MMX

The Soundtrack of my 2010

Funny how songs have a way of attaching themselves to circumstances, to individuals, to memories.  With that said, chronologically presenting the soundtrack of my 2010…

• Boston - Augustana
• Dream Big - Emily Shackelton
• Built To Last - Mêlée
• Graduation (Friends Forever) - Vitamin C
• Haven’t Met You Yet - Michael Bublé
• Our Time Now - Plain White T’s
• Lovebug - Jonas Brothers
• Chances - Five For Fighting
• 2012 - Jay Sean
• Shattered (Turn The Car Around) - O.A.R.
• Believe - Josh Groban
• Gonna Get Over You - Sara Bareilles

And as the new year approaches, I’d like to say here’s to 2010’s Auld Lang Syne as well as 2011’s Unwritten (yeap, 2 more songs).  Cheers.

Did you know…

Supposedly… 

 Urine used to be used to tan animal skins, so families would all pee in a pot & then once a day it was taken & sold to the tannery…….if you had to do this to survive you were “Piss Poor”.

But worse than that were the really poor folk who couldn’t even afford to buy a pot……they “didn’t have a pot to piss in” & were the lowest of the low.

The next time you are washing your hands and complain because the water temperature isn’t just how you like it, think about how things used to be.  Here are some facts about the 1500s:

Most people got married in June because they took their yearly bath in May, and they still smelled pretty good by June.  However, since they were starting to smell 

 ……..brides carried a bouquet of flowers to hide the body odor.  Hence the custom today of carrying a bouquet when getting married.

Baths consisted of a big tub filled with hot water.  The man of the house had the privilege of the nice clean water, then all the other sons and men, then the women and finally the children.  Last of all the babies . By then the water was so dirty you could actually lose someone in it.  Hence the saying, “Don’t throw the baby out with the bath water!”

Houses had thatched roofs-thick straw-piled high, with no wood underneath.  It was the only place for animals to get warm, so all the cats and other small animals (mice, bugs) lived in the roof.  When it rained it became slippery and sometimes the animals would slip and fall off the roof… Hence the saying “It’s raining cats and dogs.”

There was nothing to stop things from falling into the house.  This posed a real problem in the bedroom where bugs and other droppings could mess up your nice clean bed.  Hence, a bed with big posts and a sheet hung over the top afforded some protection.  That’s how canopy beds came into existence.

The floor was dirt.  Only the wealthy had something other than dirt.  Hence the saying, “Dirt poor.”  The wealthy had slate floors that would get slippery in the winter when wet, so they spread thresh (straw) on the floor to help keep their footing.  As the winter wore on, they added more thresh until, when you opened the door, it would all start slipping outside.  A piece of wood was placed in the entrance-way.  Hence: a thresh hold.

(Getting quite an education, aren’t you?)

In those old days, they cooked in the kitchen with a big kettle that always hung over the fire.  Every day they lit the fire and added things to the pot.  They ate mostly vegetables and did not get much meat.  They would eat the stew for dinner, leaving leftovers in the pot to get cold overnight and then start over the next day. Sometimes stew had food in it that had been there for quite a while . Hence the rhyme: Peas porridge hot, peas porridge cold, peas porridge in the pot nine days old.
Sometimes they could obtain pork, which made them feel quite special.  When visitors came over, they would hang up their bacon to show off.  It was a sign of wealth that a man could, “bring home the bacon.”  They would cut off a little to share with guests and would all sit around and chew the fat.

Those with money had plates made of pewter.  Food with high acid content caused some of the lead to leach onto the food, causing lead poisoning death.  This happened most often with tomatoes, so for the next 400 years or so, tomatoes were considered poisonous.

Bread was divided according to status.  Workers got the burnt bottom of the loaf, the family got the middle, and guests got the top, or the upper crust.

Lead cups were used to drink ale or whisky.  The combination would 
sometimes knock the imbibers out for a couple of days.  Someone walking along the road would take them for dead and prepare them for burial.  They were laid out on the kitchen table for a couple of days and the family would gather around and eat and drink and wait and see if they would wake up.  Hence the custom of holding a wake.

England is old and small and the local folks started running out of places to bury people.  So they would dig up coffins and would take the bones to a bone-house, and reuse the grave.  When reopening these coffins, 1 out of 25 coffins were found to have scratch marks on the inside and they realized they had been burying people alive.  So they would tie a string on the wrist of the corpse, lead it through the coffin and up through the ground and tie it to a bell.  Someone would have to sit out in the graveyard all night (the graveyard shift) to listen for the bell; thus, someone could be saved by the bell or was considered a dead ringer.

Now whoever said history was boring?

Credit: Email Forward

World Changers

A random sampling of people I’ve met here in DC…

• A law clerk who wants to become a lawyer for immigrants wrongfully imprisoned
• A Foreign Service Officer moving to the Congo for the Management Cone and learning French for it from scratch
• An IT contractor who creates networks that ensure classified information remains classified in transmission from bases in foreign countries to bases here
• An economist in the FDIC who helped pass the bill of not making Overdraft “Protection” automatic because of its deceiving premise and overpriced fees
• A Capitol Hill employee in charge of dealing with (fending off?) persistent lobbyists
• A playwright in her 20s who has already gotten her dark satirical plays into the Kennedy Center
• A USAID contractor who helps manage water development programs in 3rd world countries
• A fresh grad who is helping write about U.S. economic policies in the biggest newspaper in Japan
• A Civil Rights attorney in the Justice Department keeping an eye on local law enforcement agencies for potential issues like racial profiling
• And a crazy mix of Caucasian peers who have already mastered fluency in another language from living in Middle Eastern or Latin American countries

They say DC attracts eager beavers, type A sort of folks.  Being the capital (of the world?), it’s fitting.  It’s fascinating, and definitely humbling, to be reminded of just how big this world is - simply by meeting its mouthpieces here one day at a time.

Paraprosdokians <3

Do not argue with an idiot. He will drag you down to his level and beat you with experience. 

The last thing I want to do is hurt you. But it’s still on the list.

Light travels faster than sound. This is why some people appear bright until you hear them speak.

If I agreed with you, we’d both be wrong.

We never really grow up; we only learn how to act in public.

War does not determine who is right — only who is left.

Knowledge is knowing a tomato is a fruit; Wisdom is not putting it in a fruit salad.

The early bird might get the worm, but the second mouse gets the cheese.

Evening news is where they begin with “Good evening,” and then proceed to tell you why it isn’t.

To steal ideas from one person is plagiarism. To steal from many is research.

A bus station is where a bus stops. A train station is where a train stops. My desk is a work station.

How is it one careless match can start a forest fire, but it takes a whole box to start a campfire?

Dolphins are so smart that within a few weeks of captivity, they can train people to stand on the very edge of the pool and throw them fish.

I thought I wanted a career; turns out I just wanted pay checks.

A bank is a place that will lend you money if you can prove that you don’t need it.

I didn’t say it was your fault, I said I was blaming you.

Why does someone believe you when you say there are four billion stars, but check when you say the paint is wet?

Why do Americans choose from just two people to run for president and 50 for Miss America ?

Behind every successful man is his woman. Behind the fall of a successful man is usually another woman.

The voices in my head may not be real, but they have some good ideas!

Always borrow money from a pessimist. He won’t expect it back.

A diplomat is someone who can tell you to go to hell in such a way that you will look forward to the trip.

Hospitality: making your guests feel like they’re at home, even if you wish they were.

My favorite: Some cause happiness wherever they go. Others whenever they go.

Save as Draft

Word.  Kudos to SI/UCLA alum Natalie Cavanaugh Lee for an interesting idea.

The book asks the question, ‘How hard is it to date and find love in this electronic age?’ said Lee.  ’Readers can see both versions of all the messages sent by the three characters including emails that were never sent.  Readers come to realize that those first drafts are the ones that should have been sent.  Most people censor themselves and hide their true feelings when they communicate through email.  We don’t pick up the phone and say what we truly mean.  We revise our thoughts endlessly before we send a message.  These characters should have followed my dad’s advice to get it right on the first take.