Crazy Questions and Answers It's a crazy world out there.  Luckily, here inside Reeko's Lab, everything is pretty much normal.  So Reeko took a break from his latest anti-gravity, moon-walking flip-flops experiment and let the Chess playing monkey out of his cage for a little exercise.  While the monkey scampered all over the lab knocking over beakers and such, Reeko chased the wild-eyed creature, all-the-while firing puzzling, unanswered scientific questions at him.  Here's the responses he received (don't worry - Reeko translated the monkey talk to English for you) ...   Do cats have belly buttons? Hmmm....  Verifying the answer to this question could be a little risky.  We all know that cats aren't the most cooperative creatures in the world.  Besides that, they have those nasty little claws...   Virtually all mammals have umbilical cords and hence navels.  Cats navels don't look quite like humans, more like a scar really.  But since they're hidden by hair and located just alongside their rib cage, it's quite understandable that they are often overlooked.  And if you don't want to take Reeko's word on this - ask Dad to check it out for you...     How do chickens sit on eggs without crushing them? Quite simple really.  They don't really 'sit' on the egg but rather, squat over it - their legs support most of their weight.   The nesting materials provide further cushion.  Combine all this with the fact that the underside of the chicken is rather 'V' shaped and you can easily see why chickens lay eggs and not omelets...     If I sped past some people at the speed of sound with my radio blasting, would they be able to identify the tune?  What if I accelerated to the speed of light? First of all kids, don't try this at home... The speed of sound, or Mach I, is about 700 miles per hour.  Driving at this speed you would not be able to hear anything going on behind you (because the sound waves could not catch up with you) so any speakers in the rear deck would be inaudible.  You would hear sounds coming from in front of you but they would be increased in pitch 1 octave (the Doppler effect) so if you have speakers in the dashboard you're in luck.  Along these same lines, the people on the street wouldn't hear you coming but would hear a loud sonic boom after you passed. As for the 'speed of light' part of the question...  Sorry to break this to you but there is a well known and heavily enforced speed limit in effect.  It is highly advisable that you don't break it...       How come I can see through glass? First off, let's get something out the way here.  Glass is a highly viscous liquid -, not a solid (I know that's confusing but just take Reeko's word for it).  It's rate of flow is so slow that it would take billions of years for it to 'flow' out of shape.  You can see through glass for the same reason you can see through water.  As with most liquids, the molecules are loosely spaced and simply not big enough to restrict the light passing through it.      Why do Life Savers candy make blue sparks when you bite them? Fist off, candy is bad for your teeth and biting them vigorously, although entertaining, is even worse - but it does make a blue spark.  Wintergreen Life Savers work best although several brands of candy will do the same thing. This phenomenon is called triboluminescence, occurs when something is crushed, the something in this case being the crystalline sugar in the Life Savers.   When the sugar is smashed, electrons break free and become positively charged.   Since electrons naturally want to attract, these lonesome particles dash about madly trying to find a new home.  In this case, they attract to nitrogen molecules in the air and emit UV (Ultraviolet) radiation (they glow).  Furthermore, the UV radiation is absorbed by the stuff that makes the Life Savers taste like wintergreen - methyl silicylate - and this emits a blue light.  The moral of this story?  Who needs bulky emergency flashlights scattered all over the house when a stash of yummy-tasting candy could suffice...      What would happen if I dropped a glass of root beer from the top of the Sears Tower. Kind of an open ended question, isn't it?   I can assure you that the glass would break and you'd probably get in a lot of trouble for tossing an object off of an office building.  But, I assume you're wondering what would happen to the liquid inside the glass - would it stay in the glass, would it fly out of the top of the glass, or would it compress to the bottom of the glass?  Actually, the root beer would remain motionless relative to the glass itself.   Gravity would act uniformly on the fluid and the glass (gravity does not play favorites).  Given the absence of outside influences such as air currents, wind movement, flagpoles, and flying birds, the root beer wouldn't even slosh out of the glass.      Is there really such a thing as quicksand and if so, what do I do if I fall in some of it? First off, make sure you take off your shoes before walking across Mom's clean floor.  Secondly, if you're outside playing ball and the ball flies over the fence and lands in a pile of quicksand - don't go get it!   Instead, ask Dad what to do.  On second though, maybe we'd better explain a little bit about quicksand... Quicksand is nothing more than sand particles supported by water rather than other sand particles.  Kind of like sand mud.  Its density is greater than the density of most other things, hence, you'd float in it.  If you struggle around you'll only sink further.  Keeping that in mind, here's what you do if you fall in quicksand - be still.  You'll stop sinking at which point you can use slow swimming movements to get yourself on 'top' of the quicksand, then simply roll until you reach solid ground.  This would be a good time to go explain this to Dad in case the situation ever arises...       Is it true that water spirals down the drain in one direction in the Northern Hemisphere and in the opposite direction in the Southern Hemisphere? Yes and No. Oh, I guess you're looking for a more detailed explanation than that... There is a phenomena called the Coriolis effect which explains the effect of the earth's rotation on moving objects.  Imagine the earth rotating counter clockwise as viewed from the top (the Northern Hemisphere).  If you were to move to the bottom of the earth (the Southern Hemisphere) the earth would be rotating clockwise.  This rotation does indeed effect the rotation of certain objects - a hurricane rotates in a clockwise direction the the Southern Hemisphere and in a counterclockwise direction the the Northern Hemisphere.  But does water drain in a clockwise direction the the Southern Hemisphere and in a counterclockwise direction the the Northern Hemisphere?   Highly unlikely.  The Coriolis effect amounts to roughly 3/10,000,000 of the force of gravity, negligible to say the least in small events like toilet flushings.   Other factors play a much larger part in drainage direction - small imperfections or shape distortions in the sink or tub, the micro movement of the water by outside disturbances such as the act of pouring the water in the drain (which, although undetectable by your eyes, may continue for several hours after the fact), and so on.   So, in summary, we're back to our original answer - 'Yes' and 'No'...   Sorry, but that rowdy monkey's got to go back to his cage.  Check back soon, we'll ask him some more questions later...     Help Reeko Solve the Equations! ( Enter Answer)  (Huh???) X + 4 + 2 = 8