What Would Jimmy Do?

When I was growing up, my favorite cookie was two round chocolate wafers with a creamy white filling between them. Yep, that’s right they were Hydrox cookies. I know, you probably thought I was talking about Oreo cookies, but believe it or not, we didn’t have Oreo cookies in Maysville. Hydrox was manufactured by Sunshine Biscuits, a company that made most of the cookies sold in my dad’s and granddad’s stores.

Hydrox cookies were first sold in 1908 and were the inspiration for the Oreo cookie that was introduced in 1912. The Oreo eventually exceeded Hydrox in popularity, which resulted in Hydrox being perceived as an imitator, although it was the original.

The creators of the Hydrox cookie looked to name it something that  conveyed “purity and goodness.” The name they came up with was derived from the elements that constitute water — hydrogen and oxygen.

The origin of the name Oreo is unknown. Some say it was derived from the French word or, meaning gold, others think it’s from a Greek word meaning mountain and some think Oreo was chosen because it is short and easy to pronounce.

I personally favor Hydrox over Oreos, but over the years I’ve chosen Beta over VHS, 8-track over cassettes, WordPerfect over Microsoft Word, I had an Apple Newton and liked the New Coke so I may not be the best person to endorse products. We do have Oreos in our house and I’m sure our grandkids would choose them over Hydrox in a taste test. 

But after becoming the king of cookies, not even Oreo can survive being touched by scandal. I realize that the nation is currently faced with many scandals, but the fiasco I’m about to tell you about threatens our very notion of truth and goodness. Double Stuf Oreos do not contain twice the stuf that are in normal Oreos!! I know this is true — it was on the Internet.

Say what you will about our education system, but a high school math class conducted an experiment and concluded that Double Stuf Oreos contain only 1.86 times more stuf than the original Oreo cookies. As might be expected, Nabisco, the maker of Oreos, said that the cookies do indeed contain twice as much. 

The legal community is offering up as a defense, the fact that a Subway footlong sandwich isn’t really exactly 12 inches. Now here’s the problem with that — the dictionary defines “footlong” as “approximately one foot in length.” The dictionary definition of “double” indicates it’s a mathematical phrase signifying “twice as much.”

So the argument comes down to, “is corporate American knowingly cheating our children?” Actually, not just children — adults like Oreos, too.

You may notice that I haven’t really taken a stand here — I’m still trying to figure out what “stuf” is. I thought it was the white filling between the two chocolate cookies, but stuf isn’t listed in the dictionary and the closest word, stuff, doesn’t describe anything like that white filling…. so maybe if things really get ugly and the big Oreo Fraud trial finally overtakes coronavirus and statue toppling in the news, lawyers will reveal what “Stuf” is. I guess until this is all sorted out, just follow the old advice of “buyer beware.”
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Over the course of the history of this blog, the subject has been telephones on a number of occasions. The telephone is an interesting topic, and like a lot (most) things, it’s made tremendous progress, technologically, over the years. It’s hard to remember when a telephone wasn’t taken for granted, but it really hasn’t bee that long ago. 

When we first arrived in Manila, in the Philippines — in 1972, we moved into an apartment in the Carmen-Dewey apartment building on Roxas Boulevard — located right on Manila Bay.

The previous tenants had taken the telephone with them when they moved. Because I traveled a lot, it was important for Claire to have access to a phone — obviously there was no such thing as an “Internet” or cell phone in those days. 

In 1972, a phone was considered a luxury item in Manila. There was a long waiting list of people waiting for phones to be installed. The embassy pulled some strings and it was a only a few days after moving in that the telephone company showed up at our apartment. The previous residents evidently had the phone in the living room — there was a phone “pigtail” about five or six inches long coming out of the baseboard in that room.

Claire told the phone installer that she wanted the phone in the bedroom — with me traveling, the bedroom location just made more sense. Claire went on about her business and left the installer to do his work. Shortly, he announced that the phone was connected and everything worked fine. When she checked, she found the phone had been attached to short piece of wire coming out of the baseboard — about six inches from the wall. It couldn’t even be put on a table, it had to sit on the floor. Claire once again explained that she wanted the phone in the bedroom — on a nightstand next to the bed. The phone installer insisted that it was much better where he had installed it (on the floor in the living room.) 

Well, if you know Claire, there was a long (interesting?) discussion about where the phone should go. The phone installer’s best arguments couldn’t convince Claire that the living room floor location was “better.”

It turned out that the real problem was that the phone company didn’t have any wire. I’ll repeat that — the phone company didn’t have any wire. Claire got in touch with me and I brought a roll of wire from the embassy and the installer gladly installed the phone in the bedroom — on the table. I let the phone guy keep the extra wire and everyone was happy. 

Thinking back over the years, if I made a list of the things I’ve taken for granted, it would be a long list — and include telephone wire.
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Forty-nine years ago tonight was pretty special. We were at the Merriweather Post Pavilion in Columbia, Maryland. So not to keep you in suspense, it was our first date — we went to Merriweather Post to see Blood, Sweat and Tears.

Initially, the Pavilion was meant to be a summer home for the National Symphony Orchestra, but it soon transformed into a host for popular live event performances by lots of well-known artists.

In 1971, the Nation’s Capital was a city in the throes of tremendous turmoil. The anti-war movement was in full-swing, the Weathermen bombed the Capitol Building and the May Day Protests — a series of large-scale civil disobedience actions in Washington in protest of the Vietnam War caused disruptions and garnered a lot of publicity. 

In 1971, the Merriweather Post Pavilion was also concerned with the violence in nearby Washington and the music tinged by the progressive public’s discontent due to the Vietnam War. Until 1971, Columbia’s city manager was Merriweather Post’s overseer and in 1970 stopped the booking of rock music there after a mayhem during a Steppenwolf concert. But in 1971, the Nederlander Organization assumed management duties of the venue and pushed forward a slate of rock events by performers whose shows were not accompanied by a history of violence. Among the groups booked was Blood, Sweat, and Tears on August 13, 1971. 

Columbia, Maryland was only about 30 miles away from the District, but that distance was enough to provide a safe, and at the time, rather spectacular setting for entertainment. 

So here we are, 49 years later and Washington is still a mess, we don’t listen to Blood, Sweat, and Tears much anymore and we haven’t been back to the Merriweather Post Pavilion…. but it’s still been a pretty good 49 years — Cheers to us!
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A few weeks ago, the subject of this blog turned to schools — primarily because of the change the coronavirus has had on the education system. That led to me reminiscing about my school days and the mention of a one-room school house in the Story community near Maysville, where a number of my friends attended through the eighth grade.

I thought it might be interesting to take a closer look at our education system over the years. To go way, way back, the earliest humans didn’t need schools to pass along information. Kids were educated on an individual basis within the family unit. But of course, the populations grew and societies were formed. 

When people started living in organized societies, someone figured out that instead of each family being responsible for educating the young, it would be easier and more efficient to have a small group of adults teach a larger group of children — and low and behold, the concept of school was born.

In the beginning, and for a long time, schools weren’t like the schools we have today. The earliest schools usually focused more on teaching skills and passing along religious values, rather than teaching specific “subjects” like schools do today. 

In the US, the first schools began in the 13 original colonies. Boston Latin School, founded in 1635, became the first public school and the oldest existing school in the country. The earliest public schools focused on reading, writing and math, or arithmetic. The New England colonies were first in requiring towns to set up schools. The Massachusetts Bay Colony made basic education a requirement in 1642. Maybe not surprisingly, many of the earliest schools were only for boys. At the time, girls had few, if any, options.

Education became a higher priority after the American Revolution and most of the states began to establish public schools. As we know from today’s news, states rules and regulations aren’t universal or consistent — they weren’t then and never have been… they vary from state to state.

Credit for the modern school system we have today usually goes to Horace Mann, often called the “Father of the Common School Movement.” Mann became Secretary of Education in Massachusetts in 1837 and instituted a system of professional teachers that would teach students an organized curriculum of basic content. 

The success of Mann’s system in Massachusetts was copied and established in other states. More and more states made school attendance mandatory — by 1918, every state required students to complete elementary school. 

Throughout the 20th century, the education system improved by leaps and bounds leading to the advanced systems we enjoyed until 2019. In 2020, the education system (along with almost everything else) changed. The system will, for the foreseeable future, have to be re-invented. We’re currently facing the same problems we had following the American Revolution — education decisions are being left to the individual states with no overall or centralized guidance. Maybe another Horace Mann will come along and set forth a vision that is workable, and acceptable, across the nation.
For now, we have to start where we are, use what we have and do what we can….
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Even though we’re still early in August, some leaves are starting to fall and it’s apparent that summer is coming to a close — goodbye summer, hello fall. I was thinking about seasons… most people experience four seasons: winter, spring, summer and fall (or autumn.) Seasons are associated with a particular time of the year. The change of season is primarily due to the change in attitude of the Earth’s axis in relation to the position of the sun at a particular place. 

In temperate latitudes, four seasons are the norm, tropical regions have two seasons — wet and dry. Monsoon areas around the Indian Ocean have mainly three seasons: cold, hot, and rainy (or monsoon.) I’ve lived in places that have four seasons and two seasons, and have visited places with three seasons. I’ve also visited a place that has six seasons. There very well may be other places that have six seasons, but the only place I’ve been that has six is… Bangladesh. Much of the area surrounding Bangladesh experience the three seasons that I mentioned — but for some reason, maybe just cultural tradition, Bangladesh divides these three seasons into six.

The six seasons, and their Bengali names are:
Summer (grisma); monsoon (basra); autumn (sharat); late autumn (hemanta); winter (shit) [maybe not a bad name for that season here in West Virginia] and spring (basanta.) Bangladesh gets about 85% of its year’s total rainfall during monsoon season (mid-June to mid-August.) Winter is the coolest season, but very tolerable — the temperature then averages 52 – 68ªF.

Bangladesh promotes itself as the land of six seasons — in Bengali, “Sadartu.” That certainly helps make it sound unique, but for practical purposes, only three seasons are distinguishable — summer, rainy, and winter. But no matter — regardless of how many seasons, they all pass.
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Today is International Beer Day. Since 2013, this “holiday” has alway been celebrated on the first Friday in August. Prior to 2013, it was always celebrated on August 5.

I’ve often been asked what my favorite beer is — I’ve been to a lot places around the world and they all have their own unique beers, but choosing a favorite beer for me is easy — San Miguel. But it has to be San Miguel brewed in Manila, Philippines.

We lived fairly close to the San Miguel brewery in Manila, and they delivered the beer directly to our house. The labels were painted on the bottles and the bottles had to be returned… the brewery delivered more beer and picked up the empty bottles at our house weekly. 

San Miguel beer in the Philippines had absolutely no preservatives. Based on knowing how many bottles they had and the amount of refills of those bottles, all the bottles were recycled every three to four weeks (when we were there in the early 70s) — hard to imagine beer being much “fresher.”

The history of San Miguel traces back to 1890, when a group of Spaniards decided to open a brewery in Manila — the first brewery in Southeast Asia. 

San Miguel is available pretty much worldwide, but none of it tastes like the beer brewed in Manila. So, I’ll probably have a beer today to celebrate International Beer Day — and it may be good — it just won’t be as good as San Miguel from Manila.
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Last we met here, we talked about the “Dog Days of Summer.” It’s said that dogs are man’s best friend, and certainly dogs have had a major impact on not just man’s evolution, but on the English language.

It occurred to me that we use lots of expressions referring to “dogs.” Usually, these expressions don’t have anything to do with a “dog,” so what’s the deal? Where did these expression come from, do they mean something, or are they just fun to say?

Dog Days refers to the hot, lethargic days of summer. I’ve often heard that it’s “raining cats and dogs,”  although as far as i can tell, there are no animals falling from the sky… when we could go to restaurants, we often got a Doggie Bag, even though we don’t have a dog. Sometimes when someone’s out of line, we say he’s gone to the dogs and sometimes it’s just better to let sleeping dogs lie, especially in a dog-eat-dog world. After a wild night out and you feel sick as a dog, sometimes the best cure is the hair of the dog and when you start to recover, you’re often dog tired. I once had a boss that everyone said that his bark was worse than his bite, but I’ve heard that a barking dog never bites, so I’m not sure what to do with that…

Young love is often referred to as puppy love and some people are said to have puppy dog eyes. Supposedly, every dog has its day, but of course to get it you have to work like a dog. Once I got in the dog house for returning a library book that was dog eared. They say you can’t teach an old dog new tricks and if you’re a fan of the Browns or Redskins Washington Football Team, you’re very familiar with the term underdog. And a favorite saying on Capitol Hill is, if you want a friend in Washington, get a dog.

Well, that’s it — as my dad often, said, I have to go see a man about a dog.
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I’m a big fan of warm weather, but lately, it’s been a little too warm even for me. I know — it’s that time of year, often referred to as the Dog Days of Summer. Since it’s hot out and the grass isn’t growing much, I thought today might be a good day to talk about the “dog” days of summer. 

I’ve heard the expression since I was a kid, but I didn’t know what it meant, or where it came from. I remember hearing that it just described hot, sultry days that weren’t “fit for a dog.” My grandmother believed that those hot days actually caused dogs to go mad. 

Well, in case you’re interested, here’s what I found out about the Dog Days of Summer, courtesy of the Old Farmer’s Almanac….
The term “Dog Days” traditionally refers to a period of particularly hot and humid weather occurring during the summer months of July and August in the Northern Hemisphere. In ancient Greece and Rome, the Dog Days were believed to be time of drought, bad luck, and unrest, when dogs and men alike would be driven mad by the extreme heat. Today the phrase doesn’t conjure up such bad imagery. Instead, the Dog Days are associated purely with the time of summer’s peak temperatures and humidity. 

The origin of the phrase is actually a reference to the stars, specifically Sirius — the Dog Star. Sirius is part of the constellation Canis Majoris — the “Greater Dog” — which is where Sirius gets its canine nickname, as well as its official name, Alpha Canis Majoris. Not including our own Sun, Sirius is the brightest star in the sky.

But back to the Farmer’s Almanac….
Old-timers believed that rainfall on the Dog Days was a bad omen, as foretold in this verse:
Dog Days bright and clear
Indicate a happy year;
But when accompanied by rain,
For better times, our hopes are vain. 
and…
Dog Days are approaching: you must, therefore, make both hay and haste while the Sun shines, for when old Sirius takes command of the weather, he is such an unsteady, crazy dog, there is o dependence upon him.
~ The Old Farmer’s Almanac, 1817

So we find ourselves in the hot, lethargic period of summer…. way back before air conditioning, dogs would find a cool shady spot to lie down, spending the heat of the day doing nothing, trying to stay cool. Humans did the same. Modern day air conditioning has changed that, but these are still the lazy, hazy days of summer. I like to think of them when I shovel snow….
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“In periods where there is no leadership, society stands still.”
~Harry S. Truman
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Back in June, I commented on an article that I’d read that discussed how the month in which a person is born determines that person’t characteristics. I mentioned that even though a lot of people don’t believe that your destiny is determined by the stars, astrology is apparently fascinating to many people. From time to time you see lists published of the most searched for words or terms on the Internet and astrology and horoscope are almost always on the list, and often near the top. 

Well, anyhow, both Claire and Dave were born in June, so I included what the article indicated would be the personal characteristics of those born in June. (You can check the June blog entries, if you’re interested.)

Since my birthday is this month, I guess it’s only fair to reveal my personal characteristics, at least according to this very scientific article, obviously written by someone very, very smart….

“ August babies have an outgoing personality and take risks. They thrive on attention and have very little self-control. Those born in August are kind-hearted and self-confident. Their loud and boisterous ways mean you will always spot them in a crowd. August babies hold a grudge but they are very easy to get along with and chat to. Those born in August have an “everything’s peachy” take on life. They love to talk and sing their way through life. Music is also a big part of August babies’ personalities. They have a tendency to daydream and are easily distracted. They resent not being trusted and possess a vivid imagination. August babies love to be loved. Studying is the bane of August babies’ existence. They are big believers in that “special someone” and long for freedom. If they feel hemmed in, August babies will rebel. They live their lives according to the motto “no pain no gain.” They are playful with a mysterious side too. Everyone considers August babies charming and beautiful. They have a stubborn streak and are curious. August babies think for themselves and are strong-willed. They are fighters.”

Well, there you have it — me in a nutshell.
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