Luckily, it was only 34º degrees inside...not to the freezing point...yet. Still much too cold for my heat loving plants. I did what I needed to do, then headed back to my own comfort zone. The brisk walk to, and from, the greenhouse woke me up. Completely. It was great! Still not sure why I love the cold on my face so much. But I do.
As I busied myself in the kitchen, my brain began rehashing the late evening event between DW and myself. I had gone out to the greenhouse to shut the homemade heat source down for the evening. Unbeknownst to me, the fuel had sucked itself dry and now only the "wick" was burning. Oh wow! The greenhouse was filled with gray smoke that threatened to choke out my babies. And now, me...
Capping off the heat source, I sent a text to DW to please come help me. Windows needed opening, fan needed started, and I couldn't breath, nor see because of the burn effect coming into my eye sockets. I thought, "This could be it for me. I may collapse right here and no one will know. Especially Dennis because he's still in bed. Fast asleep." If I had stopped for just a minute to consider there couldn't be carbon monoxide filling the place (because its odorless), I wouldn't have gotten into such a frenzy. Plus, the fuel burning was clean denatured alcohol. But the neurons weren't firing so well, even though the cold early morning air had closed off all my pores, my eyeballs wanted out of their sockets and my lungs were collapsing.
Dennis rarely gets in a hurry, and staying true to form, he wasn't coming fast enough (for me, anyway), so I stepped outside and called his phone. Then he appeared. Not very happily, he says, "You do know you can draw more flies to honey than vinegar, right?" I wasn't in the mood...
Bringing you back to this morning...as I was pondering this, I realized I don't like flies. Why would I want to draw flies? Good question. Right??? Who in the world thought ANYONE would want to draw flies and so then decided it would be a great thing to make up an idiom that would last throughout eternity about them? Furthermore, why do FLIES symbolize getting someone to cooperate with you? Weird. Am I right? Do we really want those nasty creatures cooperating with us? Well....maybe. Just so they can be swatted and destroyed. Kind of counter intuitive, wouldn't you say? Okay, now. No hate speech, please.
Something to consider: Personally, I think this particular saying is false. I would think you could draw more flies (should you actually want them), to vinegar. More so than honey. Vinegar is acetic acid. It fools flies into thinking there is some sweetness to be had. Like, maybe ROTTING FRUIT! Yum...🙄 Dumb flies. I'm probably overthinking this...
However...if you know me...
Yep. I went digging. So as not to bore you to death (unless I already have), read on for the simplest explanation I found.
"I just found out something amazing about flies, vinegar, and honey that turns this old idiom on its ear! I read about the design of a fly trap that attracts them with vinegar, but traps them with honey. It's an inverted jar, and the flies, lured in by the smell of the vinegar (vinegar smells like rotting fruit to them, which they adore) are tricked into going higher up the jar, where the sides are coated with honey. They get stuck on the honey. I think the basic meaning of the saying remains intact, that if we want people to do what we want, we should be sweet and not rude to them." – user38166 Feb 24, 2013 at 2:03 (This is from the StackExchange website)
So, maybe I was wrong. Still...why compare getting what you want, to FLIES? Why not a cuddly kitten? Manipulation? Being the conspiracy thinker that I am, I think this goes much deeper than what meats the eye. Or the brain. As most things do.
For those who want to know: This saying first appeared in America in Poor Richard's Almanac in 1744. But the saying can be traced back to G. Torriano's 'Common Place of Italian Proverbs'. So I suppose we'll never really know why flies were used for this idiom. UNLESS...it was because of the same reason it's been said to "keep your friends close, but your enemies closer." 🤷♀️ Aren't you glad you read this whole post? 😉😂
Keeping an eye out for other nonsensical things, here you will find me...in Mary's World.
No comments:
Post a Comment