Chock-Cheke-Chokken-Full

So I'm sitting here working on a piece of marketing material for my day job, and I implement the phrase "chock-full of valuable information!" ...Chock-full. What does that even mean?

Apparently I'm not the only one to wonder, because a bunch of answers are jumping for my attention when I type my question into Google (which has a wonderful tribute up today to the guy who created petri dishes, by the way). I now find myself staring at The Mavens' Word of the Day from Random House.

Though the page is dated January of 1998, I'm gonna go with it. I can't imagine that the origins of "chock-full" have changed much in the last 15 years if they haven't changed in the past several centuries.

The earliest versions of chock-full showed up in the fifteenth century as "chokkefulle" and "chekefull" and then disappeared! How a word disappears I have no idea, but apparently the early forms of chock-full did. When it reappeared two centuries later, it was in the form of "choke-full" and "chuck-full."

Choke-full? Chuck-full? What kind of word is this?? Chuck-fill makes me think of vomit and full makes me think of, well, full. So I have an image of a vom filled bucket sloshing around in my mind. /gag. And Choke-full? Well that's just weird.

There is speculation that the word as we know it today means "cheek-full" as in "cheeks stuffed full like a squirrel." The Old English word for cheek could apparently be where the original "chokke" or "cheke" came from. I can maybe buy into that.

Oh, this other theory is that the "chock" part of chock-full represents Middle English "chokken" which means "to cram" which is from an Old English word "to thrust" and apparently that all boils down to "chock-full" meaning "crammed full!" I like  this explanation!! Crammed full is a synonym of chock-full, so it not only makes the most sense but it seems the most rich in its history. Three wordly ancestors for "chock." Now that's cool.

There's some other bits on Mavens' Word of the Day about chock representing the ancestor of choke and the compound becoming "full to the point of choking," which, I mean, I have been there--I ate two plates of pork chops, broccoli, and potatoes last night and thought I was going to chuck-full for a good four hours--but I don't like this meaning as much as the second.

I think from now on I'll write "chock-full" as "chokken-full." You know, as a throw back to Middle English. And to confuse people.

I'll probably leave it modern for this marketing material, though... Something tells me my boss wouldn't find "chokken-full" to be as cool as I do.

A Slice of History at the Saco Drive-In

I'm 25 years old and, despite the fact that I grew up 20 miles from one, up until last summer, I had never been to a drive-in movie theater. When I did finally go, it was the most exciting movie experience of my life. A cool summer night, a giant screen, a blanket, and a double feature... I felt like I had stepped into the movie Grease--and I loved it. It was extra meaningful to me because Jon took me there on a date and it felt like so much more than just dinner and movie. It was actually special, thoughtful, quirky, fun.

We went back for opening weekend this year and for 15 bucks saw Iron Man 3 and Oz. If we had gone to a regular theater, tickets alone would have been more than that for just one film. Not to mention buying dinner if we went to Smitty's would have been another $30 and concessions at Cinemagic probably wouldn't have been much less than that. The price of a date night at the drive-in is ridiculously low. They have a really cool concessions building, too, which also has a really 50s vibe to it, complete with glass bottle sodas.

This weekend is Memorial Day Weekend and the drive-in is playing Star Trek and Oblivion. Gates are at 7:15 and the first film starts rolling at 8:20. They're also going to be open for Friday, Saturday, and Sunday night. Considering most theaters make their money off of concessions, and that a lot of people bring in their own refreshments to the drive in, staying open for a third night may prove harmful to profits--but they're doing it anyway. They're doing it for the people who voted, "yes, please stay open for the third night this week," on the Saco Drive-In Facebook page. I'm going to go to the drive-in this weekend, I'll be going on Sunday, and I'll be purchasing from the concession stand.

But the Saco Drive-In needs our help to remain in operation. They are having trouble getting feature films this year because everything has transitioned to digital and the Drive-In is still running an old 35mm projector. If they want to get the films that people will pay to see, and, eventually, any films at all, they need to upgrade to a digital projector. The cost of which is close to $80,000. Without upgrading to digital, the Drive-In will not be able to continue functioning. The Saco Drive-In will close.

I just learned today that the Saco Drive-In was the first drive-in ever built in Maine, the 17th drive-in ever built, and is now the second-oldest, still-operating outdoor movie theater in the entire country. And it's right here in Southern Maine!! How can we stand by and let this historical drive-in become another empty parking lot??

I love the Drive-In. I just found it a year ago and I don't want to lose it now. We can save the Saco Drive-In. Spread the word! Donate $5. Every penny counts!

Check out this keepMEcurrent.com article for more information about the Drive to Save the Saco Drive-In. Share this post, share the link to donate, share the article, go to the drive-in this weekend, like their Facebook page, buy a T-shirt, donate fundraising ideas, there are plenty of ways to save the drive-in!

CLICK HERE TO DONATE SAFELY AND SECURELY TO THE CAUSE!

When you're looking at movie listings for this weekend, stop and think... Oh the Drive-In! Trust me, it's a wonderful experience--and at $15 a carload, how can you possibly beat it?

Why White People Can't Dance.

I have faith in the internet. I have faith that I can ask the internet anything I need to know and get the answer. And because of that faith, I feel I can ask the internet: Why can't white people dance?

I know, I know, how cliche can I get? But really, I need to know. Because it's widely true. When you go out to a club, at least any club I've ever been to, you're guaranteed to witness the following:

1. White ladies on the dance floor, wiggling their arms around--usually over their heads--and gyrating their shoulders off beat from their hips while their bodies sway back and forth in an attempt to gain momentum to swing their hair around in a sexy manner. They are generally doing this with other white ladies who also can't dance or with black men.

2. Black men with that rhythm and groove that is smoother than a baby's ass, dancing with white ladies who can't dance but with the assistance of said black men can produce a semblance of dance--a sort of almost deep, primal mating ritual.

3. Black ladies who can dance--and who know they can dance--who laugh, roll their eyes, or get annoyed at the white ladies who can't dance taking up the dance floor. Sometimes they will take pity and guide the rhythm-less white ladies into dance-phoria.

Where are the white men, you ask?

4. At the bar, with popped collars or loosened ties, staring at the dance floor with envy and apprehension.

Yes, I'm generalizing. Obviously there are exceptions to these rules, but, Christ, not many. Roll with me on this one.

Wikipedia can't help me here. So I turned to Google and came across this essay, Why, I Say, White People Can't Dance (And, Yes, It has to Do with Race/Culture/Rhythm, Appreciation, & Respect). The essay gets a little convoluted toward the end, but the author starts out strong by pointing out that dancing is a language whose words are movement and grammar is rhythm. In general, white people have learned a different language than black people and therefore express themselves in the language of dance differently.

I have to say, that's a pretty good explanation. I'm having one hell of a time trying to find any other, and trust me, I'm looking. Another really fantastic point made is that the preconceived notions that we have about our bodies really define how we translate our movements into rhythm and dance.

Think about it: white culture is largely conservative. Any Native culture--be it African, Native American, or Australian Aboriginal--is foreign to white European Americans. Breasts bared? No way! Rites of passage that involve sex in front of the elders? Absolutely not! Peyote around the smoke circle while the drums beat? Forgetaboutit!

We seem to have started out ashamed of our bodies in this country. We banned "provocative" dance moves at points in time, made sex a sin, and considered anything less than "proper etiquette" to be barbaric. White people owned black slaves in this country and therefore, any way the slaves acted was considered below the white people and not proper. Therefore, why in the world would white folk want to learn to move their bodies in the same beautiful, unabashed, creative way that black folk did?

Sure, this is mostly my speculation, but I think it makes sense. There's no scientific reasoning why white people can't dance. Not all white people can't dance. Not all black people can, for that matter. It's just a wide generalization which is based in truth, so it has to come from somewhere. I say it comes from hundreds of years of conservative snobbery.

It's a culture thing. Think Will versus Carlton. Rhythmical dance doesn't fit into a Tiffany's 5x7.

Psychic Popcorn

I remember sitting at the lunch table in Junior High School with the other girls, dreaming of the days when  we'd finally become women, when we'd bloom--blossom, flower, menstruate, bleed. There were candid discussions about pads versus tampons, how many holes were down there, and how much red was enough red to be considered womanly. Well, when the time came and the Fantastic Five and I actually started getting visits from Aunt Flow, our faces were probably redder than our underwear.

We immediately decided we needed code words for tampons, pads, and, the ugliest word of all, period.

Period became "popcorn," and tampons and pads morphed into one and became "microwaves." Now, I can't tell you where in the blue hell these code words came from because I have no idea. I'm not sure any of us would remember now. It just happened that way. I do know that period became "popcorn" first, and in need of something that made sense to say with the word popcorn in public, we settled on "microwave." So if we were in the cafeteria or art class or whatever and we started our periods and needed a device to stop the flow, we'd simply say, "I need a microwave for my popcorn."

In the middle of gym class, "Hey! I just got popcorn. I need a microwave."

"Oh sure! Let me get it from my backpack for you!"

Really awkward; I know. In retrospect, it probably would have made more sense to ask for popcorn from each other than a microwave. It stuck for a long while, but years passed as they have a tendency to do and as we got older, we cared less and popcorn became a distant, vintage memory.

Which is why, when in 2004ish, sitting in a dimly lit parlor in Salem, Mass across from a psychic who had just asked me what "popcorn" meant to me, I was slightly taken aback.

"Popcorn?"

"Yes, popcorn. I'm seeing the word popcorn."

"I just don't know... Popcorn..."

Then it hit me... POPCORN! I was old enough to have mostly forgotten popcorn but still young enough to be too mortified to tell this old man psychic that popcorn was code name for period. I didn't tell him and so we moved on, but I've always wondered about that day. Of all the words he could have chosen, how did he pull the word "popcorn" out of thin air?

According to my wonderful Wiki, psychics utilize extrasensory perception to feel out information that is hidden from normal senses. ESP is that "sixth sense" you sometimes hear people talking about. Now my Wiki tells me that in 130 years of psychic existence, there is no scientific evidence that psychichism is a real thing. While that may be true, I have a hard time believing that there is just no such thing as psychics.

What I went to was a "cold reading," which, according to Wiki, is a reading where a person walks in off the street, gives no details to the psychic, and the psychic uses their powers of observation to make high probability guesses about the person being read. But asking me what the word popcorn meant to me? That is just way too big of a coincidence; of all the things he could have gleaned from focusing his ESP on me, he chose that??

I don't think any amount of indicators from my clothing, race, gender, level of education, etc, etc, could have pointed that psychic in the direction of "popcorn." Do you?

A Hairy Situation

When I was in junior high school, I had this group of friends that some referred to as "The Fantastic Five." Five of us girls, from strikingly different backgrounds, who somehow came together to be an anti-clique clique. We had our fearless leader, we had our bully, we had our bad girls, we had our good girls faking bad, etc, etc. This group of girls got me to do a lot of things I don't think I would have done otherwise. I mean, I'm not saying that it's not my own fault that I mooned Route-One mid-summer, or sneaked out of the house to visit boys, or found out what alcohol was at 13--what I'm saying is, I was a dork before I befriended them and dorks weren't cool, and peer pressure is a bitch, and I wish I'd staved it off to stay a dork. 

Well, I didn't. And there came a point in seventh grade when it became very uncool to have arm hair. I'm not sure where this pandemic spread from first, but it hit our group hard. I have, what I thought at the time was, very hair arms. Looking down at them now, that makes me laugh because I've seen hairier arms on babies. Anyway, in the Fantastic Five, it was shave your arms or exile. Or so it seemed at the time. 

I remember standing at the sink at one of the girls' house, there were three of us there. We had a bag of disposable razors and we dulled two of them shaving my arms. Now I'm not talking wrist to elbow, no. I'm talking fingertip to shoulder and every last centimeter of skin in between just in case! Absolute craziness! I remember the girl whose house it was got mad at me because it took two razors to get through my hairy arms and it was her demand that I shave them to begin with! If I'd suddenly felt bad about having "hairy" arms before, now I felt ashamed, too.

Eventually, arm shaving died out like every other fad in junior high school. And thank the gods, because it looked really stupid to have prickly arms and it was a nightmare to shave your arms every other day. Once I stopped shaving my arms, though, I noticed that they were hairier than ever! And I actually had little hairs growing on my hands where I'd never had them before. I was a girl and I was sporting hairy knuckles! 

Staring at my hands and arms now, I am reminded how much I dislike tween girls for talking other girls into doing stupid things like shaving their arms for months for no reason, or, you know, stealing bracelets from little shops, or whatever. But I am curious, does shaving hair really make it grow back darker or thicker? 

My arm hair now is pretty light. I think it's permanently bleached from the sun I get in the summer. But I swear it was much darker when it first grew back 10 or 11 years ago. And I know I didn't have any hair on my fingers before I was told to shave them too, or if there was hair, it wasn't enough that even I could notice it. 

Well, according to the Mayo Clinic, shaving has no effect on hair. Except to make it disappear, of course. But, aha, because shaving blunts the tip of hairs, when it grows back it can appear darker, thicker, or more noticeable than it was before. 

I checked with Snopes, too, because obviously one source isn't enough when the origins of my hand-hair is at stake. Alas, they confirm what Mayo told me: my hand hair has been with me all along. Stupid genetics.

Ho-Ho-Hoax

So there's this rumor floating around on the internet, this meme, that in Maine, there is a law forbidding its inhabitants from keeping their Christmas lights up after January 14th.

Now I remember, when I was growing up, my neighbors put up their lights in November and kept them up through, like, February at least. Naturally, I was curious, and since it's 10pm in May, I'm not going to call up the police station and ask them about Christmas lights. So I did a little digging.

According to an article by the Portland Press Herald, there is no law! And when I Googled it, 9 out of 10 articles were in support of this bogus law. As the article points out, the rumor was even picked up by Fox Business News as the second dumbest law in the US.

Fox broadcasting false information? Nooooooooo! Never!

Less Than Three

A question that's been burning inside me all week: why are hearts shaped like this <3, when they don't actually look a thing like that?

I am attempting to challenge myself and do my own research fully instead of pulling from Wiki. Let me tell you, there is a lot of stuff out there on heart lore. So much so that I don't know where to begin or what to tell you and not tell you.

I guess I'll start at the beginning. According to an article called The Shape of My Heart, in the seventh century B.C., there was a rare plant called silphium. I guess it was a form of birth control that was quite profitable for the city-state Cyrene (an ancient Greek colony found in present-day Libya). Being such a core source of income for Cyrene, the folks decided to put a picture of its seed on their coin. The seed apparently had a similar shape to the less-than-three heart we're so familiar with today and because the plant was associated with birth control and sex, it eventually became the symbol of love. Somehow. I think this is all hilarious because each time I read "silphium" I hear "syphilis" (because obviously every word that starts with s and has a ph in the middle and relates to sex is the same word as syphilis) and if that's the symbol of love, so help us all.

Onward, to the Catholic Church. I suppose I should have started with them because they always put themselves first so I should too, right? According to The History of the Heart, in the late 17th century, a Saint named Margaret Marie Alacoque had a vision of the <3 surrounded by a thorn crown. Yet, centuries earlier, the heart was used in many stained glass windows and cloister decorations. Apparently all of this means that in Christian world, the <3 is symbolic for Jesus' soul.

Further inquiry reveals a more down-to-earth heart tale. One of ancient people making a botched attempt at recreating the pumping organ on paper.

So those are my options? An ancient birth control plant, a bad drawing, or Jesus' soul?

I'm beginning to rethink my use of the <3 symbol.