Nero Didn't Fiddle

The violin (fiddle) was invented a thousand years after the Great Fire of Rome. It belongs to a family of stringed instruments, which includes the cello and viola. Among these three, it is the highest-pitched and smallest.

Renowned violin maker Andrea Amati constructed the very first violin sometime in 1555. Before that, there was a violin-like instrument called violetta, which only had three strings instead of the usual four strings that are found in modern-day violins.

Many archive documents relate that from about 1585 Brescia, Italy was the cradle of a magnificent school of string players and makers, all called with the title of 'maestro' of all the different sort of multi-string instruments of the Renaissance: viola da gamba, violone, lyra, lyrone, violetta, and viola da brazzo.

A Persian geographer, Ibn Khurradadhbih of the 9th century was the first to cite the bowed Byzantine lira, which is held upright as a typical instrument of the Byzantines and equivalent to the rabāb used in the Islamic Empires of that time. The Byzantine lira spread through Europe westward and in the 11th and 12th centuries European writers use the terms fiddle and lira interchangeably when referring to bowed instruments.

The rabāb was introduced to the Western Europe and both bowed instruments spread widely throughout Europe giving birth to various European bowed instruments.

Lutherie

This is the practice of crafting stringed instruments, such as a violin or guitar. Lutherie is commonly divided into two main categories: makers of plucked or strummed string instruments or makers of stringed instruments that are bowed, which may require the additional help of an archetier. An archetier is someone skilled in the crafting of bows.

Experimental luthiers are craftsman who design string instruments with altered parts, or who create new and original instruments as are commonly used in the rock and jazz genres. Most instruments are never replicated or mass produced on a scale like the guitar or violin. However, additions to major instruments, such as the original vibrato bar become a vital part of the instrument.

Yogurt Breath

Research shows that the live bacteria in yogurt can suppress levels of bad breath causing bacteria. "Good" bugs in yogurt may crowd out the "bad" stink-causing bacteria or create an unhealthy environment for it.

Wordology, Called on the Carpet

To be called 'on the carpet', i.e. for reprimand by superior, is likely an early 1900's, American colloquial, from one's uncarpeted work area to carpeted offices of one's superior.

During the early 1700s it also referred to a cloth (carpet) covering a conference table and therefore came to mean "under consideration or discussion." In 19th-century America, however, carpet meant "floor covering," and the expression, first recorded in 1902, alluded to being called before or reprimanded by a person rich or powerful enough to have a carpet.

Happy Friday

If you want others to be happy, practice compassion. If you want to be happy, practice compassion.

To be truly happy, practice compassion while having a Happy Friday!

Picnics and Barbecues

Just about all the ingredients to make a perfect ‘All-American’ picnic come from German origins.

There is the hot dog, wiener, or a Frankfurter; a pork sausage that originated in 13th century Germany. We also cannot forget the Brats or Bratwurst and Knackwurst, both great grilled. All of these washed down with a chilled beer, while not originating in Germany, was certainly made popular there many years ago.

Ketchup was developed by Heinz, and Mayonnaise, developed by Hellman, both German immigrants. Some of those items are based off earlier recipes (Ancient Rome: ketchup; France: mayonnaise) but the favorites eaten today are definitely German.

Then, of course, there is the Potato Salad. There are many different versions to this dish, one of the most popular variations is the traditional German potato salad.

Smallest Park in the World

The smallest park in the world is Mill Ends Park in Portland, Oregon. It is 452 square inches or barely two feet across and not quite suitable for a barbecue. The nearby Forest Park is 60 million times as big.

Mill Ends started in 1948, when Oregon Journal journalist Dick Fagan noticed a forgotten hole outside his office on Front Street. He planted flowers and began to write a weekly column about goings-on there.

When Fagan died in 1969, Portland took up the tradition and dedicated Mill Ends as an official city park in 1976. Sometimes it has a swimming pool for butterflies, with diving board, a miniature Ferris wheel, and statues. It hosts snail races, weddings, and regular rose plantings.

A Long Rhode Island

Speaking of small, it is the smallest state with the longest name. The official name, used on all state documents, is “Rhode Island and Providence Plantations.”

Remembering Elvis

Elvis Presley died at age 42 in August 1977. Thousands lined the streets of Presley’s hometown on the day of his funeral. The nation, the music world, and fans from around the world were in shock over his passing. Even to this day, some say that Elvis didn’t die, he just wanted to get away from it all.

The sales numbers may seem small compared to a few of today's musicians, but then many have come and gone without fanfare and few remained on top for 25 years. The number of hits remains large as Elvis had an 107 hits on the pop music charts. His first hit was Heartbreak Hotel in 1956 and his last was Guitar Man, after his death in 1981. Presley had 28 gold records, 12 number one songs and 38 top-ten hits.

What's in a Name, Jacuzzi

The seven Jacuzzi brothers emigrated from Italy to California in the early 1900s. In California, they began developing innovations for the big new craze: the airplane. Their biggest hit was the creation of the first plane with an enclosed cabin, which the US Postal Service bought to deliver mail.

According to legend, their mother was worried about her sons’ safety and eventually convinced the brothers to change jobs. They started concentrating on hydraulic pumps for irrigation and hospital use. In the late 1940s, Candido Jacuzzi’s young son Kenneth started suffering from arthritis. He received hydrotherapy at a hospital, but his father decided his son needed to have access to it at home as well. He filed a patent for his invention, but it wasn’t until another relative, Roy joined the business years later that they started selling their Jacuzzi tubs to the public. Well, that is just about the hot and cold of it.

Smarter Pills

The Food and Drug Administration has just approved a device that is integrated into pills and let’s doctors know when patients take their medicine and when they don’t.

The device, made by Proteus Digital Health, is a silicon chip about the size of a sand particle. With no battery and no sensor, it is powered by the body itself. The chip contains small amounts of copper and magnesium. After being ingested the chip will interact with digestive juices to produce a voltage that can be read from the surface of the skin through a detector patch, which then sends a signal via mobile phone to inform the doctor that the pill has been taken.

Sensors on the chip also detect heart rate and can estimate the patient’s amount of physical activity. It will allow doctors to better assess if a person is responding to a given dose, or if that dose needs to be adjusted.

It has been in clinical trials since 2009, but currently the FDA has only approved the chip for placebo pills, which were used in trials showing the chip to be safe and highly accurate. Proteus hopes to gain approval to use the digestible chip with other medicines. Andrew Thompson, chief executive of Proteus, says the chip has already been tested with treatments for tuberculosis, mental health, heart failure, hypertension, and diabetes.

The company is currently working with makers of metformin, a drug used to treat type 2 diabetes and the most commonly prescribed drug in the world. The company also plans on adding a wireless glucose meter to their device so that dosage amount and frequency can be correlated with changes in blood glucose levels.

To Bee or Not to Bee

It is not exactly clear where the word derives from, but “bee” as in “spelling bee” means a gathering or get together.  One early case referred to a “spinning bee”, where people would gather to protest purchasing goods from Britain due to the high taxes on those items. Other gatherings that were commonly labeled with “bee” were: apple bee, logging bee, quilting bee, barn bee, hanging bee, sewing bee, and corn husking bee. 

Any competition or work gathering, with a specific task in mind, tended to get the “bee” label added on the end.  With many of these bees being tedious work events, it was also customary to serve refreshments and provide entertainment at the end of the task.

Wordology, Aluminum

Aluminum is the older term, while aluminium was created later by the British to make it sound more like the other elements. Here is a timeline:

1808: Sir Humphrey Davy isolates the metal for the first time. He calls it alumium
1812: Sir Humphrey decides to change the spelling of his element: he renames it to aluminum (the term adopted in the United States)
1812: British scientists dislike the new name and change it to aluminium to match the other classic sounding elements, such as Magnesium, Helium, Potassium, etc.

That's my symposium on aluminum. - Incidentally, the Greek symposium was originally a drinking party and forum for men of good family to debate, plot, boast, or simply to revel with others.

Happy Friday

Do not dwell in the past, do not dream of the future, concentrate the mind on the present.

I do not dwell in the past or dream of the future, I am concentrating on having a Happy Friday!