That means they eat sugar (the sugar in milk is lactose) and poop out lactic acid. All Streptococcus species poop out lactic acid. That's why S. pharyngitis makes your throat sore (you might call it Strep Throat) and S. mutans erodes the enamel on your teeth to create cavities. Fermenting is the metabolic process where the little bugs extract energy from the sugar. The bacteria and yeast used to create bread, beer, and wine ferment (extract energy from) sugar and poop out alcohol. The scalded milk would kill our friendly little bugs, so I had to cool it in cold water before I set them loose.

I used a cup of milk and a cup of yogurt with active cultures of L. acidophilus and S. thermophilus to create a starter. I mixed the starter into the scalded milk so the bacteria could begin eating and pooping. The lactic acid coagulates the milk, but since the proteins have been denatured (unfolded), it doesn't form curds. The curds and whey congeal together to form yogurt.

After that, I poured the inoculated milk into 4 quart jars and one 8 oz jar (a starter for the next batch) and incubated the jars in warm water. You'll notice the species name of our Strep bacteria, thermophilus, means heat-loving. They are most productive at growing, multiplying, eating, and pooping at higher temperatures.

I left them in a cooler in the kitchen for 3 hours.

After three hours, I put the jars in the fridge to cool them. The next afternoon, my beautiful assistant Ainers taste-tested my first batch of homemade yogurt.

She said, and this is an exact quote: "It tastes like yogurt." Then she added honey, vanilla extract, and mangoes. I asked Anne if she wanted to taste it. She said, "No."

Making your own yogurt requires an investment in equipment and can take some time, but you can make a gallon of yogurt for the price of a gallon of milk and it lasts up to two months in the fridge. The time and price may be a wash depending on where you shop and what brand you buy, but like anything you make from scratch at home, it's fresh and you know exactly what goes into it. No cornstarch, no chemicals to artificially gel the yogurt, no artificial sweeteners. Just yogurt.

Winter Storm Virgil
Aeneid a snow shovel. That was a pun. See what I did there?

Anne got to see her first Illinois snow storm. In a way, I feel like I saw my first Illinois snow storm. Winter Storms Nemo and Q both left around 3 inches of snow. And that seemed pretty crazy. At the time. By the way, I thought the whole naming of Winter Storms like Hurricanes came via mandate from NOAA or some equally official governmental body in charge of naming things. No. It's just something the Weather Channel started doing.

It started snowing Sunday afternoon. We got 3 inches in the first few hours. I was all like wow, more snow.

It kept snowing, though. That evening, we had up to 5 inches. I thought that was really crazy, almost double the most snow we had this year.

It came up past my ankles when I walked the dog.

But it kept snowing. See the pictures from that night.

All night it snowed. Monday morning we had 10 inches on the ground and Anne's flight home got cancelled. Winter Storm Virgil. Everything I thought I knew about snow was a lie.

Next Time on the Illinois Cheese Chronicles
Now that we've made yogurt, I've bought some cheesecloth to make labneh, a Lebanese soft cheese. We'll probably do that this weekend.

Illinois Forecast

The Erin Go Bragh that keeps go braghing
So, this will probably be the only post this week. Today is technically my Friday. My mother-in-law flies in tonight and I'm taking the rest of the week off from work. Like a good husband, I will function as cartilage for the next few days.

But you're wondering, James, what's in store for us in Jabboland? What's next?

Good question. Here's your answer.

Cheese, Grommit!
I'm going to make my own. I found the website of a professor slash homesteader out of Pennsylvania who makes his own cheese. He posted step by step instructions on a variety of cheese types. He starts you with yogurt and works you up to mozzarella.

So, we're starting with yogurt. I used some birthday cash to start my cheese making supply collection.

If you look now, my lovely assistant Piglet will show you the stash.

Now, this guy is a serious homesteader. He eats real food and grows most of his own. He makes his cheese from the milk he's milked from his own goats. He's got everything like instructions for how to build your own cheese press with supplies from Home Depot, good substitutes for cheese cloth, and pictures of how to finger-test your own curds. If you know what I mean.

Illinois is for the Birds
And so am I. We've figured out most of the trees around here, so it's time to take a serious look at the winged denizens of this fair state. I've bought some bird books.

I've been promised a pair of binoculars for my birthday (which I haven't seen yet), but once I have them we are hitting the bird trails.

I will be a birdwatcher. There's a distinction between birdwatchers and birders similar to the distinction between cavers and spelunkers. Cavers and birders are a serious bunch that consider everyone else base amateurs. I've checked out a couple Birder Websites. These folks maintain libraries of recent edition bird books, keep extensive lists of every bird they've birded, and buy expensive equipment. They say, well, if you're not going to drop at least a grand on a pair of binoculars, then you might as well stay home and collect stamps. I have stamps. I want to see birds. I don't want to spend a fortune doing it. So birdwatcher it is.

Just as a gesture of good faith, here's a recent picture of our old friend Turdus migratorious, the American Robin.

Back by Popular Request
We're still on the look out for National Historic Register sites and, after the spring thaw, we'll have some more Illinois Ghost Adventures. This weekend we're heading to Chicago and Bloomington-Normal, two exotic locales I've visited either once or never depending on the locale.

So, we'll see you next week with more local Illinois flavor.

Erin Go Bragh

A Jabbo Special St. Patrick's Day Edition
Last summer I married an Irish girl. Half-Irish, to be exact, the other half being Lowland Scottish. This makes me a contractual Hybernophile, or a lover of Irish stuff. The word comes from the Roman name for Ireland: Hybernia. The Irish also use Hybernia as the poetic name for Ireland, like Caledonia for Scotland, Britannia for the UK, and Columbia for the US (see also: District of).

In Gaelic, the Irish call their homeland Eire which comes the long way around from a Germanic goddess named Eriu. Don't feel bad: they don't have a monopoly on Germanic deities. We celebrate the resurrection of our Lord and Savior on a day named after the Germanic fertility goddes Eostre. Also, all the days of the week. Except the 7th one which we named after the baby-eating Titan of Roman mythology, Saturn (Cronus in Greek).

St. Patrick
Today, March 17th, the entire world celebrates St. Patrick's day. I'm wearing green as I type this. After a little research, I discovered that St. Patrick is NOT the guy on the Lucky Charms box and he DOESN'T have a pot of gold hidden at the end of the rainbow. Who knew?

His original name was Maewyn Succat. I'm not sure how to pronounce that. I tried saying it to Aine, but she replied, not now, I have a headache. Whatever that means. Mr. Succat was born in Roman Britain in 387 AD, almost 400 years after the life of Christ, but still before a Catholic council decided which books to include in the New Testament and which to condemn as heresy. That's why you've probably never read such classics as the Gospel of Thomas or the Shepherd of Hermas. True story: when archaeologists found a copy of the Gospel of Thomas at Nag Hammadi, they found excerpts from Plato's Republic buried with it.

Back to Roman Britain. Let that sink in a moment. The patron saint of Ireland was British. But so were our Founding Fathers.

St. Patrick's story begins when he was sixteen. This is no accident. In Irish and Scottish culture, sixteen is the age you officially reach adulthood. Both of Aine's parents started out on their own at age sixteen. When Aine turned sixteen, her dad handed over her birth certificate and said, well, good luck. Remember, Jesus began his ministry at age thirty, the age of adulthood in Jewish culture.

Patty was minding his own business, strolling along the shore, when Irish Pirates swept down from the stormy seas, tied him up, and shipped him back to Ireland. There, as a slave, he tended sheep for several years. One night, God came to him in a dream and told him to escape. He got up, walked down to the docks, climbed aboard a ship and sailed to Gaul, known today as France, where he learned about Christianity.

You're probably wanting a bit of history to orient yourself. St. Patrick probably arrived in Gaul after 400 AD. The 40th Pope was working in St. Peter's Basilica, finished in 320. In 380, Emperor Theodosius made Christianity the official state religion of the Roman Empire. In 410, the Goths sacked Rome, marking the end of the Classical Era and the beginning of the Middle Ages. The Synod of Hippo met in 393 and picked the books of the Bible. Tough luck, Apocalypse of Moses. Here's your take away: St. Patrick grew up in a Roman World, but one where Christianity was coming into its own. A hundred years before, they were still throwing Christians to the lions.

After working his way up to Bishop in the Church, Maewyn Succat, who had by now taken the name Patrick, returned to Ireland to convert the pagans.

Snake Symbolism Again
St. Patrick is the Abraham Lincoln of Ireland. Every few miles you find an official St. Patrick site and much of Irish identity is bound to his deeds and exploits. While converting the Irish and breaking the cultural power of the Druids, Patrick drove all the snakes from Ireland. Not content with that, he dug up all fossilized remains and expunged all references to snakes in ancient texts so we have no historical or archaeological evidence that snakes ever existed on the island. He explained the concept of the Trinity using the shamrock: one leaf (compound palmate) divided into three parts (leaflets). Remember that. Shamrock. Not Four Leaf Clover. If you make that mistake in front of an Irish person, he or probably she will curse at you in Gaelic. Take my word for it. I have in-laws. My favorite Patrick story is when he returned to his former master to pay his ransom. After all, Patrick deprived the poor man of property without due process. Hearing that his former slave had returned, the former master killed himself by setting fire to his house and dying in the flames.

Patrick died on March 17 (see what they did there?), 461 AD in Downpatrick, Ireland. Technically, Downpatrick is in Northern Ireland, which, while on the island of Ireland, isn't part of the nation of Ireland. It's part of the UK and therefore occupied by imperialist Sassenachs. Sassenach is the Gaelic word meaning Saxon, used as a derogatory term for those of Anglo Saxon descent. Also, it's what my mother in law calls me when I make her mad.

How It Became a Thing
You have to work through four stages to become a Saint. You know, like you have to have Bobcat, Wolf, Bear, and Webelos before you can get your Arrow of Light. Only, for Catholics, the badges are Servant of God, Venerable, Blessed, and then Saint. To be canonized by the Pope and reach the fourth level, you have to perform at least two miracles posthumously in an act of intercession.

Patrick was never canonized by a Pope. During the first 1000 years of Christianity, canonization occurred at the local (diocesan) level. Everyone already declared a saint at that point was sort of grandfathered in. The day of Patrick's death, March 17th, was made a feast day in Ireland in the 9th century. On the official Roman Catholic feast calendar, St. Patrick's day is marked Optional.

Celebrate Good Times Come On 
Much of what we consider St. Patrick's Day tradition started among Irish immigrants in America and migrated back across the Atlantic. In Ireland, the day was celebrated as a holy day and they ate boiled bacon and cabbage. Lent was suspended for that day only.

Irish Protestants (go figure) started celebrating in America as early as the 1730s. The first St. Patrick's day parade occurred spontaneously in New York in the 1760s when Irish serving in the British Army marched down the street raising a ruckus. Not wanting to be outdone, Dublin and Belfast started hosting parades, too.

The Irish made the day a national holiday in 1903. Due to the Irish being Irish, the British, still in control of Ireland at the time, passed a law banning alcohol on March 17th. The Irish parliament voted to repeal the ban in 1970. The Irish government started hosting a yearly festival in the mid-90s.

In the United States, St. Patrick's day is a legal holiday in two places: Suffolk County, Massachusetts and Chatham County, Georgia. Chicago dyes the Chicago River green. Previously, they used a 100 lbs of vegetable dye which lasted a week. They've cut back to 40 lbs which only lasts 8 hours. Irish immigrants in the US started substituting corned beef for bacon and that has become the traditional meal for St. Patrick's day. Like black eyed peas and cabbage on New Year's. The Irish don't consider corned beef an Irish dish, but they serve it to tourists who think it is. Sort of like crispy tacos in Mexican Restaurants. I've never seen a Mexican eat a crispy taco.

Every year since 1991, the POTUS issues a proclamation declaring March as Irish Heritage Month and the Irish Taoiseach comes for an official visit. You pronounce Taoiseach like tee zhah, only when you get to the end, make a noise in your throat like you're hocking a loogie. When Irish people say Taoiseach, they mean Prime Minister. Which begs they question why they don't just say Prime Minister.

Wearing of the Green
The color associated with St. Patrick was blue. But we wear green. So it goes.

The Irish used to pin shamrocks to their lapels on St. Patrick's day. They called it The Wearing of the Green. You know, because a shamrock is green. It became a political statement during the Irish Rebellion of 1798. One that meant: "British go home." The 1798 rebellion just happened to be the bloodiest and most violent rebellion in Irish history. And there are plenty to choose from. Irish soldiers took the wearing of the green to another level by wearing all green uniforms and the rest is history.

So for the Irish, St. Patrick's day is not just a day to get drunk. It's their Thanksgiving, New Year's, Memorial Day, and 4th of July all rolled into one.

There's an old Irish ballad commemorating the wearing of the green. Like all Irish ballads, a lot of people die in it.

Parting Shot
Erin Go Bragh means "Ireland Forever." It's an anglicisation of the Gaelic Eirinn go Brach. I have no idea how to pronounce it. In Scotland, they say Alba Gu Brath, meaning "Scotland Forever." You pronounce that one like: alpapa ku pra. I don't know why. See, there's old Gaelic which Scotland and Ireland share, then there's Modern Gaelic which they speak in Ireland and Scots Gaelic which they speak in Scotland. It's a mess.

Alba is the Scots Gaelic word for Scotland which comes from the Greek (go figure) Albion. Go bragh and gu brath literally mean "until Judgement Day."

Sean Connery has Alba Gu Brath tattooed on his arm.

And if you were curious: Sun Day, Moon Day, Tyr's Day, Wodin's Day, Thor's Day, Freya's Day. So there.

National Register of Historic Places (Part 1)

The National Register of Historic Places lists 57 locations in Champaign County.

You can find the full list here:
http://www.nationalregisterofhistoricplaces.com/il/champaign/state.html

And you can find listings by state here:
http://www.nationalregisterofhistoricplaces.com/state.html

Check it out. There are worse things you can do over the weekend than see a little bit of local history.

We have visited 16 locations in Champaign County:

1. Altgeld Hall 
2. Cattle Bank 
3. Chanute Field 
4. Chemical Laboratory 
5. Farm House 
6. Hazen Bridge 
7. U of I Library 
8. Lincoln Statue 
9. Morrow Plots 
10. Solon House 
11. Stone Arch Bridge 
12. US Post Office 
13. Unitarian Church 
14. Astronomical Observatory
15. Experimental Dairy Farm 
16. Lincoln Hotel

These are locations in other counties we've visited:

Sangamon County

1. Illinois State Capitol
2. Lincoln Tomb
3. Oak Ridge Cemetery
4. Old State Capitol
5. Union Station

Vermillion County

1. Danville Public Library
2. Fischer Theater
3. Fithian House
4. Holland Apartments

Macon County

1. Downtown Decatur Historical District

Weekend in Review

I have a couple stories too good not to share.

Saturday
After P90X that morning, I went outside to read a little bit in the fresh air and enjoy a warm cup of coffee. My neighbors' son and son-in-law were in the back, enjoying some not-so-fresh air, so I sat on the front steps.

First: Geography and Backstory.

My apartment is arranged so that the front door faces my neighbor's front door, both opening into a long corridor. In the front, steps lead down to the parking lot. In the back, the steps go down to the grass. This is grass, I might add, where even the angels fear to tread. Every dog owner in the complex lets his or her dog evacuate its bowels here, so you cross at your own risk. I don't understand why. Poop bags are cheap. The dumpster is near. I guess it's too much of a hassle for some folks. I think not picking up after your dog is the worst thing you can do. Or not do. I'm not sure how the grammar works there.

My neighbors are a middle-aged couple with a teenage son who still lives at home. He's often on the back step with his high school friends, indulging in certain extracurricular activities which are now legal in Colorado and Washington. They have a daughter, probably mid-twenties, and a son-in-law. These two have their own place somewhere, but they visit often with their toddler. The son-in-law likes to talk sports to me. I love talking sports. I've spoken to every one of them on numerous occasions. I don't know any of their names, though, because I am a bad neighbor.

Saturday morning, as I sat on the front steps, the son and son-in-law were sitting in the back, partaking in extracurricular activities, coughing, and talking in nasally voices. The daughter came out of the apartment, put a bag in the car, then walked past me to talk to her husband. It was then I noticed how extremely pregnant she was. I've been in this apartment for 9 months, which means she's been pregnant the entire time, and not a chunky monkey like I thought.

She walked back and talked to him for a moment. Asked how much longer he would be. He told her just a few minutes. She sounded irritated. She stomped to the car, started it, backed it out of the spot and sat idling in front of the apartment. They have a Mustang, by the way. That should explain everything.

After a few minutes, he walked out to the driver's side of the car. She rolled down the window and they got into a little tiff. A spat. As married couples are wont to do. At least, that's what I hear. He sounded scattered. She sounded angry. He told her just a few more minutes, then turned around and walked back up to the apartment.

He blinked at me with two bloodshot eyes. We spoke.

Me: How's it going?
Him: We're having a baby today...
Me: Congratulations!
Him: It's a girl, we're going to name her... (I don't remember what he said.)
Me: That's very exciting!
Him: It is exciting... so exciting I just have to be stoned...

He returned to the extracurricular activities with his teenage brother-in-law. His pregnant wife stared at me from behind the wheel of the Mustang. It made me feel uncomfortable, so I went inside.

Long Story, Short: New Baby in the World! Very Exciting!

Sunday
My birthday. We had a laid back day. Aine made breakfast after P90X. I made lunch. We went to Barnes and Noble and I spent most of the day reading. Before dinner, we went to Picadilly (a liquore store: liquor stores are open on Sundays here) and bought two beers (you can buy them by the bottle at Picadilly). I got an IPA and Aine got a brown ale. I fixed dinner and we drank our beers with the meal to celebrate my special day. We watched some Parks and Recreation, then went to sleep. We are party animals and we will not apologize for it.

Monday
I felt off during P90X. Just not myself. Less energy. I blamed it on the 12 ounces of ethanol, water, and tannic acid to which my body is no longer accustomed. After breakfast, my stomach felt weird, but I went down the hall to work.

It was important that I went to work. For one, Mondays are usually crisis days. For two, by some weird scheduling anomaly, everyone in my group, including my manager, took vacation this week (except for me and one other person).

Most of the morning, I had a headache, chills, and nausea. I thought maybe it would go away. No. That afternoon the puking commenced.

The beautiful thing about working from home is that you don't have to call in sick. You can puke for a little bit, then write some emails. Curl up in a ball on the floor for a few minutes, then work on formatting. Dry heave and weep into the toilet bowl, then do some publishing.

When you up-chuck, you have a few moments of relief before the tide of queasy starts to crescendo again and build to another ralf. I used one of these down times to go pick Aine up from school.

Then we had a snowstorm. I could see maybe 15 feet in front of the Yaris. This made the drive to campus seem really long.

That night, before bed, Aine took my temperature. I knew I had a fever all day, I didn't see the point in verifying it. Plausible deniability. She took my temperature anyway. It was 100 °F, which is only halfway to the boiling point and brain cells don't start popping like popcorn (State Snackfood of Illinois) until 106 °F, so I went to bed. Did you know that popcorn reaches an internal temperature of 450 °F before popping with the force of 135 PSI?

It wasn't only me, though, I just had it worse. Aine felt queasy all day and Bojangles yakked twice.

I have pictures, but Aine said it wouldn't be appropriate to post them on the blog. I don't see why. If you want to see them, just ask and I'll include them in the next post. I know you're curious to see what half digested craisins and peanut butter look like.

Tuesday
It snowed again. Also, my fever broke and I was able to eat for the first time since Sunday night. Most importantly, I got all my work done. My record remains mostly pristine. In the seven years I've been there, I haven't taken more than two or three full days of sick time (the last time I had the flu, I worked two half days). I have used less sick time than anyone else in my group. Some of us care more about formatting and publishing than others. So, next time you buy a new gadget and throw the user manual in a junk drawer without reading it, just remember: someone might have worked through a stomach virus to ensure that the layout looked pretty.

Wednesday
It's still snowing. We've skipped two days of P90X. I almost feel normal again. It was bad planning on my part to have a stomach virus the first Monday after Spring Forward when my entire group was on vacation. I take full responsibility.

Moral of this Story
Dulce et decorum est pro occupatio vomitere.

Mumford and Some

Where It Is
The University of Illinois was built on a north to south axis, concentrated around four main quads. The northernmost quad, the Beckman Quad, opens on the southern side of the Beckman Institute. This building replaced the old, multipurpose Elephant which fell over in the 1880s. The Beckman Quad and the Bardeen Quad to the south form the Engineering Campus. Boneyard Creek runs through the Bardeen Quad where it dips underground for a mile or so before flowing out underneath the Old Stone Bridge. The third quad (from north to south) is the Main Quad, around which sit Altgeld, Harker, and Lincoln Halls. It forms the center of the Humanities campus. The southernmost quad, known as the South Quad or the Agriculture Quad, marks the focus of the Agriculture College.

I've made a little map to orient you:

Today we're going to take a look at the South Quad. I took these pictures on the same drizzly day in October that I took the Lincoln Hall pictures. I made it all the way to the McFarland Bell Tower and the Mumford House. This southern point feels like the edge of the world. I saw, farther south, a building with fantastic Dutch Gables (which, of course, comes from Deutsche), but the rain drove me back to the car. I still don't know what Dutch Gabled Building I saw, but one day I will return, MacArthur-style with a corn cob pipe to retake it.

I did get some pictures of the bell tower and the farm house, though.

Mumford Farm House
The University built this Gothic cottage in 1870 and it's the oldest remaining structure on campus. Built as a model farmhouse to inspire Illinois corn growers in much the same way as the Round Barns, this structure provided a home for University Folks for over 100 years. Former residents include George E. Morrow, namesake for the experimental corn field, Thomas Burrill, important for negotiating funds from Governor Altgeld, and the eponymous Herbert W. Mumford, Dean of the College of Agriculture. After Dean Mumford passed away, the Art School took over the building and used it to house artists in residence.

The Mumford House received extensive renovations in 2010 and two additions, a summer kitchen and well house built in 1891 and a parlor from 1922, were removed. I guess they weren't old-timey enough. The little house has been the center of controversy at least twice. First, they wanted to knock it down to build the McFarland Bell Tower, then after building the bell tower, they wanted to move the Mumford House down to Windsor Road (the actual edge of the world). Bell tower proponents thought the little farmhouse detracted from the grandeur of McFarland. Mumford fans claimed that bell tower proponents were lousy jerks. If Mumford had been moved, the National Historic Register would have removed it from the list. Luckily, the Mumfordians won in the end and the farmhouse remains.

McFarland Bell Tower 
Richard McFarland, food business heavy weight, funded the bell tower in 2004. He named it after his wife, Sally, who passed away a year before after battling ovarian cancer. The original plans, advocated by University Chimesmaster Emeritus, Albert E. Marion included extensive renovations in Altgeld Hall.

Let's back up. You read that correctly. Albert E. Marion was appointed University Chimesmaster in 1958 and served in that capacity until 1994 when he retired and became University Chimesmaster Emeritus. I don't know what a Chimesmaster does, but Mr. Marion's life-long dream was to have a four octave carillon installed in Altgeld.

Carillon comes from French, where it basically means Glockenspiel, the German word for Xylophone. Think of a carillon as a giant musical instrument housed in a bell tower. Your basic carillon has 23 bells, that is 2 octaves, chromatically tuned and played by a keyboard. You need 47 to make it 4 octaves. The 49 bell carillon planned by Chimesmaster Emeritus Marion wouldn't fit in Altgeld's narrow tower, so campus architects went to the drawing board to design a new bell tower.

McFarland Tower, built on the south quad in a location that didn't require moving the Mumford House, is 185 ft. tall and houses 49 bells cast in the Netherlands, since the Dutch are pretty much the best bell makers in the world. This 4 octave instrument is controlled by an electronic keyboard, but also came pre-programmed to play over 500 songs.

McFarland did not replace Altgeld as the primary bell tower. It was, however, set to play in unison with the  bells of Altgeld, every quarter hour.

During construction, some teenaged pranksters hung a red eye between the vertical elements of the tower to make it look like the Eye of Sauron from Peter Jackson's Lord of the Rings.

A-Ha! Photography

Peter Jackson

Apparently, the Campus Police never identified the culprits. Word on the street is they thought it was pretty funny, too.

Many people claim the tower resembles a popular part of the male anatomy. The inferior epiphysis of the fibula, of course. What were you thinking?

Gray's Anatomy

To put it the McFarland Tower into perspective, the UT Tower reaches 300 ft. and houses 56 bells. So, I guess bell towers, at least, are bigger in Texas. Sorry, Illinois.

I wanted to get a picture from the ground up through the center of the tower, but two kids were making out beneath it. I mean, I guess that's romantic or whatever, making out in the drizzling rain underneath a bell tower, but they messed up my shot. I think they watch too many movies and I hope they have a messy break up.

Parting Shot
We all know Netherlanders are the best bell makers, but have you ever wondered about the different between the Netherlands, Holland, and Dutch? CGP Grey, aka pretty much the smartest guy ever, knows the answer:

What's in Your Olive Oil?

The Oil
I know what you're thinking. Oh my gobs, do they produce olive oil in Illinios too? No, if you remember from previous posts, Americans eat very little of what Illinois farmers grow. Most of it goes to Chinese pigs. Also, this isn't the right climate for olives. They do sell olive oil in Illinois. In fact, I found some at our local Schnucks.

Before the Greeks invented Democracy, Art, Philosophy, Science, Written Vowels, or Gyros, they invented Olive Oil and the civilized parts of the world have been cooking with it ever since. Archaeologists have found Minoan amphorae almost 6 thousand years old. An amphora was a pointy sort of clay pot used for storing and transporting olive oil.

Janusz Recław

The Minoan period denotes a bronze age civilization named for Minos. That's right. Labyrinth, Minotaur, Icarus and Daedalus, Theseus and Ariadne. That Minos.

George Frederic Watts

The olive oil we eat today comes in two basic varieties: virgin and refined. Virgin olive oil is extracted directly from the olive in a "cold press" process. Heat causes the oil to lose its flavor. Refined olive oil has been filtered with charcoal and other chemicals to remove acidity.

The official designations look like this:

• Extra Virgin - derived from virgin oil, 0.8% acidity
• Virgin - derived from virgin oil, 1.5% acidity
• Pure Olive Oil/Olive Oil - blend of refined and virgin oil, 2% acidity
• Refined - filtered oil, .3% acidity

Olive oil has become popular lately due to research that indicates olive oil can lower your LDL cholesterol. Olive oil itself has no cholesterol because cholesterol is only synthesized in animals. True story: you need to intake 0 mg of cholesterol a day. That's right. You have no dietary need for cholesterol, your body creates all the cholesterol it needs. Anything you eat is extra.

The magic ingredient of olive oil, the one responsible for its cholesterol zapping powers, the one that gives it the acidity measured above, is oleic acid. Oleic acid is monounsaturated fatty acid. Calm down. I'll explain.

A fatty acid is small acid molecule with a long string of carbons attached. Each carbon can carry up to two hydrogen atoms. If all the carbons have both of their hydrogens, the fat is saturated. Because it is saturated, it lies flat and you can pack it closely together into a solid. Like butter. If you're missing a few hydrogens, the fat is unsaturated. The missing carbons cause a kink in the chain, so the fats squiggle around like a liquid. Like oil, to be exact.

Sometimes food companies will hydrogenate oil, that is, bombard it with hydrogen to saturate it. When they do this, sometimes you get trans-fats, which are kinky like an oil, but pack tight like a solid. Also, it kills you. Check your ingredient labels. Hydrogenated = bad.

Anyway, back to oleic acid. Here's what it looks like:

Public Domain

The Ugly Truth
The other day, someone posted an article on Facebook about how some brands of honey aren't real honey. Someone posted a comment saying that sometimes olive oil isn't real olive oil. Concerned, I googled it and read several articles referencing a study done at UC Davis. They ran tests on several common brands of olive oil and determined that most of the olive oils on the grocery store shelves weren't real olive oil. They were adulterated with other kinds of oil like safflower and sunflower and sometimes canola.

I was horrified. The brand sitting in my kitchen was on the list: Pompeiian.

There's a simple test you do at home to determine if you have real olive oil or not. Oleic acid solidies at 39 °F, so if you put it in the fridge, it should turn cloudy and thick as it cools. The internet people call it the Fridge Test.

The Experiment
I poured 3 oz of Pompeiian Extra Virgin Olive Oil into a shot glass. I took the temperature and noted the clarity and solidity of the room temperature oil straight from the bottle. Then, I recorded those three physical attributes every 10 minutes until the oil fell beneath the 39 °F threshold. I checked it one last time an hour after I put it in the fridge. Here are my results:

1:05 PM
Temperature: 68 °F
Clarity: 100%
Solidity: 0%

1:15 PM
Temperature: 52 °F
Clarity: 100%
Solidity: 0%

1:25 PM
Temperature: 46 °F
Clarity: 100%
Solidity: 0%

1:35 PM
Temperature: 37 °F
Clarity: 100%
Solidity: 0%

2:05 PM
Temperature: 35 °F
Clarity: 100%
Solidity: 0%

Conclusion: Even after sitting beneath the 39 °F threshold for over 30 minutes, Pompeiian Extra Virgin Olive Oil never grew cloudy or viscous. Which means I had adulterated olive oil. I spent several minutes sobbing on the kitchen floor. Then I actually read the report.

Turns out, no one else had.

The Study
http://olivecenter.ucdavis.edu/news-events/news/files/olive%20oil%20final%20071410%20.pdf

Near the end of report, after all the pictures and fancy charts, in text, it says:
"If any of the samples were adulterated, it is most likely that the adulterant was refined olive oil rather than refined nut, seed, or vegetable oils. Unless the adulteration levels were very small, the failed samples would not have met the IOC/USDA standards for fatty acid profile and sterol profile if adulterated with refined nut, seed, or vegetable oils."

So, the testing revealed that the oils were blends of refined and virgin olive oils not blends of olive oil and non-olive oil. The lower oleic acid levels resulting from the addition of refined olive oil affect the solidification in The Fridge Test. The primary concern here is the flavor. I read that oil companies ship the pure stuff to countries like Greece and Italy, where they can tell the difference, and ship the adulterated versions to America since we're idiots and can't tell the difference.

I can't. Can you?

When it says Extra Virgin Olive Oil on the label is it a lie? Sort of. Is it as good for you as unadulterated oil? No. Is it bad for you? No. Should you dump your oil down the drain and order expensive, organic olive oil online? Of course not. Don't Panic.

The Parting Shot:
Olive oil smells like death.

The decaying corpses of some insects like bees and ants spontaneously emit oleic acid, the magic ingredient of olive oil. When a living ant gets a waft of oleic acid from a nearby corpse, it responds by hauling the dead ant to the ant graveyard. I heard a story on the radio the other day about the scientist who discovered this. After isolating the chemical culprit, he smeared living ants with oleic acid to see what would happen. Other ants would haul the oiled ants to the graveyard and toss them on to the pile of dead ants. Every time the oiled ants returned, they would be promptly hauled back and tossed on the pile. It took the ants over an hour to clean off enough of the oil to keep themselves out of the dead ant pile. And you thought you had a rough day. Ants leave no ant behind. If you leave out ant poison in your house to kill ants, you will often see more ants after the poison clears. They are returning to drag their dead back to the ant graveyard.