Quotulatiousness

December 20, 2022

Eggnog: A Christmas History

Filed under: Food, History, USA — Tags: , , , , , — Nicholas @ 02:00

Tasting History with Max Miller
Published 22 Dec 2020
(more…)

December 19, 2022

Christmas Crack – You Suck at Cooking (episode 54)

Filed under: Food, Humour — Tags: , , , — Nicholas @ 02:00

You Suck At Cooking
Published 22 Dec 2016

To make the Christmas crack:

1. Combine equal parts of butter and brown sugar (1 cup of each works) and heat in a sauce pan until it turns into sauce in the pan.
2. Line a baking sheet with foil then with graham crackers. Break them up to make them fit along the edges.
3. Once the butter and sugar become a thickish sauce, pour it all over.
4. Bake in in the oven for a couple minutes until it starts to bubble but not for too long.
5. Cover with chocolate chips … you can put that back in the oven for a minute or just wait a minute and start spreading them around as they melt until it’s a full layer. Use just over 1 cup.
6. Throw on whatever toppings you want; almonds, pepperoni, whatever.
7. Wait a few hours for it to harden or throw it in the fridge or the freezer.

I personally like keeping it frozen and eating it that way. But I am not you and you may have different temperature preferences. It’s hard for me to tell at this point, but if you message me on snapchat perhaps we can discuss this more thoroughly. Or perhaps not. I’m sorta moody that way.
(more…)

December 15, 2022

Christmas in the WWI Trenches – Xmas Rations

Filed under: Britain, Food, History, Military, WW1 — Tags: , , , , — Nicholas @ 04:00

Tasting History with Max Miller
Published 13 Dec 2022

(more…)

December 11, 2022

How to Make A Christmas Cake – The Victorian Way

Filed under: Britain, Food, History — Tags: , , — Nicholas @ 02:00

English Heritage
Published 30 Nov 2017

Christmas is approaching so Mrs Crocombe is making a cake for Lord and Lady Braybrooke at Audley End House.

This traditional plum cake is based on a recipe by Charles Francatelli, who was Queen Victoria’s chief cook from 1840 to 1841.
(more…)

December 26, 2021

Repost – The market failure of Christmas

Filed under: Economics — Tags: , , — Nicholas @ 03:00

Not to encourage miserliness and general miserability at Christmastime, but here’s a realistic take on the deadweight loss of Christmas gift-giving:

Christmas gifts under the tree.
Photo by Kelvin Kay via Wikimedia Commons.

In strict economic terms, the most efficient gift is cold, hard cash, but exchanging equivalent sums of money lacks festive spirit and so people take their chance on the high street. This is where the market fails. Buyers have sub-optimal information about your wants and less incentive than you to maximise utility. They cannot always be sure that you do not already have the gift they have in mind, nor do they know if someone else is planning to give you the same thing. And since the joy is in the giving, they might be more interested in eliciting a fleeting sense of amusement when the present is opened than in providing lasting satisfaction. This is where Billy Bass comes in.

But note the reason for this inefficient spending. Resources are misallocated because one person has to decide what someone else wants without having the knowledge or incentive to spend as carefully as they would if buying for themselves. The market failure of Christmas is therefore an example of what happens when other people spend money on our behalf. The best person to buy things for you is you. Your friends and family might make a decent stab at it. Distant bureaucrats who have never met us — and who are spending other people’s money — perhaps can’t.

So when you open your presents next week and find yourself with another garish tie or an awful bottle of perfume, consider this: If your loved ones don’t know you well enough to make spending choices for you, what chance does the government have?

You Suck at Christmas – You Suck at Cooking (episode 28)

Filed under: Food, Humour — Tags: , — Nicholas @ 02:00

You Suck At Cooking
Published 23 Dec 2015

A 100 percent full throttle high adrenaline speed chase through the history of christmas.

Wishing you all a great close to your year!

QotD: Boxing Week Sales

Filed under: Business, Humour, Quotations — Tags: , — Nicholas @ 01:00

I’ve done a few tours of duty behind a cash register. The job takes your soul, twists it like a wet chamois and runs it through the shredders they use to turn car hoods into tinfoil strips. […] When I lived out east, the relationship between cashier and customer was the same as that between a German gunner and the troops disembarking at Normandy.

James Lileks, “Backfence: Beyond new store’s hype, genuine smiles”, Minneapolis Star Tribune, 2004-08-03.

December 25, 2021

“Christmas Truce” – December 1914 – Sabaton History 107 [Official]

Filed under: Britain, France, Germany, History, Media, Military, WW1 — Tags: , , — Nicholas @ 04:00

Sabaton History
Published 24 Dec 2021

You’ve all heard about it, but here are the nuts and bolts for why and how it happened — the Christmas Truce on the Western Front in December 1914, the first Christmas of the Great War.

Support Sabaton History on Patreon: https://www.patreon.com/sabatonhistory

Listen to “Christmas Truce”: https://music.sabaton.net/ChristmasTruce

Watch the Official Music Video of “Christmas Truce” here: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HPdHk…

Listen to Sabaton on Spotify: http://smarturl.it/SabatonSpotify
Official Sabaton Merchandise Shop: http://bit.ly/SabatonOfficialShop

Hosted by: Indy Neidell
Written by: Markus Linke and Indy Neidell
Directed by: Astrid Deinhard and Wieke Kapteijns
Produced by: Pär Sundström, Astrid Deinhard and Spartacus Olsson
Creative Producer: Maria Kyhle
Executive Producers: Pär Sundström, Joakim Brodén, Tomas Sunmo, Indy Neidell, Astrid Deinhard, and Spartacus Olsson
Community Manager: Maria Kyhle
Post-Production Director: Wieke Kapteijns
Editor: Iryna Dulka
Sound Editor: Marek Kaminski
Archive: Reuters/Screenocean – https://www.screenocean.com

Sources:
– IWM NTB 178-2, IWM 205, Q 86849, Q 57165, Q 53616, Q 56198, Q 50720, Q 65834, Q 50719, Q 50721, Q 31575, Q 32613, Q 57361, Q 11718, Q 31576, Q 49581, Q 64568, IWM 130-01
– Santa vector created by vectorpocket – www.freepik.com

All music by: Sabaton

An OnLion Entertainment GmbH and Raging Beaver Publishing AB co-Production.

© Raging Beaver Publishing AB, 2019 – all rights reserved.

Repost – “Fairytale of New York”

Filed under: Europe, Media, USA — Tags: , , , — Nicholas @ 02:00

Time:

“Fairytale of New York,” The Pogues featuring Kirsty MacColl

This song came into being after Elvis Costello bet The Pogues’ lead singer Shane MacGowan that he couldn’t write a decent Christmas duet. The outcome: a call-and-response between a bickering couple that’s just as sweet as it is salty.

QotD: Blackadder and Melchet exchange Christmas greetings

Filed under: Britain, Humour, Quotations — Tags: , — Nicholas @ 01:00

Lord Edmund Blackadder: I trust Christmas brings to you its traditional mix of good food and violent stomach cramp.
Lord Melchet: Greetings of the season to you, Blackadder! May the Yule log slip from your fire and burn your house down!

Blackadder’s Christmas Carol, 1988.

December 24, 2021

How Hitler, Churchill, Roosevelt, and Stalin Spent Christmas – WW2 Special

Filed under: Britain, Germany, History, Military, Russia, USA, WW2 — Tags: , , , , , — Nicholas @ 06:00

World War Two
Published 23 Dec 2021

They might be four of the most powerful politicians and/or military leaders on earth, but they are also citizens of their respective countries and today we take a look at what they do over the traditional Christmas holidays in 1942.
(more…)

How Soldiers and Civilians Celebrated Christmas During the Franco-Prussian War 1870

Filed under: France, Germany, History, Military — Tags: , , , , — Nicholas @ 04:00

Real Time History
Published 23 Dec 2021

Support us on Patreon: https://patreon.com/realtimehistory

Christmas 1870 reminded the German and French alike that the Franco-Prussian War was going on for far too long. Soldiers and civilians on both sides tried to make the best of the situation but the grim nature of the last weeks of fighting and the ongoing Siege of Paris made this a memorable Christmas for all the wrong reason.

» THANK YOU TO OUR CO-PRODUCERS
John Ozment, James Darcangelo, Jacob Carter Landt, Thomas Brendan, Kurt Gillies, Scott Deederly, John Belland, Adam Smith, Taylor Allen, Rustem Sharipov, Christoph Wolf, Simen Røste, Marcus Bondura, Ramon Rijkhoek, Theodore Patrick Shannon, Philip Schoffman, Avi Woolf

» OUR PODCAST
https://realtimehistory.net/podcast – interviews with historians and background info for the show.

» LITERATURE
Arand, Tobias: 1870/71. Der Deutsch-Französische Krieg erzählt in Einzelschicksalen. Hamburg 2018

Gouttman, Alain: La grande défaite. 1870-1871. Paris 2015

Hahn, Joachim: Jüdisches Leben in Ludwigsburg. Geschichte, Quellen, Dokumentation. Karlsruhe 1998

» SOURCES
Allorant, Salomé u.a. (Hrsg.): La République au défi de la guerre. Lettres et carnet de l’Année terrible (1870-1871). Amiens 2015

Bernardt, Sarah: Ma double vie. Mémoires. Paris 1907

Fontane, Theodor: Der Krieg gegen Frankreich. Bd. 3. Berlin 1875

Fontane, Theodor: Kriegsgefangen. Erlebtes 1870. Briefe 1870/71. Berlin (Ost) 1984

Goncourt, Edmond de: Journals des Goncourt. Mémoires de la vie litteraire. Vol. 4. Paris 1890

Kriegsgeschichtliche Abteilung des Großen Generalstabs (Hrsg.): Der deutsch-französische Krieg 1870-71. 2.2. Berlin 1880

Meisner, Heinrich Otto (Hrsg.): Kaiser Friedrich III. Das Kriegstagebuch von 1870/71. Berlin, Leipzig 1926

Plitt, Franz: Rückerinnerungen eines Dreiundachtzigers. Kassel 1903

Russell, William Howard: My diary during the last great war. London 1874

Schikorsky, Isa (Hrsg.): “Wenn doch dies Elend ein Ende hätte”. Ein Briefwechsel aus dem Deutsch-Französischen Krieg 1870/71. Köln, Weimar, Wien 1999

Schmidt, Erna (Hrsg.): Briefe aus den Feldzügen 1866 und 1870/71. Berlin 1908

Speisekarte des Café Voisin Paris vom 25.12.1870

» OUR STORE
Website: https://realtimehistory.net

» CREDITS
Presented by: Jesse Alexander
Written by: Cathérine Pfauth, Prof. Dr. Tobias Arand, Jesse Alexander
Director: Toni Steller & Florian Wittig
Director of Photography: Toni Steller
Sound: Above Zero
Editing: Toni Steller
Motion Design: Philipp Appelt
Mixing, Mastering & Sound Design: http://above-zero.com
Maps: Battlefield Design
Research by: Cathérine Pfauth, Prof. Dr. Tobias Arand
Fact checking: Cathérine Pfauth, Prof. Dr. Tobias Arand

Channel Design: Battlefield Design

Contains licensed material by getty images
All rights reserved – Real Time History GmbH 2021

Repost – Hey Kids! Did you get your paperwork in on time?

Filed under: Bureaucracy, Humour — Tags: , — Nicholas @ 03:00

If you hurry, you can just get your Santa’s Visit Application in before the deadline tonight!

Repost – The Monkees – “Riu Chiu”

Filed under: Media, USA — Tags: , , , — Nicholas @ 02:00

Uploaded on 15 Dec 2015

The Monkees perform “Riu Chiu” from Episode 47, “The Monkees’ Christmas Show”.

H/T to Kathy Shaidle for the link.

QotD: Christmas nostalgia

Filed under: Humour, Quotations — Tags: , , , — Nicholas @ 01:00

All Christmases refer back to the Christmases of your early childhood. That’s your baseline, your definition. Mine were warm and happy, which is a blessing and a curse — you love the season, but now you have an unreasonable standard. Everything falls short. It takes a long time to unlearn Christmas and reassemble it for your own — although having kids of your own accelerates the process, makes it easier. Forget your own unrealistic half-remembered expectations; let’s implant the same in the next crop! And when your toddler hugs your leg and says Oh Daddee it’s the best Christmas EVER you know you’re back in the groove.

James Lileks

« Newer PostsOlder Posts »

Powered by WordPress