5/6/10 Where did the name Missionary Position come from?
When nineteenth-century European Christians set out around the world to convert natives, they discovered people making love in what they considered undignified positions, says Lawrence Paros, author of The Erotic Tongue: A Sexual Lexicon. The missionaries advocated the face-to-face male-superior position for those who wished to avoid the fires of hell. So it was dubbed the missionary position. Interesting huh?
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4/28/10 Why do Bra sizes go AAA, AA, A, B, C, D and so on?
Well it all started with a bad guess. "In 1935, Warners was the first company to introduce cup sizes, and they called them A, B, C, or D," says Colette Wong, an assistant professor at the Fashion Institute of Technology. " But then they found that the A cups were too big for some women. Having no letter before A to turn to, they went with AA and AAA. That makes sense right? Well how aout the fact that there are several letters AFTER D? Why was the next biggest size introduced as DD and not E? "We found that women were afraid of being too big," says Maidenform fit specialist Fran Musante, who's been in the bra biz for 39 years. "Even if they were spilling out of their bras, they would buy a C cup instead of a D." Think of a DD, then, as a psychological comfort zone for those who were spilling out of the D-cup bras.
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4/21/10 Why do we put candles on Birthday Cakes?
Back in the Thirteenth-century German peasants were the first to celebrate children's birthdays with burning candles, because they symbolized life, according to Charles Panati, author of Extraordinary Origins of Everyday Things. The birthday kids was surprised at sunrise with a cake topped with one candle for each year of his or her age. They also added an extra candle to celebrate life. The candles were kept burning and replaced as needed all day long (I wonder if the cake ended up covered in wax?) After dinner the child would make a wish, blow out the candles and then the cake would be served. A custom was born!
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4/15/10 Why do we wear our Wedding Rings on the fourth finger of the left hand?
This tradition is traced back to the ancient Egyptians. They believed that a vein they called the Vena amoris (the vein of love) ran directly from the heart to the tip of the 4th finger on the left hand. Really, no such vein exsists. It's a sweet thought though!
3/31/10 Why is getting married called Tying The Knot?
"In many ancient cultures, including at Celtic, Hindu, and Egyptian weddings, the hands of the bride and groom were literally tied together to demonstrate the couple's commitment to each other," says author Roney. The ends of the tying material- be it silk, cotton, or alpaca- were twisted into a knot. The tradition might have died out, but the saying remains.
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3/27/10 Why Do We Buy Piggy Banks Instead of Cow Banks?
According to Straightdope.com, a trivia website, the old pre-Shakespearean word pygg (pronounced "pug") meant a kind of clay used to make kitchen pottery, which people used to throw their spare change into. As the English language evolved, the y started to sound more like an i and less like a u, and crafty craftsmen began designing their pygg pots in the shape of pigs.
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3/17/10 Why Do Men's Clothes Button On One Side And Womens Clothes On The Other?
"Men have always dressed themselves. Since Most people are right handed, left over right became the standard for men's buttons", says the Fashion Institute of Technology's Blackman. "The upper-class women in Victorian Europe had servants to dress them. That's why women's clothes button right over left."
Why Do We Shave Our Armpits?
Women have been removing body hair since 500 B.C. Here in America though, the drive to depilate didn't begin until 1915 after a Harper's Bazaar story on sleeveless dresses instructed women to remove unsightly underarm hair. Then came the Wilkonson Sword company. They manufactured men's razors. Once they recognized this once-in-a-lifetime marketing opportunity, they launched a big ad campaign to push the idea that underarm hair was unattractive and unhygenic. Their razor sales doubled within 2 years!
