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Hoodoos & cakes, Jetliners takeoff speed, the top-10 smartest animals

Q: In Ernest Lawrence Thayer's poem, Casey at the Bat, two players are referred to as a "hoodoo" and a "cake". Can you tell me what those terms mean and where they come from? —Jesse, Petersburg, West Virginia

Casey at the bat [Cosmic Baseball Association]

A: The original poem that Thayer wrote in 1888 for the June 3 edition of the San Francisco Examiner didn’t include the word "hoodoo." Instead Flynn was termed a "lulu." Thayer’s original poem goes like this:

Either way—a "lulu" or a "hoodoo"—Flynn doesn’t inspire confidence. A "hoodoo" is a variant of the West African word "voodoo" and means to bring bad luck. A "lulu" is a remarkable person, often used derisively.

For example: Casey’s fiction, of course. Great fiction. Others have built on Thayer’s tale—movies, poems, an opera. "Roughhouse" Flynn, according to the opera (The Mighty Casey), was a strong hitter but, during the 1887 season, was benched eleven times and fined seven times for insulting umpires. Goodness knows, thought the hometown crowd, what this "lulu" would do. That’s "lulu", used derisively.

Jimmy Blake was a cake. According to the American Dictionary of Slang, "cake" derived from Negro use and means a sexually attractive or personable girl or young woman. Jimmy might not have appreciated this. The next line in the poem calls Blake, the "much despis-ed." So, "cake" in 1888, probably connoted what "creampuff" does now—a weakling.

Martin Gardner, in his excellent The Annotated Casey at the Bat, says that "cake" then meant a dude, dandy, or male homosexual. "Here [in Thayer’s poem], it probably means no more than a handsome, vain ball player, much concerned about his personal appearance, but a weak player."

Further Surfing:

Cosmic Baseball Association: Casey at the bat

Q: What speed do large passenger jetliners usually build up to on the runway before they take off? —Xyesret, United Kingdom

Jetliner ready on runway [NASA]

A: Jetliners typically takeoff at 160 to 180 mph (260 to 290 km/h), though it depends on how heavily the plane is loaded and whether the pilot is using flaps or slats. These devices increase the plane’s lift so it can take off at slower speeds.

When I say "speed" I mean airspeed (relative to the air). So, theoretically, a plane could just sit there and take off into a 160 mph wind. It would take a strong hurricane.

Airspeed is critical because it provides lift. That’s why planes take off into the wind: to maximize airspeed. The wind hits the up-tilted wings and tail and flows down—the path of least resistance. The air exerts an equal and opposite—upward—force on the wings and tail. The plane rises due to this lift.

Aircraft carriers maneuver so their deck is pointed into the wind as much as possible when launching and retrieving fighter planes. They catapult 45,000-pound planes (20,400 kg) into the sky at takeoff speeds of 165 mph (266 kg/h)—reaching those speeds in two seconds!

Further Surfing:

Jack Williams, USATODAY.COM: 318-mph storm wind fastest ever

Aerospaceweb: Aircraft performance questions

Q: If the chimp is the smartest animal, where does the dolphin stand in the rankings? What are the top 10 smartest animals? —Drew, Oceanside, California and Scott, Seattle, Washington

Pigs—fourth smartest animal [Corel]

A: It’s hard to say which are the top ten smartest animals but here’s my list: apes and monkeys, dolphins and some whales, dogs, cats, crows, ravens, parrots, pigs, squirrels, octopuses.

I’ve talked about chimps in an earlier question so I won’t go into apes and monkeys here.

Dolphins swim and live in highly organized family groups called pods. Females assist others in giving birth. They hunt cooperatively. They talk with one another—whistling, quacking, squeaking. We have taught dolphins sign language, which they interpret correctly—both the sign meaning and how sign order affects meaning.

Cats and dogs match or surpass all animals except apes, some monkeys, and dolphins.

Ravens, crows, and parrots solve problems and are highly social creatures. Ravens can talk with each other, count to 9 (compared with 4 for chimps), and steal. They play—sliding down long snow banks, for example.

People have trained pigs to find truffles. Mediaeval English used pigs to poach (pointing and retrieving) since commoners were allowed only tiny dogs. A researcher reported seeing an old woman in southern India speak to her pig, which immediately rounded up her buffalo herd like a well-trained collie.

Squirrels are highly intelligent animals and will investigate anything, especially if it resembles food. Theda Kane raised an orphan squirrel in the United Kingdom. "I had to give up wearing stud earrings as Oz kept taking them out of my earlobes and putting them in his mouth. He also methodically removed all the buttons from my favorite cardigan and persistently stole my cigarette lighter," she says.

Boneless octopuses can ooze through a hole as small as one of their eyes. Being boneless makes orientation challenging. They’ve developed phenomenal memories to compensate. They’re clever too. Investigators tell many such stories as this one: An octopus spies a transparent bottle containing live crabs and quickly puzzles out how to open it. What’s more, she remembers solutions and applies them to different problems.

Further Surfing:

WonderQuest: Chimps are next smartest (after man)

Montana State University: Professor never used to think animals have minds

(Answered July 18, 2003)