Apestail

Apestail (pronounced eypse–teyl)

A name for the symbol “@”, adapted from its Dutch name.

1990s: An adaptation of the Dutch word aapestaartje (literally “little monkey's tail”, coined as a jocular term for the @ symbol, the etymology reflecting the symbol's spiral or curled shape, said to resemble the tail of a monkey, the construct being aap (monkey) + staart (tail) + -je (indicating something small or endearing).  Unlike German, the Dutch language has a tradition of humorous descriptive terms although the Germans did retaliate with Klammeraffe (spider monkey.  Other forms have included the Italian chiocciola (snail), the Polish małpa (monkey) and the Hebrew shtrudel (strudel pastry).  An English alternative was ampersat, the construct being ampersa(nd) + at.  Apestail is a noun; the noun plural is apestails.

Apestail in the Algerian font.

One of the curious linguistic paradoxes produced by the internet is that the “@” symbol, although one of the most widely used of those on the standard keyboard, it has never gained a universally accepted “official” name (such as “ampersand” for the “&”).  In English, when referred to it’s usually as “at”.  It was of course its adoption as the divider between the user name and the domain (UserName@domain.x) in email addresses which meant the once neglected key on the keyboard became widely used and although the rise of SMS (short message service), social media platforms, instant messaging services and such has meant there are now many alternatives for electronic communications, so entrenched in corporate life is the email protocol that it’s estimated that every day in 2024, over 350 billion emails are sent, an increase of some 4% from the previous year.  That does make modern capitalism sound industrious but the same researchers also reckoned some 85% of the volume was spam.  As early as the 1960s there had been forms of electronic messaging but all were parochial and it wasn’t until 1971 when programmer Ray Tomlinson (1941–2016) included the @ symbol in ARPANET’s (Advanced Research Projects Agency Network; the operation which created the underpinnings of what became the modern internet) implementation and although much has changed in terms of packets and protocols, the @ endures.  From the very start, it was understood to mean “at” thus lindsaylohan@disney.com would universally be understood to mean “Lindsay Lohan at Disney Corporation”.  There was a element of chance in the choice, Mr Tomlinson selecting @ because it was one of the least used ASCII (American Standard Code for Information Interchange) characters and one thus unlikely to conflict with objects elsewhere in code or operating system routines.

Apestail in the Agency FB font.

So the basic syntax of the email address predated the development of the familiar PC or laptop keyboard but in that context it was of very little use because it wouldn’t be until well into the 1990s that email achieved a critical mass of users.  Despite that, from the very first, the @ appeared on most keyboards and that was because substantially they emulated the layout of those which had become familiar on typewriters.  Probably few typewriter users had much need for the symbol either but for those who did it was essential and its long history in typography and commercial transactions justified a key although often it wasn’t included on smaller, cheaper typewriters aimed at the consumer market and even in the computer industry, it wasn’t until @ was included in the ASCII character set that computer keyboards were (more or less) standardized.  In commerce, by the sixteenth century “2” widely was used by merchants to signify a rate or price, such as “7 jars of olives @ 5 drachmas” was understood as 7 x 5 =35 so it was 35 drachmas for 7 jars of olives.  Like the Arabic numeric system, the commercial use spread across Europe and became a standard notation, facilitating a certainty of trading terms between those who shared neither a language now spoke the lingua franca.  Because of its importance and utility in bookkeeping and commerce, it was included on keyboards for the convenience of businesses.  Occasionally, @ would appear in specific academic or technical applications but these instances were rare, localized and none seem to have endured although, for all we know, it may have some secret meaning in Freemasonry.  Some jurisdictions have banned the use of “@” and an element when registering the name of an infant, the implication of that being that some parents must have tried.

Apestail in the Berlin Sans font.

The first time many computer users became aware of the mysterious @ was when it was included as the prefix for built-in functions in the Lotus 1-2-3 spreadsheet, the so-called “killer app” which in 1983 did so much to legitimize the personal computer in corporate life.  Released in 1979, VisiCalc was the first spreadsheet but it was the more capable Lotus 1-2-3 (soon laden with macros and add-ins) which captured the market and anyone familiar with VisiCalc would have found the transition relatively simple: whereas in VisiCalc SUM(B1:B10) would have calculated the sum of the range A1 to A10, in 1-2-3 it was @SUM(A1..A10). and statements like @IF(condition, value_if_true, value_if_false) were used for conditional logic.  The arrival of Microsoft Windows 3.x in 1990 and especially Windows 95 in 1995 shifted the universe and over time Excel captured the spreadsheet market and while it moved away from the use of @ as a universal function prefix, it does still exist in aome of Excel’s advanced functions such as structured references in arrays.  In many computer languages, @ is used for a variety of purposes.

Apestail in the Niagara Solid font.

The very origin of @ is murky but it seems to have appeared during the later medieval period when it was known in Spanish and Portuguese as arroba, from the Old Spanish arroua and the Old Galician-Portuguese arrova, from Andalusian Arabic and Arabic اَلرُّبْع (ar-rubʕ) (one-fourth), the reference to it making up one fourth of a quintal (the capacity of a standard amphora, a vessel used to store and transport liquids, cereals and other goods) The symbol was used as a shorthand form of the Latin ad (at; to) and one of a range of truncated or stylized forms which saved (1) the time of scribes, (2) ink and (3) paper, all commodities which cost money and some were expensive.  In countries where Spanish and Portuguese were spoken, arroba also referred to a measure of weight, typically around 11.5 kg (25 lb) although regional variations were common.  In that sense, by the operation of local custom, @ was a (regionally) standardized measure like a pood but unlike the pood, it never spread.

Peanut

Peanut (pronounced pee-nuht)

(1) The pod or the enclosed edible seed of the plant, Arachis hypogaea, of the legume family, native to the tropical Americas (and probably of South American origin).  During the plant’s growth, the pod is forced underground where it ripens.  The edible, nut-like seed is used for food and as a source of oil (historically known variously also as the pinder, pinda and goober (used south of the Mason-Dixon Line (originally as “goober pea)), earthnut, groundnut & monkey nut (pre-World War II (1939-1945) UK use).

(2) The plant itself.

(3) Any small or insignificant person or thing; something petty.

(4) In US slang, a very small clam.

(5) In slang, barbiturates (recorded also of other substances delivered in small pills).

(6) In slang, small pieces of Styrofoam used as a packing material (known also as the “packing peanut”).

(7) Of or relating to the peanut or peanuts.

(8) Made with or from peanuts.

1790–1800: The construct may have been pea (in the sense of the small green vegetable) + nut but may etymologists think it was more likely a folk etymology of pinda or pinder, both forms still in dialectal use south of the Mason-Dixon Line.  The plant is apparently native to South America and it was Portuguese traders who early in the sixteenth century took peanuts from Brazil and Peru to Africa by 1502.  Its cultivation in Chekiang (an eastern coastal province of China) was recorded as early as 1573 and the crop probably arrived with the Portuguese ships which docked there.  According to the broadcaster Alistair Cooke (1908–2004), The spellings pea nut & pea-nut are obsolete.  Peanut is a noun & verb. Peanutted & peanutting are verbs and peanutty & peanutlike are adjectives; the noun plural is peanuts.

The word appears in many aspects of modern culture including “circus peanut” (a type of commercial candy), “cocktail peanuts” (commercially packaged salted nuts served (for free) in bars to heighten thirst and thus stimulate beverage sales (also known generically as “beer nuts”)), “peanut butter” (a spread made from ground peanuts and known also as “peanut paste”), “peanut butter and jelly” (a sandwich made with jelly (jam or conserve) spread on one slice and peanut butter on the other), “small peanuts” (very small amount (always in the plural), “peanut milk” (a milky liquid made from peanuts and used as a milk substitute), peanut brittle (a type of brittle (confection) containing peanuts in a hard toffee), “peanut butter cup” (a chocolate candy with peanut butter filling), “peanut bunker” (a small menhaden (a species of fish)), “hog peanut” (a plant native to eastern North America that produces edible nut-like seeds both above & below ground (Amphicarpaea bracteata)), “peanut worm” ( sipunculid worm; any member of phylum Sipuncula. (Sipuncula spp), “peanut cactus” (a cactus of species Chamaecereus silvestrii), “peanut ball” (in athletics & strength training, an exercise ball comprised of two bulbous lobes and a narrower connecting portion), “peanut marzipan” (a peanut confection made with crushed peanuts & sugar, popular in Central & South America), “peanut whistle” (in the slang of the ham radio and citizens band (CB) radio communities, a low-powered transmitter or receiver, “peanut tree” (A tree of the species Sterculia quadrifida), “peanut-headed lanternfly” (In entomology, a species of Neotropical fulgorid planthopper (Fulgora laternaria)) and peanut tube (in electronics, a type of small vacuum tube).

Herbert (HW) Horwill’s (1864-1943) A Dictionary of Modern American Usage (1935) was written as kind of trans-Atlantic companion to Henry Fowler’s (1858–1933) classic A Dictionary of Modern English Usage (1926) and was one of the earliest volumes to document on a systematic basis the variations and dictions between British and American English.  The book was a kind of discussion about the phrase “England and America are two countries separated by one language” attributed to George Bernard Shaw (GBS; 1856-1950) although there are doubts about that.  Horwill had an entry for “peanut” which he noted in 1935 was common in the US but unknown in the UK where it was known as the “monkey nut”.  According to the broadcaster Alistair Cooke (1908–2004), the world “peanut” became a thing in the UK during the early 1940s when the US government included generous quantities of the then novel peanut butter in the supplies of foodstuffs included in the Lend-Lease arrangements.

In idiomatic use, the phrase “if you pay peanuts, you get monkeys” is used to suggest that if only low wages are offered for a role, high quality applicants are unlike to be attracted to the position.  The phrase “peanut gallery” is one of a number which have enter the language from the theatre.  The original Drury Lane theatre in London where William Shakespeare’s (1564–1616) were staged was built on the site of a notorious cockpit (the place where gamecocks fought, spectators gambling on the outcome) and even before this bear and bull-baiting pits had been used for theatrical production of not the highest quality.  That’s the origin of the “pit” in this context being the space at the rear of the orchestra circle, the pit sitting behind the more desirable stalls.  By the Elizabethan era (1558-1603), the poor often sat on the ground (under an open sky) while the more distant raised gallery behind them contained the seats which were cheaper still; that’s the origin of the phrase “playing to the gallery” which describes an appeal to those with base, uncritical tastes although “gallery god” (an allusion to the paintings of the gods of antiquity which were on the gallery’s wall close to the ceiling) seems to be extinct.  The “peanut gallery” (the topmost (ie the most distant and thus cheapest) rows of a theatre) was a coining in US English dating from 1874 because it was the habit of the audience to cast upon to the stage the shells of the peanuts they’d been eating although whether this was ad-hoc criticism or general delinquency isn’t known.  The companion phrase was “hush money”, small denomination coins tossed onto the stage as a “payment” to silence an actor whose performance was judged substandard.  “Hush money” of course has endured to be re-purposed, now used of the payments such as the one made by Donald Trump (b 1946; US president 2017-2021; president elect 2024) to Stormy Daniels (stage name of Stephanie Gregory, b 1979).

Chairman Mao Zedong (left) and Generalissimo Chiang Kai-shek (right), celebrating the Japanese surrender, Chongqing, China, September 1945.  After this visit, they would never meet again.

Joseph "Vinegar Joe" Stilwell (1883–1946) was a US Army general who was appointed chief of staff to the Chinese Nationalist Leader, Generalissimo Chiang Kai-shek (1887-1975) (Generalissimo was a kind of courtesy title acknowledging his position as supreme leader of his armed forces; officially his appointment in 1935 was as 特級上將 (Tèjí shàng jiàng) (high general special class)).  Stilwell’s role was to attempt to coordinate the provision of US funds and materiel to Chiang with the objectives of having the Chinese Nationalist forces operate against the Imperial Japanese Army in Burma (now known usually as Myanmar).  Unfortunately, the generalissimo viewed the Chinese communists under Chairman Mao (Mao Zedong 1893–1976; chairman of the Chinese Communist Party (CCP) 1949-1976) as a more immediate threat than that of Nippon and his support for US strategy was no always wholehearted. 

So Stilwell didn’t have an easy task and in his reports to Washington DC referred to Chiang as “Peanut”.  Apparently, “peanut” had originally been allocated to Chiang as one of the army’s random code-names with no particular meaning but greatly it appealed to Stillwell who warmed to the metaphorical possibilities, once recorded referring to Chiang and his creaking military apparatus as “...a peanut perched on top of a dung heap...”  That about summed up Stillwell’s view of Chiang and his “army” and in his diary he noted a military crisis “would be worth it” were the situation “…just sufficient to get rid of the Peanut without entirely wrecking the ship…”  A practical man, his plans extended even to assassinating the generalissimo although these were never brought to fruition.  Eventually, Stilwell was recalled to Washington while Chiang fought on against the communists until 1949 when the Nationalists were forced to flee across the straits of Formosa to the Island of Taiwan, the “renegade province” defying the CCP in Beijing to this day.  Stillwell did have one final satisfaction before being sacked, in 1944 handing Chiang an especially wounding letter from Franklin Delano Roosevelt (FDR, 1882–1945, US president 1933-1945), the reaction so pleasing he was moved to write a poem:

I have waited long for vengeance,
At last I've had my chance.
I've looked the Peanut in the eye
And kicked him in the pants.
 
The old harpoon was ready
With aim and timing true,
I sank it to the handle,
And stung him through and through.
 
The little bastard shivered,
And lost the power of speech.
His face turned green and quivered
As he struggled not to screech.
 
For all my weary battles,
For all my hours of woe,
At last I've had my innings
And laid the Peanut low.
 
I know I've still to suffer,
And run a weary race,
But oh! the blessed pleasure!
I've wrecked the Peanut's face.

Phobias

One who suffers a morbid fear of peanut butter sticking to the roof of one's mouth is said to be an arachibutyrophobe.  Phobias need not be widely diagnosed conditions; they need only be specific and, even if suffered by just one soul in the world, the criteria are fulfilled.  In this sense, phobias are analogous with syndromes.  A phobia is an anxiety disorder, an unreasonable or irrational fear related to exposure to certain objects or situations.  The phobia may be triggered either by the cause or an anticipation of the specific object or situation.

Lindsay Lohan in The Parent Trap (1998) introduced the culinary novelty of peanut butter spread on Oreos; an allure appalled arachibutyrophobes avoid.

The fifth edition of the American Psychiatric Association's (APA) Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders (DSM-5 (2013)) made some interesting definitional changes from the earlier DSM-4 (1994):  (1) A patient no longer needs to acknowledge their anxiety is excessive or unreasonable in order to receive a diagnoses, it being required only that their anxiety must be “out of proportion” to the actual threat or danger (in its socio-cultural context).  (2) Symptoms must now, regardless of age, last at least six months.  (3) The diagnostic criteria for social phobias no longer specify that age at onset must be before eighteen, a change apparently necessitated by the substantial increase in reporting by older adults with the DSM editors noting the six-month duration threshold exists to minimize the over-diagnosis of transient fears.

Whether it was already something widely practiced isn’t known but Lindsay Lohan is credited with introducing to the world the culinary novelty Oreos & peanut butter in The Parent Trap.  According to the director, it was added to the script “…for no reason other than it sounded weird and some cute kid would do it."  Like some other weirdnesses, the combination has a cult following and for those who enjoy peanut butter but suffer arachibutyrophobia, Tastemade have provided a recipe for Lindsay Lohan-style Oreos with a preparation time (including whisking) of 2 hours.  They take 20 minutes to cook and in this mix there are 8 servings (scale ingredients up to increase the number of servings).

Ingredients

2 cups flour
1 cup unsweetened cocoa powder (plus more for dusting)
¾ teaspoon kosher salt
1 ¼ cups unsalted butter (at room temperature)
¾ cup sugar
1 teaspoon vanilla extract
Powdered sugar, for dusting

Filling Ingredients

½ cup unsalted butter, at room temperature
¼ cup unsweetened smooth peanut butter
1 ½ cups powdered sugar
1 teaspoon vanilla extract
A pinch of kosher salt (omit if using salted peanut butter)

Filling Instructions

(1) With a stand mixer fitted with a paddle attachment, the butter & peanut butter until creamy.

(2) Gradually add powdered sugar and beat to combine, then beat in vanilla and salt.

Whisking the mix.

Instructions

(1) Preheat the oven to 325°F (160°C). Line two baking sheets with parchment paper.

(2) In small bowl, whisk together flour, cocoa powder & salt.

(3) In a stand mixer fitted with a paddle attachment, cream together the butter and sugar until light and fluffy.  Mix in the vanilla extract. With the mixer running on low speed, add the flour mixture and beat until just combined (it should remain somewhat crumbly).

(4) Pour mixture onto a work surface and knead until it’s “all together”; wrap half in plastic wrap and place in refrigerator.

(5) Lightly dust surface and the top of the dough with a 1:1 mixture of cocoa powder and powdered sugar.

(6) Working swiftly and carefully, roll out dough to a ¼-½ inch (6-12 mm) thickness and cut out 2 inch (50 mm) rounds.  Transfer them to the baking sheets, 1 inch (25 mm) apart (using a small offset spatula helps with this step). Re-roll scraps and cut out more rounds, the repeat with remaining half of the dough.

(7) Bake cookies until the tops are no longer shiny ( about 20 minutes), then cool on pan for 5 minutes before transferring to wire rack completely to cool.

(8) To assemble, place half the cookies on a plate or work surface.

(9) Pipe a blob of filling (about 2 teaspoons) onto the tops of each of these cookies and then place another cookie on top, pressing slightly but not to the extent filled oozes from the sides.

(10) Refrigerate for a few minutes to allow the filling to firm up.  Store in an air-tight container in refrigerator.

The manufacturer embraced the idea of peanut butter Oreos and has released versions, both with the classic cookie and a peanut butter & jelly (jam) variation paired with its “golden wafers”.  As well as Lindsay Lohan’s contribution, Oreos have attracted the interest of mathematicians.  Nabisco in 1974 introduced the Double Stuf Oreo, the clear implication being a promise the variety contained twice crème filling supplied in the original.  However, a mathematician undertook the research and determined Double Stuf Oreos contained only 1.86 times the volume of filling of a standard Oreo.  Despite that, the company survived the scandal and the Double Stuf Oreo’s recipe wasn’t adjusted.

Scandalous in its own way was that an April 2022 research paper published in the journal Physics of Fluids wasn’t awarded that year’s Ig Nobel Prize for physics, the honor taken by Frank Fish, Zhi-Ming Yuan, Minglu Chen, Laibing Jia, Chunyan Ji & Atilla Incecik, for their admittedly ground-breaking (or perhaps water-breaking) work in explaining how ducklings manage to swim in formation.  More deserving surely were Crystal Owens, Max Fan, John Hart & Gareth McKinley who introduced to physics the discipline of Oreology (the construct being Oreo + (o)logy).  The suffix -ology was formed from -o- (as an interconsonantal vowel) +‎ -logy.  The origin in English of the -logy suffix lies with loanwords from the Ancient Greek, usually via Latin and French, where the suffix (-λογία) is an integral part of the word loaned (eg astrology from astrologia) since the sixteenth century.  French picked up -logie from the Latin -logia, from the Ancient Greek -λογία (-logía).  Within Greek, the suffix is an -ία (-ía) abstract from λόγος (lógos) (account, explanation, narrative), and that a verbal noun from λέγω (légō) (I say, speak, converse, tell a story).  In English the suffix became extraordinarily productive, used notably to form names of sciences or disciplines of study, analogous to the names traditionally borrowed from the Latin (eg astrology from astrologia; geology from geologia) and by the late eighteenth century, the practice (despite the disapproval of the pedants) extended to terms with no connection to Greek or Latin such as those building on French or German bases (eg insectology (1766) after the French insectologie; terminology (1801) after the German Terminologie).  Within a few decades of the intrusion of modern languages, combinations emerged using English terms (eg undergroundology (1820); hatology (1837)).  In this evolution, the development may be though similar to the latter-day proliferation of “-isms” (fascism; feminism et al).  Oreology is the study of the flow and fracture of sandwich cookies and the research proved it is impossible to split the cream filling of an Oreo cookie down the middle.

An Oreo on a rheometer.

The core finding in Oreology was that the filling always adheres to one side of the wafer, no matter how quickly one or both cookies are twisted.  Using a rheometer (a laboratory instrument used to measure the way in which a viscous fluid (a liquid, suspension or slurry) flows in response to applied forces), it was determined creme distribution upon cookie separation by torsional rotation is not a function of rate of rotation, creme filling height level, or flavor, but was mostly determined by the pre-existing level of adhesion between the creme and each wafer.  The research also noted that were there changes to the composition of the filling (such as the inclusion of peanut butter) would influence the change from adhesive to cohesive failure and presumably the specifics of the peanut butter chosen (smooth, crunchy, extra-crunchy, un-salted (although the organic varieties should behave in a similar way to their mass-market equivalents)) would have some effect because the fluid dynamics would change.  The expected extent of the change would be appear to be slight but until further research is performed, this can’t be confirmed.

Rack

Rack (pronounced rak)

(1) A framework of bars, wires, or pegs on which articles are arranged or deposited.

(2) A fixture containing several tiered shelves, often affixed to a wall.

(3) A vertical framework set on the sides of a wagon and able to be extended upward for carrying hay, straw, or the like in large loads.

(4) In certain cue sports (pool, snooker), a frame of triangular shape within which the balls are arranged before play; the balls so arranged.

(5) In butchery & cooking, the rib section of a fore-saddle of lamb, mutton, pork or veal (historically used also of the neck portion).

(6) In nephology (the branch of meteorology concerned with cloud formation, structure, classification, and dynamics), as “cloud rack”, a group of drifting clouds.

(7) In machinery, a bar, with teeth on one of its sides, adapted to engage with the teeth of a pinion rack and pinion or the like, as for converting circular into rectilinear motion or vice versa (nest known as the “rack & pinion” steering apparatus used in motor vehicles.

(8) An instrument of torture consisting of a framework on which a victim was tied, often spread-eagled, by the wrists and ankles, to be slowly stretched by spreading the parts of the framework; there were many variations.

(9) As “on the rack”, originally a reference to the torture in progress, later adopted figuratively to describe a state of intense mental or physical suffering, torment, or strain.

(10) In equestrian use, the fast pace of a horse in which the legs move in lateral pairs but not simultaneously (the “horse's rack”).

(11) In military use, a fixed (though sometimes with some scope for movement for purposes of aiming), a framework fixed to an aircraft, warship or vehicle and used as a mounting for carrying bombs, rockets, missiles etc.

(12) In zoology, a pair of antlers (more commonly used of wall mounted trophies (eight-point rack etc)).

(13) In slang, ruin or destruction (a state or rack).

(14) In slang, a woman's breasts (often with a modifier).

(15) In slang, a large amount of money (historically a four-figure sum).

(16) In military, prison and other institutional slang, a bed, cot, or bunk.

(17) In slang, to go to bed; go to sleep.

(18) In slang, to wreck (especially of vehicles).

(19) In slang, as “to rack up”, a sudden or dramatic increase in the price of goods or services.

(20) In slang, to tally, accumulate, or amass, as an achievement or score (often expressed as “racked up”).

(21) In vinification (wine-making), to draw off (wine, cider etc) from the lees (to “rack into” a clean barrel).

(22) To torture; acutely to distress or torment (often expressed as “racked with pain”).

(23) To strain in mental effort (often expressed as “racked her brain”).

(24) To strain by physical force or violence; to strain beyond what is normal or usual.

(25) To stretch the body of a victim in torture by the use of a rack.

(26) In nautical use, to seize two ropes together, side by side:

(27) In cue sports, as “rack 'em up”, to place the balls on the tales in the correct spot with the use of a rack.

1250–1300: From the Middle English noun rakke & rekke, from the Middle Dutch rac, rec & recke (framework) and related to the Old High German recchen (to stretch), the Old Norse rekja (to spread out), the Middle Low German reck and the German Reck.  The use to mean “wreck” dates from the late sixteenth century and was a phonetic variant of the earlier wrack, from the Middle English wrake, wrache & wreche, a merging of the Old English forms wracu & wræc (misery, suffering) and wrǣċ (vengeance, revenge).  Except as a literary or poetic device (used to impart the quality of “vengeance; revenge; persecution; punishment; consequence; trouble”) or in some dialects to mean “ruin, destruction; a wreck”), wrack is now archaic.  The equestrian use (the fast pace of a horse in which the legs move in lateral pairs but not simultaneously (the “horse's rack”)) dates from the 1570s and the origin is obscure but it may have been a variant of “rock” (ie the idea of a “rocking motion”).  Nephology (the branch of meteorology concerned with cloud formation, structure, classification, and dynamics) adopted “cloud rack” (a group of drifting clouds) from mid-fourteenth century use in Middle English where the original spellings were rak, recke & reck, from the Old English wrǣc (what is driven) and related to the Gothic wraks (persecutor) and the Swedish vrak.  The use in vinification (wine-making), describing the process of drawing off (wine, cider etc) from the lees (to “rack into” a clean barrel) dates from the mid fifteenth century and was from the Old Provençal arraca , from raca (dregs of grapes), ultimately from the by then obsolete Old French raqué (of wine pressed from the dregs of grapes).  The use in butchery & cooking (the rib section of a fore-saddle of lamb, mutton, pork or veal (historically used also of the neck portion)) dates from the mid sixteenth century and is of uncertain origin but was probably based upon either (1) the cuts being placed on some sort or rack for preparation or (2) having some sort or resemblance to “a rack”.  Rack is a noun & verb, racker is a noun, racking is a noun, verb & adjective, racked is a verb and rackingly is an adverb; the noun plural is racks.

Racking them up: Lindsay Lohan playing snooker.

In idiomatic use, the best known include “racking one’s brains” (thinking hard), “going to rack and ruin” (to decay, decline, or become destroyed”, “on the rack” (originally a reference to the torture in progress, later adopted figuratively to describe a state of intense mental or physical suffering, torment, or strain) and “racked with pain” (again an allusion to the consequences of being “racked” “on the rack”).  The “rack” as a description of a woman’s breasts is one in a long list of slang terms for that body part and dictionaries of slang are apparently divided on where it’s the breasts, genitals or buttocks which have provided the most inspiration for the creation of such forms.  The Australian slang “rack off” is an alternative to the many other forms popular in the country used to mean “please go away” including “sod off”, “piss off”, “fuck off”, “bugger off” etc; depending on context and tone of voice, these can range from affectionate to threatening.

Luggage rack & ski rack page in the 1968 Chrysler Parts Accessories Catalog (left) and promotional images for the 1968 Chrysler Town and Country (right).  Because the full-sized US station wagons could be fitted with a third seat in the back compartment (thus becoming eight-seaters), the roof-rack was sometime an essential fitting.

In transport, luggage racks were among the earliest “accessories” in that they were additions to hand & horse-drawn carts and carriages which enabled more stuff to be carried without reducing the passenger-carrying capacity.  There were “roof racks” and “trunk racks”, both there for the purpose of carrying trunks, secured usually with leather straps.  The most obvious carry-over to motorized vehicles was the roof-rack, still a popular fitting and still sometimes fitted as standard equipment to certain station wagons (estate cars).

1972 De Tomaso Pantera.

Although it wouldn’t have been something the designer considered, the mid-engined De Tomaso Pantera (1971-1992) had a rear section so suited to the provision of a luggage rack that Gran Turismo (a after-market accessories supplier) produced one which was as elegant as any ever made.  Because of the location directly behind the rear window, when loaded it obviously would have restricted rearward visibility so in certain jurisdictions doubtlessly it would have been declared unlawful but it one lives somewhere more permissive, it remains a practical apparatus.  Ironically, the Pantera had probably the most capacious frunk (a front mounted trunk (boot)) ever seen in a mid-engined sports cars and one easily able to accommodate the luggage the car’s two occupants were likely to need for a weekend jaunt.  Even if superfluous however, in the collector market it’s an interesting period piece and well-designed; easily removed for cleaning, the four mounting brackets remain affixed to the deck lid.

1973 Chrysler Newport two-door hardtop (left) and 1973 Triumph Stag (right).

Larger cars of course carried more than two and if they travelled over distances, usually they carried luggage.  The full-sized US cars of the early 1970s were very big and had a lot of trunk space but many, with bench seats front and rear were configured as genuine six-seaters and that could mean a lot of luggage.  Accordingly, both the manufacturers and after-market suppliers in the era offered a range of luggage racks.  Upon debut, the lovely but flawed Triumph Stag (1970-1978) was a much-praised design which offered the pleasure of open-air motoring with the practicality of four seats (although those in the rear were best suited for children) but the sleek, low lines did mean trunk space was not generous and luggage racks were a popular fitting.

1959 Austin-Healey Sprite (left) and 1971 Chevrolet Corvette Convertible LS5 454/365 (right).

There have been cars (and not all of them were sports cars) with no trunk lid.  In the case of the Austin-Healey Sprite (1958-1971), the lack of the structure on the early versions (1958-1961) was a cost-saving measure (the same rationale that saw the planned retractable headlights replaced by the distinctive protuberances atop the hood (bonnet) which lent the cheerful little roaster its nickname (bugeye in North American and frogeye in the UK & most of the Commonwealth).  It had additional benefits including weight reduction and improved structural rigidity but the obvious drawback was inconvenience: to use the trunk one had to reach through the gap behind the seats.  It was easy to see why luggage racks proved a popular accessory, sales of which continued to be strong even when later versions of the Sprite (1961-1971) and the badge-engineered companion model the MG Midget (1961-1980) gained a trunk lid.  Curiously, the Chevrolet Corvette between 1953-1962 did have a trunk lid but when the second generation was released for the 1953 model year, it was removed from the specification and not until the fifth generation in 1998 did the return.  By then, the moment of the Corvette luggage rack had passed but in the early 1970s they were still often fitted and in the modern collector market, it’s one of those accessories, the very sight of which seems to upset some.

Variations of the theme: ski rack (left), bike rack (centre) and surfboard rack (right).  The luggage rack had proved an adaptable platform and specialist versions are available for many purposes but in many cases the same basic structure can be used as a multi-purpose platform with “snap-on” fittings used to secure objects of different shapes.  The Porsche 911 was an early favorite on the ski fields because of the combination of and air-cooled engine and the rear-engine/rear wheel drive configuration which provided good traction in icy conditions.

Markers of the state of civilization: Gun rack in the back window of pickup truck (left) and silver plate toast rack by Daniel & Arter of Birmingham, circa 1925 (right).

The toast rack has been in use since at least the 1770s and, like the butter knife, is one of the markers of civilized life.  That aside, their functionality lies in the way they provide a gap between the slices, allowing water vapour to escape, preventing it condensing into adjacent slices and making them soggy while also maintaining a buffer of warm air between so the cooling process is slowed.  In the way of such things, there have over the years been design ranging from the starkly simple to the extravagant but the some of the most admired are those from the art deco era of the inter-war years.

The gun rack in the back of a pickup truck is now a classic MAGA (Make America Great Again) look but the devices have been in use for decades and were always popular in rural areas with a tradition of hunting.  Whether such things are lawful depends on the jurisdiction.  In the US, some states have an “open carry” law which means one is free to carry certain firearms unconcealed and this includes gun racks which are similarly unrestricted; in states where an “open carry” permit is required, a separate permit is required for a gun rack to be used in a vehicle while in jurisdictions with no “open carry” legislation, gun racks are also banned except for those able to obtain a specific exemption.  So, it can be that travelling across state lines can involve some additional effort, even if one is authorized to carry a firearm in both placed.  Usually, this demands the weapon being unloaded and encased in an area inaccessible to both driver and passengers.

The rack as a marker of the state of civilization: Cuthbert Simpson, Tortured on the Rack in the Tower of London (1558), published in from Old England: A Pictorial Museum (1847) and reprinted in The National And Domestic History Of England by William Aubrey (circa 1890).

The most famous of the many apparatus of torture which proliferated during the Middle Ages (and beyond), the rack was an interrogation tool which remained in use until the eighteenth century.  Although the rack is most associated with the Spanish Inquisition, it was popular also in England as a device to extract confessions to various crimes, especially heresy.  The designers were imaginative and racks were produced in many forms including vertical devices and wheels but the classic version was a flat, bed-like structure, made with an open, rectangular wooden frame with rollers or bars at each end to which the wrists and ankles of the accused (or “the guilty” as often they were known) were secured.  The rollers moved in opposite directions by the use of levers, and the victim’s joints slowly and painfully were separated.

RACK is used as an acronym, one being “Random Act of Conditionless Kindness” which seems not substantively different from the better known “random act of kindness” although presumably it imparts some depth of emphasis, given “random acts of conditional kindness” may be a more commonly observed phenomenon.  In certain sub-sets of the BDSM (Bondage, Discipline (or Dominance) & Submission (or Sadomasochism) community, RACK means either “Risk-Aware Consensual Kink” or “Risk-Accepted Consensual Kink).  Both describe a permissive attitude towards conduct which is to some degree “risky”, undertaken on the basis of “a voluntary assumption of risk”.  In that it differs from the tastes of BDSM’s SSC (Safe, Sane & Consensual) sub-set which restricts it proclivities to things “not risky”.  The RACK practitioners acknowledge the difficulties inherent in their proclivities, what they do not a distinction between “safe” & “unsafe” but rather “safer” and “less safe” (ie degrees of danger).  What this means is that in extreme cases there are potential legal consequences because while the implication or RACK is that one can “contract out” of the statutory protections usually available in such interactions, in the case of serious injury or death, the usually legal principles would apply.

Comeback

Comeback (pronounced kuhm-bak)

(1) A return to a former higher rank, popularity, position, prosperity etc, typically after an extended period of obscurity, under-performance etc.

(2) In sporting competition, a team or individual overcoming a substantial disadvantage in points to win or draw.

(3) Of products, ideas, practices etc, to again become fashionable.

(4) To reply after a period of consideration (as in “to come back” to someone).

(5) A clever or effective retort; a rejoinder; a retort; a riposte (especially if recriminatory).

(6) In informal use, a basis or cause of complaint.

(7) To return (in the sense “come back”).

(8) Of something forgotten, to return to one's memory.

1815–1825: A noun use of verb phrase “come back”, the construct being come + back.  Come was from the Middle English comen & cumen, from the Old English cuman, from the Proto-West Germanic kweman, from the Proto-Germanic kwemaną (to come), from the primitive Indo-European gwémt (to step), from gwem- (to step).  Back was from the Middle English bak, from the Old English bæc, from the Middle Low German bak (back), from the Old Saxon bak, from the Proto-West Germanic bak, from the Proto-Germanic baką, possibly from the primitive Indo-European bheg- (to bend). The adverb represents an aphetic (in phonetics, linguistics & prosody, of, relating to, or formed by aphesis (the loss of the initial unstressed vowel of a word)) form of aback.  Similar forms included the West Frisian bekling (chair back), the Old High German bah and the Swedish and Norwegian bak.  The use of comeback (for long used also as “come-back”) in the sense of a verbal (usually oral) retort dates form 1889 and was an adaptation of the verbal phrase, the implication especially of a “quick or clever response”.  The familiar modern meaning “recovery, return to former position or condition after retirement or loss” was a creation of American English, documented since 1908.  Comeback is a noun (the use as a verb is a misspelling of “come back”; the noun plural is comebacks.

In idiomatic use a “comeback kid” is a person who on more than one occasion had demonstrated a propensity to overcome tragedy, reversal or failure and rebound to triumph and victory.  It has also been used of someone who has achieved such a thing only once but in an especially notable or dramatic way such as Bill Clinton (b 1946; US president 1993-2001) who recovered from a mediocre performance in the 1992 Iowa Caucus but managed to secure an unexpected second place in the New Hampshire primary, despite (cynics would say “because”) reports of his extramarital affair with Gennifer Flowers (b 1950; “Gennifer with a ‘G’”).  Variations include “comeback king”, “comeback queen”, “comeback specialist” etc and those for whom comebacks seem to be a calling are said to stage “serial comebacks”.  When writing of comebacks (usually in sport, politics or entertainment), it not uncommon for them to be described as a “rebound”, “resurgence”, “return”, “revival”, “resurrection” or “resuscitation” (or a “redux” for those wanting something more literary).  In gambling, “comeback money” is that used by an agent of a bookie to place a large bet on a horse at large odds, thereby causing the odds on that horse to decline, reducing the bookie's potential losses in the event that the horse wins.

Thames Comeback Sauce.

Comeback sauce is a dipping sauce and salad dressing, most associated with central Mississippi and while there are variations, the classic recipes typically are based on mayonnaise and chili sauce.  A creamy & tangy Southern condiment, someback sauce is a Mississippi staple and has spread far beyond the city of Jackson, where it originated as an example of “fusion cuisine” (in this case Greek + Mississippi influences).  It’s thought the sauce's name is merely the idea “it tastes so good diners keep ‘coming back’ for more”.  It was first served in Greek-owned restaurants (some claim the Mayflower Cafe was first) in Mississippi in the mid-twentieth century and it has much evolved and in addition to the base of mayonnaise and chili sauce, other popular ingredients include ketchup, spices and Worcestershire hot sauce.

Noted comebacks in modern US politics

F Scott Fitzgerald’s (1896–1940) oft-quoted phrase “there are no second acts in American lives” appears as a fragment in his posthumously published, unfinished novel The Last Tycoon (1941) but he first published it in the early 1930s in the essay My Lost City, a kind of love letter to New York.  The quote is frequently misunderstood as an observation that for those Americans who suffer disgrace or destitution, there is no redemption, no comeback.  However, from politics to pop culture (there is still some slight distinction), there are many examples of temporarily disreputable Americans resurrecting their public lives from all but the most ignominious opprobrium.  Fitzgerald was a professional writer and his observation was an allusion to the structure used by playwrights in traditional three-act theater: (1) problem, (2) complication & (3) solution.  He thought the nature of the American mind was to prefer to skip the second act, going straight from a problem to finding a solution.  His point was well-made and it’s one of the themes of the narrative which underlies the discussions (which became arguments and sometimes squabbles) of military and political strategy between Washington and London during the World War II (1939-1945).

The concept of the comeback is well understood and the zeitgeisters at The Cut (an online publication of New York magazine) noted the phenomenon, in September 2024 posting a piece which looked at Lindsay Lohan’s latest comeback and reviewed those of the last ten-odd years.

That photograph.

What Donald Trump (b 1946; US president 2017-2021; president elect since 5 Nov 2024) did in regaining the presidency in the 2024 presidential election was perhaps the most remarkable comeback in modern US political history and as notable as any that has happened anywhere.  When one considers the prelude to the 2024 triumph, (Trump (1) lost the popular vote in 2016, (2) lost the popular vote and the electoral college (and thus the presidency) in 2020 and (3) suffered between 2021-2024 a myriad of legal problems including civil judgements in which he was found liable for hundreds of millions in damages and even a felony conviction, a historic first for a US president), his comeback seems more remarkable still.  It’s something even the Trump haters (of which there seem to be a few) must acknowledge, even if it’s not a thing of which they dare speak.

The analysis of the voting patterns in 2024 have revealed some interesting findings but talk of a “political realignment” (such as the shift of the South from the Democrats to the Republicans in the wake of the civil rights legislation of the 1960s) may be premature because there seems still not to be an understanding of just how bizarrely unique a political figure Mr Trump is.  His effect on the political dynamic is undeniable but it may be that it’s something unique to his very existence and that when he departs (God forbid), the construct called MAGA Republicanism, while it may live on as a label, ceases to exert its pull.  These personal creations do seem to behave like that, Gaullism (from Charles de Gaulle (1890-1970; President of France 1959-1969) in France and Peronism (from Juan Perón (1895–1974; President of Argentina 1946-1955 & 1973-1974) in Argentina both surviving as labels but those who have in recent decades appropriated them haven’t always pursued policies of which the two men would have approved; nor have they always aligned with the definitions political scientists have constructed.

The 2024 election:  Conde Nast's Vanity Fair makes clear its editorial position.

It was a strange election campaign.  Trump actually talked much about specifics, there were a lot of policies and many specific details: what he was going to do and to whom.  Kamala Harris (b 1964; US vice president since 2021) however appeared to have only three items on the campaign clipboard: (1) I am not Donald Trump, (2) I am not Joe Biden and (3) abortion on demand.  Had the Trump brand been as toxic as her team seemed to believe the her tactic of basing every appearance around platitudes, slogans and clichés endlessly recited (obediently to be repeated by the crowd), that might have won the election (it’s been done before) but clearly, Trump had more appeal for enough of those in the demographics the Democrats had pencilled in as “ours”.  Quickly, the analysts “scoped down” on the voting patterns and discovered (1) there were women for whom abortion was not the central issue (although it is clear women also took advantage of differential voting where possible, voting to making abortion available in their state wheen the option was on the ballot while also voting for Trump), (2) a significant proportion of Latino voters appeared to be motivated by self-interest rather than ethnic solidarity (which the Democrats seemed to assume they’d made compulsory) and (3) the black male vote for the Democrats was lower that was achieved by Barack Obama (b 1961; US president 2009-2017) in 2008 & 2012.  That last statistic intrigued some who drew what may have been a long bow in speculating that while black men don’t like being told what to do by a white man, at least they’ve had several centuries to get used to it whereas the thought of being told what to do by a black woman is just unthinkable.  It was an opportunistic conclusion to draw from an electoral behaviour which happened only at the margins but it was that sort of election.

Interest now shifts to the second Trump administration and whether it will be Trump 1.1 (ie more of the same which was experienced in the first term) or Trump 2.0 (something different).  Many analysts are suggesting it will be combination of both and structurally, the possibilities available to Mr Trump if the Republicans hold working majorities in both chambers of congress are more inviting.  Mr Trump will have learned lessons from his first term and at least some mistakes (not a word he's believed often to have used of himself) presumably won't be repeated and it's no secret a whole industry of lobbyists, specialists and obsessives have been for four years at work crafting documents detailing how they think things should be done so he won't lack for advice.  There is much talk about the "shift to conservatism" in the US (and elsewhere) but a second Trump administration promises to be one of the more radical seen since the 1960s.    

Four dead white men, left to right: Barry Goldwater, Dwight Eisenhower, Richard Nixon and Thomas Dewey, meeting to discuss the Republican platform for the 1966 mid-term elections, Washington DC, 1 June 1965.  It was a meeting of some significance because this period was the high point of the Democratic Party's control of all branches of government.

Until Trump did what he did, the greatest political comeback in the US was probably that achieved in 1968 by Richard Nixon (1913-1994; US president 1969-1974).  After two terms as VPOTUS (Vice President of the United States) to Dwight Eisenhower (1890-1969; US president 1953-1961), Nixon lost the 1960 presidential election to John Kennedy (JFK, 1917–1963; US president 1961-1963), the margin described at the time as “an electoral eyelash”.  Although it was made clear to Nixon JFK’s victory had probably been made possible by old Joe Kennedy (1888–1969 and JFK’s father) using his money to arrange some blatant vote rigging, Nixon declined to pursue his right to mount a legal challenge, arguing the institution of the office was too important to taint with scandal and telling aides: “Nobody steals the presidency of the United States”, a very different attitude that that taken in 2020 by Mr Trump  Politically, the loss in 1960 may not have been fatal but what did seem to write finis was his loss in 1962 in the Californian gubernatorial contest, an event which would now be forgotten had not Nixon, the day after, held what he called his “last press conference”.  California was then a solidly Republican state and Nixon’s loss was a surprise to most and a shock to some, most conspicuously the defeated candidate who, at the Beverly Hilton Hotel, delivered a quarter-hour tongue-lashing to the assembled press pack, accusing them, not without justification, of having hated him since first he came to prominence in 1948 and having since assiduously and unfairly worked against him.  He concluded: “I leave you gentlemen now.  And you will now write it.  You will interpret it.  That's your right.  But as I leave you, I want you to know—just think how much you're going to be missing.  You don't have Nixon to kick around anymore.  Because, gentlemen, this is my last press conference.”  Nixon sat out the 1964 presidential election, appearing at the Republican National Convention only as “a simple soldier in the ranks” to nominate Barry Goldwater (1909–1998) who he described as “Mr Conservative” and the 1964 convention was the only one between 1952-1972 from which Nixon didn’t emerge as the party’s nominee for POTUS (President of the United States) or VPOTUS.  Goldwater lost the 1964 election to Lyndon Johnson (LBJ, 1908–1973; US president 1963-1969) in one of the biggest landslides ever but Goldwater managed to engineer his own, somewhat abstract, comeback, later arguing the victory of Ronald Reagan (1911-2004; US president 1981-1989) was really him winning, sixteen years on.  Barry invented the “proto-virtual comeback”.

Harry Truman, St. Louis Union Station, St. Louis, Missouri, 3 November 1948.  United States.  In Florida, 76 years later, Donald Trump would wear the same smile.

Harry Truman’s (1884–1972; US president 1945-1953) comeback victory in the 1948 presidential election was one of those events remember for one photograph: that of a smirking Truman holding aloft the 3 November 1948 edition of the Chicago Daily Tribune, the front page’s banner headline reading: “DEWEY DEFEATS TRUMAN”.  Really, the Tribune was unlucky because for reasons both technical and related to labor relations, the Wednesday edition had “gone to bed” and been printed earlier that the historic practice, the staff relying on the early returns which they interpreted as guaranteeing a solid Republican victory, not only Thomas Dewey (1902–1971) taking the White House but also both houses of congress; as things turned out, the Democrats secured all three.  For Truman, the 1948 victory was a remarkable comeback because he’d inherited the presidency only because Franklin Delano Roosevelt (FDR, 1882–1945, US president 1933-1945) had died on the eve of victory in World War II (1939-1945) and, compared with his illustrious predecessor, he seemed plain and uncharismatic, his reputation not helped as post-war economic struggles, labor strikes, and internal divisions within the Democratic Party soon took the gloss of the celebrations which had greeted the end of four years of war.  By 1948, almost universally he was expected to lose the 1948 election.

What Truman did was return to what seemed to most a kind of “pre-modern” campaign strategy in which he embarked on what came to be known as the “Whistle Stop Tour”, traveling around the nation by train, speaking in person to the voters rather than having them receive his words on the airways or in the newspapers.  Although now remembered more as part of the political lexicon, the term “whistle stop” was originally US railroad jargon and terminology and referred to small towns or rural stations where trains would only stop “on signal” and usually only if there was something or someone to pick-up or deliver (or if the conductor had, in advance, been notified).  Such stops often had little infrastructure (sometimes only the most rudimentary “platform”) and as the trains slowed down, the driver would blow the “whistle” to announce their arrival.  Although now rarely undertaken by train, the term “whistle-stop tour” remains widely used to describe campaigns that involve making multiple brief appearances in many locations.  Truman’s trip proved a great success, often delivering his speeches from the back of the railcar, his team having travelled ahead to ensure he always had an audience and in the pre internet age, he had the advantage also of being able to recycle the same text, often changing only the odd reference to “localize” the context.  His straightforward, relatable and fiery style was quite a change from the elegant, patrician FDR but it resonated with the voters who warmed to his populist message of fighting the “…do-nothing [Republican] Congress."  Against all expectations (possibly even his own), Truman enjoyed a comeback victory in what was a major upset, proving a persistent campaign with the right message can succeed even the most daunting odds.