THOUGHTS FOR THE DAY
The journey of a thousand miles begins with a broken fan belt and a leaky tire.
I believe for every drop of rain that falls, a flower grows. And a foundation leaks. And a ball game gets rained out And a car rusts and...
Follow your dream! Unless it's the one where you're at work in your underwear during a fire drill.
Always take time to stop and smell the roses ... and sooner or later,
you'll inhale a bee.
Do not walk behind me, for I may not lead. Do not walk ahead of me,
for I may not follow. Do not walk beside me, either, just leave me
alone.
If you don't like my driving, don't call anyone. Just take another
road. That's why the highway department made so many of them.
If a motorist cuts you off, just turn the other cheek. Nothing gets the message across like a good mooning.
When I'm feeling down, I like to whistle. It makes the neighbor's dog run to the end of his chain and gag himself.
It's always darkest before dawn. So if you're going to steal the neighbor's newspaper, that's the time to do it.
A handy telephone tip: Keep a small chalkboard near the phone. That
way, when a salesman calls, you can hold the receiver up to it and run
your fingernails across it until he hangs up.
Each day I try to enjoy something from each of the four food groups:
the bonbon group, the salty-snack group, the caffeine group, and the
"whatever-the-thing-in-the-tinfoil-in-the-back-of-the-fridge-is" group.
Into every life some rain must fall. Usually when your car windows
are down.
Just remember... You gotta break some eggs to make a real mess on the
neighbor's car!
When you find yourself getting irritated with someone, try to remember that all men are brothers ... and just give them a noogie or an
Indian burn.
This morning I woke up to the unmistakable scent of pigs in a
blanket. That's the price you pay for letting the relatives stay over.
It's a small world. So you gotta use your elbows a lot.
Keep your nose to the grindstone and your shoulder to the
wheel...it's cheaper than plastic surgery.
This land is your land. This land is my land. So stay on your land
and get off my land!
Love is like a roller coaster: when it's good you don't want to get
off, and when it isn't ... you can't wait to throw up
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Life in the Sixteenth Century - (the 1500's) - so much for being
romantic!
Most people got married in June because they took their yearly bath in
May and were still smelling pretty good by June. However, they were
starting to smell, so brides carried a bouquet of flowers to hide the
bad odor.
Baths equaled 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 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 pets, dogs cats and
other small animals, mice, rats, bugs lived in the roof. When it rained,
it became slippery and sometimes the animals fell. Hence the phrase,"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
really mess up your nice clean bed. So, they found that if they made
beds with posts and hung a sheet over the top, it addressed that
problem. Hence those beautiful big 4 poster beds with canopies.
The
floor was dirt. Only the wealthy had something other than dirt, hence
the saying "dirt poor."
The wealthy had slate floors, which would get
slippery in the winter when wet. So they spread thresh on the floor to
help keep their footing. As the winter wore on they kept adding more
thresh until when you opened the door it would all start slipping
outside. So a piece of wood was placed at the entryway, hence a
"threshold" (thresh is the residue from threshed wheat/barley and grass)
They cooked in the kitchen in a big kettle that always hung over the
fire. Every day they lit the fire and added things to the pot. They mostly
ate vegetables and didn't 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 the stew had food in it that had been in there for a month. Hence the rhyme: "Peas porridge porridge hot, peas porridge cold, peas porridge in the pot nine days old."
Sometimes they could obtain pork and would feel really special when that
happened. When Company came over; they would bring out some bacon and
hang it to show it off. It was a sign of wealth and that a man "could really 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 a high acid most often with tomatoes, so they stopped eating tomatoes . . . for 400 years!
Most people didn't have pewter plates, but had trenchers, a piece of
wood with the middle scooped out likes a bowl. Trenchers were never
washed and alot of times worms got into the wood. After eating off wormy
trencher, they would get "trench mouth."
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 whiskey. The combination would
sometimes knock them 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 they
started running out of places to bury people. So, they would dig up
coffins and would take their bones to a house and reuse the grave. In
reopening these coffins, one out of 25 coffins were found to have
scratch marks on the inside and they realized they had been burying
people alive. So they thought they would tie a string on their wrist
and 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 to listen
for the bell. Hence the "graveyard shift." Then they would know if
someone was "saved by the bell" or he was a "dead ringer."
Dr. Beatrice Stiglitz
Professor of French and Italian
College of Charleston
Charleston, SC
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I want to go back to the time when...
Decisions were made by going "Eeny-meeny-miney-mo."
Mistakes were corrected by simply exclaiming, "Do over!"
"Race Issue" meant arguing about who ran the fastest.
Money issues were handled by whoever was the banker in "Monopoly".
Catching fireflies could happily occupy an entire evening.
It wasn't odd to have two or three "best-best" friends.
Being old referred to anyone over 20.
The net on a tennis court was the perfect height to play volleyball and
rules didn't matter.
The worst thing you could catch from the opposite sex was COOTIES.
It was magic when Dad would "remove" his thumb.
It was unbelievable that dodge ball wasn't an Olympic event.
Having a weapon in school meant being caught with a slingshot.
Nobody was prettier than Mom.
Arguments with a friend led to "My dad can beat up your dad." And no-one's
dad really had to prove it.
Scrapes and bruises were kissed and made better.
Getting a foot of snow was a dream come true.
Abilities were discovered because of a "double-dog-dare".
Saturday morning cartoons weren't 30 minute ads for action figures.
No shopping trip was complete unless a new toy was brought home.
Oly-oly-oxen-free" made perfect sense.
Spinning around, getting dizzy, and falling down was cause for giggles.
The worst embarrassment was being picked last for a team.
War was a card game.
Water balloons were the ultimate weapon.
Baseball cards in the spokes transformed any bike into a motorcycle
Taking drugs meant orange-flavored chewable aspirin.
Ice cream was considered a basic food group. And when you grew up you
would
eat it before your vegetables.
Older siblings were the worst tormentors, but also the fiercest protectors.
If you can remember most of these, then you have lived! If not, try some
of them tonight, you need to live!
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Dayle D'Ann
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