Want good news? Here are some bad events that don't happen much anymore

You hear it all the time. In fact, you've probably said it: "The world is getting crazier all the time. There's so much bad news. It's depressing."

Sure, we're in the third year of a pandemic (four, if you count 2019, when it actually started). There's unprecedented division in American politics. There are insane weather events every few months. There are school shootings virtually every month.

But it could be worse. Much worse, because it was worse in my childhood. This isn't a "back in my day, we really had it rough" column. No, wait. I guess it is.

It's also an attempt to note that four scary things that dominated the news in the 1970s and early 1980s rarely happen now – and we don't realize it.

Kidnappings for ransom. When was the last time you heard about someone being abducted and held for ransom? This was a regular thing back in the day. Someone famous would be taken by armed men and held in exchange for $1 million or the release of prisoners or something else. Sure, there was Patty Hearst, but there was also John Paul Getty and Aldo Moro and all those kids on that school bus in Chowchilla. Stranger abductions still happen, but not for ransom.

Skyjackings. You couldn't get through a week in the 1970s without there being a plane hijacked (cleverly called "skyjacked"). Maybe to Cuba, which seemed crazy. Maybe to Rome.  Maybe to an African country. Heck, D.B. Cooper became a legend by hijacking a plane in Portland, getting $200,000 and jumping out over southwestern Washington. When was the last time you heard about a plane being hijacked? Sept. 11, 2001, changed everything. Now we have intense security at airports and anyone who hijacks a plane is much more likely to be killed by the other passengers than to arrive safely at their destination. Skyjackings have largely disappeared from our consciousness. There were 130 American skyjackings between 1968 and 1972. You know how many American airplanes have been skyjacked since Sept. 11, 2001? Zero.

Plane crashes. Some still happen, but did you know that there were two U.S. commercial plane crashes in 2021, both minor (at least to those of us not onboard)? Compare that to 40 years ago, when there were seven fatal crashes of American commercial airliners, killing a combined 195 passengers. Heck, for much of my childhood, it felt like a rock star was killed in a plane crash every couple of months. There has been one passenger fatality in a U.S. commercial airline crash since 2019. Planes almost never crash.

Serial killers. When was the last time you heard about a serial killer? I guess it could be happening, but we would likely notice it. Think about the 1970s and 1980s, when we had a stream of serial killers. There was Ted Bundy and John Wayne Gacy. There was Juan Corona and Jeffrey Dahmer. There was Richard Ramirez and Wayne Williams. There was even the Zodiac killer, who we never identified. Was there something about that era that led to serial killers?

So yeah, the news is often bad. It feels gloomy. But look on the sunny side: Plane crashes, skyjackings, kidnapping for ransom and serial killers have virtually stopped.

That's one bit of the past that isn't worth nostalgia.

Reach Brad Stanhope at bradstanhope@outlook.com.

Exposing the malarkey behind reporting on stock market changes

We've all heard or read a variation of this and we've generally accepted it: "The stock market was up 400 points today on news that the inflation rate slowed in February."

Or, "Stocks were down sharply today, due to concerns over tensions in the Middle East."

Or, "Stocks remained were mixed today on news that Apple expects fourth-quarter earnings to fall short of expectations."

That's the template for reporting on the stock market – one that has been in place at least since I was a kid, when virtually every radio or TV broadcast had a "business" segment that primarily reported on the stock market.

I call baloney.

The connection of news events and the stock market is something that we accept because we've all heard it for decades. We're like people in the Middle Ages who were sure the sun rotated around the Earth because they'd heard it for decades. Or Raiders fans who believe their team is special because they've heard themselves say it for decades.

A caveat: Sometimes, news events do drive the performance of the stock market. When there's dramatic financial news (a country declares bankruptcy, Microsoft or Apple announces a brilliant success or miserable failure, a catastrophic news event happens), it affects the stock market.

But the rest of the time, here's what I suspect happens: Business reporters look at the stock market and then find a news item that could have some sort of financial angle. And connect them.

Stocks are up on the news of . . . uh . . . a trade agreement between Panama and Canada! Or maybe a tech company's earnings are better than expected. Or maybe the number of jobs created last month were up.

Stocks are down on news of . . . uh  . . . an oil spill in Saudi Arabia! Or persistent rumors that the Fed may raise interest rates. Or reports that a big company will have a disappointing report.

I spent several years choosing stories to appear on the Daily Republic business pages. I always suspected the reporting on the stock market was bunk, but I also always picked stock market stories because they're the scoreboard of the financial world.

Over the past decade, we've become more sophisticated in how we view the stock market. We realize that an increase in stock prices doesn't mean that thing are better for all of us. We realize that stock prices going down doesn't mean imminent catastrophe for all of us.

The stock market is not directly connected to us, any more than an increase in the stock market is connected to the news of the day.

Really, it's absurd when you think about parallels. What if someone wrote, "The new Batman movie had a huge weekend box office after news broke Friday that Samsung's new Galaxy phone exceeded sales expectations."

Or if you read, "The Warriors won their third straight game last night on news that Russia was sending more troops to the Ukrainian border."

How about if someone reported, "The number of COVID infections dropped today on news that Britney Spears' conservatorship would end."

We'd laugh at that. Or . . . maybe we'd adopt that as our strategy.

Consider a world where you make this kind of announcement: "I won't make it to work today on news of disappointing fourth-quarter earnings for Exxon."

Or you explain away a failure by saying, "I didn't clean up the kitchen because of rumors that Netflix is raising their monthly fees."

Wait a second. Maybe this all makes sense. And if it doesn't, that's probably due to rumors that the Fed may boost the prime rate.

Reach Brad Stanhope at bradstanhope@outlook.com.

Rylaz? Montelukast? Blame smart FDA rule for weird drug names

Turns out that drug-makers aren't idiots with a fetish for weird names. They may be ruthless monsters who charge exorbitant amounts for life-saving drugs that cost a small fraction of that amount to create, but they're not crazy when it comes to drug names.

There's a reason that the drug your doctor prescribed for your cholesterol or high blood pressure has a bizarre name: It's due to a rule of the Food and Drug Administration.

Yeah, the FDA is to blame for crazy names. Or maybe the FDA should receive credit for the crazy names because it's for a good reason. It all comes from the desire to save confusion at the pharmacy.

Actually, that's not the full story, because we often get confused by the weird names (do you remember the names of your prescriptions? I don't).

But the unusual names – for instance, among the 25 most popular drugs are the hard-to-remember and hard-to-pronounce Levothyroxine, Montelukast, Furosemide and Trazodone – come from an effort to prevent mix-ups among drugs with similar names. Anyone who has brought home Pepsi instead of Pepsid or pesto instead of pasta can understand this: What if you ask for something and the pharmacist accidentally gives you a drug with a name that sounds the same?

It could be like when Mr. Gower in "It's a Wonderful Life" nearly gave deadly drugs to someone during George Bailey's vision of an alternate future (the focus of another column).

But enough about that.

The FDA's standard is that a drug name must be 70% dissimilar from all other names in its database. That database has 36,000 drug names, so it's a challenge, one that is met when drug companies produce such products as Amlodipine and Meloxicam. Or consider the official names of drugs you've probably taken in the past year: Comirnaty and Spikevax. Those are the official names of the Pfizer and Moderna vaccines for COVID-19. (If  I was Moderna, I would have leaned into the official name. Spikevax is an elite vaccine name!)

Anyway, drug names must be unique. According to an article in the Wall Street Journal, there are companies that earn big paydays from drug companies to compare proposed new drug names with existing ones and either attest that they're significantly different or (presumably) present an alternative.

Here's the looming problem. Will we get to a point where there are so many drugs that drug companies will run out of names? Is it possible that sometime in the future, drug names will become like passwords? If they keep coming up with these new drug names (Voxzogo, Tivdak and Rylaz were all approved by the FDA in 2021), there's a limit, right? How far away are we from a world where our drug name must have one capital letter, one lower-case letter, one letter and one symbol?

Are we headed to a future, where we call or stop in our local pharmacy and tell them we need a refill of F8jkLd$5!t?

I guess that will work, unless they have it close to their supply of F8jkLd$6!t, which could cause a mixup (although I guess F8jkLd$6!t isn't 70% different).

Just the idea makes me anxious and when that happens, I turn to ancient wisdom from Readers Digest: Laughter is the best medicine.

But according to my unofficial internet research, that isn't necessarily 70% different from nitrous oxide (laughing gas), so I hope it's OK.

Reach Brad Stanhope at bradstanhope@outlook.com.

Guilty pleasure songs: 10 disliked pop hits you secretly enjoy

In adulthood, I still don't want people to make fun of my music choices.

I have some ridiculous musical loves. I like Barry Manilow. I like the boy bands of the late 1990s. I think "Mmm-bop" is one of the greatest pop songs ever written.

I have other musical tastes, but they're not as amusing. But I admit this: If I'm listening to a Partridge Family song or "Hot Rod Lincoln" and someone pulls up next to me at a stoplight, I generally reach over and turn down the music. Because it's a guilty pleasure – a song I like, but feel embarrassed to do so.

You're probably similar. There are songs that you publicly mock, but if you're alone and they come on, you find yourself happy. They're guilty pleasure songs.

Here are 10 you secretly like, in alphabetical order.

"Achy, Breaky Heart," by Billy Ray Cyrus. The song was absurd. His mullet was absurd. The song was infectious. His mullet was awesome. Can we just be honest and not apologize for liking this song?

"Bye, Bye, Bye" by N'Sync. Maybe the height of the boy bands craze, this song is tremendous (and so is "I Want it That Way" by the Backstreet Boys). You like it. But dislike yourself for that fact.

"Careless Whisper" by Wham! Guilty feet ain't got no rhythm, but we still get sucked in by the song. If someone pulls up next to you while you're singing "I should have known better than to cheat a friend . . ." you'll turn this down. But you won't turn it off.

"Convoy," by C.W. McCall. He talks. He uses CB language. He proposes that a group of big rigs race across the country (never stopping for gas?) and crash through barricades. But you secretly enjoy it, right? 10-4.

"Escape (The Pina Colada Song)," by Rupert Holmes. A dumb story song about a couple unwittingly writing classified advertising notes to each other (reminder: Support your local newspaper). Two guarantees: When it comes on, you'll say it's dumb. And you'll sing the chorus.

"Indian Reservation (The Lament of the Cherokee)," by Paul Revere and the Raiders. Bubblegum pop with the perfect ending. Admit it: You enjoy hearing this every 20 years or so when it accidentally comes on.

"In the Year 2525," by Zager and Evans. This was presumably embarrassing to like in 1970 (a year after it was released) and remains so now. But you hear it and you find yourself envisioning people not needing their teeth or eyes because there's nothing to chew and no one looks at them. Another song with a great ending.

"Livin' La Vida Loca," by Ricky Martin. We all make fun of Ricky Martin. Then this song comes on and we realize how great it was (although we pretend it's not).

"Stayin' Alive," by the Bee Gees. This was widely mocked about 10 years after it was a hit and everyone still mocks it by doing the finger-pointing disco move. Then the song comes on . . . and you do the finger-pointing disco move. With joy.

"U Can't Touch This," by MC Hammer. Go ahead and complain that Hammer stole the music from "Superfreak" by Rick James. Blame Hammer for making saccharine hip-hop for white suburban kids. But you'll yell "Hammer time!" and envision him dancing in those genie pants.

There are more guilty pleasure songs – many more – but start with those 10.

Right now, you are insisting that you don't like them, but you're lying to yourself.

But maybe one day when we've learned, Cherokee nation will return.

Will return. Will return. Will return.

Reach Brad Stanhope at bradstanhope@outlook.com.

It's all in a name when it comes to diet sodas

Whatever happened to diet sodas?

If you're like me (and it's best if you're not), you noticed the slow decline of diet sodas over the past few years.

Sugar-free, no-calorie sodas haven't disappeared. But "diet" sodas are apparently taboo.

Instead, we have "No Sugar" sodas. And "Zero Calorie" sodas. And other variations.

I'm famously a Type 1 diabetic (by "famously," I mean people in my immediate family know it, as do readers bored by occasional articles over the years when I've poked fun at my disease and asked for it to be named after me). That means if I drink sodas, they're of the no-sugar variety.

For most of my life, "diet" was the only word used to describe no-sugar drinks. Diet Coke. Diet Pepsi. Diet Rite. Diet 7-Up. Even Diet Shasta and Diet Cragmont (the Safeway brand until the 1990s).

But about 15 years ago, alternatives began to pop up, forcing me to read labels so I could understand whether these were replacements for the diet versions or something else. Maybe a fat-free soda? Maybe caffeine free?

The first I saw was Coke Zero. Was it zero calories? Zero carbohydrates? Zero fat? Zero caffeine? Zero Mostel? (Star of "Fiddler on the Roof," who died 45 years ago.)

I read and re-read the label to make sure I wasn't accidentally drinking regular soda.

In the past few years, it came to the point that almost no soda brands call their no-sugar drinks "diet." Apparently, younger people don't like the word diet, so it's better to call something "zero" or "no-sugar" or "zero-sugar" or "carb-NO-hydrates" (the last of those was just invented by me. Food companies are free to use it).

This is significant because, even though Millennials and members of Gen Z don't like the word "diet," they still want low-calorie, no-sugar drinks. Sugar-free drinks make up nearly 30% of carbonated drink sales in the United States, accounting for about $11 billion in sales in 2020.

As a member of the sugar-averse community (another term I just invented), I have something at stake here. I don't mind the name changes and think I look cooler drinking something called "Pepsi Max Zero-Sugar Xtreme," rather than Tab or Fresca, the diet sodas most available when I became a diabetic (both of which were marketed primarily to women who wanted to drop a few pounds).

My only request is that Coke and Pepsi and Royal Crown and Shasta and other soda manufacturers would give me a heads up, so I know which sodas I can drink. It also frees up space in my local grocery store, since it doesn't require me to stand there and read a tiny-print nutritional label.

I'm still very confused about the difference between Diet Coke and Coke Zero Sugar. I still don't know if Diet Pepsi and Pepsi Zero Sugar are different. But I do appreciate that soda companies continue to try new things. Some new drinks, many new names.

Those of us in the sugar-averse community stand ready for a carb-NO-hydrate drink.

Reach Brad Stanhope at bradstanhope@outlook.com.

Bradstradamus is back with a glimpse at what will happen in 2022

Bradstradamus is back.

Anyone familiar with history (or the History Channel) is familiar with my great-great-great (keep going) grandfather, Nostradamus. Grandpa N, as we call him, was famous for his predictions that had an eerie way of coming true.

For instance, in the years around 1460, Grandpa N made the following predictions (which came true):

"Nations will battle each other and only some will win." (Came true in the Revolutionary War. Or World War I. Or World War II. Or the World Cup of soccer.)

"Four men will succeed where others haven't." (The Beatles. Or the Los Angeles Rams' defensive line "Fearsome Foursome" of the 1960s. Or George Foreman and his grills, am I right?)

"A leader with a mustache will arise in the West." (Adolph Hitler. Or Theodore Roosevelt. Or Tom Selleck, since Hawaii is the westernmost state in the United States.)

Coincidence? Hardly. Grandpa N was amazing and because of that, I take seriously my responsibility to share with you some prognostications for 2022.

The last time Bradstradamus did this, I correctly predicted the COVID-19 pandemic (2020 prediction: "Some people will get sick and most will recover." Another correct prediction from Bradstradamus in 2020: "The author of this column will refer to himself in the third person at some point in the future." Bradstradamus made that come true. Today.)

Amazing.

With that as a precursor, here is a look ahead to what to expect in 2022:

• In late August, Californians will be warned that it could be a bad wildfire year because there was so much rain in the winter. Or so little rain. Or just the right amount. But it will be a bad wildfire season, for sure.
• You will be in a store, faced with two checkout line choices. You will pick one and the other will move faster.
• You'll be in heavy traffic and the car version of that thing in the store will happen to you. The other lane will move faster.
• While in the checkout line at that same store in the earlier prediction, you'll see a celebrity magazine and have no idea who the person on the cover is.
• A major professional athlete will succeed this year.
• On an important day in 2022, you'll wake up to see a mystifying pimple on your face and complain that pimples should disappear at age 21.
• You will read a column about what will happen in 2022. (Bingo! One prediction already is true!)
• At least once in the first two months of the year, you'll hear someone say, "How is it already 2022? Wasn't it just 2000?" It may be you who says that.
• The next COVID variant will have a side effect: We'll learn another letter in the Greek alphabet.
• You will be really hungry for specific fast food (or grocery store food) and it will disappoint you.
• Eleven months from now, you'll say, "how is 2022 almost over? It just started!"
• Some people will get sick and most will recover.
• The author of this column will refer to himself in the third person.

Bradstradamus is done. Happy New Year and don't stress too much about picking the wrong line at the store.

Reach Brad Stanhope at brad.stanhope@outlook.com.

Bringing SCIENCE to our calendar with New Year's Day in March

It is said that time is just our mind's way of making sure everything doesn't happen at once.

If so, the calendar is just a man-made way to measure the passage of time, which is artificial.

It's man-made and I say we should change it. We can throw the whole thing out.

If we want to maintain the pretense of following the Gregorian calendar (established in 1582, Tom Brady's rookie year in the NFL), we can agree on something: There's room for improvement.

That is more obvious today than any day of the year. It's the day after Christmas, nearing the end of the holiday season, but we have another holiday coming up this week.

We still have New Year's Day (and New Year's Eve).

It's another holiday after a seemingly endless series of holidays. It's there because someone long ago (Tom Brady? Maybe) decided that the new year on the man-made calendar would start seven days after Christmas.

The decisionmaker didn't account for holiday fatigue, nor for the fact that they added another day off when the weather is bad.

Can't we agree that the cavalcade of holidays (particularly the Thanksgiving-Hanukkah-Christmas-Kwanzaa-New Year's Day series) is at least one holiday too many?

My proposal is simple. It doesn't fix every calendar problem (such as the weird variation in how long "a month" is), but it fixes the biggest problem (having Christmas and New Year's Day seven days apart).

Doesn't it make more sense to start the year when spring starts (at least in the Northern Hemisphere. We could start it when fall starts in the Southern Hemisphere)?

Here is the Stanhope Change in Every Nation's Calendar Events (SCIENCE) plan: New Year's Day becomes the first day of spring (March 19, 20 or 21, depending on the year).

You don't like this? Are you disputing SCIENCE?

Imagine a world where we follow SCIENCE: New Year's Day comes at the start of spring (for 85% of the world's population), when it should. Things are growing. It's getting warmer. It's a time of renewal.

We don't need a needless middle-of-winter holiday (I realize Dec. 31 is only the 11th day of winter, but that's another column: How our seasons are wrong). Instead, we get a day off when it's starting to get warmer and nicer–or at worst, warmer, nicer days are coming.

The only potential downside is that the SCIENCE New Year's Day can fall near Easter and Passover, but according to my calculations, Easter falls within a week of March 19-21 only twice in the next 20 years. So not really a problem.

This change makes things better for us, since it spreads out holidays. It presumably makes things better for businesses, which have a shorter time to account for being understaffed in December. It's better for everyone.

The change requires only one group to modify how it works: Calendar makers would presumably make 13-month calendars that would include March twice (since the year begins March 19-21).

Would they be sad? No, it changes nothing.

This week, as you get ready to commemorate the New Year, think about how this would be in March.

It would be the same celebration, just a bigger deal. And it would be welcomed as a more special holiday.

You don't agree? Fine. You're arguing with SCIENCE.

Reach Brad Stanhope at bradstanhope@outlook.com.

How well do you know Solano County? Find out now

It's a tradition as entrenched as Black Friday, burning the Christmas yule, singing Christmas carols and watching "It's a Wonderful Life."

My annual Solano County quiz, which is in its 78th year.

The quiz is also a tradition as beloved as waiting in line at a store, having your packages delivered late and being forced to wear an ugly Christmas sweater that you were unaware was considered "ugly."

Following are 20 questions on Solano County, things that should (could? Might?) be known by a resident of one of California's 27 original counties. Get some paper, a No. 2 pencil, record your answers and don't look at the correct versions, which are at the end. How well do you know your county?

QUESTIONS

1. What are the seven cities in Solano County (bonus point for listing them in order of population, smallest to largest)?

2. What five counties border Solano County?

3. Within 1,000, how many inmates are there at the two state prisons in Vacaville, combined?

4. Within eight spots, where does Solano County rank among California's 58 counties in terms of population?

5. After whom is Solano County named?

6. Which is closer to Fairfield: Oakland or Sacramento?

7. What was Solano County's leading agricultural crop (in terms of dollars) in 2020?

8. Tony and Kelvin Wade: Who is whom?

9. Within five years, in what year did Travis Air Force base officially take on that name?

10. Within five years, in what year was Fairfield incorporated as a city?

11. Name the three largest general high schools in the Fairfield-Suisun Unified School District.

12. In which two Solano County cities are their public airports?

13. What is the official name of the large mall in Fairfield?

14. What was the name of the minor league baseball team that played in Vacaville in 2000-2002?

15. What was the last name of the person after whom Dixon is named?

16. What was the last year in which the majority of Solano County's voters voted for a Republican presidential candidate in the general election?

17. What two members of Congress represent Solano County?

18. What month on average receives the most rainfall in Suisun City?

19. Which city has a larger population: Fairfield, California, or Fairfield, Connecticut?

20. According to CoreLogic, was the median price of a home sold in Fairfield in October more or less than $550,000?

ANSWERS

1. Rio Vista, Dixon, Benicia, Suisun City, Vacaville, Fairfield, Vallejo.

2. Contra Costa, Sonoma, Napa, Yolo, Sacramento.

3. As of Dec. 8, reported total was 5,290 (1,980 at CMF, 3,310 at California State Prison Solano).

4. 19th, between Tulare and Santa Barbara.

5. Sem-Yeto, who was renamed Francisco Solano (later Chief Solano) at the San Francisco Mission.

6. Oakland is 41 miles, Sacramento is 47 miles.

7. Almonds, at just over $50 million.

8. I don't know. It's possible they are one person, posing as brothers.

9. 1951.

10. 1903.

11. Armijo, Fairfield and Rodriguez high schools.

12. Vacaville (Nut Tree Airport) and Rio Vista (Rio Vista Municipal Airport).

13. Solano Town Center.

14. Solano Steelheads.

15. Thomas Dickson. The town's name was changed in 1872 when the first rail shipment of merchandise for the town was sent to "Dixon" and it was easier to make the switch, presumably.

16. 1984 (Ronald Reagan received 54.5% of the vote).

17. Democrats John Garamendi and Mike Thompson.

18. February (3.8 inches on average).

19. Fairfield, California. It has nearly twice the population.

20. More: $590,500.

SCORING

16-20: Genius

11-15: Pretty smart

6-10: Are you pretending to be the Wade brothers?

0-5: Take the test again.

Reach Brad Stanhope at bradstanhope@outlook.com.

A complicated, deeper look at our favorite Christmas carols

I like Christmas carols. I sing Christmas carols. When radio stations start playing Christmas songs (usually around Thanksgiving), I start listening.

I love "O Holy Night" and "Silent Night" and "Joy to the World." I love "Santa Claus is Coming to Town" and "It's The Most Wonderful Time of the Year" and "Have Yourself a Merry Little Christmas." I have a particular affection for early-1980s songs "Last Christmas" and "Do They Know it's Christmas?"

But the genre isn't perfect. Far from it. Frankly, some Christmas songs are sinister, some are meaningless and a surprising number are not about Christmas.

Pull up a chair for three observations on Christmas songs that may change your perspective.

Most menacing song: A lot has been made in recent years of how "Baby It's Cold Outside" is the "rapiest" Christmas song – with good reason, since the lyrics involve a man who won't take "no" for an answer.

However, I believe another song is equally menacing. "We Wish You a Merry Christmas" seems happy, but takes a dark turn when the singers demand figgy pudding and tell the listeners, "we won't go until we get some, so bring it right here!" Oh, sure, a neighbor might offer a treat if you stopped by to sing Christmas carols, but to demand specific payment (who has figgy pudding in their fridge?) and refuse to leave unless your demands are met? "We Wish You a Merry Christmas" is a musical ransom note.

Most simplistic song: Perhaps no song is played more often on holiday radio stations than "Feliz Navidad," Jose Feliciano's 1970 tune that makes everyone feel bilingual. Let's be honest: The song is just chorus, verse, chorus, verse. And the verse is just a repeat.

In fact, there are 20 distinct words in the lyrics. Total. Used over and over: Feliz, Navidad, prospero, ano, y, felicidad, I, want, to, wish, you, a, merry, Christmas, from, the, bottom, of, my, heart.

Twenty words, occasionally changing order. That's it. Just 20 words. Come on!

For comparison sake, "Boogie Shoes" by K.C. and the Sunshine Band has about 80 distinct words. "You are so Beautiful" by Joe Cocker – a nice song, but a similar pattern – has 31 distinct words.

Add another verse or something!

Non-Christmas songs: Any list of great "Christmas" songs includes a bunch of tunesthat never mention Christmas, Jesus, Santa Claus or the holidays.

For instance, "Baby It's Cold Outside" is a winter song, not a Christmas song. So is "Winter Wonderland," "Frosty the Snowman," "Sleigh Ride" and "Let it Snow." So is. . . are you ready?

"Jingle Bells!"

"Jingle Bells" makes zero references to Christmas. It's about racing through the woods in a sleigh pulled by a single horse. Period.

Apparently, we sing these songs at Christmas because it's winter, which isn't universally true. Christmas is celebrated Dec. 25 around the world, which means in the Southern Hemisphere, Christmas comes in early summer.

So in the Southern Hemisphere, do they consider summer songs to be "Christmas songs?"

Is "Hot Fun in the Summertime" by Sly and the Family Stone a Christmas song in New Zealand?

Is "Summertime" by DJ Jazzy Jeff and the French Prince  a holiday song in Argentina?

Is "School's Out for Summer" by Alice Cooper a Christmas classic in South Africa?

I could go on – and will, unless you bring me some figgy pudding. Bring it right here.

I won't go until I get some!

Reach Brad Stanhope at bradstanhope@outlook.com.

Third-pound burger shows Americans' hunger for bad math

 

Two things are largely true about Americans:

• We like hamburgers.
• We're not great at math.

So is it any wonder that the 1/3-pound burger from A&W failed in the 1980s and was relaunched as the 3/9-pound burger this year?

America's response: Finally, a burger bigger than the McDonald's Quarter Pounder!

The short version of what has become a legendary American marketing story: In the 1980s, A&W decided to launch an attack on McDonald's by offering a bigger burger. Instead of a Quarter Pounder, folks could go to A&W and get a 1/3-Pounder, which everyone knows is more than 8% bigger than a Quarter Pounder. Because one-third is more than one-fourth.

Except everyone doesn't know that. Everyone doesn't know that one-third is bigger than one-fourth.

We know that because the burger failed and A&W's marketing tests revealed that more than half of test subjects thought A&W was trying to rip them off by charging the same amount for a one-third-pound burger as McDonald's does for a Quarter Pounder. Because four is more than three, right?

The outrage!

Well, decades later, A&W is trying to correct that misconception (and mock the math abilities of many customers) by offering the 3/9-pound burger, which as we (allegedly) learned in school can be reduced to 1/3-pound. A&W is betting that people will see a 3/9-pound burger and realized it's bigger than a Quarter Pounder. Because it is.

Also because 3 is bigger than 1 and 9 is bigger than 4. So 3/9 is obviously  bigger than 1/4.

There's a sneaking suspicion that A&W could have achieved the same goal with a 2/9-pound burger, which would be 3% smaller than a Quarter Pounder, but that's a debate for another day.

The question is whether we apply that across all products. For instance:

If someone opened a convenience store called 8-Twelve, would people think it's bigger than 7-11 (for the same reason as the A&W issue)? Because it should be, right?

Would the addition of Levi's 600 jeans seem like a step up from their famed 501 brand? Or does the presence of the "1" at the end of 501 make it seem like it's bigger than 600? We're not good at math, so I'm not sure.

Here's one thing I'm pretty sure about: American football fans would be fully confused if they were asked to explain the fractions that make up the words in quarterback, halfback and fullback.

They'd be right, because strangely, the larger the number gets (if you presume "full" means "1"), the less glory the position gets. It's almost to the point that some creative team – the Kansas City Chiefs? The Green Bay Packers? – will announce that their quarterback is now a one-eighthback, making him more valuable. It could be an advantage in attracting talent.

All this focus on numbers is confusing. It's as if Starbucks' insistence on strange names for their drinks (how is "tall" the smallest size?) didn't change Americans' perception, it reflected it.

I'll get back in the kitchen. I'm working on a new product for Burger King.

The 4/16-pounder will bury the Quarter Pounder, because it's four times as big, right?

Reach Brad Stanhope at bradstanhope@outlook.com.