According to popular mythology, male celebrities (and especially leading men on the big screen) are supposed to be tall, dark, and handsome. But many a successful actor, filmmaker, and singer has risen to great heights in the industry without having his head in the clouds—including some larger-than-life action heroes. Speaking as someone who can see […]

When we first toured our current apartment, one of the delightful things we discovered is that it had a lemon tree in the backyard. Once we moved in, we tried to think of all the things we could make with lemons, and we found quite a few, including sugary lemon bars, freshly-squeezed lemon juice, lemon […]

Although the name William is very common, there does seem to be a preponderance of poets with that name, including many from my list of favorites. Did the parents of Blake, Wordsworth, and Yeats hope that their sons would grow up to be great poets in the same mold as their famous predecessor, William Shakespeare? […]

This is the fourth entry in our series of IKEA lists. I have great affection for the wonderful epithets Shakespeare coined for his plays; his linguistic dexterity and wit seem to shine most brightly when he is putting these put-downs in the mouths of his characters. There are too many to list from his plays (see […]

Since the pop song was invented, its’ creators have often relied on a common and limited vocabulary in both lyrics and title (e.g., “love,” “baby,” and “yeah”). This is probably a smart tactic, introducing a new song by using a familiar sentiment; rarely does a song with a very strange name or lyrics gain public […]

Taking as a starting point my short list in Museums of Interesting Things at Interesting Thing of the Day, I set out to discover other small museums that specialize in just one specific (and typically rather odd) subject matter. I thought I’d find a few more; it turns out there are dozens. Here’s a mere […]

For some reason, hair salons, more than most other kinds of businesses, tend to come up with names involving bad puns. There’s the ever-popular Curl Up and Dye, which appears in numerous cities, and many other names involving plays on words like cut, snip, shear, and head. Here for your amusement are some actual salons […]

Recently I read an article about the history of the San Francisco neighborhood I live in, Glen Park. In its early days it was known as “Little Switzerland” because of its hilly terrain and the presence of several Swiss-owned dairies in the area. This inspired me to find other examples of Switzerland comparisons, and I found […]

There seems to be a trend lately of parents choosing names for their children that may be considered more traditional. I think this may be a backlash against decades of popular baby names that were newly coined or given new spellings. It’s interesting to see that there are some names that remain popular from one […]

It seems like every time I go to buy toothpaste there are fifty new kinds to choose from. Offering endless combinations of properties (whitening, tartar control, breath-freshening, cavity protection, sensitive teeth formula) in a vast array of media (paste, gel, liquid gel, sparkle gel) and flavors, I usually opt for my old standby, plain mint […]