Happy Holidays everyone, wherever and whatever you celebrate. See you all on the other side.
- "Gamer in residence" is an actual job title at the Glasgow Children's hospital. The employee visits patients to play video games with them, offering social interaction, preventing boredom, and distraction during invasive medical procedures. (Dream job alert!)
- The 3 musketeers got its name because it originally contained 3 different bars, flavored strawberry, chocolate, and vanilla. During world war 2, sugar was rationed and became impractical to produce 3 different flavors, so strawberry and vanilla were eliminated.
- The word for the hole in a sleeve is called an "armscye." Many people mistakenly believe the spelling "armscye" derives from the phrase "arm's eye" which makes more sense in modern English. This mistake is called an "eggcorn" which comes from the mistaken belief that the word "acorn" derives from the words "egg" and "corn." (So "eggcorn" is itself an eggcorn)
- Snake oil is a euphemism for something fraudulent or fake, but some research has shown that the original snake oil would actually have been therapeutic due to high omega 3 fatty acids found in cold blooded animals.
P.S. If 4 things isn't enough for you, Tom Whitwell posted his annual 52 things I learned in 2024. Tom's writing is what inspired me to start doing this in the first place.