Yes, Friends, are YOU feeling a bit bleary-eyed this morning?
If so, I bet you were up late last night watching the annual "Yummies" award ceremony live from Hollywood USA, no less !!!! My wife Lois and I elected to pass on this one and go to bed at our usual time, but we were up early this morning to get the results in this morning's Onion News. Maybe you did the same?!!!
And the story unquestionably sends a wistful smile to the lips of my wife Lois and me as we start the day here in semi-leafy Liphook, Hampshire UK, no question about that!
me and my wife Lois - some recent pictures
Fruits - be they bananas or not - are certainly on Yours Truly's mind this morning, because the date of my mini-presentation on "funny fruits" is looming large, because I've only got a week or so before I have to give it online. Yikes!!!!
Not all species are lucky enough to be able to dine, like us, sitting at a table in front of the TV, however, as we learn tonight from this week's edition of QI XL, the comedy science quiz show, presented by Sandi Toksvig, where we learn some fascinating facts about the eating habits of the starfish, a creature which initially looks like a creature with five legs:
"But where's the little guy's mouth, Colin?", I hear you cry!
Hence, perhaps, the standard question that a starfish couple might ask each other every evening - "Are we eating out again tonight, darling?"
Let me put my cards on the table at this point. [I wish you wouldn't keep doing that, Colin! - Ed]
While I'm studying up on my fruits, Lois is studying a bit of Intermediate Latin (as you do!). We're both members of the local U3A Intermediate Latin for Old Codgers group.
"For my sins" I'm the leader of the local U3A Intermediate Languages for Old Codgers group, and it's our monthly online meeting on January 16th, during which members have asked me to give them a presentation on "funny fruit words in English".
flashback to last September: I queue up behind a bunch of other
"old codgers" seeking to join the local "Intermediate Languages
for Old Codgers" group
For my upcoming presentation, I've discovered a few things already, but hardly enough for a 60-minute address. So if YOU know any words for fruits or interesting facts about them, please drop me a line - postcards only !!!!
Up till a thousand years ago, there were only really 2 words for fruits in English, which was okay because most of today's fruits weren't known about, coming as they do from hot countries. The larger fruits were all called "apples", and the smaller ones "berries". What madness, wasn't it !!!!!
Dates were called "fingeraeppla" (finger-apples) bananas were either "appels of paradis" or "earth-apples". And when it says in the Bible that Eve "tempted Adam with an apple", it could easily have been a pear or a melon, because those words didn't exist in English at the time.
Eve tempting Adam with an apple - or was it a melon perhaps?
Later, when people travelled further in the world, they, for example, discovered tangerines (first encountered in Tangiers, Morocco). The word "peach" was a mangled pronunciation of "Persian", and "currant" was a mangled pronunciation of "Corinth". Grapes were so-called because you had to "grab" them with a hook, allegedly (!).
Also in my researches today, I discover that the tomatoes, an Aztec fruit, was originally not eaten either in UK or US, and only used for decoration, being thought to be poisonous. However, Spaniards and Italians had no such qualms, it's reported. Thomas Jefferson introduced them in the States 1789, but Americans initially remained unconvinced, and didn't start eating them in large quantities till around 1830, by which time they must have "gone off", surely?
I think we should be told, don't you!
In those far-off days there was also great fear about traders and sailors contracting scurvy, known to be caused by the lack of fresh fruit. The Portuguese, Spanish, Dutch and Arabs planted citrus trees along trade routes, which must have looked nice!
The British Navy, on the other hand, gave sailors lime-juice (lime-water), hence the word 'limeys' applied to British sailors in Australia, Canada and New Zealand, and later in the US.
What a crazy world they lived in, in those far-off times !!!!
Today, Tuesday, however, is a great day for study, for both me and also Lois, today, as the snow is still on the ground, and more falls this morning. We're hoping that the rain forecast for tonight will "slush" all that snow away (no pun intended!!!), and we'll wake up to a different world tomorrow, all being well. But we'll see.
snow falling on our tiny back garden this morning
Our group meetings are a bit in abeyance at the moment because Joe, our leader, is in hospital in Portsmouth with back issues, although the latest word is that Joe is itching to get back in the saddle, so we suspect it won't be long before group meetings resume.
It's difficult for Lois, who's having to do the most "catching up" with her Latin. We both joined the group only recently, and we're very much the "newbies", because the other members pretty much have been in the group for years, and all know each other really well: we call them "Joe's harem", because they tend to fuss over Joe a lot, making sure he's all right, and feeling fit enough to take the class etc etc.
flashback to a typical meeting of Joe's "Intermediate Latin for Old Codgers" group,
Joe writes on the whiteboard while his devoted existing members "Joe's Harem",
Lois and I call them (!), fuss over him and check he's feeling okay etc etc
- what madness !!!!
It's possible that Lois may give up on the group, because it's a lot of work for her catching up with everybody else - she did a Wheelock's Latin course, but it was some years ago.
My guess is that she'll persevere, however. She's nothing if not determined, and she hates to give up on a goal, once she's set it for herself. So we'll see!
flashback to June: I showcase Lois's old copy of "Wheelock's Latin"
Watch this space! [Latin: hunc locum observa!!!]
19:00 After a hard day's study, and the snow still on the ground outside, it's nice to relax this evening with another helping of Lois's stew that she made a couple of days ago, followed by another slice of her delicious 2025 Christmas Cake - yum yum!
(left) flashback to a couple of days ago: Lois prepares a stew,
and (right) she sorts out two helpings of her 2025 Christmas cake - yum yum!
However, the starfish is actually all head. Scientists looking for the head gene found that it was all over the little fellow, even in the tips of the 'arms'. There was no 'torso gene', it was completely missing. And if you define a leg, or a foot, as an organ of support and locomotion for the body, then a starfish has 15,000 feet: tiny tube feet, which are all over the starfish's body, so basically it's all head and lots and lots of feet.
"But where's the little guy's mouth, Colin?", I hear you cry!
Well, the starfish mouth is at the centre of the underside, as you might expect, but they have a peculiar way of eating, to put it mildly.
Hence, perhaps, the standard question that a starfish couple might ask each other every evening - "Are we eating out again tonight, darling?"
What a crazy world we live in !!!!!
Will this do?
[Oh just go to bed! - Ed]
22:00 We go to bed - zzzzzzz!!!!
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