What's the Real Story?

The microwave oven is a wonderful time saver. When you want to defrost a chicken, warm up a bowl of soup, pop some popcorn or cook an instant burrito, you can’t beat microwave technology.

When someone tells you that you have a frog in your throat, that person is letting you know that you sound terrible. Your voice is raspy and dry, and you’re probably having a hard time speaking. So, is there some magical tale about how this expression came about?

Hopefully you’ll never be tried by a kangaroo court. And no, that doesn’t mean the jury will be made up of boxing marsupials.

We’re not talking about giving someone a parakeet for his or her birthday. We’re talking about flipping someone the bird, or the middle finger — a time-honored insult that has been around for thousands of years. Here’s a little more information about how this very telling gesture got started, in all its variations.

There seems to be a holiday for every member of the family these days, but none is probably more important than Mother’s Day. What daughter or son would dare forget the woman who gave birth to them? With that in mind, here are a few historical tidbits about the origins of Mother’s Day.

When you have to ‘cut through the red tape,’ it means your have to slog through lots of bureaucratic mud in order to achieve the goals you set out to achieve. How did tape — colored tape at that — come to represent the headaches that mounds of paperwork, unpleasant clerks and by-the-book functionaries cause us when we’re trying to get something done?

When a newly married couple exits a church, a synagogue, a courthouse or wherever they’ve just tied the knot, people often shower them with rice (not the sticky kind, of course). Most of us have seen this in the movies or in real life. If you’re wondering how this grain-throwing tradition came about, don’t fret. We’re going to tell you.

One of the first rides parents usually let kids enjoy by themselves is the gentle horse carousel, or merry-go-round. Carousels, which seem very safe and wholesome, have drawn families in for years. For many of us, they bring back fond childhood memories. But how did they first come into our lives?