Uncle John’s 24-Karat Gold Bathroom Reader®

by Bathroom Readers' Institute

Here are the origins of some common phrases.

  HAVING KITTENS

  Meaning: To be extremely anxious

  Origin: “Dates back to the medieval belief in the power of witches. It was thought that witches could perform a spell on a pregnant woman by turning her baby into kittens that would scratch at her womb. It is possible to imagine the kind of fear that would have gripped the ‘victim’ in more superstitious times. However, as our superstitions have diminished, we have been left only with this strange image.” (From March Hares and Monkeys’ Uncles, by Harry Oliver.)

  JUST DESERTS

  Meaning: A punishment or reward that is deserved

  Origin: “The phrase has its origins in the obsolete word ‘desert,’ meaning that which one deserves. In use since at least the 1300s, it is commonly seen in print as just desserts, as in the sweet final course of a meal. It is pronounced this way, but the spelling is incorrect.” (From Exploring Idioms, by Valeri R. Helterbran.)

  GET THE SACK

  Meaning: To be fired from a job

  Origin: “In 17th-century France, mechanics traveling in quest of work carried their implements in a bag, or sack. When discharged, they were literally handed the sack so that they could put their tools in it and seek a job elsewhere.” (From Dictionary of Phrase and Fable, by Ebenezer Cobham Brewer.)

  GOODY TWO-SHOES

  Meaning: An overly virtuous person

  Origin: “Goody Two-Shoes is the name of the main character in a children’s story called “The History of Little Goody Two-Shoes,” which was published in 1765 in London. She lived most of her life with only one shoe, but when she received a second shoe, she was so overjoyed that she ran around yelling ‘Two shoes! Two shoes!’ until nobody could stand the sight of her.” (From Complete Idiot’s Guide to Weird Word Origins, By Paul McFedries.)

  Only 2 U.S. presidents, William Henry Harrison and Zachary Taylor, died in the White House.

  SAVE ONE’S BACON

  Meaning: To prevent an injury or loss to oneself

  Origin: “The phrase arose as a metaphor from the necessity of keeping the household’s winter store of bacon protected from scavenging dogs. In this sense its meaning is to prevent a loss.” (From Flying by the Seat of Your Pants, by Harry Oliver.)

  CUT TO THE CHASE

  Meaning: Get to the point

  Origin: “In the early days of film (late 1920s to 30s), the term meant to cut (edit out) the boring parts and get to the excitement: the chase scenes. By the late 1940s, the term had gone from an editing direction to a figure of speech.” (From Let’s Talk Turkey: Stories Behind America’s Favorite Expressions, by Rosemarie Ostler.)

  BY THE SEAT OF YOUR PANTS

  Meaning: Without the necessary experience

  Origin: “Back when pilots didn’t have so many navigation instruments, they relied on feedback from the plane itself through the point of greatest contact: the pilot’s pants. British Royal Airforce pilots used the term ‘fly by the seat of your trousers’ in World War II and American pilots borrowed the phrase, switching ‘pants’ for those starchy British trousers.” (From I Love It When You Talk Retro, by Ralph Keyes.)

  THE LUNATICS HAVE TAKEN OVER THE ASYLUM

  Meaning:Those who should be regulated are running the show

  Origin: “In 1918, three of film’s greatest stars—Charlie Chaplin, Mary Pickford, and Douglas Fairbanks—together with director D.W. Griffith, founded a movie studio of their own, to be called United Artists. When the news reached the head of Metro Pictures Richard Rowland, his reaction was: ‘The lunatics have taken over the asylum.’” (From Who Said That First?, by Max Cryer.)

  A bottlenose dolphin’s outer skin replaces itself every 2 hours—9 times faster than a human’s.

  SEE YOU AT THE IGLOO

  Few sports fans call stadiums or arenas by their official names (Qualcomm Park? Really?) True fans use colorful, locally derived (and often derisive) nicknames...like these.

  STADIUM: Minute Maid Park

  HOME TEAM: Houston Astros

  STORY: It was once called Enron Field, but Coca-Cola bought the naming rights when Enron famously collapsed in 2001. Coke then named it after Minute Maid, its subsidiary that primarily packages orange juice. Add to that the fact that the Astros wear orange uniforms, and the fact that the park is one of the smallest in Major League baseball, and you get...The Juice Box.

  STADIUM: Cleveland Stadium

  HOME TEAM: Cleveland Indians

  STORY: For years a rumor persisted that the stadium, which opened in 1931, was built to help persuade the International Olympic Committee to hold the 1932 games in Cleveland, but that clueless planners broke ground after Los Angeles had already been awarded the event. In truth the stadium, constructed near Lake Erie, was built for the Cleveland Indians, not the Olympics, and was meant to attract commerce to downtown Cleveland. Still, it’s never shaken its nickname: The Mistake by the Lake.

  ARENA: Verizon Center

  HOME TEAM: Washington Capitals

  STORY: Verizon, a cell-phone service provider, owns the naming rights to the arena, prompting fans to call the building The Phone Booth. That’s kind of ironic, because cell phones have actually brought about the widespread disappearance of phone booths.

  ARENA: Prudential Center

  HOME TEAM: New Jersey Devils

  STORY: Prudential Insurance, which is headquartered in Newark, New Jersey, and holds the arena’s naming rights, has been using the Rock of Gibraltar as its logo since the 1890s and introduced its most famous advertising slogan, “Get a piece of the rock,” in the 1970s. It makes sense that the Prudential Center’s nickname, then, would be The Rock.

  Bestselling pharmaceutical drug worldwide: aspirin.

  ARENA: Civic Arena

  HOME TEAM: Pittsburgh Penguins

  STORY: The arena is round and painted white. And it’s filled with ice because a hockey team plays there. So despite the fact that real penguins live in Antarctica, while igloos are found only in the Arctic, the Mellon Arena is nicknamed The Igloo.

  STADIUM: Wrigley Field

  HOME TEAM: Chicago Cubs

  STORY: Cubs fans are among the most loyal in sports, despite the team not reaching the World Series in more than 100 years. And one of the most popular Cubs of all time was Ernie Banks, a Hall of Famer whose positive attitude (despite his team never winning a championship) earned him one of his nicknames, “Mr. Sunshine.” Banks gave the stadium its nice nickname, The Friendly Confines.

  STADIUM: Tropicana Field

  HOME TEAM: Tampa Bay Rays

  STORY: The NHL’s Tampa Bay Lightning played there in the 1990s. And the building is a dome, earning it humorous comparisons to the bloodsport arena from the 1985 movie Mad Max Beyond Thunderdome. So, since lightning goes with thunder, fans call it The Thunderdome.

  STADIUM: Lambeau Field

  HOME TEAM: Green Bay Packers

  STORY: One of the most famous games in NFL history, the “Ice Bowl,” was played there in December 1967: The Packers and the Dallas Cowboys played on frozen ground amidst frigid winds and a –15°F temperature. Sports Illustrated writer Tex Maule equated Lambeau Field with the Arctic tundra. But when the game was discussed in season highlight films for both teams, narrators referred to the field as The Frozen Tundra, and the nickname stuck.

  The world’s largest igloo, built in Wisconsin in 2010, was big enough to hold 200 people.

  STREET SONGS

  For generations of kids, the songs on Sesame Street were the first pop songs they ever heard. Here are the stories behind some favorite ones.

  “CIS FOR COOKIE”

  In 1971 Sesame Street mastermind Jim Henson, puppeteer Jerry Juhl, head writer Jeff Moss, and chief song-writer Joe Raposo decided to write a sketch for every letter of the alphabet. One of the Muppets’ biggest hits was the song they came up with for C: “C Is for Cookie,” sung by Cookie Monster (Frank Oz) while sitting on a giant letter C, with a monster chorus singing operatic background vocals. Raposo w
rote the song, which debuted on a Sesame Street album in 1971 and aired on TV in 1972. Raposo was also the original inspiration for Cookie Monster. He was a ravenous fan of cookies—so much so that when he died in 1989, his family had a milk-and-cookies reception instead of a wake.

  “MAHNA MAHNA”

  This song is more famous from The Muppet Show. It was the basis of the very first sketch on the very first episode in 1975: A crazy-looking jazz singer puppet named Mahna Mahna (pronounced “ma-náh ma-náh”), dressed in a green fuzzy vest, with wild orange hair, sang the nonsense song “Mahna Mahna” as he bounced on, off, and around the screen. But the song debuted on episode 14 of Sesame Street in 1969, as performed by a puppet named Bip Bippadotta. (It also made quite an impression when the Muppets performed it on The Ed Sullivan Show that same year.) The premise of the sketch was always the same—the nonsense words “mahna mahna” repeated over and over, sung calmly at first, then veering wildly out of control. It’s one of the few well-known Sesame Street songs not written specifically for the show. It was actually written by Italian composer Piero Umiliani for a the 1968 movie Sweden, Heaven and Hell—a soft-core porn film.

  “I” is for inflation: A birdseed milkshake on Sesame Street cost 20¢ in 1969. In 2010: $2.99.

  “BEIN’ GREEN”

  In 1970 producer Jon Stone asked Joe Raposo to “write a song for the frog,” meaning Kermit, and gave him educational guidelines for the lyrics, a common practice on the show. Stone said it had to be about making kids feeling special and unique. He even gave Raposo some lyrics to work from. Raposo hammered out a song in which Kermit laments being green because it’s ordinary, but ultimately realizing that it’s beautiful. The lyric, “It’s not easy being green,” became a catchphrase in the early 1970s, and was also interpreted as an anti-racist sentiment. Although many of the lyrics used in “Bein’ Green” were written by Stone, he didn’t ask for a songwriting credit. Raposo ended up being listed as the sole writer of the song and Stone lost out on millions in royalties.

  “CAN YOU TELL ME HOW TO GET TO SESAME STREET?”

  Jon Stone wanted the show’s theme song to build momentum and excitement—exactly what an opening song should do. “Running happily, tumbling, playing along the way, but always intent on getting to Sesame Street,” is how Stone put it in his memoir. He liked the catchy, toy-piano-driven sing-song melody that Joe Raposo and co-writer Bruce Hart came up with but hated the lyrics—he thought they were trite and full of clichés (“Sunny day, sweeping the clouds away”), with references he felt would be dated, like “everything’s A-OK,” which Stone derided as “astronaut slang.” Nevertheless, it’s been the theme song for the show’s entire run (although it was remade several times—most notably as a calypso version in 1993 and a hip-hop version in 2007).

  T IS FOR TRIVIA

  • “Sing.” This Raposo ballad, about trying to do things even if you’re afraid you aren’t good at them, was written for the show in 1970 and was sung on the show in English, Spanish, and even sign language. It’s the most-performed song on Sesame Street. (It’s been sung by more than 50 performers.) The Carpenters recorded it in 1973, and it became a #3 pop hit.

  • “Rubber Duckie.” While rubber ducks had been around since the 1890s (with the availability of cheap rubber), it wasn’t until this song was featured on Sesame Street in 1970 that they became really popular, becoming the definitive kids’ bath toy (as well as the mascot for a certain trivia book). The song itself was popular, too. Singing it as “Ernie,” Jim Henson hit #16 on the pop chart with “Rubber Duckie” in 1970.

  12% of magazine subscribers sign up using those loose subscription cards tucked in every issue.

  TOILET TECH

  Better living through bathroom technology.

  TAG, YOU’RE IT

  Product: Linen Trackers

  How They Work: The days of checking out of your hotel with your suitcase stuffed with the hotel’s bath towels will be a thing of the past if Linen Technology Tracking of Miami, Florida, has its way: The company has developed a washable version of those anti-shoplifter ID tags that sound an alarm if you take merchandise out of a store without paying for it. The tags can be sewn into towels, bathrobes, bedspreads, and anything else the hotel thinks you might be tempted to abscond with. LTT says that a Honolulu hotel that installed the system to keep track of its pool towels cut thefts from 4,000 towels per month to just 750—a savings of $16,000 a month. (If hotels pass the savings on to consumers in the form of lower room rates, you might save enough money to buy yourself some towels.)

  LOO-VER DAM

  Product: HighDro Power

  How It Works: Developed by a British graduate student named Tom Broadbent, HighDro Power is a small turbine that can be installed in the vertical drainpipes of high-rise buildings, which connect plumbing fixtures to the sewer system below. Every time a toilet is flushed or a sink is emptied, wastewater going through the drainpipe turns the blades on the turbine. The turbine is connected to a generator, which converts this mechanical energy into electricity. Broadbent estimates that a seven-story building fitted with the devices would cut its electricity bill by $1,400 a year, and that a big hotel could even make money by selling the energy back to the power company.

  RECYCLED CONTENT

  Product: Reusable Toilet Wipes

  How They Work: Not all toilet tech has to be high-tech.

  Biggest draw at the Harlekin Toilet Museum of Modern Arse in Wiesbaden, Germany: a WWII-era British urinal with Adolf Hitler’s face painted inside the bowl.

  Sometimes it’s nice to get back to basics...and sometimes it isn’t. Wallypop, a company whose goal is “supporting a natural lifestyle,” sells flannel and terrycloth toilet wipes for people who feel guilty about using toilet paper. The Wallypop website offers tips on how to incorporate the reusable wipes into daily life. After use, it says, “Shake, scrape, swish, or squirt off anything you don’t want in your laundry, then toss the wipe into a diaper pail or container.” Then, “in laundering poop-stained cloth, an important tip: wash them separately from other laundry.” Check! And finally, “This is not nearly as gross as you might be imagining.” (Yes, it is!)

  NO ESCAPE

  Product: “Billboard Mirrors”

  How They Work: Installed over restroom sinks, these 40-inch mirrorized video screens display advertising—high-definition video clips or still images—when no one is using the sink. Then, when someone approaches the sink, the ad shrinks until it occupies just a corner of the screen, enabling the person to use the mirror and, if they want, watch the commercial in the corner. TV ads in restrooms may seem like an unwelcome intrusion into one of the last places where a person can have a moment to themselves, but Clear Channel Airports, the company that introduced them at Chicago’s O’Hare Airport in early 2011, says feedback from the public and from advertisers has been positive. Don’t expect to see TV screens in toilet stalls anytime soon, though. The mirrors are intentionally installed only at the sinks to get “as far away as possible from the toilet and the negative connotations associated with that from the advertiser’s point of view.”

  THE SHOOTIST

  Product: The Sega Toylet

  How It Works: Why wasn’t this game system called the Wii? The Toylet is the latest attempt to turn a urinal into a video game. In early 2011, Sega installed these game consoles in a few public restrooms in Tokyo. A pressure sensor is installed inside the urinal; a video display is installed at eye level above it. “Players” aim for the sensor as they make use of the facilities. There are four games to choose from: “Manneken Pis,” which calculates the volume of urine released from the time spent urinating and the pressure generated; “Graffiti Eraser,” in which you use a virtual fire hose to spray graffiti off a wall; “The Northern Wind and Her,” in which you try to generate enough pressure (wind) to lift a girl’s skirt, revealing her underwear; and “Milk from Nose,” in which you try to generate more pressure than the last person who used the urinal. When the games
are over, the video screen plays an advertisement. The Toylets are experimental; Sega says it has “no concrete plans to turn them into actual products.”

  STOP AND GO

  Product: The “Don’t Flush Me” project

  How It Works: When New York City’s sewer system is deluged with rainwater during heavy storms, millions of gallons of untreated sewage can end up flowing into New York Harbor. The Don’t Flush Me Project, created by a graduate student named Leif Percifield, uses a sensor connected to a cell phone to keep track of water levels in the sewer system. When the levels rise close to the point of overflowing, the cell phone calls a computer, which alerts subscribers via text messages and Twitter tweets to hold off flushing toilets until the crisis has passed. Percifield hopes to one day install them throughout the city’s sewer system.

  GOING CLUBBING

  Product: The UroClub

  How It Works: Disguised as a golf club, this personal urinal allows golfers who suffer from “urinary frequency” to pee while out on the course. Developed by a urologist named Dr. Floyd Seskin, the faux 7-iron has a hollow shaft that can hold up to half a liter of urine—about twice the capacity of a human bladder. When nature calls, just unscrew the triple-sealed, leakproof cap at the top of the shaft and relieve yourself into the UroClub. Bonus: The club comes with “a removable golf towel clipped to the shaft that functions like a privacy shield!” Attach the towel to your belt or waistband and you’re ready for action. Some golfers actually credit the UroClub with improving their game: “I used to hit my ball directly into the woods so I could urinate,” one fan told Dr. Seskin. “You took five strokes off my game.”

  Only US town where mail arrives by mule: Supai, AZ (at the floor of the Grand Canyon).

  GEOGRAPHIC

  ODDITIES Q&A

  Here’s some obscure trivia about the world around us that you didn’t learn (or maybe forgot) in geography class.

  CHINESE CHESS

  Question: What is Formosa?

  Answer: It’s a small island off the coast of China, more commonly known as Taiwan. (A Portuguese sea captain sighted it in 1554 and called it Ilha Formosa, meaning “beautiful island.”) The nation that governs the island is also commonly referred to as Taiwan, but its official name is the Republic of China. This is not to be confused with the People’s Republic of China. That’s mainland China—with which Taiwan/the Republic of China is locked in an ongoing dispute over who really owns the island, and who is the real China. Mainland China was the Republic of China from 1912 until 1949, when the Communist party won the Chinese Civil War, and the government of the Republic of China fled to Taiwan. Today the Taiwanese government still claims that mainland China is part of the ROC, and the Communist PRC government claims that Taiwan is part of mainland China. The United Nations gave its “China” seat to the Communist PRC in 1971, making it the de facto “Real China” and relegating ROC/Taiwan to a small independent nation that has diplomatic relations with only 23 other countries.