Ben Franklin

I woke up hungry. I was dreaming about eating a peanut butter sandwich while I was sitting in a conference room at the public library, listening to Ben Franklin present a talk on "The Scarlet Pimpernel".

I sat up in bed and may have even said it out loud: "What the heck is a pimpernel?"

The Ben Franklin part is easy to explain. We just had the primary elections here in Colorado, and voters have taken their first steps toward the significant political housecleaning that's coming in November. "Throw the bums out!" is the catchphrase of this political season...and the quote is often attributed to the aforementioned Mr. Franklin (although I believe he was referring to the Redcoats, not to the current crop of "taxation is next to godliness" pinheads we've somehow managed to elect.)

And the time travel part (Ben being in modern-day Jefferson County and talking about a literary work produced a century after he died) is also a logical dream topic, seeing as how I've been pondering the back-from-the-future Terminating powers of Mr. Schwarzenegger, et al, for the past few days. But what I don't understand is where the pimpernel came from. My best guess is that because I enjoy making the occasional PB sandwich on pumpernickel bread, and "the Scarlet Pumpernickel" was a 1940s Daffy Duck parody of the literary Pimpernel dude, the association is close enough for my sleeping brain to make the connection.

Clear enough? OK then.

Anyway, it made me wonder if there are any other colors of pimpernels, whatever they happen to be. So I looked it up. And yes, my friends, there apparently are also white ones. The dictionary says: a plant belonging to the genus Anagallis, of the primrose family, esp. A. arvensis (scarlet pimpernel), having scarlet or white flowers that close at the approach of bad weather.

OK, fine. So now I know that if anyone uses the phrases "blue pimpernel" or "plaid pimpernel", I can laugh at him and taunt him for his lack of botanical correctness. But the quoted definition does show that those who write dictionary definitions are sometimes guilty of anthropomorphic egotism, and should receive additional diversity and sensitivity training. After all, who are they to define what is "bad" weather?

Perhaps these meteorologically-sensitive pimpernels choose to close up when a snowstorm is coming...but a penguin would consider that to be a good day, while a cloudless 80-degree sun-fest would be a complete disaster—so I think we need to pass legislation to require definitions to specify exactly the type of weather that causes pimpernels to fold, and to banish chauvenistic judgement-based descriptors from the dictionary entirely.

Wouldn't you agree?

Anyway, it got me thinking about other weird words.

I've heard of people "gnashing" thier teeth. But have never once heard about anything else being gnashed. (Well, somebody once told me that Cheech Marin used to gnash bridges...but I have no idea what that means. Probably a drug reference of some sort. Stupid hippies.)

Back to the dictionary: to grind or strike (the teeth) together, esp. in rage or pain.

Hmm. Apparently, the word has a very limited usage. But I suppose we still need it, since I know of no other terms to use in the situation where one needs to describe raging teeth. It would be cool if you could "gnash your fingernails", or "gnash your knish" or something...but I guess you can't. Oh well.

One more and then I'll shut up for the day: What, exactly, is "brimstone"? You hear of "fire and brimstone" rather often, but it's always in the context of eternal suffering as a consequence of bad behavior (such as not eating your vegetables, or listening to Lady GaGa.) You'd think that we'd be talking about some sort of "stone", possibly with a "brim"...but given the context, I had always imagined brimstone to be something acidic, or smelly, or otherwise unpleasant.

Turns out I was right. The dictionary says brimstone is: sulfer.

I'm not sure why Satan's realm has such a large supply of sulfer, but I suppose the stink does enhance the suffering and torment to some degree. But my granddad's farm used to be near the stockyards, and I know from experience that you become accustomed to odors after prolonged exposure...so I'm not sure how valuable sulfuric stench really is for the business of eternal torture. And I'm also not sure why the textbooks always use the word "brimstone", when "sulfer" is a far more common (and shorter) word. "Fire and sulfer" seems to be a perfectly cromulent phrase, if you ask me. And I'm sure Ben Franklin (and all of the Founding Fathers) would agree with me.

So with that I shall return to thoughts of tasty sandwiches and classic literature, and will bid you adieu. Have a great day, my friends, and may your dreams continue to educate and inspire you!