The Complete Idiot's Guide to...’s Comments (group member since May 25, 2012)

The Complete Idiot's Guide to...’s comments from the The Complete Idiot's Guides group.

Just a reminder guys: This giveaway ends on August 23rd. Hurry over to Facebook for your chance to win!

Like us on Facebook and enter for a chance to win a Kindle Fire! Follow this link for your chance to win: https://www.facebook.com/completeidio...

Sweepstakes ends on August 23rd. The winner will be announced August 24th.

Hello CIG Group members! We are giving away a code to get The Complete Idiot's Guide to Bartending App (http://itunes.apple.com/us/app/comple...) for free on iTunes! The first person to use the code, gets the app! Comment on this thread to let us know if you've already redeemed it. Enjoy!

Here is the code:

P6KK973WLH6M

The Men's 3 Meter Springboard event is today! And, though you may not be able to do a handstand dive from 3 meters into an Olympic sized pool, you can still learn what it takes to win that coveted gold medal.

Check out this Quick Guide to learn more about Olympic Diving, its rules, and how athletes are scored. http://idiotsguides.com/static/quickg...

If you've been following the London 2012 Olympics, you know that the Women's Individual All-Around Final in gymnastics is today. Not sure how the events are scored? Visit our website! This Quick Guide (Olympic Gymnastics: The Rules and How Events are Scored) can clear up some of your questions. http://idiotsguides.com/static/quickg...

That's fantastic, Terri! Let us know what you think :)

Terri wrote: "I pre-ordered it."

The number of fad diets that you see online, in TV infomercials and in magazines is huge. Each one claims to be the diet that changes your life. But, you know the truth. Effective weight loss relies on a simple idea: being able to balance caloric intake with the calories you burn.

In this month's book selection, you'll learn more about caloric nutrition as well as use Denise Webb's book as a resource for healthy, low-calorie, recipes. Bon appetit!

In August 1914, all of Europe was caught up in the Great War. Andorra, a usually neutral country in southwestern Europe, decided to join in and declared war on Kaiser Wilhelm II’s Imperial Germany. Given its size and neutrality, Andorra’s army consisted of just 10 part-time soldiers that assembled only a few times a year for ceremonies; and with no military budget (the country has no income tax), the only ammunition the army had were ceremonial blank cartridges.

Needless to say, World War I passed pretty quietly for Andorra—so quietly, in fact, that the country was left out of the Versailles Peace Treaty negotiations, and was not included on the final signed Treaty. Since no peace treaty was enacted, Andorra remained in a state of war with Germany. It wasn’t until the start of World War II, some twenty-five years later, that the oversight was discovered. On September 25, 1939, Andorra signed a reparation-free treaty, finally ending its state of war against Germany and ending its involvement in World War I.

After living in a state of (albeit bloodless) war for twenty-five years, the government of Andorra decided to sit out World War II.

Interested in some more unique history? Check out more Did You Knows on our website! http://idiotsguides.com/static/didyou...

Think you know everything there is to know about the Games? Put your Olympic knowledge to the test with this quiz! http://idiotsguides.com/static/gameco...

The first few Olympic Games of the modern era were chaotic events with a dizzying array of games, one of the most popular of which was Tug of War. Although it may seem a strange choice, since it is now mostly thought of as a kid’s game, Tug of War was actually a main event of the Olympic games in Ancient Greece.

Tug of War, a game in which two teams of six to eight men on either end of a rope try to pull the other team over a line in the center, was a main event in the Track and Field category. Countries did not have an official Olympic Tug of War team, though—the competition was entered by individual clubs, which meant that several medals could be won by a single country. The most interesting sweep was in 1908, when the Gold, Silver, and Bronze medals were won by the City of London Police, the Liverpool Police, and Great Britain Metropolitan Police K Division, respectively.

From 1900 to 1920, the sport was a crowd favorite. However, during the five Olympic Games in which the sport was played, only seven countries ever competed in the game. (No games were held in 1916 due to the outbreak of World War I.) In fact, in 1900 and 1912 no Bronze medals were given for Tug of War because only two teams entered the event. Tug of War made its last appearance at the Olympics was at the 1920 Antwerp games.

Great Britain dominated the sport, winning five of the thirteen total awards given. It is no surprise that a petition has been started in England to bring Tug of War back for the London 2012 Olympic Games.


Learn more trivia on our site! Visit http://idiotsguides.com/static/didyou...

It's Emmy Award season! How well do you know your Emmy history? Find out here: http://idiotsguides.com/static/gameco...

We are thrilled to announce that our first app, The Complete Idiot’s Guide to Bartending, is now available for purchase in the Apple and Android stores! This fantastic app has much more than just the contents of the original book, and in fact has more unique features than any other cocktail app on the market! You get:


* 1500 mixed drink recipes searchable by name, ingredient, type, mood, or occasion
* A library of mixology terms and techniques
* A liquid measurement unit converter
* An interactive blood alcohol checker
* A huge collection of drink and alcohol trivia
* Instructions on how to play dozens of popular drinking games
* Scads of pick-up lines to break the ice with anyone
* Call a Taxi and Find a Bar features, using Google Maps and Yelp


You can also bookmark favorite drinks, add your own recipes, and store information about the best drinks and bartenders at your favorite watering holes. The app is available in iPhone, iPad, and Android versions, for just $4.99! You can check it out here:

http://itunes.apple.com/us/app/comple...

Scores of inventions have come about by mistake, but how many can claim they were the mistake of a kid?

One evening in 1905 in San Francisco, an eleven-year-old boy named Frank Epperson was on his porch, making a cup of soda by mixing some white powdered flavoring and water with a wooden stick. For reasons that are now left to history, he left the mixture (with the stick in it) on the porch. That night, the temperatures hit a record low, and the next morning Frank found that the drink had frozen to the stick. That happy accident got Frank to thinking about the idea of a frozen fruit-flavored treat on a stick.

It took a while for him to bring his idea to fruition, though. Eighteen years, to be exact.

In 1923 Epperson finally perfected his fruit-flavored frozen pop on a stick and decided to see what the public thought. He took his frozen confections to Neptune Beach, an amusement park in Alameda, California; the Epsicle Ice Pops, as he had named them, were a huge hit. He immediately applied for a patent, with one small change: his children hated the name Epsicle Ice Pop and insisted he change it. Epperson came up with the name Popsicle®; the rest is history.


Read more interesting trivia on our website: http://idiotsguides.com/static/didyou...

Julieanna Hever, author of The Complete Idiot's Guide to Plant-Based Nutrition, shared her recipe for Indian Hummus Dip with HLN earlier this week.

Watch the video here: http://www.hlntv.com/video/2012/06/22...

For more delicious quinoa recipes, check out our Quick Guide: http://idiotsguides.com/static/quickg...

Take this short quiz to see how well you remember your world history! http://idiotsguides.com/static/gameco...

Check out Brent Peterson's discussion with the Today Show as he explains some of the reasons why RVing has become a very appealing way for families to go on vacation. http://todaytravel.today.msnbc.msn.co...

Test your knowledge of Harry Potter by taking our quiz! You'll find it here: http://idiotsguides.com/static/gameco...

Summer is the perfect time to sit around and play some tunes. If you've ever wondered what it takes to learn to play the Ukulele, David Hodge's The Complete Idiot's Guide to Playing the Ukulele is the read for you!

To get starting, you'll need to select the right Ukulele for your musical tastes. Check out this quick guide and see all of the possibilities! http://idiotsguides.com/static/quickg...

This balmy weather calls for something refreshingly tasty! The Detroit Free Press just highlighted the recipe for the Gingered Beet and Apple Juice found in Ellen Brown's book, The Complete Idiot's Guide to Juicing. To read the recipe, follow this link: http://www.freep.com/article/20120705...

You'll find some more healthy, delicious drinks in the book!

One of the most iconic images of July 4th is that of the Liberty Bell being rung while the Founding Fathers signed the Declaration of Independence. That story was created by writer George Lippard in his story, “Fourth of July, 1776” which appeared in Saturday Review magazine. In the story, an old bellman was sitting sullenly by the Liberty Bell, worried that the men were not going to have the courage to sign the Declaration. The story builds to a climatic moment when a young boy runs up to the tower with instructions for the bellman to ring the bell. The story was published on January 2, 1847, and is responsible for linking the Liberty Bell to America’s Independence Day. Years later, parts of the story were used in a pictorial history of the revolution, turning the story into historical fact.

The trouble is, the event in that story never happened.

Although the Declaration of Independence was signed on July 4, there was no public declaration of the event, so no bells—Liberty or otherwise—were ever rung. When the Declaration was read in public on July 8th, bells were rung, but it is not clear if the Liberty Bell was one of them, as the bell tower of the State House was in terrible condition and may have prevented the bell from being rung.

After Washington’s defeat at the Battle of Brandywine on September 17, 1777, Philadelphians feared the bell would be stolen and melted down for ammunition. They took it in a wagon to a Zion German Reformed Church in Allentown and hid it behind a fake wall. It was returned to the State House in June 1778 and was rung each year on July 4th and on George Washington’s birthday.

The Liberty Bell now resides in the Liberty Bell Center next to the Independence Mall in Philadelphia.


For more interesting facts in US History, visit our site at http://www.idiotsguides.com/static/di...