Poop

Poop (pronounced poop)

(1) In naval architecture, as “poop deck”, a structure at the stern of a vessel.

(2) In nautical jargon, (1) as of a wave, to break over the stern of a ship or (2) to take to take seas over the stern (especially repeatedly).

(3) As “pooped”, a slang term expressing exhaustion or fatigue; has been used as a noun in this context as “an old poop”.

(4) As “pooped out”, a slang term applied usually to machinery which has failed.

(5) As “poop sheet”, military slang for information updates circulated on paper; later adopted as “get the real poop” (get the true facts on something).

(6) As a noun, excrement; as a verb, the act of defecation, both described by most dictionaries as informal and often childish; also recorded as a child’s expression of disappointment; was also used as a euphemism for flatulence, apparently as a more polite replacement for the earlier fart. 

(7) As “party pooper”, a stupid, fussy, or boring person.

(8) As onomatopoeia, to make a short blast on a horn.

Circa 1350: Origin uncertain but possibly from the Middle English powpen, popen & poupen (to make a gulping sound while drinking, blow on a horn, toot) and perhaps influenced by the Dutch poepen (to defecate) and the Low German pupen (to fart; to break wind”); the English adoption of the latter sense dating from 1735–1745.  The sense of information began as the US Army slang “poop sheet” to refer to anything on paper, distributed by the authorities, one of many ways soldiers had to disparage military intelligence, this one comparing official documents to toilet paper, presumably used.  The sense of “information collated on paper” continued in US journalism circles as “get the poop” in the post-war years but was later displaced by other slang as technology changed.  “Party pooper” was first recorded in 1910–1915 which some suggest is derived from nincompoop but not all etymologists are convinced.  The sense from which the poop desk of ships evolved happened independently, although in parallel with, the various onomatopoeic meanings.  Dating from 1375-1425, it was from the Middle English poupe & pope, from the Old French pope, poupe & pouppe, from the Italian poppa, from the Vulgar Latin puppa, from the Classical Latin puppis, all meaning “stern of a ship”.  All alternative spellings are long obsolete.  Poop & pooping are nouns & verbs and pooped is a verb & adjective; the noun plural is poops. 

A costal carpet python pooping.

In humans and other animals, although the general principle remains (if not exactly accurately) “What goes in, must come out”, there are a number of variables involved in the parameters of poop production, most obviously diet.  This coastal carpet python was seen on the Sunshine Coast in the state of Queensland, Australia and experts in such things commented there was nothing unusual in the behavior.  As they explained: “Carpet pythons will usually eat one big meal, such as a possum”, the meal lasting “...a while as slowly it's digested..." whereas “...smaller snakes, like tiger snakes, eat smaller prey like frogs.  So they will relieve themselves more regularly and with smaller stools.”  Ophiologists (those dedicated to the study of snakes) note also that there's not of necessity any direct correlation between the size of a snake and the volume of their poop, factors such as diet, climate and age all influencing the outcome and observational studies in zoos have concluded that some snakes seem simply to prefer to poop more often than others.  Now we know. 

The Poop Deck

In naval architecture, a poop deck is a deck which forms the roof of a cabin or other enclosure built in the aft (rear) of a ship’s superstructure.  On larger vessels, the cabin was usually called either the “poop cabin” or “navigation cabin”.

The significance of the poop desk is that it was from here the ship was sailed; it was for centuries the highest point of a ship’s main structure and so offered the best visibility.  The captain or officer of the watch would from the poop desk instruct the helmsman how to steer with the rudder and relay instructions to those trimming the sails, to change both speed and direction.  The helmsman turned the rudder using a big wheel mounted on the quarter deck, adjacent to and within earshot of the captain on the poop deck.  The placement of poop and quarter decks was dictated by the need for the wheel to be directly above the rudder’s controls because there was no electronic or hydraulic assistance; movements of the wheel acted on the rudder through a system of ropes and pulleys so distances between the two had to be kept as short as possible.

On modern, motorized ships, the navigational functions once directed from the poop deck have been moved to the bridge, usually located towards the bow (front).  Poop desks still exist on some naval and commercial vessels and it's not merely as a term of naval architecture because many ships (such a tankers and other bulk carriers) continue to be constructed with the bridge located in the stern area.  There's no longer the need for the bridge to be so close to the rudder but the older architecture is used to maximize the space available for cargo.  On larger pleasure craft such as the big yachts billionaires like, the poop deck is usually allocated variously as a viewing area (sometimes with a diving platform), an entertainment space or a helicopter pad.

Lindsay Lohan on the poop deck of a yacht cruising of the coast of Sardinia, July 2016.

Poop porn: A scorpion having a poop.

Tit

Tit (pronounced tit)

(1) Any of numerous small active old world songbirds of the family Paridae, especially those of the former genus Parus.

(2) Medieval slang for a girl or young woman thought something of a minx.

(3) A small, worthless or worn-out poor horse; a nag (archaic).

(4) Slang for a despicable or unpleasant person (archaic).

(5) Slang for a teat (used in agricultural and other circles).

(6) As tit-bit, a small morsel of food.

(7) One of the many vulgar slang terms for the human female’s breast (mammary gland).

Circa 1600: From the mid sixteenth century Middle English titte, from the pre 1100 Old English titt and cognate with the Middle Low German & Middle Dutch titte, the German as zitze, the Icelandic tittr and the Norwegian titta.  The Scandinavian forms applied to small birds and the Old English titt was a variant of teat.  The modern slang variation, attested from 1928, seems to be a recent reinvention from teat, used apparently without awareness it’s a throwback to the original form although the form is on record from 1746 as an English and Irish diminutive of teat, used in nurseries.

In ornithology, tits, chickadees, and titmice constitute the Paridae, a large family of small passerine birds found mostly in Africa and the more temperate regions of the Northern Hemisphere and Africa.  Most were formerly classified in the genus Parus and in the English-speaking the terms chickadee & titmice tend to be used in North America while its tits elsewhere.  The creatures are mainly small, stocky, woodland species with short, stout bills, some with crests and ranging in length between 4-9 inches (100-220 mm), they have a mixed diet including seeds and insects and have adapted well to co-habitation with humans in urban environments.  It’s a charming linguistic coincidence that ornithological taxonomy has given English the black-breasted tit (Periparus rufonuchalis), the cinnamon-breasted tit (Melaniparus pallidiventris) and the stripe-breasted tit (Melaniparus fasciiventer).

A pair of small tits and a pair of great tits: Bushtits (Psaltriparus minimus, left) and great tits (Parus major, right), the word order of the latter descriptor distinguishing use from the more common idiomatic form "a great pair of tits".

Among the smaller tits is the bushtit (Psaltriparus minimus), found in the US Pacific Northwest, the tiny songbird typically 100-110 mm (3.9-4.3 inches) in length and weighing 4–6 grams (0.14–0.21 oz).  The Pygmy tit (Psaltria exilis) is smaller and a monotypic now within the genus Psaltria (it was previously placed, along with the rest of its family, with the true tits (Paridae).  The largest of the tits is the widely distributed great tit (Parus major) which measures usually between 135-155 mm (5.3-6.1 inches) in length and weighs between 16 to 21 grams. (6-.81 oz).

The origin of familiar use of “tit” as slang for “breast, human female mammary gland” (now also as "tittie" or "titty" although they also enjoyed other meanings) lies in the Old English titt (teat, nipple, breast), used as a variant of teat or from the dialectal and nursery diminutive plural variant “titties”.  Perhaps surprisingly, it appears the modern slang use in this context (predictably, almost always in the plural) dates only from 1928 (oral use may have pre-dated this) and the adoption (actually a re-invention) is thought unrelated to the original form.  The tradition was however long because in the Middle English the singular was often tete or tate, often used figuratively to mean both “source of (spiritual) nourishment” and by the late fourteenth century, an “object of erotic attraction”.  In modern slang use, it appears the use of “tits” was almost exclusively male until the 1970s when it became of the words “reclaimed” by feminists as a political statement although, as a general principle women seem still to prefer “boobs” although there seems more acceptance of "fake tits" as a critique.

By the 1540s “tit” was used for a small or unproductive horse, the sense of something “diminutive” transferring over later centuries to other small creatures, most enduringly in birds such as the titmouse, tom-tit, titlark, titling, tit-babbler et al although not all survived to be added to modern taxonomy such as the late nineteenth century titty-todger (a wren).  In the Nordic nations, the Icelandic tittr, the Norwegian tita and the Old Norse titling were all used of small birds but etymologists are uncertain about the connection, the Oxford English Dictionary (OED) suggesting the link was of either something small rather than anything specific to birds or even onomatopoeic, drawn from the “chip-chipping” sound of small songbirds.  At least by 1706 it was common slang for “titmouse” and by 1734 was used figuratively of persons but between the sixteenth & eighteenth centuries a “tit” could be a “girl or young woman” and while that could be merely descriptive, it was applied often in the deprecatory sense of “a hussy or minx” (though apparently not actually a prostitute).

Big tits are not always what they seem.

Some years ago, an image circulated on internet's “usual suspect” sites; it purported to show a wax-paper bag from the  1930s which originally had been the packaging for “Big Tits Potato Chips” manufactured by the Tart-Chestnut Company of Dunn, North Carolina.  The back-story behind the name was said to come from “Big Tits” being the nickname of the rather corpulent Mr Titus Tart, one of the operation's co-owners who may have been over-fond of his company’s products.  As might be suggested by a product called “Big Tits” coming from a concern called “Tart-Chestnut”, it was fake news although that didn't stop debates about whether the use of “tit” in its modern sense was part of the US vernacular in the Carolinas by the 1930s, some even suggesting the linguistic innovation may not have penetrated south of the Mason-Dixon line because dictionaries of slang may have been banned from public libraries on grounds of obscenity.  Plausibility might have been enhanced had the image been rendered with a little patina although as an emulation of 1930s packaging it did seem a creditable job, the art deco typeface a nice period touch.

The form “tit-bit” (small, delicate snack of food; a sweet morsel) was in use by the 1630s and was synonymous with “tidbit” which was in concurrent use, the coining of that thought to be the dialectal tid (fond, solicitous, tender (itself perhaps influenced by the relevant sense of “tit”)) + bit (in the sense of “a morsel”).  Also surviving into modern use is “tit for tat”, an expression indicating “a retaliatory return), first documented in the 1550s and from this ultimately came “titfer” which appeared in UK dictionaries of rhyming slang as a substitute for “hat” (in from the “that” element).  “Tit for tat” may have been a variant of the earlier “tip for tap” (blow for blow) which carried the same implication.  The game tick-tack-toe (noughts & crosses) was so named at least by 1892 but according to oral historians, decades before that it had been known as tit-tat-toe (by 1852, in reminiscences of earlier years), the names thought derived from the sound made by the pencil on the slate with which it originally was played by schoolboys.  The modern slang “taking the bull by the tits” is an absurdist variant of “taking the bull by the horns” (confronting a problem and dealing with it in a manner prompt, resolute & effective”); it suggests someone is doing something wrong or has misunderstood (ie they have NFI).

Caffeine

Caffeine (pronounced ka-feen, kaf-een or kaf-ee-in)

A white, crystalline, bitter alkaloid with the chemical compound C8H10N4O2.

1830: From the French caféine, the construct being café (coffee) + ine (the chemical suffix).  The earlier German was kaffein, from kaffee (coffee); the adjective is caffeinic.  Technically, caffeine is a trimethyl-derivative of xanthine, a coining as Kaffein in 1830, from German Kaffein, by German analytical chemist Friedlieb Ferdinand Runge (1794–1867).  He chose the name because the alkaloid was found in coffee beans; its presence accounting for the stimulating effect of coffee and tea.  The noun caffeinism was coined as medical jargon in 1880 to describe the "morbid state produced by prolonged or excessive exposure to caffeine" although the condition had for centuries been noted by doctors and others.

Of coffee

Caffeine's molecular structure.

Methyltheobromine (or caffeine) is a central nervous system stimulant and the most widely consumed psychoactive drug which works, inter alia, by reversibly blocking the action of adenosine on its receptor and consequently prevents the onset of adenosine-induced drowsiness.  Caffeine is a bitter, white crystalline purine, a methylxanthine alkaloid, chemically related to the adenine and guanine bases of DNA and ribonucleic acid RNA.

Human caffeine consumption is said to date from circa 3000 BC when, according to Chinese legend, the mythological Emperor Shennong (Divine Farmer) serendipitously invented tea, a story derived from an early book on the history of tea.  Coffee drinking first became common in the mid-fifteenth century in the Sufi monasteries of Yemenin Arabia and it spread first to North Africa and by the sixteenth century was widely consumed throughout the Middle East, Persia and Asia Minor.  The first European coffee houses were in Italy and they soon became common throughout the continent.

Voltaire (1760) by Théodore Gardelle (1722–1761); he doubtlessly agreed with de Fontenelle.

In its pure form, caffeine can be fatal in tiny quantities although in the form usually enjoyed, coffee, one would need to drink over a hundred cups in a day to approach toxicity.  Voltaire (1694–1778), often at the Café de Procope in Paris, drank sometimes as many as forty cups a day, enjoying it so much he ignored the advice of his doctors to stop.  He lived to eighty-four but there’s no evidence the often attributed quotation: “It may be poison, but I have been drinking it for sixty-five years, and I am not dead yet” was his.  The more likely source is French author Bernard Le Bovier de Fontenelle (1657–1757) whose actual words were: “I think it must be [a slow poison], for I’ve been drinking it for eighty-five years and am not dead yet.”   Fontenelle died a month short of his hundredth birthday.

Depiction of seventeenth century London coffee house.

Whatever the concern about coffee the drink, the coffee house the place attracted its own concerns.  There’s some evidence coffee houses were welcomed by the authorities when first they became popular in seventeenth century London because they seemed a desirable alternative to the ale house where men would drink beer and later gin, leading to all the notorious social ills.  However, it seemed soon to kings and ministers that while having drunken men brawl or beat their wives was hardly good, it was a more manageable problem than having them cluster, share the newly available cheap newspapers and pamphlets, talk and think.  Men taking and thinking might lead to them getting ideas which was worse than them fighting in the street and government made repeated attempts to suppress the coffee shops.  Ultimately, caffeine prevailed.

Johann Sebastian Bach (circa 1760) by Johann Eberhard Ihle (1727–1814).

On the continent, the Habsburgs were no more impressed than the Stuarts in England, the government there encouraging the idea of coffee was a subversive societal vice and there was something of a minor moral panic among good citizens disturbed at the corrupting influences of such places.  This didn’t amuse a German composer famously associated with the late Baroque, JS Bach (1685–1750) who was fond of taking his frequent shots in his favorite coffee shops and, although never noted for his light-heartedness, he took an amusing poem mocking the public’s concerns, written by his frequent collaborator Christian Friedrich Henrici (1700–1764; pen name Picander), and set it to music as Schweigt stille, plaudert nicht (Be still, stop chattering).  Composed between 1732-1735, it’s usually called the Coffee Cantata, although, it’s really a comic operetta.  A satirical commentary, the work makes fun of the concerns respectable folk had about coffee and coffee houses.  In Vienna as in London, caffeine triumphed.

Despite the joys of a Bach cantata and the persuasive (if misattributed) endorsement of Voltaire, the killjoy editors of the Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders (DSM) weren’t sure ordinary folk could be trusted to decide how many cups of coffee daily to enjoy and declared more research was needed.  They often conclude more research is needed.  Strangely, the DSM’s editors appear to be less trusting than most clergy, caffeine a drug to which even normally condemnatory priests, rabbis and mullahs don’t object, the only famously abstemious among the major faiths being the Church of Latter-Day Saints (the Mormons), the Seventh-Day Adventists and the Rastafarians, the last perhaps a surprise given how well a long black complements some good weed.

Simple pleasure: the long black.

Widely consumed, caffeine is a psychoactive drug which produces its psychomotor stimulant and reinforcing effects through antagonism at adenosine receptors and indirect effects on dopaminergic neurotransmission.  The editors of DSM-5 (2013) were prepared to concede consumption of caffeine at recommended dietary doses is usually at least harmless and may even have some benefits such as the enhancement of analgesia but do caution some may experience caffeine-related health effects and functional impairment and that this can manifest in different people at different levels of consumption.  Higher doses can produce dysphoric subjective effects and caffeine intoxication, including restlessness, nervousness, insomnia and an irregular heartbeat.  It’s also associated in some with gastrointestinal problems, urinary incontinence and anxiety, use during pregnancy said to be associated with especially poor outcomes.

Lindsay Lohan with coffee, leaving Coffee Bean, Los Angeles, December 2007.

Cold turkey may not be the solution either, the editors documenting withdrawal symptoms which some may experience if abruptly discontinuing regular use, including headaches, fatigue, irritability, a depressed mood, difficulty concentrating, and even flu-like symptoms, the DSM-5 codifying the conditions as (1) caffeine intoxication, (2) caffeine withdrawal, (3) caffeine-induced anxiety disorder and (4), caffeine-induced insomnia.  These are listed as the potential diagnoses when symptoms cause clinically significant distress or impairment and, because some individuals report an inability to reduce their consumption despite clinically significant problems even after seeking treatment, caffeine consumption can be said to lead to substance dependence.

Caffeine is an essential part of the recommended pro ana breakfast.

Thus the DSM-5 proposed three necessary diagnostic criteria for caffeine use disorder: (1) a persistent desire or unsuccessful efforts to reduce or control caffeine use, (2) continued caffeine use despite knowledge of (it’s not specified if an explicit acknowledgment is needed) having a persistent or recurrent physical or psychological problem that is likely to have been caused or exacerbated by caffeine and (3), withdrawal, as manifested by the characteristic withdrawal syndrome for caffeine, or caffeine or a closely related substance being taken to relieve or avoid withdrawal symptoms. Six additional diagnostic criteria included in other substance use disorders, such as craving, tolerance, and taking caffeine in larger amounts or over a longer period of time than intended, were also included as markers for greater severity beyond the three key criteria for caffeine use disorder.  Because caffeine is so widely consumed, to reduce any potential for over-diagnosis, the proposed diagnostic strategy for caffeine, despite sounding onerous, is actually more conservative than for other substances.

Red Bull girls.  One can see the attraction of energy drinks.

The editors did note the paucity of data relating to the prevalence and clinical significance of caffeine use disorder and the suspicion is the interest may have been triggered not the usual suspect, coffee, but the newer generation of energy drinks and diet supplements.  Previous research was apparently too focused on specific, small-subsets rather than the general populations, some of the studies so specialized as to be thought unrepresentative of the general population.  One (very small) study of caffeine use disorder in the United States (reported in the DSM-IV (1994)) found that 30% of caffeine consumers fulfilled the generic DSM-IV criteria for substance dependence as applied to caffeine but this fell to 10% under (the supposedly more realistic) DSM-5 criteria, a hint the concerns of clinical over-diagnosis do need to be taken seriously.  Again, the point was made that more research is required, the extent to which caffeine use disorder is associated with markers of clinical significance such as self-reported caffeine-related distress or impairment, psychological distress, sleep problems, or other drug use is wholly unknown.

The documented study the editors reviewed was the most thorough evaluation yet conducted of the prevalence, clinical significance and correlates of meeting proposed criteria for caffeine use disorder yet it was extensive enough only to inform future research and considerations regarding risk and differential diagnosis, technical points about the parameters of control group populations especially noted.  Despite the apparent lack of robustness, the editors were persuaded the findings did support the inclusion of caffeine use disorder in future editions of the DSM.  Although only a small percentage of sampled caffeine consumers met the proposed key diagnostic criteria, where the standards were met, there were clinically meaningful effects.

All reputable authorities recommend a caffeine intake of not more than 400 mg a day, or two long black coffees.  Many coffee fiends exceed this before breakfast is over.

Caffeine has become more interesting as a drug because of the late twentieth-century phenomenon of the energy drink, the interest not so much in the caffeine content which, can be much more or much less than a cup of coffee but because the pattern of consumption is, in certain sub-groups, so associated with strong alcohol, often on a 1:1 (ie 30-60 ml spirits to 250 ml energy drink) basis, a pattern well known with long-established mixers like Coca-Cola but now in both much greater volume and a much higher caffeine content.  It’s difficult to tell whether a problem has emerged because while the deaths associated with the combination attract attention, the aggregate numbers, impressionistically, seem small and may not be statistically significant.  There's even been the suggestion extreme variations in ambient temperature may have been an at least contributory factor in some deaths.

Caffeine addiction is one of humanity’s most widespread vices and it extends to those driving cars.  In famous tort case, Stella Liebeck v. McDonald's Restaurants, P.T.S., Inc. and McDonald's International, Inc (1994 Extra LEXIS 23 (Bernalillo County, N.M. Dist. Ct. 1994), 1995 WL 360309 (Bernalillo County, N.M. Dist. Ct. 1994), a passenger in a car (a 1989 model with no cup holders) received severe burns from spilled coffee, just purchased from a McDonald’s drive-through.  Although the matter received much publicity on the basis it was absurd to be able to sue for being burned by spilling what was known by all to be “hot” and the case came to be cited as an example of “frivolous” litigation, there were technical reasons why some liability should have been ascribed to McDonalds.  The jury awarded some US$2.6 million in damages although this was, on appeal, reduced to US640,000 and the matter was settled out of court before a further appeal.

Hertella Auto Kaffeemachine, 1959.

In the twenty-first century, some now judge cars on the basis of the count, capacity & convenience of its cup-holders but in the less regulated environment of the FRG (Federal Republic of Germany, the old West Germany, 1949-1990) of 1959, one company anticipated the future trend by offering a dashboard-mounted coffee maker for the Volkswagen Type 1 (better known as “the Beetle”).  The Hertella Auto Kaffeemachine was not a success, presumably because even those not familiar with Sir Isaac Newton's (1642–1727) First Law of Motion (known also as the Law of Inertia: “An object at rest will remain at rest, and an object in motion will continue in motion with the same speed and in the same direction unless acted upon by an unbalanced external force”) could visualise the odd WCS (worst case scenario).

A happy caffeine addict, pouring himself a cup of coffee in his VW Beetle.

That it was in 1959 available in 6v & 12v versions is an indication Hertella may have envisaged a wider market because VW didn’t offer a 12v system as an option until 1963 and the company seems to have given some thought to Newtonian physics, the supplied porcelain cups fitted at the base with a disc of magnetic metal which provided some resistance to movement although the liquid obviously moved as the forces were applied.  The apparatus was mounted with a detachable bracket, permitting the pot to be removed for cleaning.  The quality of the coffee was probably not outstanding because there’s no percolation; the coffee added in a double-layer screen and “brewed” on much the same basis as one would tea-leaves and for those who value quality, a thermos-flask would have been a better choice but there would have been caffeine addicts willing to try the device.  The trouble was there clearly weren’t many of them and even in the FRG of the Wirtschaftswunder (the post war “economic miracle”) the fairly high price would have deterred many although now, one in perfect condition (especially if accompanied by the precious documents or packaging) would command a price well over US$1000.

Diet

Diet (pronounced dahy-it)

(1) Food and drink considered in terms of its qualities, composition, and its effects on health.

(2) A particular selection of food, especially as designed or prescribed to improve a person's physical condition or to prevent or treat a disease.

(3) Such a selection or a limitation on the amount a person eats for reducing weight.

(4) The foods eaten, as by a particular person or group.

(5) Food or feed habitually eaten or provided.

(6) Anything (food and otherwise) habitually provided or partaken of.

(7) To regulate the food of, especially in order to improve the physical condition.

(8) Legislative bodies of certain countries.

(9) The general assembly (Reichstag) of the estates of the Holy Roman Empire.

(10) In the law of Scotland, the date fixed by a court for hearing a case.

(11) In the law of Scotland, a single session of a court.

(12) In microbiology, the abbreviation of Direct Interspecies Electron Transfer.

1175-1225: From the Middle English diete or dieten (pittance, fare) and the Old French diete (diet, pittance, fare), from the Medieval Latin dieta (parliamentary assembly (also "a day's work”; daily food allowance, food) from diaeta (prescribed way of life) from the Ancient Greek díaita (way of life, regimen, dwelling), from diaitan & diaitasthai (separate, select (food and drink) which later had the sense “to direct or lead one's life”), frequentative of diainysthai (take apart), the construct being dia (apart) + aita (akin to aîsa share, lot) from ainysthai (take), from the primitive Indo-European root ai- (to give, to allocate).

As a verb, diet began its evolution to the current modern meaning from the late fourteenth century with a range of meanings such as “customary way of eating", "food considered in relation to its quantity and effects" & "a course of food regulated by a physician or by medical rules", the latter often a restriction of food or certain foods, hence the sense of “putting someone on a diet” which was attested by the 1650s in the sense of the specific meaning "to regulate oneself as to food" and applied especially against growing fat; from here came “dieted” & “dieting”.  A long obsolete word for this was banting (an early system for weight loss through diet control, named after its inventor, William Banting (1797-1878), the English undertaker(!) who self-tested the programme and advertised it in his 1863 pamphlet: Letter on Corpulence, Addressed to the Public").  The undertaker lived a long life and was inspired to enter the embryonic field which would become such a huge industry because, in the course of his work, he noted, impressionistically, a striking correlation between obesity and those who died young.  Because of the linguistic coincidence, although the word is a surname, it was used as a verbal noun as in “she needs to start banting".  The system was similar to some modern diet advice in that it advocated eating lean meats and limiting the intake of fat, starch, and sugar.

As a noun applied to legislative bodies (assembly of delegates, etc., held from day to day for legislative, political, or other business), it came into use in the fifteenth century, the Medieval Latin diēta (public assembly) apparently the same word as Latin diaeta, from the Ancient Greek diaita (way of life, regimen, dwelling) but associated with Latin dies (day).  Technically, diēta was a variant of diaeta (daily office of the Church) most often translated as daily duty or an assembly or meeting of counsellors.  In Latin diēta meant also "a day's work, diet, daily food allowance", derived from diaeta (prescribed way of life), from the Greek diaita and the best-known early assemblies were the German and Austrian of the Holy Roman Empire, “diet” used as a descriptor by both French and English authors.  The (now rare) adjective dietal (pertaining to a diet in the “assembly” sense) entered the language in 1845.

Product placement: Diet Coke in Mean Girls (2004).

The verbal noun “dieting” from the verb diet was first noted circa 1400 and the first practicing (or at least one advertised as such) dietician (one who practices some theory of diet) dates from 1845, from the noun diet on the model of physician, replacing the older dietist from circa 1600 although it seems curious dietist hasn’t been picked up as an Instagram niche; one can hardly think of a better tag for many an influencer.  The adjective dietary (pertaining to diet) is from the 1610s, from the Medieval Latin dietarius, from the Classical Latin diaetarius.  The old adjectives are listed by dictionaries thus: diætetic (archaic), dietetical (dated) and dietetic (obsolete).  All meant “pertaining to the rules for regulating the kind and quantity of food taken” and again were from the diaeteticus, from the Ancient Greek διαιτητικός (diaitētikós).  The adjective “diet” as a trade-name meaning (or at least implying) “slimming, having reduced calories” was first used in the US in 1958 when the Diet Rite soft drink was released, its novelty being sugar-free and the Coca-Cola Company responded in 1963 with the similar Tab which remained available in a gradually dwindling number of markets until 2020.  Interestingly, the Coca-Cola Company which since 1983 had been selling Diet Coke, discovered from its extensive market research that “diet” was off-putting to male consumers and thus in 2005 released Coca-Cola Zero though they must have though consumers just didn’t get it because in 2017 it was re-named Coca-Cola Zero Sugar.

Japanese Diet: Upper (2013 & 2016) and Lower House (2017) Election Results

Elections for the lower house (House of Representatives) of the Japanese diet became rambunctious sometime in the 1950s but those for the upper house (House of Councillors) were usually rather sleepy affairs which seemed to matter little until, in retrospect, the polls of 2013 and 2016 seemed to assume an unexpected importance after the Liberal Democratic Party’s (LDP) unexpectedly decisive victory in the 2017 (lower house) general election.  What the 2017 landslide meant was that Prime Minister Shinzo Abe’s (b 1954; Prime Minister of Japan 2006-2007 & 2012-2020) LDP suddenly enjoyed a two-thirds majority in both houses, a type of control of the legislature called a supermajority, giving Mr Abe the legal means, if perhaps not a mandate, to attempt to amend Japan’s pacifist constitution which had been a long-held ambition of members of certain LDP factions.

Adopted in 1947 when Japan was under US occupation, the constitution has ensured Japan’s so-called Self-Defense Forces have never been deployed in combat although successive LDP administrations have for decades stretched policy well-beyond what the constitution technically permits.  The critical matter is Article 9 of the constitution which prohibits war as a means to settle international disputes and its repeal would be controversial in the region where the conduct of Imperial Japan’s military remains in living memory.  Nor is it universally popular at home, some fearing a government might be tempted by risky military adventurism.  However it’s analyzed, the people of post-war Japan have done very well out of their “pacifist” constitution and even with his double-chamber supermajority, constitutional revision was no simple thing, a change requiring a national referendum and the opinion polls indicated there was no certainty voters would approve what would have been the be the first change to the document which has been the nation’s basic law for some seventy-five years.  It is now the world’s oldest, un-amended constitution.

Under the terms of Article 9, the Japanese people “…forever renounce war as a sovereign right of the nation and the threat or use of force as means of settling international disputes".  That would seem to make illegal the waging of offensive war, confirmed by the phrase “The right of belligerency of the state will not be recognized” but Article 9 also stipulates "…land, sea, and air forces, as well as other war potential, will never be maintained".  Article 9 needs obviously to be read in conjunction with more recent documents, given the Japan Self-Defense Force (JSDF) consists of: Ground Self-Defense Force (Rikujou Jieitai, GSDF; includes aviation), Maritime Self-Defense Force (Kaijou Jieitai, MSDF; includes naval aviation), Air Self-Defense Force (Koukuu Jieitai, ASDF); Japan Coast Guard (Ministry of Land, Transport, Infrastructure and Tourism) (2021) with an establishment of approximately 240,000 active personnel (145,000 Ground; 45,000 Maritime; 45,000 Air; 4,000 Joint Forces); 14,000 Coast Guard (2021).

JSDF helicopter carrier Hyūga (DDH-181) on exercises with a US carrier strike group.  Listed as an escort ship according to JSDF naming conventions, the two Hyūga-class carriers are the largest largest ships commissioned by the Japanese navy since the Second World War.

The emphasis admittedly is certainly on self-defense because the official overseas deployment in January 2022 stood at 175, all attached to the US base in Djibouti (2021).  Still, most analysts rate the JSDF as the fifth most powerful (in non-nuclear capability) military on the planet so the idea that “…land, sea, and air forces, as well as other war potential, will never be maintained” clearly needs a bit of mental gymnastics to be understood.  Indeed, in the years immediately after Japan regained its sovereignty in 1954, some black-letter law judges in lower courts felt compelled to declare the JSDF unconstitutional but appellate courts found a number of ways to rationalize matters and have always regarded it as a political matter, declining to be involved and in recent years it’s never been tested.  Political it certainly is, the US, authors of Article 9 (in the years before the Chinese Communist Party (CCP) conquered mainland China), soon began to review its position, re-equipping the embryonic forces which would become the JSDF, the constitutional constraints apparently no impediment.  In the years since, the US has more than once encouraged Japan to amend Article 9, the Pentagon not unhappy at the thought of the JSDF’s impressive capabilities being able to augment US forces in overseas deployments.  Those capabilities may be more impressive still, some analysts claiming the country has the capacity to commission and equip existing delivery systems with nuclear warheads within weeks or even days, depending on who is running the numbers.  According to some, lurking deep in (the inevitably secret underground) bunkers, the warheads lie in an almost complete state, awaiting only the placement of the weapons-grade plutonium.  A marvelous conspiracy theory, no evidence has ever been presented other than the circumstantial matters of technical capability and a supposed ability use the capacity of the local nuclear industry for the purpose.  It became an especially interesting theory after the passage of a “Regional Affairs” law in 1999 which permitted Japan automatically to participate as "rear support", were the US to be engaged in armed conflict involving "regional affairs”.  Nobody has ever suggested the South China Sea is anything but a “regional affair”.

Neither Beijing nor Seoul have suggested Tokyo is planning a second attempt at an East-Asia Co-prosperity Sphere but a change meaning Japan can again declare or wage war remains controversial at home and abroad although given how the force has evolved since 1954 and the doubtless ability of Japanese governments to be most expansive in just what “regional” means, the status of Article 9 may be less significant than once it appeared.  As things transpired, the implications of Mr Abe’s rare dual chamber supermajority remained unexplored and he retired from office in 2020 as Japan’s longest-serving prime-minister.

In praise of dieting: Lindsay Lohan before and after.

Foxbat

Foxbat or fox-bat (pronounced foks-bat)

(1) NATO reporting name for the MiG-25 (Mikoyan-Gurevich MiG-25) high-altitude supersonic interceptor and reconnaissance aircraft.

(2) A common name for members of the Megachiroptera (the Pteropus (suborder Yinpterochiroptera), a genus of megabats), some of the largest bats in the world.

Fox is from the Middle English fox, from the Old English fox (fox), from the Proto-West Germanic fuhs, from the Proto-Germanic fuhsaz (fox), from the primitive Indo-European púḱsos (the tailed one), derive possibly from puḱ- (tail).  It was cognate with the Scots fox (fox), the West Frisian foks (fox), the Fering-Öömrang North Frisian foos, the Sölring and Heligoland fos, the Dutch vos (fox), the Low German vos (fox), the German Fuchs (fox), the Icelandic fóa (fox), the Tocharian B päkā (tail, chowrie), the Russian пух (pux) (down, fluff), the Sanskrit पुच्छ (púccha) (source of the Torwali پوش‎ (pūš) (fox) and the Hindi पूंछ (pūñch) (tai”).

Bat in the context of the animal was a dialectal variant (akin to the dialectal Swedish natt-batta) of the Middle English bake & balke, from the North Germanic. The Scandinavian forms were the Old Swedish natbakka, the Old Danish nathbakkæ (literally “night-flapper”) and the Old Norse leðrblaka (literally “leather-flapper”).  The Old English word for the animal was hreremus, from hreran (to shake) and it was known also as the rattle-mouse, an old dialectal word for "bat", attested from the late sixteenth century.  A more rare form, noted from the 1540s, was flitter-mouse (the variants were flinder-mouse & flicker-mouse) in imitation of the German fledermaus (bat) from the Old High German fledaron (to flutter).  In Middle English “bat” and “old bat” were used as a (derogatory) term to describe an old woman, perhaps a suggestion of witchcraft rather than a link to bat as "a prostitute who plies her trade by night".  It’s ancient slang and one etymologist noted the French equivalent hirondelle de nuit (night swallow) was "more poetic".  To “bat the eylids” is an Americanism from 1847, an extended of the earlier (1610s) meaning "flutter (the wings) as a hawk", a variant of bate.

The term fox-bat or flying fox, (genus Pteropus), covers some sixty-five bat species found on tropical islands from Madagascar to Australia and noth through Indonesia and mainland Asia.  Most species are primarily nocturnal and are the largest bats, some attaining a wingspan of 5 feet (1.5 m) with an overall body length of some 16 inches (400 mm).  Zoologists list fox-bats as “Old World fruit bats” (family Pteropodidae) that roost in large numbers and eat fruit and are thus a potential pest, many countries restricting their importation.  Like nearly all Old World fruit bats, flying foxes use sight rather than echolocation, a physiological process for locating distant or invisible objects (such as prey) by means of sound waves reflected back to the emitter by the objects) to navigate, despite the largely nocturnal habit of most species.  In the database maintained by the International Union for Conservation of Nature and Natural Resources (IUCN), about half of all flying fox species are listed as suffering declining populations, 15 said to be vulnerable and 11 endangered. The fox-bats were previously classified in the suborder Megachiroptera, but most researchers now place them in the suborder Yinpterochiroptera, which also contains the superfamily Rhinolophoidea, a diverse group that includes horseshoe bats, trident bats, mouse-tailed bats, and others.

MiG-25 (Mikoyan-Gurevich MiG-25).

Once the most controversial fighter in the skies, there was so much mystery surrounding the MiG-25 that US, British and NATO planners spent years spying on it with a mixture of awe, fear and dread.  Conceived originally by USSR designers to counter the threat posed by Boeing’s B-70 Valkyrie bomber, development continued even after the B70 project, rendered redundant by advances in missile technology, was cancelled.  First flown in 1964 and entering service in 1970, nearly 1200 were built and were operated by several nations as well as the USSR.  Able (still) to outrun any other fighter, only the US Lockheed SR-71 Blackbird was faster but fewer than three dozen of those were built and those were configured only for strategic reconnaissance.  When first the West became aware of the Foxbat, it caused quite a stir because, combining stunningly high speed with high altitude tolerance and a heavy weapons load, it did appear to be the long-feared platform which would render Soviet airspace immune from US penetration.  It was the threat the Foxbat was thought to pose which was influential in the direction pursued by US engineers when developing the McDonnell Douglas F15.

The Foxbat however never realized its apparently awesome implications. Because the original design brief was to produce a device which could combat the fast, high-flying B-70, many of the characteristics desirable in a short-range interceptor were neglected in the quest for something which could get very high, very quickly.  At that it was a breath taking success but there were compromises, the fuel burn was epic and, with a very high take-off and landing speed, it could operate only from the longest runways.  Still, at what it was good at it was really good and its very presence meant the US had to plan any mission within range of a Foxbat, cognizant of the threat it was thought to present.  Unbeknown to the West, at lower altitudes it presented little threat and was no dog-fighter; it was essentially a dragster built for the skies, faster than just about anything in a straight line but really not good at turning.

It wasn’t until 1976 when a Soviet defector landed a new Foxbat in Japan in 1976 that US engineers were able to examine the airframe and draw an understanding of its capabilities.  What their analysis found was that the limitations in Soviet metallurgy and manufacturing techniques had resulted in a heavy airframe, one which really couldn’t maneuver at high speeds, and handled poorly at low altitudes. The surprisingly primitive radar was of limited effectiveness in conventional combat situations against enemy fighters, which, combined with the low altitude clumsiness meant that its drawbacks tended to outweigh the advantage it had in sheer speed at altitude, something which meant less to the US since missiles had replaced the B-70 strategic bomber (which never entered production).

In its rare combat outings, those advantages did however confer the occasional benefit.  In 1971, a Soviet Foxbat operating out of Egypt used its afterburners to sustain Mach 3 for an extended duration, enabling it to outrun three pursuing Israeli F4-Phantoms and one downed a US Navy F/A-18 Hornet during the first Gulf War (1991).  During the Iran-Iraq War (1980-1988), the Iraqi Air Force found them effective against old, slow machinery but sustained heavy losses when confronted with the Iran’s agile F-14 but most celebrated was probably the Foxbat’s success during the Gulf War in claiming both of the last two American aircraft lost in air-to-air combat.  Otherwise, the Foxbat has at low altitude proved vulnerable, the Israeli Defense Force (IDF) shooting down several in the war over Lebanon (1981) although they have of late been used, most improbably, in a ground attack role in the Syrian Civil War, the Syrian Arab Air Force, lacking a more appropriate platform, pressing the Foxbats into a ground support role, in at least one case using air-to-air missiles to attack ground targets.  The Soviet designers took note of the operating environment when developing the Foxbat’s successor, the MiG-31 (NATO reporting name Foxhound), a variant which sacrificed a little of the pure speed and climb-rate in order to produce a better all-round fighter.

Usually unrelated: 1957 Morris Minor Traveller (left) and 1960 Jaguar XK150 FHC (right).  Stations wagons with wood frames (real and fake) ate in the US called "woodies" but the spelling "woody" also appears in UK use.

Although for the whole of the Jaguar XK150’s production run (1957-1961) the Morris Minor Traveller (1952-1973) was also being made in factories never more than between 20-60 odd miles (32-100 km) distant, so different in form and function were the two it’s rare they’re discussed in the same context.  One was powered by an engine which had five times won the Le Mans 24 hour endurance classic while the other was one of several commercially-oriented variants of a small, post-war economy car, introduced in the austere England of 1948.  The Traveller did however have charm and it was also authentic in its construction, the varnished ash genuinely structural, an exoskeleton which provided the strength while the panels behind were there just to keep out the rain.  By contrast, by the mid-1950s, the US manufacturers had abandoned the method and produced “woodies” with a combination of fibreglass (fake timber) and DI-NOC, (Diurno Nocturna, from the Spanish, literally “daytime-nighttime” and translated for marketing purposes as “beautiful day & night”) appliqué, an embossed vinyl or polyolefin material with a pressure-sensitive adhesive backing produced since the 1930s and perfected by Minnesota Mining & Manufacturing (3M).  In phased releases over 1957-1958, Jaguar made available the usual three versions of its XK sports car, the DHC (drophead coupé, a style which elsewhere was usually called a cabriolet or convertible) and FHC (fixed head coupé, ie coupé), later joined by the more minimalist OTS (open two-seater, a roadster) and the line was a link between flowing lines of the 1930s and the new world, celebrated by the E-Type’s sensational debut at the 1961 Geneva Motor Show.

Minor modification: 1960 Jaguar XK150 3.4 Shooting Brake (“Foxbat”).

The Morris Minor Traveller was the last true woodie in production and is now a thing in the lower reaches of the collector market but there's one less available for fans because one was sacrificed to a project by by industrial chemist and noted Jaguar enthusiast, the late Geoffrey Stevens, construction undertaken between 1975-1977. He wanted the Jaguar XK150 shooting brake the factory never made so blended a XK150 FHC with the rear compartment of a Morris Minor Traveller of similar vintage.  Mr Stevens in 1976 dubbed his hybrid creation “Foxbat” because just as a Mig-25 landing in Japan was an event so unexpected it made headlines around the world, he suspected that in the circles he moved, a timber-framed XK150 shooting brake would be as much a surprise.  It has been restored as a charming monument to English eccentricity and even the usually uncompromising originality police among the Jaguar community seem fond of it.  In a nice touch (and typical of an engineer’s attention to detail), a “Foxbat” badge was hand-cut, matching the original Jaguar script.  Other than the coach-work, the XK150 is otherwise “matching-numbers” (chassis number S825106DN; engine number V7435-8).   

On the Wings of a Russian Foxbat: Deep Purple bootleg, 1977.

The origin of the term “bootlegging” dates from the late eighteenth century when it was used by British customs and excise officers to describe the trick smugglers used hiding valuables in their large sea-boots.  Since then, it’s been applied variously including (1) the distilling, transporting and selling of unlawful liquor (2) unlicensed copies of software and (3) unauthorized recordings of music and film.  In music, bootleg recordings began to appear in some volume in the 1960s and originally were often from live performances.  Often created from tapes of dubious quality with little or no editing, these bootlegs generally were tolerated by the industry because they tended to circulate among fans who anyway purchased the official product and were thought of just a form of free promotional material.  Later, when things became more organized and bootleggers began distributing replicas of official releases, the attitude changed and for decades the software industry fought ongoing battles against bootleg copies (which in some non-Western markets represented in excess of 90% of installations).

On the Wings of a Russian Foxbat, re-released (in re-mastered form with bonus tracks) in 1995 as Live in California, Long Beach Arena, 1976.

Taken from a performance by the English heavy metal band Deep Purple at the Long Beach Arena, Los Angeles on 27 February 1976, the bootleg On the Wings of a Russian Foxbat was released in 1977 and was another example of the effect on popular culture of the Soviet pilot’s defection.  The link with the event in Japan was that the quality of the band’s performance was unexpectedly good, their reputation at the time not good (they would break-up only weeks after the Long Beach show).  Additionally, the sound quality was outstanding (certainly by the usual bootleg standards), something not then easy to achieve in outdoor venues with a raucous audience.  Curiously, the original On the Wings of a Russian Foxbat bootleg used for the cover art a picture of unsmiling soldiers from the PLA (People’s Liberation Army) from the Republic of China (then usually called “Red China” or “Communist China); presumably the bootleggers decided the star on the caps was “sufficiently Russian”.  In 1995, re-mastered, the recording (with a few bundled “extras”) was re-issued as an “official” release, the fate of many a bootleg.  With memories of the diplomatic incident in 1976 having faded, although On the Wings of a Russian Foxbat still appeared on the cover, the album was marketed as Live in California, Long Beach Arena, 1976.