Friday, May 21, 2010

baksheesh \bak-SHEESH\, noun:

1. A gratuity, present or tip.

2. A gratuity, tip, or bribe paid to expedite service.

verb:

1. To give a tip.

Baksheesh originally was a common term for a tip in Near Eastern countries such as India and Egypt. The Persian bakhshish, "gift," derives from the verb bakhshidan, "to give."

sticker shock

• A condition resulting from seeing the total price of a bunch of items and realizing the damage is much greater than you originally expected. May cause a person to have second thoughts about the purchase.

I wanted to book your mom for 7 days of her "services," but when I realized the total came to $21, I got major sticker shock and decided to bail out.

Trivia

In cowboy slang, what’s a skunk egg?

• An onion.

History

• Pagliacci: Leoncavallo's opera debuted in Milan (1892)

• Leopold and Loeb: two teenagers attempt to commit the perfect crime when they murdered 14-year-old Bobby Franks (1924)
• The Spirit of St. Louis: one-seater plane touched down as Charles Lindbergh completed the first solo non-stop transatlantic flight (1927); Amelia Earhart became the first woman to perform the same feat (1932)
• hydrogen bomb: first aerial detonation took place over Bikini atoll (1956)
• Rajiv Gandhi: former Indian prime minister was assassinated while running for reelection (1991)
• Susan Lucci: won her first Daytime Emmy award for Best Actress in the 19th consecutive year she was nominated (1999)

Berfdays, yo!

• Alexander Pope (1688-1744): English poet best known for his satirical verse and for his translation of Homer
• Henri Rousseau (1844-1910): naïve painter
• Willem Einthoven (1860-1927): physiologist who developed the EKG
• Andrei Sakharov (1921-1989): human rights activist and Soviet dissident who won the 1975 Nobel Peace Prize

• Leo Sayer (62): pop singer; musicians Fats Waller (1904-1943) and Bill Champlin (63) were also born on this date
• Al Franken (59): comedian and political satirist turned politician
• Lisa Edelstein (43): House's Dr. Lisa Cuddy; other entertainers born on this date include Richard Hatch (65), Carol Potter (62), Mr. T (58), Judge Reinhold (53), Nick Cassavetes (51) and Fairuza Balk (36)