Going Bananas!

Someone once gave me a book titled 1,411 Quite Interesting Facts to Knock You Sideways by John Llyod, John Hutchinson and James Harkin.  Now mind you, the interesting facts are often quite obscure, and while there is an index to the book, there are no source attributions.  So I guess we just need to take Mr. Lloyd and friends at their word. 

A full six of the 1,411 facts have to do with bananas.  Did you know, for instance, that there are 1000 species of banana, but we only eat one?  Or that bananas are considered unlucky on fishing boats?  (No more peanut butter and banana sandwiches in the coolers guys!)  Or that bananas are used in making kimonos?  (Huh?)  My favorite banana fact, however, is this one:  "The world's largest container ships can carry 746 million bananas."  (67)

Imagine that!  Bananas stretched as far as the eye can see, and then some.  End on end, enough bananas to, I don't know, reach the sun?  The moon?  Midtown Manhattan?  Think of all the banana pudding you could make.  Or banana splits (Personally, I never liked the pineapple sauce though--make it mostly chocolate syrup.)  Or banana bread.  Now that would be pretty gross.  I mean, you have to let bananas go half-rotten before you can use them in banana bread.  Imagine the fruit flies that would attract!

I suppose this is something of a waste of time--ruminating on bananas like this.  But sometimes, you need distractions from a world that offers up things like this year's presidential campaign. I mean, it is, quite literally, enough  to drive you . . .  well, bananas.  746 million of them at least!