Bull's Eye Business Writing Tips
Tip
# 271: Ever wonder where some of our
English sayings come from?
These
FREE weekly business writing tips
will help you improve your business writing.
Tip # 271: Ever wonder where some of
our English sayings come from?
Here are a few sent to me by Toby Archer Ehren:
Here are some
facts about the 1500s: Most
people got married in June because they took their yearly bath in
May and still smelled pretty good by June 20. However, they were
starting to smell so brides carried a bouquet of flowers to hide
the body odor. Hence the custom today of carrying a bouquet when
getting married.
Baths consisted
of a big tub filled with hot water. The man of the house had the
privilege of the nice clean water, then all the other sons and
men, then the women and finally the children - last of all the
babies. By then the water was so dirty you could actually lose
someone in it. Hence the saying, "Don't throw the baby out
with the bath water."
Houses had
thatched roofs-thick straw-piled high, with no wood underneath. It
was the only place for animals to get warm, so all the dogs, cats
and other small animals (mice, bugs) lived in the roof. When it
rained, it became slippery and sometimes the animals would slip
and fall off the roof. Hence the saying "It's raining cats
and dogs."
In those old
days, they cooked in the kitchen with a big kettle that always
hung over the fire. Every day they lit the fire and added things
to the pot. Sometimes they could obtain pork, which made them feel
quite special. When visitors came over, they would hang up their
bacon to show off. It was a sign of wealth that a man "could
bring home the bacon". They would cut off a little to share
with guests and would all sit around and "chew the fat."
Bread was
divided according to status. Workers got the burnt bottom of the
loaf, the family got the middle, and guests got the top, or
"upper crust."
Weekly Exercise:
We receive over 200 emails per
day. We encourage you to answer our weekly tips, but please, if
you are answering this weekly tip exercise, identify the tip
number in the subject line of your email.
Correct the
sentence below and explain what’s wrong with it:
Once we were
able to finally administer the venom, the police officer’s
condition began to quickly stabilize.
"Never
confuse activity with results." (Leo Gerstner, CEO, IBM)
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To send the
above exercise answers to Gloria for her comments and
review, copy the questions, paste them into an
email, answer them, and send to Marsha@basic-learning.com.
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These business writing tips brought to you
by:
Bull's Eye Business Writing 
10 Easy Guides for Getting to Your Writing Target
By Gloria
Pincu, M.A. , President of Basic
Learning Systems, Inc.
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To find out more about us:
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| Here are some books on business
writing that I recommend.
Bull's Eye Business Writing is
also available from Amazon.com.
| Eats,
Shoots & Leaves: The Zero Tolerance Approach to
Punctuation, author, Lynne Truss |
The
Everything Resume Book by Steven Graber |
| On
Writing Well: The Classic Guide to Writing Nonfiction
, by William Knowlton Zinsser |
The
Gregg Reference Manual, by William A. Sabin |
| The
Elements of Style, by William Strunk, White, E. B.
White |
How
to Take the Fog Out of Business Writing, by Robert
Gunning, Richard A. Kallan (Contributor) |
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More
books on business
writing and other
business subjects (available from Amazon.com). |
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Contact Gloria
Pincu at Basic Learning Systems, Inc.
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