What Would Jimmy Do?

As time passes, some things change — actually almost everything changes. That includes our language and the way we speak, or maybe don’t speak so much anymore.
This weekend at church an elderly man that usually sits in front of us was wearing suspenders. I spoke to him and said, “nice braces.” Of course he smiled because he knew what I’d just said. This past December, we attended a Christmas party and the host’s grandson had on a pair of bright red suspenders. I said, “nice braces.” He looked at me like I was from another planet — he had no idea what I was talking about.

When I was young, a lot of people wore suspenders and often times they were referred to as “braces.” So what’s the difference in suspenders and braces? Really, not much. If you happened to grow up in England, suspenders would probably be a foreign word to you. Generally, the British call all suspenders braces. I believe the technical difference (at least in the United States) is that the term braces refers to button-on suspenders and the term suspenders refers to the clip-on variety that can be worn without special buttons on pants.

The first suspenders appeared in 18th century France and were basically strips of ribbon attached to the buttonholes of trousers. Back then, suspenders were considered undergarments, never to be seen in public. Visible suspenders were considered risqué as recently as 1938 when a town in Long Island, New York tried to ban gentlemen from wearing them without a coat.
One of the first U.S. patents for suspenders was issued in 1871 to Samuel Clemens (Mark Twain) for “adjustable and detachable straps for garments.” Metal clasps were invented in 1894 so that suspenders could be clipped on rather than buttoned, so that pants no longer had to come with buttons sewn in the waist, as most did in that era.

I suppose any discussion of suspenders should include the age old question, “Why do firemen wear red suspenders?” If you think it’s to keep their pants up, I’ll leave it at that.
So suspenders have almost disappeared from our vocabulary – and – really pretty much from society. Maybe that’s for the better — for years I thought my granddad was a hunchback. Turns out he didn’t know suspenders were adjustable….
— 30 —

I never grew up wanting to be a “boss.” It was never my desire to order, or even direct, people. But as it turned out I found myself in the leadership position of a number of groups over my working years. I was always of the opinion that if you clearly defined what was expected of someone and gave them the resources needed to accomplish it, a “boss” wasn’t necessary.
But nonetheless, I found myself being in charge of a number of programs and projects over the years. The one thing that irritated me the most were employees that attempted to convince me that they knew something they didn’t or that gave me incorrect information.

For some reason, it seems difficult for some people to simply say, “I don’t know.” I don’t know is a perfectly acceptable answer to me. No one knows everything and I’d much rather hear that from someone  than have them “blow smoke” or try to “snow” me.

I’m not sure why people can’t just say, “I don’t know” — if they don’t. Maybe it’s something they should know or maybe something they wished they knew. I can’t say that its a particularly nice feeling to say you don’t know something, but as I said, no one knows everything and we all experience not knowing. I remember in school, the teacher asking me questions and I often had to say I didn’t know. Sometimes the teacher seemed a little angry or maybe sometimes disappointed, but he/she would have been more angry/disappointed had I tried to make something up.
I don’t necessarily think the words “I don’t know” means a lack of knowledge, but some people think that using that phrase gives the impression that one is not as smart as he’s led people to believe.
Not that it matters so much to me anymore, but I still wonder why people are reluctant to use those three words. Why? I don’t know….
— 30 —

I was talking to Siri on my iPhone earlier today and later got to thinking about talking to a machine. When I was a kid any machine that talked was pure science fiction and usually it was just described in books… I don’t remember any movies with a talking machine or robot or computer until I was much older.

The first real interaction I remember with a piece of hardware that talked, was something our kids had called a “Speak and Spell,” I think. Anyhow this “voice” would ask you to spell a word and you typed it into a keyboard of sorts and the voice would tell you if you were correct or not and even give you encouragement and congratulations if you got it right.

I’ve noticed that most mechanical or computer generated voices are female — I think the Speak and Spell sounded female. I don’t know if there’s a reason for this or not, but I remember telephone operators were almost always female and receptionists and secretaries were usually female. That may all have been a sexist thing that certain jobs were appropriate and inappropriate for women (and/or men.)

I’ve heard that studies seem to indicate that in general, women’s voices are more pleasing to most people. And if you think about it, maybe babies can actually “hear” their mother’s voices before they’re born, so they become accustomed to female voices. I remember our kids and grandkids, when they were young, responded more to Claire’s voice than to mine.

So there may be a lot of reasons that female voices seem to have taken over the artificial voice sector. The GPSs in our cars, our phones, computers and even our TV/cable remotes seem to be female. I think all of the devices can be changed to operate with a male voice, but I’ve never had any desire to do so.

Its not clear to me if these voice assistants are supposed to represent some kind of goddess or a retro secretary. I think its kind of sad, but in many instances, still today, we tend to think of “assistants” as female — I think, probably, because that’s the way, in the past, the labor force was generated and stratified. The fact that these voice assistants are usually female doesn’t seem so much advancing technology as referencing old stereotypes.
Or…. maybe not.
— 30 —

One summer a long, long time ago a traveling carnival came to Maysville, Oklahoma. Since it was late summer, Maysville was probably their last stop for the year. When the carnival left town, the lady (and her son) who sold snow-cones at the carnival stayed behind a couple of weeks and asked permission to set up their snow-cone “stand” on the sidewalk outside my grandad’s store. Since the weather was still warm, they did a pretty good business.
I was about 12 years old at the time and I talked to the “snow-cone people” a lot because I spent a fair amount of time hanging around my grandad’s store — I bagged groceries there on a part time basis.

So when the snow-cone people  announced they would be leaving, I asked if I could buy their snow-cone machine. They said they’d sell me everything — including the supplies and the “stand” (which was not much more than packing crates nailed together.) for $125. My Dad suggested that I offer them $100 for the whole package. (Remember, $100 was a lot of money back in the 1950s time frame.) Turns out that they accepted my offer, but there was a problem — I didn’t have $100. I had maybe $20…. and of course my Dad did the right thing by telling me that it was my responsibility to come up with the money. He suggested that I go to the bank and see if I could get a loan. I don’t remember for sure, but I think the bank agreed to the loan if my dad would co-sign. But my grandmother (Williamson) came through for me. She said she’d loan me the money with no interest, but I had to pay it back in a reasonable amount of time.

Well, I set up my snow-cone business right in front of my granddad’s store and business boomed. I only had a month or six weeks (maybe 2 months maximum) before it would be too cold for snow-cones. It turned out that I was either a very good businessman or very lucky, because I was able to pay my grandmother back in full and bank enough money to get the business started the following summer before the weather got bad.

Over the winter, I made arrangements to rent a space for my snow-cone stand and my grandad (Archer) built a real “stand” or building that had a door, a floor, a customer counter, shelves and was wired for electricity. There was a shoe repair shop located on Main Street that had a vacant lot right next to it. I rented the space to set my stand and Mr. Beck (the shoe shop owner) agreed that I could tap into his electricity — for a fee — that was added to my monthly rent. For the next two or three years, the business did well and I made a fairly good profit. I was written up in the Maysville News newspaper a couple of times for being the youngest businessman in town. I know it wasn’t the Washington Post, but hey, it was a real newspaper that was published every week.

When school started in the fall and before it was out for the summer, my (great) aunt ran the business for me during school hours.
I operated the business until the last two or three years of high school. By that time a local drug store had noticed the popularity of snow-cones and put a machine in their store. That competition (they were able to operate it year-round) and probably my deteriorating interest led to closing the business and pursuing other interests through high school.

Once again, no particular point to this — just something I happened to remember a few days ago, when the subject of summer jobs for kids came up….
— 30 —

Well, here it is one of those holidays that we faithfully celebrate every year – Ten-Ten Day. Both the faithful readers know all about it — that it’s Taiwan’s Independence Day.

As a way of background, in case you don’t know, the National Day of the Republic of China is referred to as Double Ten Day or Ten Ten Day. It commemorates the start of the Wuchang Uprising that occurred on October 10, 1911 that led to the collapse of the Qing Dynasty in China and the establishment of the ROC on January 1, 1912.
Subsequently, during the course of the Chinese Civil War, the government of the Republic of China lost control of mainland China and fled to Taiwan Island in December of 1949. The National Day, or Ten Ten Day, is mostly celebrated in Taiwan, but a lot of Chinese immigrants in the United States also celebrate on the 10th.

Since the Communist Party of China seized control of mainland China (in 1949) October 10 is celebrated in the People’s Republic of China, not as Taiwan’s Independence Day, but as the anniversary of the Xinhai Revolution and the Wuchang Uprising.

But no matter. Even though the US doesn’t officially recognize the government of Taiwan, we still celebrate and have Chinese food every 10th of October.
— 30 —

I was fortunate(??) enough to be one of the first Americans in china when the U.S. was in negotiations to re-establish diplomatic relations with mainland China in 1972. I traveled to China from Manila in the Philippines. I Flew to Hong Kong from Manila, took a train to the border, crossed into China, a train to Canton and flew on a Russian built bomber that was configured to hold passenger seats instead of bombs  to Peking (not Beijing that time.)

One of the many things that I noticed back then was the (almost) total lack of color — everyone wore beige or gray “Chairman Mao” suits. The exception was that occasionally small children wore colorful clothes..

Before I get too far, a bit of background — although most older people know already…. Chairman Mao, or more properly, Mao Tse-tung was a Chinese communist revolutionary and the founding father of the People’s Republic of China in 1949. In addition to being the founding father of the PRC, Mao was also a poet and political theorist — his Marxist-Leninist theories, military strategies and political policies are collectively known as Maoism or Marxism-Leninism-Maoism. From 1949 until 1972, China was pretty much a closed society to the western world.

In 1972 Chairman Mao was still very much in control and tributes to him were everywhere. When we arrived in Peking, we drew large crows of people… they were very orderly and kept their distance, but they seemed to just want to see us. I’m sure part of this was our dress, which stood out from the crowd, but also that we just looked different — we weren’t Chinese. Many had never seen someone that didn’t look Chinese. Anyhow, everywhere we went , we drew a crowd.

Chairman Mao’s presence was everywhere. Mao published a very famous book, “Chairman Mao’s Little Red Book.” It contained Mao’s philosophy and quotes about almost everything. The books were printed in just about every language on earth and distributed freely on the streets.

Since I was one of the first to visit China, I naturally tried to find gifts for family and friends. One Sunday afternoon I passed a clock shop. All the stores in Peking were much like many stores when I grew up… all the merchandise was in glass cases or on shelves on the wall behind counters. You had to ask the merchant to help you and hand you the item you wanted to touch or examine. Anyhow, in the window of the clock shop was this bright red alarm clock with a picture of the Red Army being led up a hill with someone waving Chairman Mao’s Little Red Book (see the picture.) The book waved back and forth to count the seconds. Well, I decided this would be a perfect gift to bring to our families and a couple of friends. I went into the store and the Chinese man behind the counter was very helpful. I bought six of the clocks. Each came with a “guarantee” that was beautiful — it consisted of gold Chinese writing on a black background. The man carefully told me all about the guarantee in excruciating detail — in Chinese. And — he told me all about it six times as he filled out the guarantee for each and every clock. He put each clock (along with its guarantee) in a box. As far as I could tell, there were no paper bags in Peking in 1972. He stacked the boxes one on top of the other and tied them together with string. I took my purchases back to the hotel and put them in my room, not giving them any more thought. Later that night, after I’d gone to bed (actually it was 2 o’clock in the morning) all the alarms went off!! Six very loud alarm clocks…it certainly got my attention, and probably half the people on the fourth floor of the hotel.

I’ve thought about that over the years and I’ll bet the shopkeeper still tells the story of this American that came in and bought six alarm clocks… I can just hear him now “… and I set them all to go off at 2 a.m.”
The only thing he could have done to improve on the prank is to have set them to go off an hour apart…
— 30 —

A couple of days ago we celebrated our friend Anne’s birthday and today our neighbor’s kids are having a party. Anne is in her 80s and the neighbors are probably 3 or 4. We went to a favorite restaurant to celebrate with Anne; the kids have a blow-up bouncy house on their lawn.

I don’t remember our kids having anything fancy like a bouncy house on their birthdays but I remember they usually had a party of some kind. One year Claire came up with a Cookie Monster costume and one of our neighbors dressed as the Cookie Monster as a surprise for the kids. I’m not sure where she got the costume but one of Cookie Monster’s eyes kept falling off… one of the kids kept saying it wasn’t the real Cookie Monster, there was a man inside…
I think having the Cookie Monster was about as fancy as we ever got… mostly the kids just showed up and with any kind of luck, we tried to play some games, the kids opened their presents and everyone got cake and ice cream.

When I was a kid, you just had a party. Your friends came, maybe played a game or two, had some cake and left. There were no “themes” for parties — if you had a birthday party, it was a birthday party…. just like everyone else had. I remember one time when my mother (who may have been ahead of her time} decided on a cowboy “theme” for my birthday. She sent out hand-made invitations inviting everyone to a roundup at the “Lazy J” Ranch. She even made a sign over the driveway, identifying our house as the Lazy J Ranch. Everyone was supposed to wear western attire and we were to play Cowboys and Indians (that was a popular game back then.) Well, of course, no one understood it… no one wore “cowboy” clothes, or brought their “guns” or “bows and arrows” — because, well because it was a birthday party. You only wore birthday party clothes and played birthday party games at a birthday party.

As usual, there’s no real point to this entry… I just happened to remember my roundup party at the Lazy J Ranch, when I noticed the activity next door. Birthday parties, like everything else, have changed — probably for the better.
— 30 —

Seems like a lot of people we know, or at least know their relatives, have recently, or are going to have twins. I read somewhere that between 1980 and 2009, twins birth rates rose 76 percent. I was going to do some extensive research into that, but I decided that it wasn’t something that I wanted to spend a lot of time researching. One article that I browsed over indicated that the increase might possibly be due to the fact more women over the age of 30 are having babies (apparently older women are more likely to have twins — who knew?) Another theory chalked it up to the use of fertility drugs that also supposedly contribute to the birth of twins.

In case you’re wondering how/why I decided on this particular topic today, I guess it’s now ok to say that we are going to be grandparents again. In fact, the number of grandchildren we’ll have is about to double. Dave and Chassie are expecting twins — they’re both girls and they are identical. That’s absolutely all I know about it, so don’t bother calling or e-mailing me for additional details.

I read the other day that the new iPhone X won’t have a fingerprint sensor, it’ll use “face recognition to unlock the phone. A question was asked (and never answered to my satisfaction) if identical twins could unlock each other’s iPhones…I’ll let you know the answer to that in a few months. Accessing the phone with the fingerprint sensor doesn’t pose a problem, because identical twins don’t have identical fingerprints — fun fact number one.
More twins are born in Massachusetts than any other state. Connecticut and New Jersey round out the top three. New Mexico has the fewest twin birth rate. Fun fact number two.
About 25 percent of identical twins develop directly facing each other — in other words, they become exact reflections of one another. They may be right and left handed, have birthmarks on opposite sides of their bodies, etc. Fun Fact number three.
Mothers of twins may live longer (or maybe it just seems longer) — the theory being that women who gave birth to twins were very strong and healthy to begin with, so were likely to live long lives. Fun fact number four.
Forty percent of twins invent their own language.What sounds like babbling may actually be cryptophasia, a language developed between twins that only they can understand. Fun fact number five.

But whether any of these “fun facts” are true or not, we’re super excited to be getting two new grand babies. There’s all sorts of joke and rhymes about twins, like double the giggles and double the grins, or two to argue, two to cry and other “two” analogies along with things like “double the trouble,” but in reality there’s two to love. Obviously Dave and Chassie will have their hands full, but that doesn’t compare to what will fill their hearts.
As I said, we’re super excited to have twins in the family and while they may look alike, we won’t lose sight of the fact that they’ll both be one of a kind…..
— 30 —

We have a somewhat “famous” place here in Shepherdstown called the Bavarian Inn. It’s restaurant serves German food and people come quite a distance to dine on their favorite German dishes.

Every year the Bavarian Inn holds a German festival, known as — your guessed it — Oktoberfest. This year it was held on September 17… in fact it’s held in September every year. So you’re probably asking why, if it’s called Oktoberfest, it’s not held in October. I’ve often wondered that myself over the years.

The first time I ever experienced an Oktoberfest was in Germany. I think the original, and probably still the biggest and best known, is held in Munich. However, the only Oktoberfest festival I ever attended in Germany was in Frankfort. Apparently the magnitude of the Frankfort festival doesn’t compare to the one in Munich… but it’s pretty big!!
This year, the real Oktoberfest (in Munich) began on Saturday, September 17. At noon on that day, the Mayor of Munich tapped the first keg of Oktoberfest beer. The mayor tapping the first keg of beer officially starts Oktoberfest. The mayor declares, “O’ zapft is!” (“It’s tapped”.) Once that first keg is tapped, the first person to get a beer is traditionally the Minister-President of the State of Bavaria, but after that, all visitors are allowed to quench their thirst. This year’s festival ends on October 3 (officially at 11:30 pm.)

So how did these festivities get started in the first place? Well, in 1810, Bavarian Crown Prince Ludwig married Princess Therese von Sachsen-Hidburghausen, and all the citizens were invited to the celebration. Since then, the festival has grown to include horse races, games, rides, music and — beer. It’s interesting that originally the celebration did not include beer. In the festival’s early years, beer was only served outside the fair, or festival, grounds. Of course that’s no longer the case — now more than 7.5 million liters are consumed each year.
Oktoberfest regulations say that the only beer that can be served for the celebration must be from one of Munich’s six breweries — Paulaner, Spaten, Hacker-Pschon, Augustiner, Hofbrau, and Lowenbrau. And, like all other German brews, Oktoberfest beers must pass the “purity” law or Reinheitsgebot, which was passed in 1516 to ensure the beer’s quality.

When there’s a 16-day long beer festival, some people, or a lot of people, are bound to have one pint too many. When someone passes out from too many beers, the locals call them “Bierleichen” — or, “Beer Corpses.” I saw many of them at the one Oktoberfest I attended in Frankfort. In fact, you could hardly walk for all the Beer Corpses. The protocol seems to be, you just step over them and carry on….

So back to wondering why Oktoberfest begins in September… by moving the festivities up, it allowed for better weather conditions. Because the September nights were warmer, visitors were able to enjoy the gardens outside the tents and stroll over “die Wiesen” or the fields much longer without feeling chilly. Historically, the last Oktoberfest weekend was in October and that tradition continues today. Having better weather is also nicer for the Beer Corpses when they come back to life…..
— 30 —

Well, here be me most favorite holiday again — Talk Like a Pirate Day. Today everyone around here will be calling each other ‘me hearties,’ be donning their finest eye patches and pulling the usual shenanigans that they do every year. Needless to say me and me wench Claire have been lookin fore t’ it since last year.

Both my favorite readers know I get very excited about today every year. But on a serious note, the day is more than just saying aaargh a lot and using ye instead of you. Even though many people just substitute ‘me’ when they usually use ‘my’ and celebrate by having a drink, for those of us who honestly wish that we had been pirates, it’s a day to reflect on what could have been… and especially today, we can can imagine ourselves the image of swaggering pirateness.

Even though some think pirates just ran around looting gold and causing terror on the seas, pirates like every one else, had their own personal problems. So today is also for celebrating and forgetting your woes.
Happy TLAP Day, me hearties!!
— 30 —