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Dear Aunt Nettie: Are rivers alive?
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Dear Littoral: No one thought so for the longest time. The consensus was that they were simply what scientists of the time called "big straightish moving bodies of water." It wasn't until 1951 that Hans Uberschlüss of downtown Bavaria in Germany reported that had gotten a tributary of the Danube to play fetch, sit up and beg, and bring him his pipe and slippers when he came home from work each evening. He was promptly committed to the Gevartikinmentallenausgefuchtup Asylum, but it started hydrologists to thinking about the intelligence of rivers. They attempted to duplicate Uberschlüss's work, but discovered that the tributary he had trained had pined away in its master's absence and was now a bed of dried mud with a doleful expression. In 1955 in neighboring Czechoslovakia, a young Moravian peasant boy was reportedly accompanied to school every day by a branch of the Bourunka River, which he had also taught to play third base during after-school stickball games. It was fortunate that his science teacher was a certified hydrologist, and the story of the boy and his river was published in "Wasserup?" the leading hydrologic journal in Czechoslovakia. This led to a movie role for the river in Cecil B. De Mille's blockbuster epic, "The Ten Commandments," where it played the Red Sea, although it always complained later that Charlton Heston parted him on his bad side. By 1960 the intelligence of rivers was firmly established, and the Mississippi vote was credited by many with handing the election to John F. Kennedy, a known water enthusiast. Many remember his opponent's bitter comment, "You won't have Richard Nixon to spash around anymore," when he accepted his election loss. In 1965 the Potomac River led the first protests against the abuse of the Mekong in Vietnam, with millions of gallons chanting the slogan, "Hey, hey, LBJ/How many fish did you kill today?" In 1968 during the police riots in Chicago, the Calumet River was reduced to a trickle by heavy-handed attempts to break up its natural flow in support of the protestors, an incident which led to the passage of the first United Nations River Rights Act, landmark legislation which eventually led to the fall of the Berlin Dam and the collapse of the Soviet Irrigation System in 1989 as freedom was finally restored to those Captive Water Bodies. Rivers across America had high hopes for Al Gore in the 2000 presidential race, as he had always supported the freedom of rivers, and was a known environmentalist, but the Supreme Court handed a "dry-as-dust desert Texan," the victory, partly through the invalidation of many Everglades votes in Florida because the voting machines had not been properly rustproofed. After exhausting all legal remedies, Florida's rivers petitioned the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration for redress, leading to the series of hurricanes which chastised Republican counties in late 2004. See http://www.discourse.net/archives/2004/09/hey_florida_have_you_got_the_hint_ yet.html
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Dear Aunt Nettie: I was at the old lunch counter again
today and it suddenly struck me that I had no idea where pickles come
from. Tony, who owns the luncheonette, said he gets them from some
restaurant supply place in Chicago, but that's not what I meant. So I'll
ask you: Where do pickles come from, anyway?
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Dear Salty: Many people think that pickles were accidentally invented, but it was actually a brilliant discovery by Peregrine Souse, a freelance cucumber wrangler in Blackpool-upon-the-Sea, England. Souse knew that shipping cucumbers in barrels of rainwater, his usual method to keep them fresh, was an iffy proposition, especially in times of drought, when rainwater was dear or sometimes unavailable. One extremely dry summer during 1317, just at the peak of the cuke season, Souse had exhausted every drop of rainwater simply keeping his beloved plants alive and was faced with a dilemma: how to ship his cucumbers to cucumber bars and hamburger joints without spoilage. In an act of desperation he filled thirty barrels with seawater, knowing that he had to ship or watch his entire crop rot on the ground. So he sent them off, then fell prostrate on the ground and prayed to Saint Cucurbit, patron of cucumber wranglers, begging the saint's intercession. He then went on a ten-day drunk. Imagine his surprise when he finally sobered up and discovered his mailbox full of congratulatory letters and telegrams from his customers, all of whom were delighted with the new product, which they had named "Piggles," after an ugly houseboy of the same name who had drowned in the seawater remaining in one of the emptied barrels while trying out his new surfboard. And so the "piggle" became the sensation of England, and it was considered rude to serve up a hamburger without one, even if it was on a sesame-seed bun and accompanied by a secret sauce. Spelling not being anyone's strong suit during the 14th century, the name was spelled in various creative ways until printing finalized it as "pickle," in the "Householder's Book of Difficult Spellings Regarding Food," (London & Bombay, 1488). Souse became a wealthy man and was soon surrounded by relatives he never knew he had until he hit the big time. At his request he was buried in a pickle barrel full of salt water from Blackpool-upon-the-Sea, although a later and more careful reading of his will indicated that he would have preferred to have been dead first. His "relatives" sued each other to the point where the entire estate was eaten up in legal fees and became the subject of Charles Dickens's novel "Bleak House, or, Lawsuits in a Pickle."
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Dear Aunt Nettie: Why are the threads in weaving
referred to as the "warp" and the "woof"?
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Dear Shuttler: It has to do with the 18th-century cottage weaving industry in England and an attempt to mainstream the unfortunate. You see, home weaving became extremely popular as a way to earn big money at home, just as stuffing envelopes would be two centuries later. Very often every member of the family had his or her own loom which, as you might expect led to a decline in the birth rate, as weaving was lots more profitable than producing offspring. This trend was noticed by Pippin X. Swineworthy, head of the Asylum of the Destitute Insane in London. He discovered that the insane made excellent weavers, and the combination of weaving and insanity led to startling new patterns like paisley and Scotch plaid. The problem was that the cottages were in the countryside and the Asylum was in the Pooping Squatters district of London, very near Oxmangle Street. How could the inmates be safely conducted to the cottages to work in the morning and safely led back at night? Luckily Deacon Swineworthy belonged to the same club as T. Bedlington Downboy, head of the Red Rover Communist Youth Organization for Homeless Dogs. Downboy, after listening to Swineworthy's tale of woe over several bottles of sherry one evening, proposed an elegant solution: he would train his canines to lead the insane weavers to a particular cottage in the morning and lead them home at eventide! Experiments were tried and proved to be a stunning success. Soon streets and lanes were filled with the man-dog duos shuttling back and forth morning and evening. Eventually the lunatic-canine teaming became synonymous with the act of weaving itself, since each cottager would herald the arrival of their handicapped worker and his guide with the cry, "Mother, the warped and the woof are here!"
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Dear Aunt Nettie: One of my typing exercise books has
the practice sentence, "The Quick Brown Fox Jumps Over the Lazy Dog." It
seems like a peculiar phrase. What do you know about it?
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Dear Stroked: Many people believe that this is simply a typing exercise using all the words of the alphabet, but it has a much more interesting and complex history. One summer day in 1889 the American philosopher Charles Sanders Peirce was sitting in his study contemplating his theory of pragmatic behavior. Outside in the yard his elderly bulldog Marcus Aurelius was asleep in the sun. From out of the woods came a sleek fox who headed straight for the doghouse where the bulldog was chained. "Here," thought Peirce, "is an illustration of my argument: the chained Marcus represents determinism; the unfettered fox, free will. The fox wishes to take the shortest distance across the yard, but its path will intercept the sleeping Marcus, a decided risk. How will the fox resolve the situation, pragmatically or instinctively or habitually?" So he recorded his observations in his journal: 1:12pm -- The fox has not only ignored Marcus, but has actually jumped over him to cross the yard! Lazy dog! 1:17pm -- The fox, returning, has not only jumped over Marcus this time, but has gone back twice more to jump over the lazy dog. Is this the triumph of free will over determinism? What about the pragmatic element? I shall keep watch. 1:38pm -- That quick brown fox has not only jumped over my lazy dog, but has performed two back flips and a rolling somersault! Wake up, Marcus! 1:45pm -- The quick brown fox has actually used the lazy dog as a trampoline and still he sleeps on! The fox has had the further temerity to eat all the food in Marcus's dish and drink all his water, and has actually marked the doghouse as his territory. Marcus, awake! The defense of determinism rests in your paws! 2:20pm -- The fox has brought the rest of its family to witness the disgrace of Determinism. or, rather, Marcus. They have taken turns using the poor beast as a trampoline, and at one point even formed a conga line to dance around him. My entire philosophy will have to be rewritten! Oh, Marcus, Marcus, lazy hound-- wake up! 3:45pm -- I was distracted by the need to answer a letter from that upstart William James, who thinks he is the answer to a philosophy major's prayer. I have decided to change the name of my philosophy to "pragmaticism" to separate myself from the Jamesian movement. Let James put that in his pipe and smoke it! There is no sign of Marcus. Did he finally awaken and give a deterministic bashing to those upstart free-will foxes? 4:00pm -- I am bereft. I went down to replenish Marcus's food and water bowls only to discover my pet had fallen victim to free will with a vengeance. Only well-gnawed bones remain of him, and one of the quick brown foxes was wearing his favorite collar while the little ones played skip-rope with his chain. I am going to the shed to get Divine Wrath & Justice, my 12-gauge double barreled shotgun and a box of #2 shells. I will make certain that the quick brown fox jumps over no more lazy dogs, the bastard! After I take care of free will I will turn the gun on myself and join Marcus in some putative afterlife. This will destroy my philosophy and James will probably dance on my grave, but I will not be shaken in my resolve. (end of journal; game, set and match to free will) 
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Dear Aunt Nettie: I'm enclosing a trivia contest entry
sheet. Could you help me with the answers, as I really, really need the
first prize?
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Dear Competitive: I'd be happy to. Here you go. No charge. TRIVIA ANSWERS: 1. The cabbage 2. 1734 3. Then the bartender says, "I wouldn't send a knight out on a dog like this!" 4. Usually anterior, but instances of posterior formation have been recorded. 5. 21 lbs/psi (0.14479 MPa or 1.47645 kg/cm²) 6. Aneurin Bevan 7. Formerly attributed to the Greek poet/playwright Aeschylus, but recent studies have shown that it was first said by Soupy Sales. 8. A large, oafish, disreputable member of the eggplant family, assumed to be extinct since the last person poisoned by one was in 1881. 9. For most of its history an enclave of Matradonia, although it achieved partial independence in 1994 after the Popskull Riots, and full independence a year later. At 19¼ square miles and with a population of 322 and no resources other than returnable bottles and cans, it was voted "Nation Least Likely to Succeed" by the UN in 2000. 10. Webster the Extremely Unlikely. His father, Webster the Accident-prone, died in 1178 after falling from his dromedary into a volcano while carrying a load of high explosives to Psrd. Webster the Extremely Unlikely assumed the throne that year at the age of 4, and the country was pretty much isolated after the boy asked the Turkish Ambassador to "play horsie," instead of signing a mutual non-aggression pact. Webster the Extremely Unlikely died in 1183 after attempting to live exclusively on cherry lollypops. His son, Webster the Highly Improbable, died during his coronation when the 18-pound (8.16 kilo) crown snapped his neck like a matchstick. Since there were no more male heirs of the line, the country was sold to Laburnia in 1185 for 600 lottery tickets and a case of Scotch whiskey. As a province of Laburnia it vanished altogether in 1199 when someone spilled coffee on a Royal Map.
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Dear Aunt Nettie: Where is the Lost Kingdom of
Balluchia?
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Dear Wanderer: It's easiest to get there from Central London. Here's how: 1: Start out going Northeast on GREAT SCOTLAND YARD toward SCOTLAND PLACE. 2: Turn RIGHT onto NORTHUMBERLAND AVENUE/A400. 3: Turn LEFT onto VICTORIA EMBANKMENT/A3211. 4: Stay straight to go onto BLACKFRIARS UNDERPASS/A3211/VICTORIA EMBANKMENT. Continue to follow A3211. 5: A3211 becomes A100. 6: A100 becomes A1203. 7: Turn LEFT onto BUTCHER ROW. 8: Turn RIGHT onto COMMERCIAL ROAD/A13. Continue to follow A13. 9: Turn SLIGHT LEFT onto BLACKWALL TUNNEL NORTHERN APPROACH/A102. Continue to follow A102. 10: Turn SLIGHT RIGHT onto ROCHESTER WAY RELIEF ROAD/A2. 11: Turn SLIGHT RIGHT onto KIDBROOKE PARK ROAD/A2213. 12: Turn LEFT onto SIDCUP ROAD/A20. 13: Enter next roundabout and take 2nd exit onto A20. 14: Keep RIGHT at the fork to continue on A20. 15: A20 becomes M20. 16: Merge onto A20. Pass through 4 roundabouts. 17: Enter next roundabout and take 1st exit onto DOCK EXIT ROAD. 18: Turn SLIGHT LEFT onto DOVER-CALAIS (Check ferry schedule/fares). 19: DOVER-CALAIS becomes CALAIS-DOVER (Check ferry schedule/fares). 20: CALAIS-DOVER becomes unnamed road. 21: Stay straight to go onto E15. 22: E15 becomes A216. 23: Take A26 toward ST OMER/ARRAS/PARIS/REIMS (Portions toll). 24: Merge onto AUTOROUTE DE L'EST (Portions toll). 25: Stay straight to go onto A35/AUTOROUTE DE L'EST. Continue to follow A35. Mind the speed limit. 26: Take the A35 exit- exit number 9- on the left toward SAINT-DIÉ-DES-VOSGES PAR TUNNEL/MULHOUSE/COLMAR/OBERNAI. 27: Merge onto N422. Pass through 2 roundabouts. 28: N422 becomes A35. 29: A35 becomes N83/E25. 30: N83/E25 becomes A35. 31: A35 becomes A3 (Portions toll). 32: Take the exit. 33: Turn RIGHT onto VOLTASTRASSE. 34: Turn SLIGHT RIGHT onto SANKT JOHANN. 35: Merge onto A3 (Portions toll). 36: Take A2/VERZWEIGUNG AUGST/9 toward GOTTHARD//ARISDORF (Portions toll). 37: Merge onto A2 (Portions toll). 38: Take the exit- exit number 26- toward ZENTRUM KRIENS. 39: Keep LEFT at the fork in the ramp. 40: KRIENS becomes 2A, KRIENS-BALLUCHIA 41: Continue on 2A to Customs Booth at REINO PERDIDO DE BALLUCHIA® (Bribe suggested) 42. Turn left at the McDonald's, continue on EINWEGSTRAßE to CENTRO DELL'OSPITE 43. Purchase tickets for tour. (20 Euros Adults, children under 14 free) NOTE: Balluchians are proud of their "lost," status and wish to keep it that way. It's considered polite for tourists to exclaim from time to time, "I wonder where the devil we are? ("Mi domando dove il diavolo noi è?") or "Who would ever guess such a nice place was forever lost to the outside world?" ("Zou wie ooit veronderstellen een dergelijke aardige plaats voor altijdaan de buitenwereld werd verloren?") ———
See also: "Lost Balluchia on 40 Euros a Day" (<<Gemheistorspreitz
Valluchia el Perdo å 40 Euron per Diem>>) Balluchia Board of Tourism
(London vort Balluchia Zité, 2002) |
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Dear Aunt Nettie: How did the skeleton of the
more-than-three-million-year-old female hominid discovered in Ethiopia in
1974 come to be called "Lucy"?
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Dear Digger: Because the discovery team was sued by Charles Schulz when they tried to use "Linus," "Snoopy," and "Pigpen." "Charlie Brown" was obviously not appropriate either. Since "Lucy" was in the public domain they had to settle for that, although it led to unpleasant incidents at the dig, when one paleontologist would sweep the skull away just as another paleontologist was about to kick it free of the trench, causing him to fall on his head with little stars coming up. Many people think paleontology is a fun career, but there's a lot more to it than going to college and wandering around with a shovel. The naming process alone has led to physical violence, lawsuits and breaches of international peace.
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Dear Aunt Nettie: What cartoon character's "racy
lifestyle" once led to a ban on his comic books in youth club libraries in
Helsinki, Finland?
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Dear Toon: That would be Superman. The issue where he uses the old x-ray vision to surreptitiously ogle the cheerleaders' dressing room was just the beginning of a long series of tragic disappointments. Afterwards Lois Lane claimed he was "faster than a speeding bullet," and Jimmy Olsen denounced Clark Kent for that incident in the employee swimming pool. The capper was when Ma Kent revealed that Clark was actually Lex Luthor, that he was the father of Lana Lang's illegitimate child, and that he had poisoned Krypto because he barked at the constellation Orion all night when Clark had a hangover.
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Dear Aunt Nettie: I have to do a biographical paper
about "Ananda," whoever that was. Can you tell me what he did in 300 words
or less?
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Dear Slacker: Ananda was the Buddha's comical sidekick in the old TV eastern, "The Mexikarma Kid," which ran from 1950 to 1956. The Buddha, always dressed in his snappiest eastern garb with solid silver spurs and a wide sombrero, fought evildoers in the frontier days in old Mexico and along the Hindu Kush. The show's characteristic signoff, "Hey, Ananda! Hey,Gautama!" as the lead characters rode off into the sunrise became a popular greeting until the early 1960s, when it was replaced by "Hi, Honey, I'm home," from the show "Leave It to Beccaria," based on the home life of the 18th-century criminologist and philosopher.
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Dear Aunt Nettie: Which is the tallest animal in the
whole wide world, not including Dr. Phil?
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Dear Elevated: Most people would say the giraffe, but the discovery of the Articulated Anaconda in the jungles of the Amazon have made that creature the tallest, at least according to the Guinness Book of Records (look under "Tall Things"). Unlike regular anacondae, the articulated version walks on its hind legs exclusively, allowing it to tower some 40 feet in the air, well above the tree canopy. This advantage allows it to raid bird's nests and pick off the occasional ecologist or National Geographic photographer. It was undiscovered until now because of its extreme slenderness and brown fur, which allows it to blend into the jungle, resembling as it does a tall, thin, furry sapling. Its reign as the tallest may be brief, however, as another contender for the title has been discovered in nearby Paraguay. The Composite Crockya represents an entirely new species, order, genera and family, not necessarily in that sequence. The crockya differs from all other cold- and tepid-blooded animals in that it is actually a collection of spare parts living in symbiosis, much as lichen is a symbiotic pairing of a fungus and a duck. As a composite beast it can disassemble itself to escape from its enemies, each part hiding in a different location until the danger is passed. This ability to both disassemble and dissemble makes it an extremely elusive creature. It was only discovered last month by pseudoxenopaleobiologist Dr. Tammy Doats of the University of Jamaica after a three-day binge on the potent native hallucinogen, ayahuasca. In her own words:
Ref: "Tammy the Yanomami Mammy" by Mairsey "Tammy" Doats, PhB. Jungle
Books (London & Chicrambulacagachopho-e, 1999) |
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Dear Aunt Nettie: Quick, what is "deconstructionism"? I
have a test tomorrow.
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Dear Postponer: Sheesh, can't you kids today even pick up a dictionary to copy stuff from? Here's the official definition from one of the founders, or perhaps both of them. de·con·struc·tion (de´kon-struk-shun) noun A philosophical movement and theory of literary criticism that questions traditional mis-assumptions about reality, certainty, identity, truth, and the dirty meanings behind the shapes of certain letters, and which asserts that words can only refer to other words, usually nouns or gerunds, and attempts to demonstrate how statements about any text subvert their own meanings unless divided by pi and the author asks, "Mother, may I?" at some point before publication: "In deconstruction, the critic claims there is no meaning to be found in the actual text, and no words in the actual book, but that the blank pages form various, often mutually irreconcilable, 'virtual texts' constructed by readers in their search for meaning while at the checkout counter behind somebody with at least 42 articles (not gerunds) in the 10-items-or-less line." ~ Noam "Slapshot" Derrida in "The Big Book o' Deep Ideas." Perplexity Press (London & Planet Bonzo, 1944-1967 inclusive)
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Dear Aunt Nettie: Thank you for explaining the
definition of "deconstructionism," yesterday. My only question is, isn't
Derrida's first name "Jacques"?
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Dear Picky:
You're confusing him with Jacques Chomsky. The two men exchanged
names in 1948 as a symbol of their undying affection for one another after
they realized they couldn't be legally married in France.
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Dear Aunt Nettie: Yesterday my boyfriend and I went to
one of those new "fusion" restaurants, you know, where they combine the
cuisines of two different countries or regions? Well, this one was a
Norwegian-Japanese fusion. My Octopus Lefse was so-so, but my boyfriend
unwisely ordered Lutefisk Sashimi with Daikon Pepperrotsmor on a bed of
potato/rice pancakes with a coffee-sake chaser. I never thought anyone
could throw up like that without losing a lung or something. He had to
donate his car to some organization, it was that bad. Anyway, I was just
wondering if you had ever tried any fusion cuisine and what your favorite
was?
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Dear Gastronome: Oh, yes indeed! Here at the Home our illegal immigrant chefs do wonders combining all sorts of bizarre ingredients scavenged by the owners from dumpsters in different ethnic neighborhoods. By the way, for etiquette's sake we don't use the word "favorite" when discussing the food here, but other adjectives like "least dreaded," or "closest to edible." Here is a fine sample Hispanic-French "fusion" recipe for your delectation. Try it on your boyfriend if he recovers. Ingredients need not be fresh, canned or preserved very well. Enchiladas à la Mode de Caen Ingredients: 3 cubic feet abandoned beef tripes, scraped and slivered 1 gallon chicken, pigeon or rat stock 10 tomatillos, husked, shucked and stomped 1 rinsed and chopped pail intestines, large or small 40 bulbs garlic, unwrapped and unpeeled 1 barrel onions, spoiled and chopped 22 serrano chilies, seeded and smashed 1 cup chopped lye 2 lbs not-so-fresh cilantro, chopped, channeled and sectioned 1 qt unleaded salt 2 gallons fermented black beans, overcooked 1/2 kilo mango, papaya or unrecognizable fruit, diced 41 scallions (white part only) 41 scallions (green part only) 1 thinly sliced cup corn kernels, roasted 8 kilos fresh goat cheese w/ goat if available, crumbled 3 cups motor oil, 30W 100 week-old tortillas 1 bucket mango/hot dog relish, separated Boil all ingredients to slurry. Pour into tortillas, then deep-fry until dining room smoke alarm goes off. Garnish with dollop of relish. Serves one coalition of the unwilling. --- ©2004 Living Dead "R" Us Experimental Kitchens. All rights regurgitated.
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Dear Aunt Nettie: You must have been around for the
Wright Brothers first flight. Do you recall the comments of the world's
leading scientists on the occasion?
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Dear Ariel: Oh, yes-- you might even say that I was Wilbur and Orville's most intimate advisor. However, you might be disappointed at the scientific community's response to the flight. Lindbergh, Sputnik and John Glenn it wasn't. "WITCHCRAFT!" ~ Scientific American "Wrights meddle with unclean forces to achieve levitation!" ~ National Science Foundation "BURN THEM! BURN THEM NOW! WE MUST PROTECT THE CHILDREN!" ~ American Academy for the Advancement of Science "Human flight, if permitted, can only mark the end of our species!" ~ Popular Science "Two Ohioan bicycle mechanics cannot overturn the inspired decisions of the College of Cardinals." ~ Ernest Rutherford, "Contra Æroplanicus Diabolicus" "The Smithsonian has conclusive evidence that the Wright 'brothers' do not belong to any known monastic organization, and cannot therefore have Divine permission to achieve flight." ~ The Smithsonian Institution "A knee-jerk reaction to a falsehood!" ~ Ivan Pavlov "If Aristotle does not condone it, I do not believe it, even if I were to see it!" ~ Jules-Henri Poincaré "I believe their claims are relatively exaggerated." ~ Albert Einstein "Not until the blasphemous Wrights pry my cold, dead fingers from around these relics of Blessed Joseph of Cupertino" ~ Thomas Edison "We have thrown the lots and consulted the oracle; also have we examined the livers of the sacrificial bullocks upon the altar, and we conclude that this is heresy most foul." ~ Journal of Physics
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Dear Aunt Nettie: Why do we call seedy saloons "dives"?
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Dear Sot: The name goes back to 1st-century Palestine, and is mentioned in the gospel story of Dives and Lazarus. Isaac "Jimmy" Dives started out humbly, scrimping to buy his first bar in downtown Jerusalem in minus eleven, a fixer-upper whose patronage consisted largely of cattle-tenders and camel-jockeys from the interstate. In a daring move he renamed the bar after himself, feeling that "Yet Another Publican Dramshoppe," lacked the proper cachet. He was also the first barkeep in Jerusalem to use neon in his signage in spite of Philistine disapproval, so the name "Dives" could be seen from any place in town after dark. It was a natural magnet for the thirsty, and Dives was soon able to open branches in Galilee to attract the fisherfolk, and on the road to Bethany to capture the commuter trade. In 23 he sold the franchise to Phoenicia Beverages, Ltd., and retired a very wealthy man, buying an olive ranch in Tiberias and devoting his remaining years to collecting nubile slave girls. Phoenicia (NASDAQ:PBV) had the financial leverage to spread the brand through Lebanon, Syria and Egypt. After the catastrophe of 70 Phoenicia moved its headquarters to Rome and changed its corporate name to Vatican Refreshments, SA, to disassociate itself from the bad publicity surrounding the fate of the former Roman province. It also moved downscale, realizing that margins were greater if volume was high and less was spent on ambiance. Hence every waterfront came to have its "Dives," and the name came to be synonymous with drinking establishments of less than stellar character. --- Ref: "Dives: The Empire Built on the Down and Out" Harvard Business Review Press (Londinium et Phoenicia, 187)
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Dear Aunt Nettie: Who was Claude Lévi-Strauss and what
did he do? Please hurry, as I have a test tomorrow.
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Dear Idler: Claude Lévi-Strauss was a French anthropologist and creator of the riveted indigo denim clothing that bears his name. Alas, he was nowhere near as successful with his follow-up invention. Noting how quickly undergarments wore out in the Alaska gold mining camps, he used cast iron to forge small, medium and large underwear sets, which he boasted would "outlast their owners." He may have been correct, but wearing cast-iron underwear at -40° F. was anything but fun, although the tee-shirts *would* deflect a fairly large-calibre bullet and became fashionable for evening wear in low-class saloons and dance halls.
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Dear Aunt Nettie: Where did questions come from?
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Dear Querulous: Nobody knows who asked the first question, although it probably concerned when dinner was going to be ready, or a lament like, "Mastodon *again*?" followed by a pitched battle involving dinnerware. We do know that the first question was followed rapidly by many others as early humans began to interrogate the world around them. Some questions, like, "Why is the sky blue?" would have to wait tens of thousands of years to be answered, whereas others, like, "Why is your hair on fire?" were capable of direct responses. It is believed that "Y" became the first letter of the alphabet due to the frequency of its use, although it was later downgraded during the Great Alphabet Reversal of -84,222 (Old Calendar). As humans spread into Europe a whole new range of questions began to be asked, usually centering on the weather, such as, "Does this bearskin make me look fat?" and "Is this just a cold snap or the start of another Ice Age?" Soon trade began, and questions centering on finance and economics became prominent, like "And this comes with a money-back guarantee, right?" or "Is it wise to take a flyer on these new metal axe-heads, or invest in tried and true blue chips like flint?" Some questions became essential to the growth and fruitfulness of the tribe, like, "What are you doing after work tonight?" and "Is that a throwing stick in your pocket or are you just glad to see me?" Other questions had to do with the social organization of the tribe, like, "Will you take a check?" and "Do I look like a thief?" Still others dealt with intertribal or geopolitical matters, like, "Are you certain the M'tunk tribe has weapons of mass destruction?" The invention of writing allowed questions to be documented. The very first question we have record of is in proto-Sumerian, and its content seems to indicate that it may be the very first fragment of writing ever impressed into wet clay: "What hath Nun-Shigguth wrought?" The early Hebrews recorded volumes of questions in the Old Testament, ranging from "Am I my brother's keeper?" to "Did Moses say we should turn right or left after crossing the Red Sea?" to 'This Jesus seems like a nice boy, but aren't you fed up with his liberal claptrap?" and "Are you certain the Edomites have weapons of mass destruction?" The rise of Christianity led first to introspection, then to the Dark Ages, which were full of questions like, "The Pope has said that the sun revolves around the earth, so why would you doubt it?" and "Would you like to answer now, or should we turn the old rack up another notch?" and "Hey kids, who wants to walk across the sea to liberate the Holy Land?" and "Won't the townspeople be pleased that we've sold them into bondage to afford yet another cathedral?" Eventually the Renaissance arrived to sort things out, and the nature of questions changed again, to courtly and artistic topics like, "Why would I want you to take your clothes off if I *wasn't* a painter?" and "Pope Julius wants you to decorate the entire Sistine Chapel on spec?" and "Is it the six wives of Henry the Eighth, or the eight wives of Henry the Sixth?" But it wasn't until the Age of Reason arrived (Gate 4, Track 3) that questioning really took off, from Descartes's, "I think, therefore I am... aren't I?" to Nathan Hale's second thought, "Hey, wait, I've only *got* one life to give, don't I?" to Charles IX of France's "Are you certain that the Huguenots have weapons of mass destruction?" Questioning was in the air, and soon led to the Age of Science with a whole lot of new and different questions, like Charles Darwin's "Do you honestly think I can evolve an answer out of thin air?" and Bernoulli's "Do you honestly think you can use my theory to lift an airplane?" to Alexander "Graham" Bell's, "But Mister Watson's right in the next room-- why on earth would I need an area code, operator?" to Albert Einstein's "Okay, if E=MC² is too simple to sell, what if I added a couple of deltas and an integral sign, or maybe pi?" One can only hope that, in our jaded and information-saturated age, we don't foolishly abandon questions and begin to believe whatever people tell us. Especially regarding weapons of mass destruction....
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Dear Aunt Nettie: What is the big deal with "hand-cut"
doughnuts? A couple of local doughnut shops have started advertising
pricier models with this description. Are they really better?
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Dear Toroid: They taste exactly the same as machine-cut doughnuts or robot-rolled doughnuts, or any other kind. It's just a gimmick to raise the price. When you go to the doughnut store this morning, give the proprietor or counter person some serious grief about this sham. Sometimes you just have to draw a line in the powdered sugar and say enough is enough! And don't get me started on "organic" vegetables. Like there's any other kind? Go the produce section in your supermarket after you come from the doughnut store and ask the person there for some *inorganic* vegetables. If he tries to get smart-assed about it, whack him with a bok choi or give him an endive thrashing. If we don't take action now this can only lead to further atrocities like "liquid" water, or "hand-drilled" Swiss cheese....
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Dear Aunt Nettie: Who said, "The great question...
which I have not been able to answer despite my 30 years in research into
the feminine soul, is 'What does a woman want'?"
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Dear Dateless: That would be Victor Frankenstein. He gave it up as a bad job and concentrated on other life forms, discovering that a scarecrow wants a brain, a tin man wants a heart, and a pusillanimous lion wants courage. His researches were later made into a semi-autobiographical horror movie, "Wizard of the Brainless, Heartless Scaredy-Cat." His monster, whom he called "Snoopy," for lack of a better name as the church had refused it baptism, kept pestering Dr Frankenstein to build him a mate, and even retrieved several wheelbarrow-loads of choice parts from the local cemetery, but its bride was never completed, as Viktor was allergic to silicone. So he disassembled her, much to the annoyance of Snoopy, who retaliated by doing the same to Victor's fiancée, Elizabeth, who had the misfortune to be alive during most of the operation.
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Dear Aunt Nettie: What's the name of what happens when
you see, like, faces and things in clouds or shrubbery? It's right on the
tip of my tongue but I can't recall it.
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Dear Imagist: Pareidolia. For years people have distracted and amused themselves by looking for images in clouds and suchlike. It's caused by the brain trying to find a pattern in what it's seeing, one of the things a brain is good for. In some cases these images have seemed so real that people have reacted as though they actually existed. The most spectacular of these illusions happened in 1887, when the entire town of Rift in Montana Territory (pop. 836) witnessed the Mormon Tabernacle Choir passing overhead while singing the hymn "Jerusalem," by William Blake. It was an event so striking that most of the townspeople gave up drinking and took to eating mescal buttons in hope of a repeat performance. To compound the mystery, the Mormon Tabernacle Choir had no performance scheduled that day. Another famous sighting occurred in Siang Province in China in 1344, when villagers were amazed to see an 80-foot-long Western Dragon land without clearance in a nearby field. After eating several of the slower rice-paddy workers, it took off again, headed toward Xiangtan. Although the villagers insisted that the dragon was real, and pointed to the gnawed bones of the unlucky villagers the dragon had eaten, surveillance tapes showed that it was merely an altocumulus cloud formation. Pareidolia has even been immortalized on the stage. There's the very famous scene in Francis Bacon Shakespeare's "Omelet" where the hero is attempting to persuade Ofeelme's father Peritoneum that he is mad by claiming to see weird things in the clouds: Omelet: "Do you see yonder cloud that's almost in shape of a camel?" Peritoneum: "By the mass, and 'tis like a camel, indeed." Omelet: "Methinks it is like a weasel." Peritoneum: "It is backed like a weasel." Omelet: "Or like a whale?" Peritoneum: "Very like a whale." Omelet: "Thou churlish, boil-brained, cockered, clapper-claw clouted, clay-brained, bum-bailey, craven, canker-blossom, currish, crook-pated, dismal-dreaming clotpole! Thou are not even looking out the window, but at the opposite wall, in which framed sits the Melchior Broederlamadingdong painting, 'It's a Camel, a Weasel and a Whale-- and They're Playing Cards!' which the King hath purchased for the rec room." [seizing Peritoneum by the sleeve, he drags him to the window, slips on banana peel, falls out window to courtyard below] Peritoneum: "Oh, hie! Oh, by the rood! Help! Help! Prince Omelet has fallen and lie shattered in the yard! Send for all the King's horses and all the King's men to put poor Prince Omelet back together again!" [exeunt, noises off]
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Dear Aunt Nettie: What is the town of Neillsville,
Wisconsin famous for?
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Dear Cheesehead: Neillsville had the world's largest talking cow, a Chianina weighing 2,300 pounds, standing 5 feet, 3 inches tall at the withers and with a vocabulary of over 1,800 words. She first came to public attention in 1994 at the Neillsville Harvest Festival, when she won the spelling bee with the word "psittacine." Since the room was on the dark side, officials did not realize that "Penny Louise Butterworth" was a cow, thinking she was just a obese child with a tragic last name. Imagine their surprise when the lights came up and there was "Penny Louise's" head poking through the curtain from the cattle-judging tent on the other side, where she had just taken the blue ribbon in the Colossal Cow category. Penny Louise was an immediate celebrity in the small town of Neillsville (population 2,731.3). The weekly newspaper, the Neillsville Democrat-Nonpareil-Trumpet & Shopper's Notes, sent its reporter over immediately for an interview, only to discover that, just because a cow can talk, she doesn't necessarily have anything worth saying, although her observations on the alfalfa crop later made the early editions of the Wisconsin Farm News & Advertiser. Eventually the larger networks heard about the remarkable cow, and Penny Louise was interviewed by Barbara Walters and appeared on Oprah, but again, her perspective was so limited by being a cow that these interviews were remarkable only for the fact that appeared on broadcast TV at all. She regretted never having had the opportunity to go to school, and dreamed that in a different society she might have liked to have become a veterinarian, or perhaps an interior designer specializing in barns. Martha Stewart gave her some first-hand pointers about coping with lack of freedom and institutional décor, and whipped up a corn-bran-and-barley dish for her which Penny later described as "scrumptious." Several born-again types visited her, either to attempt to convert her to evangelical Christianity or to pray over her in an attempt to drive out the demons which gave her the power of speech. Penny Louise got to be quite an accurate cud-spitter thanks to their visits. In 2002 she was invited to make a dedication speech at the opening of the new Tyson Foods meat-packing plant in Jefferson, Wisconsin. Her present whereabouts are unknown.
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Dear Aunt Nettie: What plant with red, yellow, or green
fruit is named for a musical instrument?
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Dear Percussist: The marimbanana. Originally called the Lithuanianana because its colors reproduce the flag of that country and because it grew only in the jungles there, the marimbanana was ignored for many years after its discovery, as it was inedible except for 2 days in the growing season. Alas, commercial development was ruled out when it was discovered that during those 2 days it was also the world's most powerful organic laxative. So the marimbanana languished until the Swing State Era, when jazz musicians were looking for a new sound to identify their musical and political styles. "Lionel" Hamper, who had made a two fortunes in his model train and laundry storage businesses before branching out into popular music, was one of these innovators. One day at a Lithuanian street festival in the Bronx, he noticed a child beating time on an odd, colorful, banana-shaped dried gourd. He bought the crude instrument from the boy, but was unable to comprehend the name, not being fluent in Lithuanian since the traumatic incident on the trolley in 1931. He practiced day and night, and, sure enough, this was the new sound he had been searching for, a haunting cross between the marimba and the sousaphone. He named it the marimbanana because he couldn't pronounce marimbasousananaphone, nor could the other members of his band. After diligent searching he was able to locate the full range of the fruit, from the tiny soprano marimbanana to the huge bass marimbanana. At long last in 1937 at the Ritz-Carlton Hotel in New York City the world was introduced to the brassy flatulent thump of the marimbanana, and musical history was made. The "Lionel" Hamper Big Dance Band was in universal demand, and its founder soon acquired a third fortune, forcing him to add another wing to his house. Hamper's frenzied playing style was soon copied, and soon a new expression entered the jargon of jazz musicians, when a truly inspired marimbanana player was described as being "out of his gourd." Hamper's success came to an abrupt end in 1942 when he was drafted into the USO and sent to entertain the troops in the European Theatre, a magnificently-restored symphony hall which had once belonged to the Grand Vice-Duchy of Bastürgnovn until he lost it in a card game with a group of American Army sergeants. Hamper adapted well to army life and the pressures of constant performances while under aerial bombardment¹ and was planning a comeback performance once his tour of duty was over. It was not to be, however. On October 8, 1944, while traveling to a performance site in a newly-liberated area, he was inadvertently dropped over Berlin during a bombing run. --- ¹ His original composition, "
" (1943) has never been performed due to the restrictions imposed by the Geneva Convention.
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Dear Aunt Nettie: What are you afraid of if you have
pogonophobia?
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Dear Hairless: The absence of pogo sticks. The best case on record is Amelia Fayette Downbloomer, who was obsessed with the idea that she would wake up one morning and all the pogo sticks in the world would have disappeared. It became her custom to call the Marvel Manufacturing plant at 8:00 every morning to verify that they were still producing them. When Marvel went out of business in 1978, Ms Downbloomer withdrew into a catatonic state, where she remains to this very day.
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Dear Aunt Nettie: Where does the word "Halloween" come
from?
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Dear Spooked: Our word Halloween comes from the ancient Etruscan expression, "Hallo, we'un," a greeting to someone of less than average stature. The Etruscans believed that short people were a source of good luck, to the point where many Etrurian families kept their offspring in small boxes until well past adolescence.¹ Preferential breeding for size is what caused the Etruscans to become smaller and smaller, until one day they vanished completely. The Romans then took over the word, but in Roman "halo wir unum" was used to refer to an unmarried man whose head was encircled with a band of light, which really had nothing to do with Halloween as we know it, so the Romans traded the word to the Romanianjs, in whose language "h'løvëënj" meant one of the demons who hung around in the dark forests of Transylvania waiting to nibble on tourists. This was perfectly suited to the traditional concept of Halloween, and inspired children to dress up as tourists and go door to door begging for candy ("kæñðj") from the demons, which eventually led to the extinction of the Olde Romanianj people as the entire crop of children was wiped out in a single year. The Galls came across the word scratched into an outhouse door and adopted it for their own Gallic purposes, calling it " 'allowong" in a disgusting nasal accent, and using it to refer to kandy korn, which they cooked up to celebrate the late October feast in which they surrendered to their nearest neighbor. They also added a children's game which was to become a Halloween tradition, bobbing for French fries. This led to the popular expression, "fried, died, and laid side by side," to describe the aftermath of seasonal parties. Their nearest neighbor that year was the Angled Sextons, a national religious order which wore odd square hats and iron clothing and drove on the wrong side of the road to spite people. The Angled Sextons imported the word as "hollow weenies," referring to the martial ability of the Galls. They also added the custom of yelling "ye tricke or ye treate" when going door to door, and the custom of burning anyone dressed as a witch. Also their cats. Soon afterwards America was discovered by somebody looking for a direct flight to China, thereby avoiding the nuisance of changing boats at the hub city. This introduced the word "Halloween" to the United States, although to the Indians the idea of dressing up and going hut to hut begging for food was degrading, and they made fun of the colonial kids who did it, offering them succotash instead of candy. Later Halloween became the excuse for freelance vandalism and amateur Satanism, although the amateur Satans they summoned up weren't capable of anything more than parlor tricks. Today Halloween is outlawed in many communities as a pagan superstition by evangelicals, who feel that their Christian superstition can beat up anybody else's superstitions. __________________ See "Halloween 9/11" by Michael Moore for complete details on the relationship between Michael Meyers and Moustapha Akkad, and why it was necessary to destroy Haddonfield, Illinois to save it. --- ¹The expression referring to someone's child as a "chip off the old block" is believed to have originated with this practice, as Etruscans tended to be rather cubic as a result of the practice. However, near the end of the Etruscan Civilization, spherical chambers were used instead of boxes. These chambers, called "pump-kins" created a whole new fashion in people, and were later used by the Romans to grow spherical gourds, "iacolanterni," which they would carve into scary shapes and place in their windows to repel the tax collectors who came around in late Octoberus.
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