 For Authors: November 16, 2016 Issue [#7977] |
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This week: Time for a Few Trivialities! Edited by: Fyn  
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“I don’t know how long we talked about that game the first time my dad showed me the ticket stub. He admitted he hadn’t even been sure that he still had it, that he was surprised when he’d been able to find it. But we’ve spent hours and hours and hours talking about it since. And it’s pretty amazing, because that ticket stub sat in a box for two decades—once it let my dad into a stadium to see a baseball game, and then later, it let me into my dad’s world, into his past, to learn about the man who taught me to love a game so passionately that it shaped nearly every aspect of my life.” ~~Tucker Elliot
“...Makeup is for women. It's the law of nature for them to doll themselves up to get a man."
"On the contrary. [...] In the natural world, it is the male of the species who is adorned with colors to attract,
impress and keep his potential mate.” ~~Dawn Flemington, Hometown Secrets
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Trivia. From the early 20th century, the word derives from modern Latin, the plural of trivium or ‘place where three roads meet,’ where, presumably, folks would greet each other exchanging greetings, banalities (lest they offend) and meaningless gossip. Over time, trivia has become something to share, the root of numerous game shows and board games and a fun way to bemuse folks. Personally, I love trivia. But even more, it is the collection of (what some might call) useless facts. For example: I love to track down where particular phrases come from and often (as does J.D Robb, Nora Roberts, Craig Johnson, Clive Cussler, John Grissom and others) us them in my writing.
One thing I learned long ago is there are usually several definitive 'wheres' from whence a phrase might spring. Often times, the more colorful origin may well not be the correct one, so do the research! I heard several of those odd phrases over the past few days, so I thought that this might be a good newsletter idea!
For example, I heard a man talking about something being 'as dead as a doornail.' What makes a 'doornail dead?' I remembered Charles Dickens in 'A Christmas Carol' referring to Marley be as dead as one, so I went looking.
Old Marley was as dead as a door-nail.
Mind! I don’t mean to say that I know, of my own knowledge, what there is particularly dead about a door-nail. I might have been inclined, myself, to regard a coffin-nail as the deadest piece of ironmongery in the trade. But the wisdom of our ancestors is in the simile; and my unhallowed hands shall not disturb it, or the Country’s done for. You will therefore permit me to repeat, emphatically, that Marley was as dead as a door-nail.
When strengthening doors, (to keep invaders, nosy neighbors or invading hordes out) nails would be hammered all the way through the overlaying boards until they came clear through and out the other side. The ends would then be hammered over (a term called clenching as the nail would then clench the wood) and thus be unrecoverable or dead as in the nail couldn't be used again. Thus the phrase. It has been attributed to Shakespeare, but the phrase actually is older than that, having been used by William Langsland in 1362 in the poem The Vision of William Concerning Piers Plowman. A translation from Old English reads: Faith without works is feebler than nothing, and dead as a doornail.
The phrase 'it hurts like the dickens' had nothing to do with Charles Dickens at all! Shakespeare used it in 'the Merry Wives of Windsor, 1600:
I cannot tell what the dickens his name is my husband had him of. It appears to be have come from a fractured phrase via 'devilkin's'.
I saw a sign advertising grave blankets. It got me thinking and wondering: Why do graves need blankets? The dead feel no cold. Then there was also the thought that heaven, I should think would be cozy and who would need a blanket in hell? Is it because one wishes that our dearly departed to be warm or well dressed over the holidays? As it turns out, the action of blanketing a grave appears to have originated by Scandinavians in the Midwest, US as a way of brightening a gravesite when it is no longer practical or possible to have flowers. It used to be (in the days of private, family cemeteries, to plant pretty flowers atop a grave to keep it looking pretty. While having nothing to do with modern grave blankets, people (back in the day) would place a blanket on the ground (before a freeze) to help keep the earth warm when anticipating having to dig a grave, or over a freshly dug grave to keep snow or blowing leaves from falling inside!
Sleep tight! I remember this one from when I was a kid. My grandmother had her grandmother's bed. (We are talking early 1800s) I remember my grandmother had a funny tool she always called a 'dreamcatcher.' She would use it to tighten the ropes crisscrossing the bedframe under the zippered case that held fresh hay, herbs and flowers that served as the bed's mattress. If the ropes stretched out too far (like when Uncle Henry came to visit and I got to sleep in the window seat alcove (BIG treat)), she would tighten them, using her dreamcatcher so it wouldn't sag and the ropes would catch all the good dreams for me.
Ever thought that someone was 'Mad as a Hatter?' While Lewis Carroll used 'Mad Hatter' as a character, the phrase goes further back than that to the 1700s when hat makers in France used mercury to settling the felt used in men's and women's hats. Actually called the 'Mad Hatter's Disease' its symptoms were a severe shyness, irritability and tremors which would make the hat maker appear to be 'mad.'
The phrase 'the whole nine yards' seems to have multiple origins and these are vastly different from one another. The one I like best goes back to the 13-1400s and concerned men's kilts in Scotland. Material was sold in bolts nine yards in length. Usually, one would purchase two or three yards for sewing a dress, skirt or several shirts. The men wore kilts and had an everyday kilt and a dress kilt that they wore to go to war, to get married in or to be buried in. These kilts were more than mere skirt as the material wrapped around and then the material came up over the back and around to the front where it was belted in place. At night, the men would wrap this part around them for warmth. The full dress kilt is nine yards long, hence the term. The dress kilt was a big expenditure and a man usually could only afford one.
Another commonly used origin for this is from World War II when the ammo for machine guns came in belts (ammo belts) that were nine yards long. To give it your all, you used the whole nine yards.
Salt. There are many phrases having to do with salt. Salt used to be a rare commodity because it was obtained by the evaporation of sea water and required warm climates to be easily obtained. In Europe this was not practical and thus needed to be imported which meant it was expensive. The nobles would regularly eat at 'the high table' with their servants, lesser nobles and less honored guests below them at smaller tables. These tables would be 'below the salt' because salt was not offered here.
Being 'worth one's salt' meant you had value. Roman soldiers were once paid in salt, hence the word salary. (from Dictionary.com -- Middle English: from Anglo-Norman French salarie, from Latin salarium, originally denoting a Roman soldier's allowance to buy salt, from sal ‘salt.’)
Remember ordering a dozen doughnuts and sometimes getting that 13th one for free? This comes from the fact that bakers were once under strict laws regarding weight of their loaves of bread. Punishment for infractions of these laws range (in Egypt) from having the baker's ear nailed to his sign to losing a hand in Babylonia. As the pans baker's used typically had room for thirteen loaves, they would give you the extra loaf for free to be certain they couldn't be accused of cheating someone.
Money. Bucks, Lettuce, Bacon. Referring to twenty dollars as twenty bucks goes back to the time when deer hides were a form of commodity that could be exchanged for something else. In 1748, Conrad Weiser, a Pennsylvania Dutch pioneer who served as a diplomat between early colonists and Native Americans, noted in his journal that the exchange rate “for a cask of whiskey” traded to Native Americans was “5 bucks,” The term stuck.
From the Huffinton Post comes a description of how many terms we use today had their origins as a result of a series of code words used by the mob! The mob has had considerable influence on developing a special “underground” vocabulary for money. The mob was organized by families, and most families were of Italian origin. Italians are known for having large family dinners, when family members sit around a large family table discussing all sorts of subjects. It should, therefore, be no surprise that the mob devised an entire “food” vocabulary for referring to money in general: for example, “bread,” “bacon,” “gravy,” “dough,” “lettuce,” and “cabbage,” to mention the most used ones. There is no genuine evidence that “lettuce” came to be used as a word for money because of its green color.
These are but a few of many phrases that are a part of our language. It can be fun, when appropriate, to use terms like these when you are writing.
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abrand says: Great topic that I think will get a lot of people talking. I love the discussion of "people"! I love non-people. 
brom21  writes: Thanks for the newsletter. It’s true how everything goes into our writing. I am, however, not aware where most of my inspiration stems from. It’s been a long while since I’ve written so pardon the brevity of my response. Again, thanks for sharing! Hear from ya next time!
SB Musing  comments: I love the exchange between the Velveteen rabbit and the skin horse. I haven't come across that before and it's such a wonderful description of becoming 'real.' I also enjoyed how you mentioned that as writers we have silverware of our lives. This was a great article and now I have to get my hands on the book the Velveteen Rabbit. 
Osirantinous  adds:What a lovely NL, Fyn. I don't collect stories so much as keep mementos (photos, newspaper clippings, badges - all those sorts of things from my life and often my family's lives too) but you know I never really thought to actually use them in a story, or really even take inspiration from them. What a resource I've been missing out on! And... I loved your quote from The Velveteen Rabbit. It's not a story that I think many New Zealanders have read, but the quote resonated with me. I've got a small teddy bear I've had since I was about 3 (I'm 41 now, ssh) and he practically has two eyes but no face, and his little paws have worn thin with stuffing coming out. I like to think that's because he's Real. I certainly could never give him away or get him 'fixed'. And yet none of my characters have something like him to cling to. They have been missing out, as much as I have!
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