Category: –

Sunday

There are many individual stock markets throughout the world, but by volume and total value, the largest is the New York Stock Exchange.

Monday

Why are these large animals fighting on Wall Street? A “bull market” is one which is on the rise with stocks increasing in value, while a “bear market” is one of falling stock values, generally a loss of at least 20% below a recent peak. The traditional explanation of invoking these animals relates to how each strikes in battle: a bull thrusts horns upward at an opponent, while a bear swipes its mighty claws downward.

Tuesday

The Nasdaq is the world’s second largest stock market after the NYSE, was fully electronic since its creation in 1971, and tends to trade more tech-intensive and growth-focused stocks.

Wednesday

Business partners Charles Dow and Edward Jones created the Dow Jones in 1896. It is an index of thirty established and consistently-earning companies, traded on both the NYSE and Nasdaq, which serve as a proxy for the broader economy.

Thursday

Another common index is the “S & P 500,” which includes the largest 500 stocks from the NYSE and Nasdaq. S & P is for Standard and Poor’s, a company formed from the 1941 merger of Poor’s Publishing and the Standard Statistic’s Bureau, companies which had been publishing credit ratings, financial data, and market indicators. The McGraw-Hill Company later bought S&P in 1966.

Friday

A stock’s shortened “ticker symbol,” such as “MSFT” for Microsoft Corporation, is named for the pre-digital days when stock prices appeared on ticker tape, a practice which began in 1867.

Saturday

In a four-year period starting in October 1929, the US stock market lost nearly 90% of its value, leading to the Great Depression.

Sunday

“Top brass,” which now indicates the highest-level leaders in an organization, is based on the metal decorations used by officers in European militaries.

Monday

The Bronze Age, which lasted from about 3300-1200BC in the Fertile Crescent, was called that because earlier stone tools were replaced with bronze in many Middle Eastern civilizations. Copper had long been in use by that time, but the addition of tin to make the stronger alloy bronze brought these civilizations out of the “Stone Age” and was followed by the “Iron Age.”

Tuesday

In the classic film “The Wizard of Oz,” the Tin Man is first encountered when immobile with rust, and is thereafter afraid of watery things. However, tin does not rust. Only iron, or iron-containing metals, rust.

Wednesday

Winston Churchill coined the term “Iron Curtain” to describe the post-WWII divide between more open democracies in western Europe and the more closed-off Soviet-controlled states.

Thursday

“Tin Pan Alley” refers to types dance music, ballads, and vaudeville songs that began in the late 19th century and were named for the “tin pan” sound of pianos as the musicians promoted the songs for the concentration of music publishers originally found on 28th Street between Broadway and Fifth Avenue in Manhattan.

Friday

Only one metal – mercury – also bears the name of a planet and a Roman god. Unfortunately, that planet is uninhabitable and that metal is toxic.

Saturday

An accident with actual metal played a major role in the birth of heavy metal music. At age 17, future Black Sabbath guitarist Tony Iommi was working as an industrial welder. Assigned to an unfamiliar guillotine-type machine one day, he lost the tips of two fingers in an accident and nearly quit playing guitar completely. However, he created his own prosthetic fingertips and changed his guitar tuning and playing style to accommodate them. This became the deeper, darker sound associated with his pioneering band and the heavy metal genre as a whole.

Sunday

“Dinosaur” is derived from the Greek words for “thunder lizard.”

Monday

The name of the water-loving hippopotamus comes from the Greek words for “river horse.”

Tuesday

And “rhinoceros,” fittingly, is Greek for “nose horn.”

Wednesday

“Helium” comes from the Greek “helios” or “sun,” which is indeed full of helium, and is the name of the sun god.

Thursday

“Acrobat” derives from the Greek words for “edge” and “to walk / tread.”

Friday

The three Charities (or Graces) in Greek mythology originated the word “charity.”

Saturday

“Cemetery” derives from the Greek word for “sleeping place.”

Sunday

Plans unlikely to be realized are called “pipe dreams” in a reference to the dreams of opium users, since this drug was often smoked with a pipe.

Monday

Saying “pipe down” to encourage quiet seems to trace back to an officer ordering that a pipe whistle be blown on old sailing ships to either have the crew go to sleep or go below deck after a disturbance.

Tuesday

In an apparent reference to multi-piped musical instruments such as bagpipes and organs, a person with a “set of pipes” has a strong speaking or singing voice.

Wednesday

Despite being traditionally associated with Scotland, the bagpipes were likely introduced to Scotland by the Romans, with roots in ancient Egypt before that.

Thursday

“Pied” in Old English meant multicolored, so in the legend of The Pied Piper, the musician was wearing an outfit of many colors.

Friday

The term “pay the piper,” meaning to finally face consequences, is related to this same legend. When the townspeople of Hamelin reneged on their promise to pay the piper who lured the rats out of their town, he took revenge by also luring their children away.

Saturday

Water pipes made of lead, as they had been for decades, are now known to be a serious health hazard. In the US, lead pipes are restricted by federal law and hundreds of millions of government dollars have been set aside to replace old lead pipes.

Sunday

At one time, there was a custom in the US and Canada in which someone seeking a fight would place a chip of wood on his shoulder and whoever knocked it off was agreeing to fight him. Hence the saying that an aggressive or antisocial person “has a chip on his shoulder.”

Monday

Among deep-fried potato products, what Americans call “chips” the British call “crisps,” and what the Brits call “chips” Americans call “fries.”

Tuesday

In the traditional set of blue, red, and white poker chips, blue are the highest value and the namesake for “blue chip” stocks, the well-established, and fiscally sound companies on the stock market.

Wednesday

Poker is the origin of several chip-related terms. To “chip in,” or help with a collective effort, comes from the ante in poker where all player contribute to the winnable pot. Likewise, “when the chips are down,” referring to a crucial moment when fortunes and circumstances can change quickly, is a poker reference to when card hands are revealed to determine who won.

Thursday

Before most common-usage poker chips were plastic, they were clay, and later a clay composite which added strength. Chips of clay composite or ceramic remain common in casinos. Further back in time, individual gambling houses might have used their own chips of bone, ivory, shellac, paper, or some other material before the chip designs and values were more standardized.

Friday

Describing “a chip off the old block,” for children who are similar to the parent, is a notably old term, with an apparent origin in the 15th century.

Saturday

That adventurous cartoon chipmunk duo is called Chip & Dale and the famous muscular male dance revue is Chippendale’s, but the original Chippendale (and apparent namesake) was London cabinetmaker Thomas Chippendale, who designed intricate furniture that became popular in England and colonial America.

Sunday

FLOPS = Floating-Point Operation Per Second

Monday

QLED = Quantum Light-Emitting Diode

Tuesday

WLAN = Wireless Local Area Network

Wednesday

FIOS = Fiber Optic Service

Thursday

COBOL = Common Business Oriented Language

Friday

FORTRAN = Formula Translator

Saturday

GIS = Georgraphic Information System

Sunday

Regardless of engine size, all cylinders must be firing for a car to work at full capacity. Accordingly, people said to be “not firing on all cylinders” are not thinking or performing at an expected ability.

Monday

Since a dime is the smallest American coin, to “stop on a dime” means to be able to stop so quickly you land on this tiny area, and can apply to cars or other fast-stopping things.

Tuesday

To “burn rubber” means to accelerate so that your tires smoke and leave marks on the pavement. This idiom came into use in the mid-20th century and was a product of the automotive age, since it is hard to imagine an animal-pulled vehicle accelerating this quickly!

Wednesday

The term “four on the floor” refers to both a vehicle with a four speed manual transmission near the driver’s seat and also the very steady 4/4 beat popular in disco and later dance music.

Thursday

Unreliable cars are called “lemons” because that term was applied to any product of poor quality in the turn of the 20th century, but by the 1960s, with the help of a Volkswagen ad, the term was mostly reserved for sub-par vehicles. States now have “lemon laws” on the books requiring certain standards in used car warranties.

Friday

Putting the “pedal to the metal” is another mid-century car term for accelerating to the maximum. This term started in the 1950s when many cars had metal floorboards under the accelerator pedal.

Saturday

Until 1988, vehicle titles were printed on pink paper in California, which gave rise to the term “pink slips” for these titles. “Racing for pink slips” is a familiar movie term indicating that the loser must sign over his or her car to the winner.

Sunday

The sport of baseball derived from cricket and the children’s game rounders, and references to a game played with sticks, balls, and bases go back to at least the 18th century. However, most of the basic rules of the modern game were established in 1845 in New York City by Alexander J. Cartwright. Among other things, he established that runners must be tagged out rather than the previous (and dangerous) method of hitting them with the ball.

Monday

Basketball began at Springfield College in Massachusetts over the winter of 1891-92. James Naismith, a teacher who had come to study under physical education pioneer Luther Halsey Gulick, wanted to honor a directive from his mentor to create a new game “that would be interesting, easy to learn, and easy to play in the winter and by artificial light.” The two square boxes Naismith asked the school janitor for were not to be found, but two peach baskets were, and these became the original two nets.

Tuesday

Although football was derived from rugby and influenced by soccer, “father of American football” Walter Camp developed the rules to differentiate it from both sports, from his first conception of the game at Yale University in the 1880s and while personally developing the rule book until his death in 1925.

Wednesday

Bandy, hurling, and shinty, the games which are the most direct ancestors of modern ice hockey, were played in England, Ireland and Scotland since the 1400s, though other “stick and ball” games were played among indigenous Americans, ancient Greeks, and Egyptians long before that. Bandy was likely played on ice without skates in the 1600s, then later with skates by the 1700s, and balls were later replaced by “cork-bungs” or barrel plugs, the precursor to the modern puck.

Thursday

“Jeu de paume,” a French game played since the 11th century, was the ancestor of modern tennis, which got the name from “tenez!” or “here it comes,” said to an opponent upon serving. Through the centuries, however, bare hands were replaced by a racquet, a rubber ball became the norm, the unique scoring system was standardized, and the courts went from grass to “hard” courts of concrete or acrylic.

Friday

Like many modern sports, golf also has roots in ancient games played all over the world, but the closest relative of modern golf came from 15th century eastern Scotland with players hitting pebbles with clubs. At one point, the game was banned for fear players would neglect their military training against the frequently-invading British. When the ban was lifted and royalty later adopted the game, its popularity blossomed, and by the 20th century standardized rules and governing bodies had been established worldwide.

Saturday

Bowling goes back over 7,000 years, with evidence of similar games going back to ancient Egypt and Polynesia. In the case of the latter, the standard lane length was 60 feet…the same as today. When played centuries ago in Germany, the game also had religious significance, and variations spread across Europe. Notably, this game, like golf (see above) had to be temporarily banned for distracting archers from their shooting practice, this time in England. English, Dutch, and German settlers helped bring the game to the U.S., where a tenth pin was added.

Sunday

NATO = North Atlantic Treaty Organization

Monday

FAQ = Frequently Asked Questions

Tuesday

FOMO = Fear of Missing Out

Wednesday

BYOB = Bring Your Own Bottle/Booze/Beer

Thursday

UNICEF = United Nations Children’s Fund, originally United Nations International Children’s Emergency Fund. (Consider donating below!)

Friday

OCD = Obsessive Compulsive Disorder

Saturday

HIV/AIDS = Human Immunodeficiency Virus / Acquired Immunodeficiency Syndrome

Sunday

Things which occur rarely are said to happen “once in a blue moon.” A blue moon is the second full moon in one calendar month, and it need not actually appear blue. It happens about every 2.5 years.

Monday

A “blood moon” often refers to the way the moon appears during a lunar eclipse, when it passes through Earth’s shadow. The light which illuminates the moon has filtered through our planet’s atmosphere, resulting in a red or brownish-looking moon.

Tuesday

When the moon is both full and closest in its orbit to the Earth, the result is often called a “supermoon,” which is a bit larger and brighter than other full moons.

Wednesday

The full, bright moon which occurs nearest the first day of autumn is sometimes called a “harvest moon” because it previously allowed farmers to harvest large fall crops into the night.

Thursday

Even though the Earth is much larger and more likely to be hit by meteors, many burn up in our atmosphere or otherwise have their craters erased by erosion, tectonics, or volcano action. The moon has no atmosphere, weather, active volcanoes or tectonics, so its surface is full of impact craters new and old.

Friday

It takes the moon about 29.5 days to go around the Earth once, and it takes about 365 days for the Earth to go around the sun. Since 29.5 x 12 = 354, our calendar months are longer than lunar months so as to fit 12 months more equally into a year.

Saturday

The visible phases of the moon go from right to left in the Northern Hemisphere, but left to right in the Southern Hemisphere.