Thursday, August 28, 2003
Drink-Meat, It’s Good for You
(…especially on Handsel Monday)
Every year my dear Mom gives me Jeffrey Kacirk’s incredible Forgotten English, A 365-Day Calendar of Vanishing Vocabulary and Folklore (next year it's 366 days!) Each day of the calendar features an archaic word that has (sadly) fallen out of usage in the English language, as well as the word’s definition, an appropriate feast or festival day for the date, and perhaps an anecdote (all from the original sources, usually from the 16th to 19th centuries).
I can’t recommend Kacirk enough. He has authored a companion book, Forgotten English, and also Altered English and The Word Museum.
From the 2001 Forgotten English calendar, here is January 8th’s entry:
drink-meat
Ale boiled, thickened with oatmeal, and spiced.
-Georgina Jackson’s Shropshire Word-Book, 1879.
Handsel Monday
One William Hunter, a collier, was cured in the year 1758 of rheumatism by drinking freely of new ale, full of barm, or yeast. The poor man had been confined to his bed for a year and a half, having almost entirely lost the use of his limbs. On the evening of Handsel Monday, as it is called, some of his neighbours came to make merry with him… and in the endbecame much intoxicated. The consequence was that he had the use of his limbs the next morning and was able to walk about. He lived more than twenty years after this, and never had the smallest return of his old complaint.
-John Brand’s Observations on Popular Antiquities, 1813.
Great stuff, eh? In 1813 John Brand had already learned what today's men's magazines know well: Tell 'em what they wanna hear. Drink more beer, it's good for you!
Still, one can’t help but question the facts of the tale. The critical mind is compelled to postulate its own version, which might go something like this:
William Hunter the Collier was enamoured of ale long before it cured him of his affliction. He liked his ale perhaps a bit too much, and much, MUCH more than he liked to work as a collier. William developed rheumatism as a means of staying in bed and doing very little, answering any protestations from his wife with, “Woman! My limbs doth not work! Fetch me a brandy, it doeth good for my aching bones!”
After a long night celebrating Handsel Monday with his neighbors, William was awakened the next morning, still drunk, by the throbbing of his bladder. Without thinking he jumped out of bed to relieve himself. Running headlong for the chamber-pot, William ran headlong into Mrs Hunter, his wife. Thinking quickly, he declared, “I am cured! It is a miracle! It must have been the ale!”
William imbibed the medicinal ale liberally for the rest of his life, finally dying at a ripe olde age (from liver failure). His rheumatism only recurred when he attempted to work.
~
8/28/2003 08:01:00 PM
Saturday, August 23, 2003
Mugwump
Mugwump sits on a fence, with his mug hanging over one side and his wump hanging over the other.
Doesn't sound very comfortable, does it? Not very exciting, either.
And so, alas, mugwumpery is not nearly as sinister as it sounds.
~
8/23/2003 10:00:00 PM
Thursday, August 21, 2003
The Boiled Frog Phenomenon
(Or, How warm do you like your bathwater? A little warmer, yes?)
"[Systems] seem particularly susceptible to what is sometimes called the boiled frog phenomenon. This refers to the notion that a live frog will immediately jump out when placed in a pan of hot water. When placed in cold water that is heated very slowly, however, the frog will stay in the water until the water boils the frog to death."
(-from Organizational Behavior, 7th ed.,
Schermerhorn Jr, Hunt and Osborne.)
Wow, actual usable wisdom from, of all things, a business textbook!
I have no idea why this tidbit strikes me as so humorous and profound, except that Taz mentioned the same idea to me last week and I tripped over this quote shortly after.
Or perhaps it explains, as succinctly as any Zen parable, how I am where I am right now.
Or maybe it's just the latest global-warming heatwave boiling my brain.
The downside: No doubt someone came to the "boiling frog" conclusion through experimentation with live frogs, because humans are like that, and common sense means nothing compared to the irrevocable truth of the "scientific method."
The sentence, "This refers to the notion that a live frog will immediately jump out when placed in a pan of hot water" [italics mine], was no doubt proven scientifically as well, by first ascertaining that: No, a dead frog will not jump out of hot water no matter how hot the water may be.
The upside: I'm not a dead frog yet.
~
8/21/2003 06:21:00 PM
Tuesday, August 19, 2003
An Internet Classic Revisited:
The classic "gentle" rejection letter from the Smithsonian to a would-be archaeologist
Paleoanthropology Division
Smithsonian Institute
207 Pennsylvania Avenue
Washington, DC 20078
Dear Sir:
Thank you for your latest submission to the Institute, labeled "211-D, layer seven, next to the clothesline post. Hominid skull." We have given this specimen a careful and detailed examination, and regret to inform you that we disagree with your theory that it represents "conclusive proof of the presence of Early Man in Charleston County two million years ago."
Rather, it appears that what you have found is the head of a Barbie doll, of the variety one of our staff, who has small children, believes to be the "Malibu Barbie". It is evident that you have given a great deal of thought to the analysis of this specimen, and you may be quite certain that those of us who are familiar with your prior work in the field were loathe to come to contradiction with your findings. However, we do feel that there are a number of physical attributes of the specimen which might have tipped you off to it's modern origin:
1. The material is molded plastic. Ancient hominid remains are typically fossilized bone.
2. The cranial capacity of the specimen is approximately 9 cubic centimeters, well below the threshold of even the earliest identified proto-hominids.
3. The dentition pattern evident on the "skull" is more consistent with the common domesticated dog than it is with the "ravenous man-eating Pliocene clams" you speculate roamed the wetlands during that time. This latter finding is certainly one of the most intriguing hypotheses you have submitted in your history with this institution, but the evidence seems to weigh rather heavily against it. Without going into too much detail, let us say that:
A. The specimen looks like the head of a Barbie doll that a dog has chewed on.
B. Clams don't have teeth.
It is with feelings tinged with melancholy that we must deny your request to have the specimen carbon dated. This is partially due to the heavy load our lab must bear in it's normal operation, and partly due to carbon dating's notorious inaccuracy in fossils of recent geologic record. To the best of our knowledge, no Barbie dolls were produced prior to 1956 AD, and carbon dating is likely to produce wildly inaccurate results.
Sadly, we must also deny your request that we approach the National Science Foundation's Phylogeny Department with the concept of assigning your specimen the scientific name "Australopithecus spiff-arino." Speaking personally, I, for one, fought tenaciously for the acceptance of your proposed taxonomy, but was ultimately voted down because the species name you selected was hyphenated, and didn't really sound like it might be Latin.
However, we gladly accept your generous donation of this fascinating specimen to the museum. While it is undoubtedly not a hominid fossil, it is, nonetheless, yet another riveting example of the great body of work you seem to accumulate here so effortlessly. You should know that our Director has reserved a special shelf in his own office for the display of the specimens you have previously submitted to the Institution, and the entire staff speculates daily on what you will happen upon next in your digs at the site you have discovered in your back yard. We eagerly anticipate your trip to our nation's capital that you proposed in your last letter, and several of us are pressing the Director to pay for it. We are particularly interested in hearing you expand on your theories surrounding the "trans-positating fillifitation of ferrous ions in a structural matrix" that makes the excellent juvenile Tyrannosaurus rex femur you recently discovered take on the deceptive appearance of a rusty 9-mm Sears Craftsman automotive crescent wrench.
Yours in Science,
Harvey Rowe
Curator, Antiquities
~
(Rumored to be an actual letter. Originally via "Grant's Graceland," 1997.)
8/19/2003 07:50:00 PM
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Why I don't much like fashion magazines
(men's or women's.)
"It's simple," Kat told them. "You bombard them with images of what they ought to be, and you make them feel grotty for being the way they are. You're working with the gap between reality and perception. That's why you have to hit them with something new, something they've never seen before, something they aren't. Nothing sells like anxiety."
-from the story Hairball in Margaret Atwood's anthology Wilderness Tips.
Similarly, I've always sworn that mirrors in clothing department fitting rooms add at least 15 pounds to you. This way you want to buy something to make you feel better about how you look. Or at least something black...
~
8/19/2003 03:52:00 PM
Monday, August 11, 2003
Blogging's About Exposure, Right?
Dan and I and Joanne are "internet friends" who have never met. Joanne's website is an absolute marvel, as is Dan's place (which is also home to some of my favorite quotes, but that's another day's entry, soon.) Anyway, Dan's been bugging us as to what we look like. Mystery solved, Dan.
Okay, here we go. *grits teeth*
Pictures of me never look like me. My cheeks have been thinning, my eyes are usually grisly bloodshot from the 'puter, and I wear my wee specs most of the time. Otherwise, this is recent (this summer):
Someone took this of me at work, hence the frumpy shirt, and the cheesy, conspicuous cropping-out of coworkers who may otherwise have accidentally discovered themselves featured on my 'blog. (Oh, and my hair is rarely that neat, too.)
But the goofy stuff is always the most fun. Sticking your face on the scanner is the best thing since, well... sticking your face on the copy machine...and weird lighting only makes it better.
But photos of me or anyone else never quite seem to do it. Heck, there's no need to worry about capturing a person's soul with the camera, it doesn't even capture most peoples' character. Still, maybe I'm just talking sour grapes, because I'll never be as suave, as debonair, or as plaid as I once was.
(Um, thank God for that...)
~
Hmm, that wasn't so painful...
8/11/2003 11:13:00 PM
Wednesday, August 06, 2003
Bruises
Last weekend I put the roof on a shed that I'm building as a favor for my aunt and uncle. I won't let my uncle help me, as he has no common sense and gets underfoot worse than the average 2-year-old. He asks more stupid questions than a kid, too. That's okay, I guess. But let him reside in his natural environs: the golf course (or more accurately the clubhouse.) He has no calluses, while I cherish mine and panic when they begin to disappear (causing me to run out and find something to hoe or hammer.) I may mostly spend my time tapping a keyboard now, but I still like what wood does to my hands (while my uncle's soft hands prefer the touch of a smooth highball-glass.)
So I pounded nails by myself last weekend. Lots of nails. I also pounded many of them through the 2x4 "plates" and into the concrete slab base to anchor the shed against the Lake Erie wind.
Now, don't get me wrong: I'm in damn good shape. But take several hours of holding plywood sheets in place with one hand while whacking nails into trusses with the other, add time knocking masonry nails into concrete (with sparks flying and the hammer rebounding, like a blacksmith pounding an anvil), and combine with excessive heat and humidity: the result is me, feeling my age (thirties, and not really early thirties anymore.)
So at work on Monday morning I discovered a jaundice-colored bruise taking shape on my right wrist. Not your ordinary bruise, but a bruise forming from the inside out.
And I can't help but think how strange it is, knowing something is torn inside, waiting and watching as the hurt makes its presence known, fading only with time...
~
8/06/2003 10:56:00 AM
Monday, August 04, 2003
Blackmail
It's 9:00 in the evening and I just got done throwing table scraps out back for the nighttime visitors. If the skunks don't get something to nibble, I wake up at 3 a.m. to a terrible stink. It's come to this: I'm being blackmailed by small furry woodland creatures who don't even run when they see me coming. They know who's boss.
The newest resident is a groundhog who comes out in the early evening and tries to climb the lower limbs of a young mulberry tree to eat the berries. He pulls himself up by his front paws but he's too heavy, and his hind legs and sometimes his chubby belly drag the ground. Still, he hangs there as long as he can, frantically munching mulberries, leaves, stems and all until his strength gives out... then he falls like an overweight man who attempted one desperate chin-up before collapsing exhausted on the ground.
~
8/04/2003 09:07:00 PM
