Ash

Ash (pronounced ash)

(1) The powdery, nonvolatile products and residue formed when matter is burnt; that which remains after burning; any of certain compounds formed by burning.

(2) In geology, finely pulverized lava thrown out by a volcano in eruption (technically volcanic ash).

(3) In chemistry, the non-aqueous remains of a material subjected to any complete oxidation process.

(4) Human (or animal) remains after cremation and either buried, scattered or stored in a crypt or container (usually styled as an “urn” regardless of style (always in the plural).

(5) Figuratively, mortal remains in general (always in the plural).

(6) Figuratively, the residue of anything (structures, institutions, movements, ideas, hopes etc), especially following disasters or catastrophes.

(7) In arboreal classification, any of the various oleaceous trees of the genus Fraxinus, of the olive family (especially F. excelsior of Europe and Asia or F. americana (white ash) of North America), having opposite, pinnate leaves, winged seeds and purplish flowers in small clusters.

(8) In arboreal classification, any of several trees resembling the ash, such as the mountain ash (and in Australia, any of several trees resembling the ash, especially of the eucalyptus genus).

(9) The tough, straight, close-grained wood of any of these trees, highly valued as timber because of its durability, widely used for the handles of tools (shovels, pick-axes etc) and once the choice material for the frames of many early automobiles.

(10) The largely archaic æsc (the symbols Æ & æ) (ash) from the Old English (the plural æscas).  The digraph æ represents a front vowel approximately like that of the “a” in the Modern English “hat” and the character is used also used to represent this sound in the International Phonetic Alphabet (IPA).

(11) A light silvery grey colour, often with a brownish tinge.

(12) As the ash-blonde hair color, a spectrum expressed in solid and variegated forms which blends or interpolates various classic blondes, silver-greys, and the lighter shades of brown.

(13) The acronym for Action on Smoking & Health, non-governmental organizations (NGO) in eth UK, Ireland & New Zealand, chartered as a charities (though through interaction with government they function sometimes in a way similar to QANGOs).

(14) To removed the burned tobacco from the end of a burning cigar or cigarette (usually by “flicking”, “tapping” or tapping the unburned section on the rim of an ashtray  The used to describe emptying the ask from the bowl of an extinguished pipe is less common.

(15) In agriculture, to cover newly-sown fields of crops with ashes.

Pre 950: From the Middle English asshe & aisshe (powdery remains of fire), from the Old English asce & æsce, from the Proto-West Germanic askā, from the Proto-Germanic askǭ, from the primitive Indo-European hes-.  It was cognate with the Frisian esk, the Dutch asch, the Swedish aska, the Danish & Norwegian aske, the Old Norse & Old High German aska (from which German gained German Asche) and the Gothic azgo (from the unattested Germanic askōn- (though the evolution of the Gothic is murky).  It was akin to the Latin ārēre (to be dry) (from which English ultimately gained arid) and āra (altar), the Oscan aasaí (on the altar), the Tocharian ās- (dry out; to get dry), the Sanskrit ā́sa- (ashes) and the Hittite hassi (on the hearth), from the primitive Indo-European root as- (to burn, glow).  The Spanish and Portuguese ascua (red-hot coal) are Germanic loan-words.  Ash is a noun & verb, ashiness is a noun, ashed is a verb, ashing is a noun & verb, ashen is an adjective & verb and ashless is an adjective; the noun plural is ashes.  The UK dialectal plural axen was from the Middle English axen & axnen, from the Old English axan & asċan (ashes) and was the plural of the Old English axe or æsċe (ash).  Some dictionaries do list it as rare but for (non-historic) purposes it’s archaic.

The various trees gained the common name ash from the Old English æsc, which was related to the primitive Indo-European word for the tree, while the generic name originated in Latin from a primitive Indo-European word for birch.  Both words were also used to mean “spear” & “shaft” in their respective languages because the straight, tough and durable timber was ideal for such purposes.  From the Old High German asc was derived the German Esche, with an altered vowel from the adjectival derivative eschen (which in Middle High German was eschîn.  It was akin to the Latin ornus (wild mountain ash), the Welsh onnen, the Ancient Greek ὀξύα (oxúa) (beech), the Old Armenian հացի (hacʿi), the Russian yáseń, the Polish jesion, the Czech jasan, the Lithuanian úosis, the Armenian hatsi and the Albanian ah (beech), all ultimately from the primitive Indo-European ōs (ash (tree)).  Although the close-grained timber of the ash is tough, it also has outstanding elasticity which allows it to be formed into shapes so was the preferred wood for spear-shafts and later came to be favored by coach-builders, many of the early automobiles also constructed with ash frames.

Forms have been coined as needed (as a portmanteau or with or without the hyphen) including ash-gourd, ash-pan, ashtray, ashcan, ash-pit fly-ash, ash-borer, pearl-ash, pot-ash & soda ash.  Potash (a class of potassium minerals of similar applicability to potassium carbonate and widely used in the production of fertilizers) is one of the most extensively mined minerals in the world.  One inventive use was noted in 1945 when the US military designated their internment camp for suspected Nazi war criminals as “Ashcan”; impressed, the British dubbed their holding facility “Dustbin”.  The ash-bin (receptacle for ashes from a fire and other refuse) seems not to have been recorded until 1847 although such devices would have been in use for centuries.  Similarly, the word ash-tray (reusable receptacle for the the ashes of the tobacco of smokers) first appears only in 1851 although they were doubtlessly among the first companion products after tobacco was introduced to the Western world after the early European exploration of the Americas in the late fifteenth century.  The ash-heap (stack or pile of ashes or other refuse) dates from the 1640s and seems to have been invented by foundry workers, who presumably produced more ash than most, at a time when their processes were mostly wood-fired.  The ash-pit (repository for ashes, especially in the lower part of a furnace) was first recorded in 1797 and reflected the increasing size of furnaces technological progress made possible; it was the “big brother” to the earlier ash-hole, in use since the 1640s, which continued to be used to describe the architecture of smaller installations.  It’s not known if regional variations in pronunciation meant “ash-hole” sometimes cause problems.

Lindsay Lohan imagined as an ash-blonde.

The phrase “ashes to ashes” is from the Church of England’s (Anglican) burial ritual, mentioned first in the Book of Common Prayer (1549) as part of the service's committal: “Forasmuch as it hath pleased Almighty God of his great mercy to take unto himself the soul of our dear brother [or sister] here departed, we therefore commit his body to the ground; earth to earth, ashes to ashes, dust to dust.”  It’s an echo of biblical passage from Genesis 3:19: “In the sweat of thy face shalt thou eat bread, till thou return unto the ground; for out of it wast thou taken: for dust thou art, and unto dust shalt thou return.”  Over time, “ashes to ashes” transcended its religious origin and has come to be used to allude to the cyclical nature of life and the inevitability of death.  Long pre-dating Christianity, ashes, as a reminder of finality, had been an ancient symbol of grief or repentance, their presence a part of pagan rituals and the early Church picked this up, the tradition beginning when Pope Gregory I (circa 540–604; usually styled Saint Gregory the Great, pope 590-604) sprinkled ashes on the heads of penitents on the first day of Lent although it wasn’t formalized in the ecclesiastical calendar until the fourteenth century, “ashes” having come to mean “the mortal remains of a person” by at least the late thirteenth century and alluded to the ancient custom of cremation.  The use to refer to the finely pulverized lava ejected from volcanoes dates from the 1660s.

Craftspersons (and some these days are other than male) in the Morgan factory at Malvern Link, Worcestershire in the UK, fashioning & fabricating ash frames (left) and 1973 Morgan +8 (right).

With only detail changes, the appearance of the roadsters (and the underlying ash frame, the patterns for which haven’t changed since 1937) in 2023 has little changed since the 1950s and the ancestry of the machines from the 1930s is obvious, the similarities out-numbering the differences.  It’s a persistent myth that under the skin, the Morgan’s platform is made entirely of wood but the truth is the chassis has always been rendered in steel & aluminum onto which is mounted the ash frame, to which the aluminum external panels are attached.  Each roadster takes three weeks to complete.

The “Ashes obituary”, 1882.

The Ashes is the (usually biannual) test cricket series conducted between Australia and England (who toured as the MCC (Marylebone Cricket Club) until 1970).  The term “The Ashes” dates from a satirical obituary published in a UK newspaper in 1882, the day after Australia recorded its first test victory on English soil.  The “obituary” noted the death of English cricket and that “the body will be cremated and the ashes taken to Australia”.  The idea caught on and as a prelude to the MCC’s next tour of Australia in 1882–1883, the press frequently mentioned the importance of regaining “those ashes”.  This the MCC’s captain vowed to do and after taking an unassailable 2-0 lead in the three-match series the job was done and some ladies presented him with a small urn (of unknown provenance although it may have been used for scent) said to contain the ashes of a wooden bail, humorously referred to as “the ashes of Australian cricket”.  Although it took some years before the contest between the teams was institutionalized as “the Ashes” since the 1920s that’s how they’ve been known.

Former England captain Mike Brearley (b 1942) with the Ashes urn, 1977.

The actual “ashes”, the original urn which has rarely left the MCC Museum at Lord's Cricket Ground in London since being presented to the club in 1927, is tiny, just over four inches (105 mm) high which is remarkable for a trophy which is of such significance to both nations.  It’s something like the sense of English understatement expressed when one compares No 10 Downing Street to something like the Élysée Palace which isn’t a wholly fair juxtaposition but they are, in a sense, comparable national symbols.  Certainly, the modest Ashes urn (originally a mass-produced, terracotta item little different from the thousands sold at the time in seaside souvenir shops) has about it noting of the grandeur of something like the America’s Cup (known as the Auld Mug; 1.1m (43 inches) high and weighing in at a hefty 14 kg odd (30+ lb) or any number of trophies in sports like rugby, football, tennis et al.  As a consolation for the original remaining locked up the MCC, in recent series, larger trophies with designs which acknowledge the little urn are now awarded to the victorious team.

Sir Lewis Hamilton contemplating a "plastic" trophy, Silverstone, 2014.

So trophies don’t have to be imposingly large or obviously expensive to be sought after as long as they’re vested with an appropriate history.  However, there can be some expectation of bling for those won by those contesting one-off events of some significance and Formula One driver Sir Lewis Hamilton (b 1985), prompted apparently by being awarded a “plastic” trophy after winning the 2014 British Grand Prix at Silverstone, later suggested it looked like it might be worth about £10, rather less than the traditional RAC (Royal Automobile Club) Gold Cup (he was subsequently presented with the cup at a press conference).  Warming to the topic though, Sir Lewis said he’d noted an obvious decline in the quality of the trophies awarded to Grand Prix winners and that he’d brought the matter to the attention of the then head of the F1 Bernie Ecclestone (b 1930).  It’s estimated the Ashes urn in 1882 would have been purchased for less than whatever was the equivalent then of £10 in 2014 so history and aura can be worth more than bling.

Lindsay Lohan with some trophies.  Sir Lewis might reflect things could have been worse.

Regalia

Regalia (pronounced ri-gey-lee-uh or ri-geyl-yuh)

(1) The emblems, symbols, or paraphernalia indicative of royalty or any other sovereign status; such as a crown, orb, sceptre or sword.

(2) The decorations, insignia, or ceremonial clothes of any office or order.

(3) A casual term for fancy, or dressy clothing; finery.

(4) Royal rights, prerogatives and privileges actually enjoyed by any sovereign, regardless of his title (emperor, grand duke etc).

(5) Sumptuous food (obsolete except in the odd literary novel).

(6) A large cigar of the finest quality (obsolete except in the odd literary novel). 

1530–1540: From the Medieval Latin rēgālia (royal privileges; things pertaining to a king), noun use of neuter plural of the Latin rēgālis (regal).  The word stems from the Latin substantivation of the adjective rēgālis, itself from rex (king).  Regalia is a Latin plurale tantum (plural as such, plural only) word that has different definitions. In one ancient (but now rare) definition, it refers to the exclusive privileges of a sovereign, a concept which remains codified in Scots law as Inter regalia (something inherently that belongs to the sovereign) and this may include property, privileges, or prerogatives.  The term is a direct borrowing from the Latin inter (among) and regalia (things of the king).  In Scots law, the division is between (1) regalia majora (major regalia), which are inseparable from the person of the sovereign and (2) regalia minora (minor regalia), which may be conveyed to a subject.  The word originally referred to the formal dress of a sovereign, but is now used of any type of elaborate formal dress or accessories and is applied especially to academic and ecclesiastical robes.  Although regalia is a Latin plurale tantum (plural as such, plural only) which, in the grammar of Latin is a noun (in any specific sense) that has no singular form (eg scissors) in most usage, in Modern English, it’s sometimes used in the singular: regale.  Further to complicate, the plural form of the grammatical descriptor is pluralia tantum.  Regalia is a noun and regalian is an adjective; the noun plural is regalias.

Cardinal George Pell (1941-2023) in ecclesiastical regalia (left) and a deconstruction of the layers (right).  The nature of the garments' layers assumed significance in the matter of the cardinal's trial on charges of sexual abuse of a minor, a discussion about the ease and speed with with "accessibility" was physically possible (within the constraints of time and place) being among the evidence offered in defense.

In his original trial the cardinal was convicted, the verdict upheld on appeal to a full bench of the Court of Appeal.  However, upon final appeal to the High Court of Australia (HCA), the conviction was quashed, the judges ruling that the Crown had not beyond reasonable doubt proved the acts alleged happened as described, in the circumstances, in the place and at the time mentioned in the indictment.  Quash means to nullify, void or declare invalid and is a procedure used in both criminal and civil cases when irregularities or procedural defects are found.  In a unanimous (7-0) judgment (Pell v The Queen [2020] HCA 12)) quashing Cardinal Pell’s conviction in the Supreme Court of Victoria (Pell v The Queen [2019] VSCA 186), the High Court set aside the verdict and substituted an acquittal; in a legal sense it is now as if the original verdict never happened. 

Lindsay Lohan being adorned with prom queen regalia (Mean Girls (2004)).

A depiction of Peter Dutton (b 1970; leader of the opposition and leader of the Australian Liberal Party since May 2022) in the regalia of a Freemason Grand Master (digitally altered image).

Although no documentary evidence has ever emerged, Mr Dutton has never denied being a Freemason.  Masonic Grand Masters wear specific regalia signifying their high rank within the cult.  The details of the garments & accessories vary between the sects of Freemasonry but the core elements are:

Apron: The Grand Master wears an ornate apron which historically was fabricated from natural fibres such as silk or lambskin but it may be some now use modern synthetics which offer some advantages although they lack the same quality of tactility.  The aprons feature intricate embroidery, including Masonic symbols such as the Square and Compasses and may feature gold or silver fringes are common.

Collar: A grand and elaborate collar made of a wide ribbon is worn around the neck, often with a grand master's jewel or other symbol of office attached.  Most ribbons are still the traditional blue with gold or silver embroidery & embellishments.

Jewel: A grand master's jewel is a distinctive medallion or emblem (usually attached to the collar) which includes symbols denoting the authority of the office such as the square, compass, eye or other Masonic insignia.

Gloves: White gloves are a standard part of Masonic regalia (worn not only by a grand master).  The origin of the white gloves was their (alleged) use by stone masons when working on porous materials such as marble, symbolizing purity and the craftsman's clean hands.

Sash or Girdle: In some Masonic temples, grand Masters wear a sash or girdle around the waist, again, often adorned with the cult’s symbols and colors.  Some temples don’t use sashes as part of the regalia because it’s said to be a modern addition with no real link to Masonic tradition.

Hat: The hats, while distinctive, seem to be a fashion choice more than a general tradition.  The most popular seem to be tricorn, bowler or top-hats although evidence suggest regional factors may influence the choice, a wide array of ceremonial caps existing in the photographic record.  In some sects, a specific, unique hat is reserved for use by the Grand Master who may wear it only during ceremonies and rituals.

Youth

Youth (pronounced yooth)

(1) The state (imprecisely defined) of being young.

(2) The appearance, freshness, vigor, spirit etc, characteristic of one who is young (usually as youthful or youthfulness).

(3) The time of being young; early life (figuratively applied also to institutions, ideas, movements etc to describe the first or early period.)

(4) The period of life from puberty to the attainment of full growth (nominal adulthood), sometimes used as a (vague) synonym for adolescence.

(5) Young persons, collectively.

(6) A young person, by convention usually male (which some etymologists suggest is the only correct use).

(7) As a locality name, the Isle of Youth (Isla de la Juventud in the Spanish and formerly the Isle of Pines), an island in the Caribbean, a municipality in southern Cuba.

Pre 900: From the Middle English youthe, youghte & ȝouþe, from the Old English geoguth or ġeoguþ (the state of being young; young people, junior warriors; young of cattle (and related to geong (young)), from the Proto-West Germanic juwunþa, from the Proto-Germanic jugunþō & jugunþiz (youth) and related to the Old Saxon juguth, the Old Frisian jogethe, the Middle Dutch joghet, the Old High German iugund, the Gothic junda and the Latin juventus.  It was cognate with the Saterland Frisian Juugd, the Gothic junda, the German Low German Jöögd, the West Frisian jeugd, the Dutch jeugd and the German Jugend.  The ultimate source of the Germanic forms was a suffixed form of the primitive Indo-European root yeu- (vital force, youthful vigor) + the Proto-Germanic abstract noun suffix –itho.  According to the Oxford English Dictionary (OED), the Proto-Germanic form apparently was altered from juwunthiz by the influence of its contrast dugunthiz (ability (source of the Old English duguð)).  In Middle English, the medial “g” became a yogh (a Middle English letter (ȝ) used mainly where modern English has gh and y), which then disappeared.  The alternative forms yought & youthe are obsolete.  The Middle English youthhede (youthhood, the synonyms being yonghede, yongthe & youthe) was an example of an early nuancing as it described the part of life which followed childhood and is thus the equivalent of the modern adolescence although it’s clear it was also used of youth generally.  Youth, youthism & youthfulness are nouns, youthy is a noun & adjective (both obsolete), youthwards is an adverb and youthful & youthless are adjectives; the noun plural is youths (collectively as youth).

Synonyms are easy to list but harder to use like youth, the meanings tend to be loaded, some working in some contexts but not others and the list includes: juvenility, youngness & youngth (both archaic), youthfulness, immaturity, minority, adolescence, child, childish, kid, lad, teen, teen-ager, youngster, young  minority, immaturity & stripling.  The classic antonym is adulthood but in some contexts old-age, senility and dotage (the one favoured by Kim Jong-un (Kim III, b 1982; Supreme Leader of DPRK (North Korea) since 2011) to disparage Donald Trump (b 1946; US president 2017-2021) before they fell in love) may be applied.

Lindsay Lohan as an 11 year old youth and at a youthful 36.

The adjective youthful dates from the 1560s and much earlier, Old English had geoguðlic and other words formerly used in the same sense were youthlike, youthly, youthsome & youthy.  Yippie was first reported in 1968 and was the “marketing” name of the (not wholly fictitious) "Youth International Party" (modelled on the then commonly used “hippie”), “founded” by counter culturalists Abbie Hoffman (1936–1989), Jerry Rubin (1938–1994), Nancy Kurshan (b 1944) & Paul Krassner (1932–2019).  Youth can be a modifier (youth culture, youth crime, youth worker, youth hostel, youth market, youth justice et al) and be modified (middle youth, troubled youth) while “youthism” (discrimination against the young) is the companion term to ageism (discrimination against the old) although the former is, at law, not an inherently “suspect category” in most systems where the appropriate framework exists; that’s why five year olds can’t sue for the right to hold drivers licences although if someone that youthful in somewhere like Florida or Texas petitioned the US Supreme Court for the right to carry an AR-15, given the composition of the bench, it’s far from certain there wouldn’t be at least a few dissenting opinions supporting his or her right and as a piece of black letter law, under current interpretations, it could be argued a five year old with an AR-15 wouldn’t be any less representative of a “well-regulated militia” than anyone else who now enjoys the right.

Ever inventive, English has coined new derivations as required, the spread encouraged by the emergence of social media.  A “youthemism” is a particular form of euphemism, describing the phrases and photographs used in advertising to make older individuals feel a little young younger; youthemisms appear in the slogans and marketing campaigns for everything from pairs of jeans to “mid life crisis” motor cycles.  Also from advertising (sometime seeking votes as well as sales) is “youthenize” which describes making someone or something more appealing to a younger market; as a transitive verb it can be used to mean “to make youthful or younger; to rejuvenate”.  By obvious analogy with earthquake, “youthquake” seems first to have appeared in Vogue magazine in 1965 and was a reference to the cultural changes being wrought by the youthful baby boomers who were (uniquely in history) both in a critical mass and an economic force by virtue of their unprecedented (for youth) levels of disposable income.  The phrase “fountain of youth” is an allusion to some of the tales from antiquity and is used to refer to any product, exercise regime or other activity which promises to restore or prolong youthfulness.  The non-standard spelling “yoof” is a colloquialism from England which first gained currency during the 1980s, often as “yoof kulture” and in Thatcher-era England was a way of disparaging the behaviour and sloppy language standards among the young.  Like other words intended to offend, there were sub-cultures which adopted yoof as a form of group identity and solidarity, use prevalent among the then emerging “ravers” and the “acid house” scene.

Hitler Youth & Band of German Maidens members on camp together, circa 1937. Sometimes, the boys & girls got to know one another.

The German form jugend became notorious because during the Third Reich (1933-1945) the Hitlerjugend (Hitler Youth, 1926-1945 and abbreviated as HJ) was the Nazi Party organization for boys (10-18), intended to instil a sense of nationalism, prevent any from drifting towards delinquency and, more controversially, prepare them for military training proper.  The Bund Deutscher Mädel (Band of German Maidens) was the girls' wing of the Hitlerjugend and, abbreviated as BDM, its purpose was to prepare girls for their traditional role of motherhood.  Perhaps unfortunately, some mixed activities such as the HJ and the BDM going on camps together resulted in much practical preparation for motherhood, revelations of this promiscuity leading Germans to conclude BDM might be better understood as Bund Deutscher Matratzen (Band of German Mattresses).

The word youth has long been applied to the young of both sexes (and now of all genders) but there was (especially among classists) an argument that while anyone could be youthful or possess the quality of youthfulness, only a young male could be described as a youth.  That was skating on etymologically thin ice although it does seem likely the view did reflect the conventions of use in earlier centuries and that was another example of the reverence for antiquity which so flourished in the post medieval-period.  Those who translated the myths from Rome and Greece of course wrote often of the beautiful boys and young men who litter the tales but the girls and women were never youths; they were nymphs, waifs, pixies, sprites, fairies or naiads and this tradition infected academia, more than one professor insisting a youth could be only male.

But now it’s used of anyone young though context still matters.  In clinical medicine for example there are two distinct fields: paediatric medicine and adolescent medicine, puberty the point of delineation.  As a technical distinction in hospitals that’s uncontroversial but other words within the rubric of youthfulness can carry baggage, juvenile for example being innocuous when used in zoology to describe the young of a species but potentially incendiary when applied to people, such remains the influence of the phrase “juvenile delinquency”, popular since the 1960s whenever there’s a need to create a moral panic about the behaviour of youth (complaints about which by older generations have been documented since Antiquity).  Adolescent too has suffered because of phrases like “adolescent humor”, “adolescent behavior” etc which rarely suggest anything positive.

Teenage fencing.

Then of course there is teen-age which true pedants will always distinguish from teenage (pronounced teen-ige) which is a technical herm of fence-builders to describe a technique of weaving which interleaves brushwood to produce a type of fencing called wattle, the weave effected usually horizontally around vertical uprights planted in the ground.  The use to refer to those aged 13-19 dates from 1911 and was used originally of Sunday school classes with the adjective teen-aged first noted 1922 although it wasn’t until the 1950s that an identifiable “teen-age culture” could be said to exist, something of which many (then and now) disapproved but modern capitalism, generally neutral on low-intensity cultural squabbles, identified a new market and in music, clothing, film and just about every aspect of pop-culture, teens have since been a valuable segment, spending either other people’s money (OPM) or their own.  Being teen-aged of course stops with one’s 20^th birthday but youth for some time persists although there’s no general agreement for how long.  A helpful guide though may be the criterion enforced by New Zealand-based tour operator Contiki Tours, long renowned for their innovative model of alcohol-fueled packaged tourism for amorous youth although it seems they now also cater for those who drink rather less enthusiastically than the average Antipodean.  Contiki restrict their tours to those aged 18-35, presumably because at 18 sex is lawful in all countries visited and 35 is the upper limit at which it's (in some cases) plausible for men to hook-up with 18 year old women.  The days when a 21^st birthday was of legal significance have gone but there’s a wide range of ages which (somewhat arbitrarily) are used to at least imply a suggestion of adulthood including matters of sexuality activity (generally 14-18 depending on jurisdiction), obtaining a drivers licence (14-23), voting (15-20), consuming alcohol (5 (with parental supervision) –20), being responsible for criminal acts (8-14) or becoming President of the United States (35).  Lindsay Lohan, having thus attained the statutory age of political adulthood on 2 July 2021, may now seek to become POTUS; that would MAGA.

A montage of images of a teen-aged Lindsay Lohan.  

Legal rights and responsibilities however really don’t define the end of youth because it’s a cultural construct and probably most would accept 25 or even 29 as the end although of course many even beyond this can remain “youthful” and the distinction between someone thought a “youth” or a “young adult” is likely more a judgment of the individual than anything much to do with their age and in casual use, youth, inherently a relative term, can also be applied to the middle aged.  When it was noticed during the first Nuremberg Trial (1945-1946) that certain defendants were being influenced during the communal lunches by the most recalcitrant of the Nazis, it was decided to serve the meals to a number of separate tables and the one allocated to Walther Funk (then aged 56), Hans Fritzsche (46), Albert Speer (41) & Baldur von Schirach (38) was referred to by jailers and prisoners alike as der Tischjugend (the youth table), the average age of the diners at the other tables much older.  The troublemaker who was the reason the seating plans were changed was Hermann Göring (52) who was put in a room to eat alone which he did, most unhappy at being denied his audience.

Crumb

Crumb (pronounced kruhm)

(1) A small particle of bread, cake, biscuit etc that has broken off.

(2) A small particle or portion of anything; fragment; bit.

(3) The soft inner portion of a bread, as distinguished from the crust (archaic).

(4) In the plural crumbs, a cake topping made of sugar, flour, butter, and spice, usually crumbled on top of the raw batter and baked with the cake.

(5) In slang, a nobody; a contemptibly objectionable or worthless person (rare).

(6) In cooking, to dress, coat or prepare with crumbs or to remove crumbs from (literally to de-crumb).

(7) To break into crumbs or small fragments.

(8) In the industrial production of food, a mixture of sugar, cocoa and milk, used to make bulk cooking chocolate.

(9) In (predominately historic military) slang, a body louse (Pediculus humanus).

Pre 1000: From the Middle English crome, cromme, crumme & crume, from the Old English cruma (crumb, fragment), from the Proto-Germanic krumô & krūmô (fragment, crumb), from the primitive Indo-European grū-mo- (something scraped together, lumber, junk; to claw, scratch), from ger- (to turn, bend, twist, wind).  It was cognate with the Dutch kruim (crumb), the Low German Krome & Krume (crumb), the Middle High German krūme & German Krume (crumb), the Danish krumme (crumb), the Swedish dialectal krumma (crumb) & the Swedish inkråm (crumbs, giblets), the Icelandic krumur (crumb), the Latin grūmus (a little heap (usually of earth) and the Ancient Greek grumea (from ψιχίον (psichion)) (bag or chest for old clothes).

The un-etymological -b- appeared in the mid-fifteenth century as in limb & climb to match crumble and words like dumb, numb & thumb although there may also have been the influence of French words like humble (where it makes sense, unlike in in English where it’s just silly given crumb should be spelled “crum” or “krum”.  The slang meaning "lousy person" dates from 1918, linked to US troops who had picked up crumb as a word to describe the body-louses well known in the trenches on the Western Front in France.  The use to refer to louses, base on the resemblance, was from another war, attested from 1863 during the US Civil War.  The obsolete alternative spelling was the dialectal crimb.  Crumb, crumbling, crumbler, crumbling & crumble are nouns & verbs, crumbled is a verb, crumbly is a noun & adjective and crumbable is an adjective; the noun plural is crumbs.

The adjective crummy dates from the 1560s in the sense of “easily crumbled" but within a decade had come also to mean "like bread", the slang adoption of which to suggest "shoddy, filthy, inferior, poorly made" in use by 1859, either from the earlier sense or influenced by the more recent used to refer to the louse.  In one curiosity thought probably related to the resemblance to certain loaves of bread, crummy was briefly (although dialectical use did persist) used in the eighteenth century to describe a woman, "attractively plump, full-figured, buxom" although any link with Robert Crumb’s later work Stormy Daniels is mere coincidence.  The related forms are crummily & crumminess.  The adjective crumby (full of crumbs) is from 1731 and while it overlapped with crummy, it seems almost always to have been applied literally.

The verb crumble is from the late-fifteenth century kremelen (to break into small fragments (transitive)), from the Old English crymelan, thought to be the frequentative of gecrymman (to break into crumbs), from cruma; the intransitive sense of "fall into small pieces" dating from the 1570s.  As a noun, crumb has meant "a fragment" at least since the 1570s but as a cake or dessert-topping (made of sugar, flour, butter, and spice, usually crumbled on top of the raw batter and baked with the dish), the first known reference is in English newspapers in 1944, one of the techniques recommended as a culinary innovation during the wartime food rationing, the best remembered of which is the vegetarian “Woolton Pie”, named after Lord Woolton (1883-1964; UK Minister of Food 1940-1943)

Stormy Daniels (2019) by Robert Crumb.

Robert Crumb (b 1943) is an US cartoonist, associated since the 1960s with the counter-culture and some strains of libertarianism; he was one of the most identifiable figures of the quasi-underground comix movement.  There is a genre-description of the long-typical women in his work as “Crumb women” based on the depiction of the physical characteristics he most admired although, for reasons he’s widely discussed, he no longer feels the need to draw women in that manner.  He still draws women but the work is now more literally representational, his portrait of pornographic actress & director Stormy Daniels (Stephanie Gregory Clifford; b 1979) a more sympathetic interpretation than Donald Trump's (b 1946; US president 2017-2021) ungracious description of her as “horse face”.  Really, President Trump should be more respectful towards a three-time winner of F.A.M.E.'s (Fans of Adult Media and Entertainment) much coveted annual "Favorite Breasts" Award.

Handed down on Tuesday 30 November 2021, Set the Standard is a report by sex discrimination commissioner Kate Jenkins (b 1968) on behalf of the Human Rights Commission, exploring bullying, sexual harassment and sexual assault experienced by those working in commonwealth parliamentary workplaces in Australia.  The report recommends (1) codes of conduct which should apply to both parliamentarians and their staff and (2) standards of conduct within the parliamentary space.  The printed version includes evidence from some seventeen hundred individuals, including almost 150 current or former parliamentarians and some 900 current or former staffers.  At this time, it appears the only restriction placed on politician’s behavior is the so-called “bonk-ban”, the proscription of ministers and their staff enjoying sex together, a thing imposed in the wake of the revelation of Barnaby Joyce's (b 1967; thrice (between local difficulties) deputy prime-minister of Australia 2016-2022) adulterous affair with the taxpayer-funded help.  The way around that is apparently for ministers to arrange staff-swaps with other offices because the bonk-ban doesn’t extend to sex with other people’s staff and it’ll be fun to see what tricks and techniques are adopted as work-arounds to avoid what little will be done between the three months it takes for the Jenkins’ report to work its way through the system and the following three weeks it takes to forget about it.  The politicians like things the way they are; expect more of the same.

Although it didn’t make it into the report, one group of enablers of poor conduct subsequently identified were the “crumb ladies”, the female politicians who are doughty defenders of the predatory male politicians who are the perpetrators of abuse inflicted on women, the reference to crumbs being the pathetic and insignificant rewards tossed their way by the male establishment who divide the spoils of office mostly among themselves.  While the men enjoy the important jobs, the most lucrative perks and the best travel to civilized spots, the "crumb ladies", knowing their place and toeing the line, might pick up the odd appointment as an "assistant something" or a holiday (disguised as a study trip) to somewhere where (usually) it’s safe to drink the water.  The existence of the parliament’s “crumb ladies” alludes to the use of crumbs as a device in the New Testament.  Crumbs which fall from the table appear in an increasing number of translations and of particular theological interest are Matthew 15:27 and Mark 7:28.  However, the best illustration in this context is probably Luke 16:21: "...and desiring to be fed with the crumbs which fell from the rich man's table".

Lindsay Lohan MH Crumble Cake #'d Tobacco cards 462 (left) & 463 (right).

Rhubarb & Apple Crumble

All crumble recipes are forks of apple crumble and the same instructions can be used with just about any combinations of fruit.  Crumbles can be assemble to emphasize tartness, sweetness or a blend of the two.  Among the favorites to mix and match are rhubarb, apple, pineapple, apricot, peach, boysenberry, & strawberry.  The extent of the sweetness can further be enhanced by adding more sugar (brown sugar is recommended) although many prefer to use honey.

Core Ingredients

450g rhubarb, cut into 1 inch (25 mm) slices.
350g apples (Granny Smith recommended), peeled and cut into 1 inch (25 mm) chunks.
1 vanilla pod, split open (or 1 teaspoon of vanilla paste or extract).
120g golden caster sugar.
Ice cream, custard or thickened cream (as preferred) to serve.

Topping Ingredients

200g plain flour.
1 tsp ground ginger (optional).
100g cold salted butter, chopped.
70g light soft brown sugar

Instructions

(1) Pre-heat oven to 200^oC / 390^oF (180^oC / 360^oF if fan forced).

(2) Place rhubarb, apples, vanilla and sugar together in an ovenproof dish and toss to ensure vanilla & sugar coating is consistent.

Roast for 10 minutes.

(4) Place flour in a large bowl, mixing in ginger if it’s being used.  Using fingertips, rub in butter to create a chunky breadcrumb-like textured mixture.

(5) When texture is achieved, stir through the sugar (creating the crumble).

(6) Sprinkle crumble topping onto the fruit and cook for a further 30-35 minutes or until the topping is a light, golden brown.

(7) Serve with ice cream, custard or thickened cream as preferred.

Squad

Squad (pronounced skwod)

(1) In modern military use, a small number of soldiers (typically between 4-10), under the authority of a corporal or staff sergeant, usually a sub-set of a platoon and the smallest operational unit recognized by the military.

(2) In law enforcement, a group of police officers or other officials, especially one organized to deal with a particular area of law enforcement or a particular event or situation.

(3) Any small group or party of persons engaged in a common enterprise.

(4) In sport, group of players from which a team is selected.

(5) In slang, any group of people with some identifiable connection (especially one’s friends, taken collectively).

(6) In zoology, an (informal) collective noun for a group of squid.

(7) To form into squads (rare except in technical use).

(8) To assign to a squad (rare except in technical use).

(9) In some dialects (UK, dating from the mid-seventeenth century), sloppy mud, of uncertain origin.

1640–1650: From the French escouade, from the Old French esquade, an alteration of esquadre, from the Italian squadra (battalion, literally “square” (from which French gained escadre), from the Spanish escuadra (square (so called from square shape of the formation)), from the Old Spanish, from escuadrar (to square (from the square formations used)), from the from Vulgar Latin exquadra (to square), from the Latin  squadra (a square), the construct being ex- (out) + quadrare (make square), from quadrus (a square), from the primitive Indo-European root kwetwer- (four).  Squad is a noun & verb, squaddie & squadron are nouns and squadded & squadding are verbs; the noun plural is squads.

Before advances in ballistics extended the range of firepower, infantry troops tended to fight in a square formation because it was the most effective to repel cavalry or superior forces. And from this came the idea of the squad as a basic military formation, the Latin squadra meaning “square” although that doesn’t imply Roman squads could number as few as four (as is the modern practice, reflected in the slang term for private soldiers (the army’s lowest rank (technically non-ranked)) in some armies being “squaddie”.  In historic (army) use, a squadron was a body of cavalry comprising two companies or troops, averaging from one hundred and twenty to two hundred soldiers.  Probably the best known military squad is the firing squad, a traditional method of military execution and regarded as among the most honorable forms of dispatch.  By the early nineteenth century the word was extended to any small party or group of persons and the use in sports is traced to 1902.  With the evolution of sporting competitions to become professional, larger groups of players were needed to be on stand-by for selection (to cover injury, illness etc) and these groups came to be called squads.

The use by police forces as both standing institutions dedicated to certain duties (drug squad, dog squad, vice squad, bomb squad et al) and ad hoc formations for a one-off purpose (essentially task forces: royal visit squad, test match squad et al) appears to have begun in 1905 and is now institutionalized.  In police use “squad car” can probably has been applied to any vehicle but is most associated with a marked patrol car.  God squad is a casual terms for those spreading the word of God and is usually reserved for especially devoted lay members of a church.  A cheer squad can either be a formal group of attractive young women employed (cheerleaders) to dance and wave pom-poms in support of sporting teams (their numbers diminishing as attitudes to this and that change) or a description of those who (in a usually unorganized fashion) offer unquestioning and often vocal support to someone (Donald Trump, crooked Hillary Clinton et al) or some idea or institution.  In recent US political use, “The Squad” is the collective term for nine (originally four bolshie women of color) Democrat Party members of the US House of Representatives who self-identify as “progressive” and are labeled by Fox News etc as “socialist” or worse.  It was one of the squad members who coined the term “The Squad” although it’s not believed the inspiration was the Irish Republican Army (IRA) of the same name which was tasked with the assassination of political opponents but that’s probably crossed the mind of many of the old, white men who have dominated US politics for centuries.

Some of "the squad", who seem often angry about something, House of Representatives, Washington DC.

Navies in the 1580s picked up the idea of the squadron (from the Italian squadrone, from the Latin squadra (a square) but that does not imply naval squadrons were either originally or even typically of four ships.  The squadron was simply analogous with the army’s platoon / company / regiment / brigade / division arrangements whereby several squadrons made up a flotilla and several flotillas a fleet (confusingly, several fleets could be assembled into a fleet so to make things clearer tags like “home fleet”, grand fleet” et al emerged and squadrons also attracted specific designations such as “China squadron”, “East Africa squadron et al.  Air forces by 1912 began to use the squadron as the basic formation upon which organizational arrangements pivoted.  Over the years the number varied greatly but classically a squadron consisted of twelve aircraft, made up of four “flights” of three.  Squadrons were organized into “wings”, a collection of which was a “group” and beyond that point the arrangements and naming conventions varied.   In the US military’s recently constituted Space Force, multiple squadrons make up an operations delta or a support garrison.

Suicide Squads

HH Asquith (1852-1928) and his young friend Venetia Stanley (1887–1948).

Although few were quite as vituperative as Paul Keating (b 1944; Prime Minister of Australia 1991-1996) who once describes the members of the Australian Senate as "unrepresentative swill", governments in the twentieth century often found upper houses to be such a nuisance they schemed and plotted ways to curb their powers or, preferably, do away with them entirely.  As the electoral franchise was extended, governments were sometimes elected with what they considered a mandate to pursue liberal or progressive policies while upper houses, by virtue of their composition and tenure (some with life-time appointments) often acted as an obstruction, rejecting legislation or imposing interminable delays by sending proposed laws to be “discussed to death” in committees from which “nothing ever emerged”.  This was the situation which confronted the glittering Liberal Party cabinet of HH Asquith (1852–1928; UK prime minister 1908-1916) which in 1909 found the Lords, in defiance of long established convention, blocking passage of the budget.  The Lords was wholly unelected, its membership mostly inherited, sometimes by virtue of some service (virtuous or otherwise) by an ancestor hundreds of years before.  Successive elections didn’t resolve the crisis and Asquith resolved to pursue the only lawful mechanism available: the creation of as many peers as would be necessary (in the hundreds) to secure the passage of his legislation.

That of course required royal ascent and the newly enthroned George V (1865–1936; King of the United Kingdom & Emperor of India 1910-1936), while making his reservations clear, proved a good constitutional monarch and made it known he would follow the advice of his prime-minister.  As it turned out, the “suicide squad” wasn’t required, their Lordships, while not at all approving of the government, were more appalled still at the thought of their exclusive club being swamped with “jumped-up grocers” in “bad hats” and allowed the legislation to pass.  Actually, “castration squad” might have been a more accurate description because while the Lords survived, Asquith ensured it would be less of an obstacle, substituting the road block of its power of veto with a speed-bump, a right to impose a two-year delay (in 1949 reduced to six months).  The New Labour administration (1997-2010) introduced further reforms which were designed eventually to remove from the Lords all those who held seats by virtue of descent and even the Tories later moved in that direction although the efforts have stalled and a few of the hereditary peers remain.  As things now stand, the last remaining absolute veto the Lords retain is to stop an attempt by a government to extend a parliament's life beyond five years. 

The preserved Legislative Council Chamber in the Queensland Parliament.

Some upper house assassins however truly were a suicide squad.  In Australia, the state of Queensland followed the usual convention whereby the sub-national parliaments were bicameral, the Legislative Council the upper house and like the others, it was a bastion of what might now be called "those representing the interests of the 1%" and a classic example of white privilege.  Actually, at the time, the lower houses were also places of white privilege but the Australian Labor Party (ALP) had long regarded the non-elected Legislative Council (and upper houses in general) as undemocratic and reactionary so in 1915, after securing a majority in the Legislative Assembly (the lower house) which permitted the party to form government, they sought abolition.  The Legislative Council predictably rejected the bills passed by the government in 1915 & 1916 and a referendum conducted in 1917 decisively was lost; undeterred, in 1920, the government requested the governor appoint sufficient additional ALP members to the chamber to provide an abolitionist majority.  In this, the ALP followed the example of the Liberal Party in the UK which in 1911 prevailed upon the king to appoint as many new peers as might be needed for their legislation to pass unimpeded through an otherwise unsympathetic House of Lords.  That wasn’t needed as things transpired but in Queensland, the new members of the Legislative Council duly took their places and on 26 October 1921, the upper house voted in favor of abolition, the new appointees known forever as "the suicide squad".  Despite the success, the trend didn't spread and the Commonwealth parliament and those of the other five states remain bicameral although the two recent creations, established when limited self-government was granted to the Northern Territory (NT) and Australian Capital Territory (ACT), both had unicameral assemblies.

Lindsay Lohan in costume as Suicide Squad’s Harley Quinn (a comic book character created by DC Comics), "Halloween bash", Albert's Club, South Kensington, London, October 2016.

Across the Tasman Sea, the New Zealand upper house lasted another three decades but it’s eventual demise came about not because of conflict but because the institution was increasing viewed as comatose, rejecting nothing, contributing little and rarely inclined even to criticize.  Unlike in England and Queensland, in New Zealand the abolition movement enjoyed cross-party support, left and right (although the latter in those days were pretty leftist), united in their bored disdain.  One practical impediment was the New Zealand parliament couldn’t amend the country’s constitution because no government had ever bothered to adopt the Statute of Westminster (1931) by which the Imperial Parliament had granted effective independence to the Dominions but in 1947 this was done.  Despite that, the Labour Party didn’t act and after prevailing in the 1950 general election, it was a National Party administration which passed the Legislative Council Abolition Act, its passage assured after a twenty-member “suicide squad” was appointed and the upper house’s meeting of 1 December 1950 proved its last.  Opposition from within the chamber had actually been muted, presumably because to sweeten the deal, the government used some of the money saved to pay some generous “retirement benefits” for the displaced politicians.  New Zealand since has continued as a unitary state with a unicameral legislature.