[Vhfcn-l] Monday musings

[Gary Thewlis]

As to the presidency, the two happiest days of my life were those of my
entrance upon the office and my surrender of it.

Martin Van Buren

 

They want the federal government controlling the Social Security, like it's
some kind of federal program.

George W. Bush

 

We're all capable of mistakes, but I do not care to enlighten you on the
mistakes we may or may not have made.

Al Gore

 

Politics has become so expensive that it takes a lot of money even to be
defeated.

Will Rogers

 

It isn't pollution that's harming the environment. It's the impurities in
our air and water that are doing it.

Dan Quayle

 

There's a whiff of the lynch mob or the lemming migration about any
overlarge concentration of like-thinking individuals, no matter how virtuous
their cause.

P. J. O'Rourke

 

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Hide one's light under a bushel

 

This is from the Bible, at one time most often from this famous version:

 

Neither do men light a candle, and put it under a bushel, but on a
candlestick; and it giveth light unto all that are in the house. Let your
light so shine before men, that they may see your good works, and glorify
your Father which is in heaven. - King James Bible, 1611, Matthew, 5:15 and
5:16.

 

The bushel was at the time a container for measuring dry goods such as grain
or peas. It was typically a wooden bucket with a volume of eight gallons
(though this has varied over place and time).

 

In the original Greek text of the Gospel, the word used was related to seah,
Hebrew for a rather smaller dry measure that held about a gallon and a half.
King James's translators chose bushel because it would be obvious to people
of their day. The bushel measure is still used for fruit, grain and other
commodities in the USA and Canada; however, modern translators of the
gospels have assumed readers would be unfamiliar with the image and replaced
it with basket, bowl or measuring basket.

 

To turn a bushel measure upside down and put a candle under it was to hide
its light from view. We use hide your light under a bushel for somebody who
figuratively does the same - who modestly stays silent about their talents
or accomplishments.

 

There are thousands more the length and breadth of the country who work
tirelessly for their communities and hide their light under a bushel. - The
Sun, 18 Jul. 2014.

 

The translators of the King James Bible borrowed extensively from the work
of William Tyndale and John Wycliffe. The latter's bible, from the end of
the fourteenth century, includes the same image in similar language.

 

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Segue

 

Pronounced segway, this reminds one source of BBC training in the
mid-sixties when, as an apprentice spinner of disks, he was taught this term
for the action of jumping straight from one record to the next without any
announcement in between, or, as the Oxford English Dictionary more soberly
puts it, to make an "uninterrupted transition from one song or melody to
another". It's Italian, the present tense of seguire, to follow. It was
borrowed into English - probably in the 1920s, though it is first recorded
in the 1930s - originally as musicians' and radio broadcasters' slang. More
recently it has been extended to cover any smooth transition, as in a
conversation, or from one film scene to another.

 

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What common salad ingredient belongs to the aster family?

A: Lettuce.

 

What delicacy is named for the city of Cheriton, Virginia?

A: The cherrystone clam (the town was originally known as cherry Stones). 

 

When was coffee first sold in sealed tin cans in the United States?

A: In 1879--by Chase & Sanborn.

 

How did the ice-cream sundae get its name?

A: The sundae was created in Evanston, Illinois, in the late nineteenth
century to get around a Sabbath ban on selling ice-cream sodas.  It was
dubbed Sunday but spelled with an "e" instead of a "Y" to avoid religious
objections.

 

How did the Gatorade fruit drink get its name?

A: From the University of Florida football team--the Gators--after the team
tested it.

 

Why did candy maker Milton S. Hershey switch from making caramels to
chocolate bars in 1903?

A: Caramels didn't retain the imprint of his name in summertime; chocolate
did.

 

What fruits were crossed to produce the nectarine?

A: None. The nectarine is a smooth-skinned variety of peach, and not--as
many people believe--a cross between a peach and a plum.