What really stunned you as a kid? I'll start with 2 things

* I was in grade school in the 40s. One day our homeroom teacher asked us if we had seen the flags flying at half-mast. It was because the owner of the world had died.

I just sat there stunned, thinking that I didn't know anyone owned the world. Then she said the owner of 1 of the 2 major newspapers in town--the World--had died.

I'll never forget how I felt when she so calmly informed us that the owner of the world had died.

* In the early 50s I was reading the magazine Look in the living-room. Suddenly I came across an article about the Dionne quintuplets. I sat there in angry disbelief. Then I said to my Mom, why didn't anybody ever tell me that women could have 5 babies at once!? I felt betrayed, feeling that this had been kept from me. I was maybe 10 or 11 and was in that period when a kid is learning about the world. 5 babies at once!?!

Does anyone wear a muff anymore? Know what one is?

Vaguely remember having one as a little girl in the 40s.

Read on internet they were common in US until the 50s.

Dish rag and dish cloth--the same thing? Just regionally or generationally different?

Have read that term 'cultural Marxism' comes out of the anti-semitic swamp. Anyone else seen this?

Books to escape today's world? What would you suggest?

*Some years ago I found Louisa May Alcott's An Old-fashioned Girl very soothing. It does contain the social ideas of the 19th century, so some may not enjoy it.

*Georgette Heyer mysteries.

!?!? Women riding bicycles will get 'bicycle face' and a 'heavy jaw' late 19th century campaign

Bicycles gae wome freedom they had not had before. This new freedom was totally unacceptable to many!

Found at PZ Meyers blog pharygula. He links to the Twitter thread that contains 19th century rants against women riding bicycles.

?!? A Rep from AL quoted Mein Kampf on House floor today?!?

Stated by commenter at balloon-juice

What is 'chlorinated chicken'? Seems US cannot export it to EU but could to post-Brexit UK

Heard about this watching James O'Brien's attempts to explain the problems post-Brexit UK will have at the border between the Republic of Ireland and Northern Ireland.

As I understand it, he claims we wash chicken carcasses in chlorine to try to destroy the stuff that sticks to them because of the filthy way we raise them. Is this true? Do most people in US know this, and I haven't been paying attention?

?!? Evangelical Rick Wiles is very anti Israel and anti Christian Zionist?!?

His show TruNews can be seen on youtube.

He's had many shows attacking John Hagee, leader of US Christian Zionists.

He's had shows against moving US embassy to Jerusalem and against giving the Golan Heights to Israel.

He seems to be operating from a very anti-semitic worldview. Very weird coming from a prominent Evangeical preacher in today's US Evangelical environment.

Many Evangelicals believe/have been taught that the Koran was dictated by demons!!!

Libby Ann in her blog Love,joy,feminism at patheos discusses this in her 3-21-19 post on the Christchurch massacre. As she says, if you believe this, it is easy to believe that Muslims are evil and must be destroyed.

Libby Ann is no longer Christian, but she was raised in an Evangrlical home and church and was home-schooled. She states that this is what she was taught.

I am stunned. From birth in 1940 to college graduation in 61 I was in SBC churches. I never, ever heard such an idea. I suspect this may have developed after Evangeicals became aware of Islam as a world force after the fall of the Soviet Union as a threat.