On Today’s Show

September 7, 2021 9:35 am Published by

➢ If you field a lot of phone calls at work, you might need that extra cup of coffee today, because it’s “Telephone Tuesday” . . . the day of the year businesses supposedly get the most phone calls.

The first Tuesday after Labour Day always sees a big spike in phone calls to businesses.  It’s because everyone’s back at it after the long weekend, when most businesses weren’t answering the phone.

Plus, it’s the unofficial start of fall.  So summer is over . . . the holidays suddenly seem like they’re right around the corner . . . and people want to get a head start on planning.

 

➢ Labour Day is the unofficial end of summer.  But it turns out not many people actually agree with that.

Only 26% feel like Labour Day marks the true end of summer.  19% said it’s when school starts back up.  And 39% are keeping summer alive until the OFFICIAL first day of fall on September 22nd.  (7% said “other” and 8% weren’t sure.)

The poll also found 7% of people had their WORST summer ever, compared to 16% who said the same last year.  Only 2% of Americans said this was the BEST summer of their life.

 

➢ A California grandmother and granddaughter are home from the hospital after their car was hit by a plane making an emergency landing.  Here are Victoria and Evie Roberts describing the crazy situation. 

 

➢ Michael Keaton told a great story to Seth Myers. He  thought he was exchanging emails with a saddle maker named Cash Cooper about an order, but he was actually emailing Bradley Cooper.  Bradley thought it was a joke so he went along with it.  

COUNTRY MUSIC NOTE

Brooks & Dunn scored a #1 with their debut single “Brand New Man” in 1991.

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Why Are Baby Carrots Always So Wet?

You’ve probably noticed that there are three main differences between CARROTS and BABY CARROTS.  Baby carrots are smaller, obviously . . . they often come in a bag . . . and they’re almost always WET.

 

Which begs the question, why are they always so wet?

 

Well, the experts at Dollar Shave Club looked into it . . . (???) . . . and it all goes back to how they’re made.

 

Baby carrots do not pop out of the ground as little stubs.  Instead, they’re created from regular carrots that are too unattractive to sell.  Those ugly carrots are cut into chunks, and put into a “polishing drum” that uses water to whittle them down.

 

So that’s PART of the reason.  Water is also added to the bag before it’s sealed to keep them moist.  That’s because baby carrots lose their skin while they’re being smoothed out, and that makes them VERY vulnerable to drying out. 

 

If you’ve ever left them sitting out, you know they get dry, and a white film forms on them.  That white film IS safe to eat, by the way. 

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FOUR RANDOM FACTS 

  1. Not every Model T was black.  For the first few years of production, it came in gray, green, blue, and red.

 

  1. The city of Montreal finished paying off construction costs of the 1976 Olympics in 2006.
  2. “Amazing Grace”was written by a former slave trader in England.

 

  1. Hawaiian Punch was originally developed in 1934 as an ice cream topping.  It wasn’t sold specifically as a juice until 1946.

 

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BIRTHDAYS 

[71] Julie Kavner, actress (‘Marge Simpson’ on “The Simpsons” since 1989)

1956 [65] Diane Warren, Van Nuys CA, pop songwriter (Cher-‘If I Could Turn Back Time’, Aerosmith-‘I Don’t Want to Miss A Thing’, Celine Dion-‘Because You Loved Me’)

 

[54] Leslie Jones, (“Saturday Night Live” 2014-19)/movie actress (“Ghostbusters”, “Trainwreck”)

 

[34] Evan Rachel Wood, actress (“West World” 2016-20)/movie actress 

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SCIENCE NEWS 

  1. A new material that makes seawater drinkable within minutes could solve the world’s freshwater shortages. One common method of desalinating water works by using pressure to force water through membranes. But membranes regularly become too wet and ineffective, meaning they have to be replaced frequently. Researchers from the Korean Institute of Civil Engineering and Building Technology have created what they call a coaxial electrospun nanofiber membrane. While current membranes last for around 50 hours, the team’s new material can go for as long as a month before needing to be replaced. 

 

  1. The Indian city of New Delhi opened the country’s first “smog tower” in a bid to purify air in the world’s most polluted capital city. Using 40 giant fans and 5,000 filters, the 82-foot (25m) tower sucks in polluted air from the top, filters it, then pumps it out from the bottom. It covers a radius of 0.4 square miles, and filters around 35,000 cubic feet of air a second. The $2 million tower is a pilot program, and authorities will study it for 2 years to determine its effectiveness.

  2. In animal news:  A giant tortoiseate a small bird, and we’ve never seen that before . . . they’re usually vegetarians.  

A study in Australia found venomous sea snakes that attack scuba divers might just be trying to MATE with them.  

And a hummingbird study found females that look like male hummingbirds don’t get harassed as much.

 

  1. Fossils of an ancient whale with legswere found in Egypt.  Whales actually evolved from four-legged animals that lived on land 50 million years ago.  

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You Can Pay to Go Inside a “Reverse Zoo” Where Lions Can Gawk at You

Zoos offer people the chance to learn . . . and gawk . . . at wild animals secured in a cage.  And now, there’s a REVERSE ZOO where wild animals can gawk at humans while THEY’RE secured in a cage.

A lion sanctuary called GG Conservation in South Africa offers a package where people can go into a plexiglass cage at the center of a lair with 77 rescued lions.

Three people can fit in the cage at once, and you’re in there for 45 minutes.

The sanctuary has done this for about two years, and they say safety is a top priority.  That said, they also warn visitors that they “cannot guarantee how the lions will react.”

The lions will jump onto the top of the cage, so it’s regularly inspected by an engineer to make sure it can hold their weight, which can be up to 570 pounds.

The sanctuary says the cage is good for the lions too, because, it offers them enrichment in the form of mental and physical stimulation.

This sounds like one of those once-in-a-lifetime experiences that will cost an arm and a leg, but it’s reasonable.  Prices range from about $130 to $200, with the profits going toward the care of the lions. 

 

TUESDAY SEPTEMBER 7TH  

 

  1.   Blue Jays 8  Yankees 0 Pirates 6  Tigers 3

 

  1.   Michael K. Williams from “The Wire” diedof a suspected heroin overdose yesterday.  He was 54 years old.  Williams was best known as Omar Little on “The Wire”.  (Here he is telling Larry King how he got his scar.  That scar is what launchedhis acting career.)

 

Former “Today” show weatherman Willard Scott died Saturday.  He was 87 years old.  He started on “Today” in 1980, and stepped aside in 1996, but continued to appear until his retirement in 2015.  He also created and was the first person to portray Ronald McDonald.  (Here’s a montage of his work.)

 

  1.   A Las Vegas nurse has been spending her days off brushing and braidingthe hair of patients that are too sick or weak to do it themselves.  This is Brooke Johns explaining why she started doing this. 

 

  1.   It’s interesting that people entertain themselves during their free time by watching and listening to crime shows.  Here’s comedian Nate Bargatze with more.  (From his 2021 Netflix special, “The Greatest Average American”.)

KEITH URBAN ‘BURNED ON FUEL’ FROM NEGATIVE COMMENT MADE EARLY IN HIS CAREER 

Keith Urban can certainly relate to the message in his new single, “Wild Hearts.” The song speaks to those who need inspiration and how one negative comment can provide the fuel to achieve a dream.

Keith tells us his “fuel” came from another older artist at a festival in his native Australia. [“One of my first trips to America when I was about 21, 22, I came to Nashville and wrote some songs, went back to Australia. And I was playing at a country music festival. I’ll never forget it. And this older country artist said to me backstage ‘so where you been?’ I said ‘oh I’ve been in Nashville writing songs.’ And I was like so excited and he looked at me and he said ‘yeah, yeah, you’ve got to get it out of your system don’t ya?’ And I could have punched this guy square in the face. I was so angry at this comment, this kind of condescending, jaded thing that this guy said to me. And I’ve burned on that fuel for so many years.”] 

“Wild Hearts” will likely be included on Keith’s next studio project. He performed the song live on NBC’s Today show on Friday (September 3rd).

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OLD DOMINION READIES NEW ALBUM FOR OCTOBER RELEASE 

Old Dominion’s fourth studio album, called Time, Tequila & Therapy, will be released on October 8th. The group has shared a new song from the project called “All I Know About Girls.”   Time, Tequila & Therapy features 13 tracks which were recorded during quarantine. Matthew Ramsey tells us: [“Our new album, Time, Tequila, and Therapy, was written and recorded all in a three week span in Asheville, North Carolina during the height of the pandemic lockdown. We decided to create our own little Old Dominion bubble, go out there with no plan, no songs whatsoever and just see what we can do in the moment. So we really didn’t really put much pressure on ourselves to make a whole album we were aiming for, hopefully four or five good songs, but we wound up making a whole album. It was really a dream scenario, so we can’t wait for everyone to hear it.”] 

The band’s We Are Old Dominion Tour continues on through December.

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CARRIE UNDERWOOD, DAN + SHAY SHARE DUET, VIDEO FROM ‘DEAR EVAN HANSEN’ SOUNDTRACK 

Carrie Underwood and Dan + Shay have officially unveiled their new collaboration, a song called “Only Us,” which will be featured on the Dear Evan Hansen Original Motion Picture Soundtrack. The soundtrack will be released on September 24th, the same day the movie arrives in theaters. Carrie and Dan + Shay have also released an in-studio performance video with footage from the film to accompany the track. 
Dear Evan Hansen opened on Broadway in December 2016 and won  six Tony Awards, including for Best Musical and for Ben Platt as Best Actor in a Leading Role in a Musical. The show’s cast album would go on to earn a Grammy.

 

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This post was written by Dave Palmer