So, a few days ago I saw the following headline pop up on my newsfeed: “The 100 Best Spoons Ranked, According to NBC Select Editors”.  My first reaction was… “this can’t be serious”, then, once I realized that they were serious, my reaction became… “why in the hell would anyone research that?”  Although painstaking I decided that I had to read this article.  What I discovered is that they took a fairly scientific approach to research this useless, boring, silly (fill in your own adjectives).  They established five evaluation categories: size, finish, feel, ergonomics, and temperature regulation.  They went through a fairly labor-intensive methodology to track each spoon including number assignment and color coding.  They then tested 100 spoons (yes, I said 100) in a two-part testing process (yes, two parts).  The testing included a controlled test at the office with each team member trying each spoon three times (yep, 100 spoons tested by multiple people 3 times).  They were meticulous in their process, including multiple food types representing the variety of size, shapes, consistencies, and temperatures where a spoon might be employed.  At the end of the in-office test they scored all the spoons and identified the top 20 spoons for a second round of home testing.  Upon completion they reranked the top 20 and published their results.  They even went so far as to give each of the top twenty a paragraph articulating the features, benefits, and drawbacks.  By now I’m quite sure that you are just dying to hear the results.  Well, according to this painstaking research project the top three spoons are: 3. Marin teaspoons, 2. Hiware soup spoons, and coming in at number one, 1. Hay Sunday spoons.  Ugh, that is about twenty minutes of my life that I will never get back…

I continue to shake my head every time I think about this article and research project.  Why would anyone put forth the time and effort to research something like this?  However, this also got me thinking and past memories started coming to mind.  I fondly remembered the “Golden Fleece Awards” given by Wisconsin Senator William Proxmire in the 1970’s and 80’s.  Each month Senator Proxmire would issue awards to government programs and departments for squandering public money.  Here’s some of my favorite Golden Fleece Award winners:

• The Federal Aviation Administration spent $57,800 on a study of the physical measurements of 432 airline stewardesses, including the distance from knee to knee while sitting (around $208K in 2023).
• The National Science Foundation spent $103,000 to see whether tequila or gin made sunfish more aggressive ($370K).
• The Office of Education spent $219,592 to develop a curriculum teaching college students how to watch television ($790K).
• The Department of Agriculture spent $46,000 to find out how long it takes to cook breakfast ($166K).

God bless you Senator Proxmire…  I only wish that someone else in Congress had taken up your banner and continued the Golden Fleece Awards.

OK, so now I was on a roll.  Where else could I search to find amazing wastes of time and money?  I decided to do a Google search on the word “earmarks”.  For those of you that don’t know, earmarks are items included in Congressional appropriations bills that almost entirely benefit the state(s) or district(s) of the members that propose them.  In 2023 a group called “Citizens Against Government Waste” identified 7,396 earmarks with a total cost to taxpayers of $26.1 billion.  Some examples of recent earmarks:

• A Florida Congresswoman got $4,000,000 for the Bahamian Museum of Arts in Nassau, Bahamas. Hum… I wonder how a Florida politician benefits from getting $4,000,000 for a museum in the Bahamas?
• A Hawaiian Congressman got $250,000 for the Bishop Museum in Honolulu (note, at the time of the award the museum was sitting on a fund balance of $60.7 million).
• A Mississippi Senator got $6,000,000 for the Ulysses S. Grant Presidential Library at Mississippi State University. So, I’ve got to ask, why is the Ulysses S Grant Presidential Library located in Mississippi?  He never lived there and his efforts in the civil war certainly wouldn’t have endeared him to folks in the deep south.

I just couldn’t stop!  Where else could I look?  I decided to Google “strange research topics”.  Yep, you guessed it, the results were overwhelming and unbelievable.  Here are some of my favorite, strange University based research projects, theses, and dissertations:

• A dissertation at Keio University evaluated pigeons’ preference between Monet and Picasso. I personally think that they needed to expand the study to evaluate the difference in results between pigeons that have / have not crashed into windows.  I think that the pigeons that have crashed into multiple windows during their lifetime would prefer Picasso.
• A research project at the University of Minnesota sought to determine whether humans swim slower in syrup than in water. Apparently, it doesn’t matter, and you can read about it in the American Institute of Chemical Engineers Journal.
• A cooperative study between SINTEF Unimed and the Technical University of Denmark sought to answer that age old question, “why is wet underwear uncomfortable?” They came up with a plethora of scientific data.  However, considering where the study was conducted, you’re probably not going to be surprised to learn that “the cooling effect” ranked high on the list.

The list is endless including such things as: the dangers of sword swallowing; improved methods to address penile zipper entrapment; music preferences of rats; whether unicorns existed; the similarities between Jesus and Harry Potter; the pressures produced when penguins poop; the nature of navel lint; and the effect of cocaine on bees.

Well, there it is.  Clearly, there continues to be no lack of creativity and imagination in the mind of man.  Now I just need to figure out how I can fund my research project to determine whether a Guinness with every meal will add years to your lifespan…