Ripley's Believe It or Not by Ripley’s Believe It or Not! for March 29, 2018

The Berlin Wall factoid: I wouldn’t have calculated that.

Am I getting older. There are people almost 30 years old that weren’t around for it.

Microwave ovens are very inefficient. 1100 watts input power to the magnetron, only 3-10 watts dissipated in the target. But(!), I’m not willing to believe that a microwave oven’s clock uses more than a watt.

Of course it was bacon. What else would it be??

The bacon was washed down with TANG!

I remember that day, I was in 9th grade when the wall came down. I have a really cool poster I got from my German teacher, depicting that scene. November 9, 1989.

Berlin Wall – has it been that long?!

I was very fortunate to be able to try the food that the astronauts ate. My friends Dad worked at Whirlpool on the team that developed the freeze dried packets for the Gemini and Apollo missions. He gave a show and tell at school and we all tried some. Needless to say he got an a on that one.

. . . enjoy! :) http://www.gocomics.com/tomthedancingbug/2018/03/29

. . . most people don’t realize that there use to be a little known USA military base in Berlin. At the end of the Cold War, it was closed. Here is how it looks like, now. :) https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mINRXR5RmIc

“Mr. Gorbachev! Tear down this wall!!”

My wife’s German relatives sent us a peace of the wall but we can’t remember where we put it now.

The microwave power thing has been pretty well disproven. It’s from a 2006 Economist article and poor estimates were used. In addition newer microwaves have more efficient power supplies. A little googling can find all this information.

Aw, not a moon pie?

Why Americans are so crazy about bacon?

The microwave OVEN (not the microwave!) claim is not correct.As stated by others, the clock (which includes multiple timers, not all used) is on as long as the machine is plugged in (whether it is set or not). But typical modern electronic (as versus electromechanical) clocks use a watt or less per hour. Even back in 2000, before the Economist article, that was true. A small 700W oven uses (surprise!) 700W per hour – nearly a KW – except it’s not using that much the full time – but ANY setting is using electricity at the rate of 700W, just for more or less of the time*). Even at the lowest setting it is using more energy than the clock.

If they had said that a microwave oven that is turned off still pulls electricity because of the clock running internally or visibly, I would have to agree tentatively**

Higher wattage ovens may vary the amount of electricity pulled as well as the amount of time slices that it pulls that electricity.

*

Years ago when the electric meters had a round disk turning, which caused the meter’s dials to turn, I found out that with every circuit breaker off except one – the one that nothing was connected to except an old electromechanical clock, the wheel did not turn. Even a week and a half later it had not turned at all – so that old clock used less than the 3-4 watts needed to turn the wheel. So as far as the electric company was concerned, we used no electricity for that ~10 days we were gone, but the clock was still accurate.