wherehaveallthebloggersgone

Boxing day. I am not boxing. A am waiting. Waiting for some people to arrive. So to fill in the waiting time I checked the blogs. No new blogs. No new comments. Blog it all. Where are all the dovetale bloggers? Must've been busy shopping, wrapping presents, baking, visiting, Christmas caroling, etc.etc.

Slowly, slowly the days are getting longer. Not noticable yet, but we know. The days are lenghtening. The year is coming to an end. 2006 waiting at the threshold.

Oh, by the way, wanna know where the word threshold comes from? In earlier days the floor of poor people's houses was dirt. Hence the saying, "dirt poor." Wealthy people had slate floors. Slippery when wet. They would spread thresh (straw) on the floor to keep their footing. The thresh would keep slipping out of the door and they'd keep on adding more thresh. Then someone thought of placing a piece of wood in the entrance to keep the thresh from slipping out. Hence the saying "threshold".

One of my favourites is: In early days at bath time, one hot tub was filled. Father got to go in first to wash. Then the sons and any other men. Then mother and children. Babies came last. By that time the water was so dirty that you could loose someone in it. Hence the saying, "Don't throw the baby out with the bathwater."

I have more. But I will spare you those for now. Enough education for one boxing day. I like language and am always interested in origins. For the Dutch language I have a book that traces all the folkhabits, histories, etc. from way back, to the words and phrases we use. I have not been able to find such a book for the English language. Except a page in a newsletter, recently, where I have been quoting from here.

Don't anyone get too drunk parting with the old year, collapsing into the new. Make sensible (Ha, how boring!) resolutions over turkey soup and turkey sandwiches. Before you know it the sun will shine again.

netty

Spilling the books, er... beans... or whatever...

A few postings back, M@ blamed the stupid snow (as opposed to the smart snow) for his not making it to a DoveTale Writer's group editing session. Well, it was indeed pretty nasty weather--

But then in the middle of his posting, he tantalized us with an announcement he had intended to make that night, but that he couldn't (because of the stupid snow, I gather) and we'd have to wait until better weather to hear it.

Okay, fellow bloggers and bloggettes, I'm going to spill the beans (where the hell did that expression ever orginate??? Meaning to tell a secret?), and ask M@ to tell us more...

M@ heard the good news (as opposed to bad news) that his military novel is getting published this spring (when all the snow is gone, I presume...).
~Marianne