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    Terms Which Have Disappeared

    On second thought, use of the word "Oriental" may have disappeared around the same time people stopped being described as "swarthy."
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    Terms Which Have Disappeared

    When the Orient Express quit running? And then there's Occidental.
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    Terms Which Have Disappeared

    Does anyone refer to "Orientals" these days? Asian is the term I hear all the time. Or the Orient? The mysterious Orient?
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    Terms Which Have Disappeared

    It is true that many things have their origins decades ago (but not light years). In fact, there was a television show, which aired decades ago, which featured the origins of some common technology in wide use today, like computers. I have a book on the subject but, well, you know, nobody reads...
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    "New" D-Day footage re-emerges

    I don't recall that my father avoided watching war movies. He generally never mentioned much about fighting, though, but he would talk about his experiences as a P.O.W. and never really had anything bad to say about it. He was prisoner for about a year and held captive in Mossburg, north of...
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    Why American Workers Now Dress So Casually

    That happens to me when I go to church sometimes. The only ones who are consistently dressed up are the ushers. The rector is vested, of course. But it seems like I'm usually the most over-dressed person at any function, which is not to say I'm well-dressed. Funny, but when I read the message...
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    "New" D-Day footage re-emerges

    My father, who took part in landings in Italy (where he was captured after a couple of months), described men on either side of him falling while he got through the whole thing without a scratch. He thought he was pretty lucky. In another war, one of my wife's distant relatives described being...
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    Old gas stations

    I didn't define limited government. I don't have that authority.
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    Old gas stations

    I don't know anything about straw men. The problem with limited government ideals, which I think I understand, is that there are a lot of governments. And the ones that make the most difference in your life is first the local government, then the state government and finally the federal...
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    Old gas stations

    So you think it would be better if a profit-making corporation ran things? New York and other larger cities are one thing. Everywhere else is another matter. The arrogance and sense of power can still be there, of course. But it's worse to have a large and wealthy neighbor who thinks he can do...
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    Old gas stations

    My late father-in-law also suggested that if the gas station manager liked you, he'd sell you extra gas if you really needed it. He told me that happened to him unexpectedly when he was home on leave from the Army Air Corps in 1943 or 1944, after which he went overseas. He said the man said it...
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    Old gas stations

    Although the system might have been difficult to game, as you put it, it gave the rationing board a lot of power, at least as far as gasoline went. The same thing was true for the draft board.
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    Old gas stations

    I don't remember anyone mentioning rationing when I was little, in the 1950s, when it should have still been a fresh memory. But maybe that seemed longer ago than I would have imagined. Anyway, they may have mentioned it after all. My relatives that lived in the same town all worked for the...
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    Old gas stations

    What kind of mileage would that station wagon have gotten in the 1940s? The vehicle I drive now averages between 28 and 29 miles per gallon. My old Ford would get almost but not quite, 40 miles to the gallon.
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    Deco Deliveries

    Would you believe I have seen more Ferraris and Maseratis than Porsche 911s in the last ten years? But the Cayenne model is fairly common around here, at least, and we, the company, even owned one.
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    Deco Deliveries

    Sometimes a product is promoted as a superior design (in all respects), yet really isn't as advanced as they would have you believe. And sometimes, it can be let down by a design or engineering shortcoming. There is also the matter of what might be called fads in design. One such fad, unless...
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    Why American Workers Now Dress So Casually

    As Robin Givhan wrote in mentioning a certain woman's high heels, it's not about comfort. Neither hers, nor yours. In some old book, it says that no one desires to wear special clothing except to win empty glory, that is, to seem to be more honorable than others. People do not want to put on...
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    Why American Workers Now Dress So Casually

    I'm not so sure that war time brings sensible, simple fashions. The Zoot suit appeared during WWII and was hardly a sensible, simple fashion. Likewise, dandies wearing exaggerated fashions appeared during the French revolution. On the other hand, the end of a major war can bring somewhat...
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    Looking For Wide Leg Jeans

    Ben Davis has something called gorilla cut pants, although they aren't jeans. But they're wide legged (without being bell-bottoms). Some logger jeans have fairly wide legs, too and are usually high-waisted. But they probably aren't as wide as you had in mind. In any event, they are neither...
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    Things that make you smile

    For a few years, Universal Studios began their films with an airplane flying around a cloudless globe. That was replaced by their name doing the same thing and, I believe, going in the opposite direction. I liked their serial productions from the 1940s. In contrast, RKO's globe was floating in...

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