Lost Note

Thanksgiving Week. Is it just me, or has this year simply flown by?

Hey, I had one of those compact fluorescent light bulbs (CFL) burn out on me recently. I know there's a wee spot of mercury in them so you can't just toss 'em away or throw them in the regular recycle bin.

Which led me to this site.

By the way, Home Depot has the country's largest CFL recycling program.

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A policeman was patrolling the streets of Dublin late one night when he noticed a man down on his hands and knees by a lamp-post.

He strolled over, inquiring, "And what might you be doing?"

"Sure and I've dropped a ten-pound note, Constable," explained the man.

Upon hearing this, the police officer also drops to his hands and knees and begins searching. After a few minutes, he asks the man, "Are you sure you dropped it here?"

"I didn't drop it here," comes the reply. "I dropped it in the next street over."

"Are ye daft, man?" exclaims the policeman. "What the devil are you looking in this street for?"

"Because the light's better here."

[selected from lightbulbjokes.com]

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WORD for YOUR WEEK: Did you every "mollycoddle" someone? Our old friend Latin gave us "calere" which meant "warm" and later used in "calidium" which was a warm drink Around 1300 in France and Western Europe that became "caudel" and about 300 years later it was known as "caudle," which was what they called a warm drink for invalids. The process of "coddling" is to gently warm a liquid - usually water - until it is almost, but not quite, boiling. You generally cook eggs at that temperature, so you get coddled eggs. In the mid-1700s someone added the "molly" to the front of the word. Molly was a nickname for Mary at the time. The word was originally used as an insult and a noun. To be a "mollycoddle" was to be an old, infirm woman. Now we generally use the term to mean we are treating someone gently, or gingerly. (Just as we would treat an old, infirm woman. Hmmm. The circle is complete.)

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