Customer Reviews

Do Penguins Have Knees? An Imponderables Book

5 star:		(6)
4 star:		(5)
3 star:		(2)
2 star:		(0)
1 star:		(0)

 

 

This book is one of the "Imponderables™" series, which, the jacket claims, "has become the unchallenged source of answers to civilization's most perplexing questions." Like the title question "Do Penguins Have Knees?" or "Why are there legless ducks on the crests of Cadillacs?" Readers write in questions, and the author finds experts with answers.

There's Stuff in here I never knew I didn't know. "Why are sticks of margarine and butter thicker and shorter in the Western United States and longer and narrower in the East?" Hmm. I never noticed. This book never answers a logical follow-up question - Where is the geographical cut-off line? Is it like broadcasting station call letters that kinda sorta are assigned according to whether the station is East or West of the Mississippi? (W*** east and K*** west except for Fargo, which is West of the Headwaters of the Mississippi but has "W" stations anyway - but that is an "Imponderable™" for another Day.)

Speaking of answers that raise other questions, teasers for other books in the "Imponderables™" series run rampart through this book. E.g. When answering "How do they make Hot Dog buns that are partially sliced?" the author begins by saying: "Now that we solved the Imponderable of why there are ten Hot Dogs in a package and only eight Hot Dog buns in a package (See *Why Do Clocks Run Clockwise?* ..." or imparting the information that the most FAQ is "Why are buttons on men's shirts and jackets arranged differently from those on women's shirts?" and then leaving the readers hanging until we can procure copies of previous books.

We are not tackling "What is the meaning of life?" here, but the quick questions and answers are entertaining and illuminating.

Feldman keeps producing these books of imponderables;and they just keep
getting better all the time. His books just go on asking questions and producing answers about those unlimited number of things we've all wondered about,and even many that we have come to accept as "that's just the way it is". Feldman encourages his readers to send in their own imponderables to answer ;much in the same way that Allan Funt did with Practical Jokes on "Candid Camera " and Robert Ripley did with his Oddities with his "Believe It or Not". I have been a fan of this sort of thing and their "stuff" has intrigued the curious,entertained the joker in us all and amazed all who are surprised to see the rare or unbelievable.
This is the type of book that can be left hanging around, and anybody who picks it up will become engrossed in it in no time at all.Many of the imponderables you'll read about are not earth shattering,won't make much difference in your life,but nevertheless grab your interest and provide enjoyable pastime entertainment.Maybe the time spent waiting at the Dentist's,Doctor's ,Barbers or any other waiting room would be a little less painful if books like this were available rather than those awful magazines.
Who wouldn't be interested in questions like these?

"Why do straws in drinks sometimes sink and sometimes rise to the
surface?"

"Why is Rhode Island called an island when it obviuosly isn't an
island."

"How did they keep beer cold in the saloons of the Old West?"

"Why are 25-watt light bulbs more expensive than 60-,75-,and 100-watt
bulbs?"

"Why do hospital gowns tie in the back?"

"What causes the green-tinged potato chips we sometimes find? Are they
safe to eat?"

And how about thisimponderable that never seems to die?

"Why are so many restaurants,especially diners and coffee
shops,obsessed with mating Ketchup bottles at the end of the day?
Believe It or Not,it prevents Explosions! Thats right!;you'll find out why,right here in this book!

With this book anyone should be able to stop those silly questions that run around the world wild. I greatly enjoy it and pop it open again and again whenever I run into a person that asks questions like "Why do coupons have 1/100 of a cent value"

As a kid, asking inumerable "stupid" questions was sure to get a weary "Go look it up" from a parent. Unfortunately, as a kid, I didn't have the innumerable resources at the fingertips of the Imponderables crew. As always, David Feldman and his team of information hunters have compiled questions from all over, some of which kept me going until I read the answer!

If you want to have an interesting afternoon while it's raining outside, get together some friends. Open up the book to a random page. Read out the question on that page, and have everyone come up with what they think the answer is. Then, read out the answer, and see who came close (or even spot on!). You'll be surprised (sometimes) to see some of the answers that your friends came up with be popular urban legends, which Feldman goes on to discredit.

Imponderables books are a riot for pleasure reading, or in large groups of people!

Do Penguins Have Knees? is a great book with a great concept. It answers all of life's little imponderables that you always wanted to know the answer to but never knew who to ask. The questions range from, "Why do cats like to be scratched behind the ears?" to "How did they keep beer cold in the Old West?". In the back of the book are Frustables (Imponderables that have not been solved), a Frustable update (new answers to old Frustables), an index to this book, and an index to all of the other Imponderables book. Why someone would put all of that in a book beats me. You look at the big book only to find that 1/3 is spent on things other than Imponderables (such as the complete index to all of the books, which I think is a stupid idea). The only flaw in this book is that there might even be too much information. They give you the answer and they keep rambling on. Some of the answers took up 2-3 pages when they had answered the Imponderable on the first page. Also, all of the names and places where they come from, for example: Bob Smith from the University of Learning Things in Yourtown, USA, seemed to clutter up the page and take away from the answer. I think this book had a great concept, but with a poor format.

Saw this book featured in a Children's Christmas toys catalog and my 7 year old daughter saw it and asked for it. I read the reviews for all of the books and the "Penguins" one had the best reviews. The catalog had it advertised for 8 and up so I thought it would be okay. While it has many fun and fuuny facts about things, it really is not a children's book as the cover would make you believe.

I recently found this book in the National Library Service for the Blind's Talking Book catalog and on their pilot web site for their new digital format. Curious, I downloaded a copy to see what Imponderables was all about.
The short of it is that the Imponderables series takes little questions about things we encounter in everyday life, little things that, though we've never questioned how or why they got to be the way they are, we've nonetheless come to accept as, "just the way it is." These are questions that people write in to ask and, once gathered, the author, David Feldman, poses these questions to experts in the fields of study that pertain to the question. This has led to at least six Imponderables books, Do Penguins have Knees being the sixth. And for all I know, this having been my first such book, there could be more. And it's thanks to one of these books that we now know the answer to the trivial yet still troubling question of why hotdogs tend to come in packages of ten while hotdog buns seem only to come in packages of eight. Note that I haven't yet read the book in which this answer is revealed, but Penguins does tackle, among other things, the question of why, and more particularly how, we have hotdog buns that are only partially sliced. The most fascinating question for me had to do with one of my absolute favorite soft drinks, Dr. Pepper. The question was how it got its name and if there was ever really a Dr. Pepper. To put it simply, yes there was.
In short if you're looking for an interesting read that combines humor with fact, then you should definitely check out the Imponderables series. I certainly intend to read more of them as soon as I can find copies.

It's a fun, informative book that holds the interest of pre-teens and adults alike. I would recommend the whole series to everyone.

This book is good, it has the answers to questions that people have always wondered.

The author has a good formula going here. He takes an offbeat question and consults various experts, coming up with a plausible answer. Most of these I never would have thought to ask, but I still found myself intrigued by the answers.
The questions include such topics as:
*How do 3-D movies and 3-D glasses work?
*Why do the rear windows of taxis only go part way down?
*Why does grease turn white when it cools?
*Why can't they make the flavor in chewing gum last longer?
It's a handy book to keep around when you
have interrupted or distracted reading times (doctor's waiting room, during TV commercials, etc.). It's entertaining.