Pass The Buck

Some card games used a buckhorn knife marker called a buck. Players took turns acting as dealer with the buck marking the next dealer. When the buck was passed to the next player, the responsibility for dealing was also passed.

There is also widespread belief that as time went on, silver dollars were used, and the use of 'buck' as slang for a dollar originated. The phrase "The buck stops here" was popularized by President Harry Truman.

A buck-slip is also a small piece of paper that is sometimes preprinted, or hand-written, and included the names of the people who were to receive a memo or report. It is a routing list.

In the days before copy machines and computers people typed one memo, with a carbon copy, then passed the one copy of the memo around to the people listed on the buck slip. Each person initialed next to their name on the buck slip and passed the memo on to the next person on the buck slip.

Friday

Did you ever wonder where the word Friday came from? Friday is Freya's day.

Freya (Fria) is the Teutonic goddess of love, beauty, and fecundity (intellectual productivity and prolific procreation). She is identified with the Norse god Freya. She is leader of the Valkyries (maidens who chose heroes to be slain). She is confused in Germany with Frigg. Now we know where the recent 'Valkryie' movie with Tom Cruise got its title.

Frigg (Frigga) is the Teutonic goddess of clouds, the sky, and conjugal (married) love. She is identified with Frigg, the Norse goddess of love and the heavens and the wife of Odin. She is confused in Germany with Freya.

Old English is frigedæg "Freya's day" composed of Frige plus dæg "day"

Germanic is frije-dagaz "Freya's (or Frigg's) day"

Hmmm! One would think I could be more intellectually productive on Fridays, instead of putting out this Freyan and Friggin blather.

Daylight Savings Time

A wise Indian Chief described Daylight Savings Time as cutting one foot off the top of a blanket and sewing it back on the bottom.

Glasses

I saw your new girlfriend last night. She dropped her glasses.

Signs

How would you pronounce this street name?

Healthcare Headlines

Couldn’t resist these two headlines back-to-back in an email.

1. Despite economy, overall healthcare employment picture strong
2. WellPoint hit by 61 percent loss in Q4 2008, plans job cuts

Washing Instructions

Forgive me, but you have to admit this is funny.

Gibberish

I love this song. The words are total gibberish and made to sound like English.
Check out the YouTube.

Soupy Sales Dies

Soupy Sales, born Milton Supman was one of the wackiest characters on television, especially during the 50s and 60s. He had a number of shows on TV. He did eleven hours a week while in Detroit, with his sidekicks Black Fang and White Tooth. He had a morning show, a lunch show, and later he had a weekend evening show for adults that was hilarious. Of course, all of the shows were live.

The character seen here with Soupy is Pookie, the Lion.

One of his enduring bits was to hear a knock on the door, open it, and be hit in the face with a pie. Some accounts say he was hit by as many as twenty thousand pies during his TV career.

After Detroit, he went on to have shows in LA and New York, but many Detroiters still claim him as their own, even though he was born in North Carolina.

You can go here to see some of his hilarious comedy bits. No kidding Soupy, We'll miss ya.

I started a wikizine about Soupy Sales on Zimbio. You can check it out here.

Government Attic

Here is an interesting site. It is a compilation of documents that have been released under the 'Freedom of Information Act'. The home page says that it contains historical documents, reports on items in the news, oddities, fun stuff, and government bloopers. The site motto is Videre licet (to be able to see).

Glass of Bacon

Ummm! It is true that pork and bacon cannot cause swine flu.

Quotable

Consider this scary thought - The most radical revolutionary will become a conservative the day after the revolution.

James Dyson

You probably all know about the Dyson vacuum cleaner, invented by the British inventor, James Dyson. He is at it again and has come up with a bladeless fan.

It pulls air into the machine's cylindrical base with an impeller that draws from jet-engine technology. The air rushes up into a hollow ring and is then forced out of a slit that is less than 1/16th of an inch. The slit runs all around the ring.

As the air exits through the slit, it flows over the inner edge of the ring, which was modeled after an airplane wing. As the air exits the loop, the lower pressure pulls air from behind along with it, and air around the front of the fan also gets pulled into the stream.

The fan runs with a small motor, and airflow can be fully regulated with a dimmer switch. A 10-inch fan costs $299. Cool technology,  kid safe, and would look great under my Christmas tree.

Hunting Wolf Picture of the Year

This picture has won the prestigious Veolia Environment Wildlife Photographer of the Year 2009 award. It was taken by Jose Luis Rodriguez and won out over 40,000 entries.