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anagram
  • The word anagram has no anagram

upset
  • The word ‘upset’ originated from horse racing. The common use of the word came after one race where a new upstart horse named ‘Upset’ unexpectedly beat the crowd favourite named ‘Man O’ War’ who had never lost a race before that day

United States, USA, America
  • 26 of the American states have names originating from native Indian words, including Iowa which means “Sleepy Ones” and Texas meaning “Ally”

Christmas
  • The word Christmas comes from Cristes maesse, or “Christ’s Mass.”  The abbreviation X-mas originated from the word Christ, which in Greek is chi, and also identical to the letter ‘X’
  • Why on the 25th of December? In the time of Christ, there was a common Jewish belief that the prophets died on the on the same date as their conception. According to certain calculations, Christ was crucified on 25 March, thus signifying His conception. 9 months after 25th March is the 25th December. Others say that the celebration date was set to replace popular pagan winter solstice celebrations
  • Christmas was only celebrated 440 years after Jesus died
  • The twelve days of Christmas represent the time it took the wise men to visit the manger of Jesus
  • The use of evergreen “Christmas” trees during winter celebrations is actually pre-Christian
  • The first decorated Christmas tree was in Riga, Latvia in 1510
  • Most artificial trees are manufactured in Korea, Taiwan, or Hong Kong, where Christians are the minority
  • Teddy Roosevelt banned the Christmas tree from the White House for environmental reasons
  • English Puritan leader Oliver Cromwell banned Christmas between 1647 and 1660 because he believed such celebrations were immoral for the holiest day of the year
  • In Australia, the postal service says that approximately 120,000 letters are addressed to Santa yearly
  • Santa has 2 addresses: Letters addressed to “Toyland” or “Snowland” go to Edinburgh and those to the “North pole” actually go to the North pole
  • Father Christmas, was based on St. Nicholas who is also the patron saint of pawnbrokers among many of his patronage
  • 3 years after Edison invented the light bulb, he was presented with the first Christmas tree bulbs
  • Santa’s reindeers took their name from the poem “A visit from St. Nicholas”

quiz
  • This word was allegedly invented in the 1830’s by a Dublin theater owner named Richard Daly and was a result of a bet where Daly said he could make a nonsensical word known throughout Dublin in 48 hours. This fact is of course disputed.

Goodbye
  • The origin of this phrase comes from God be with you. It has been shortened over the years since 16th century. Shakespeare used “God be wy you.” The substitution for good for God seems to have been mainly due to the influence of such phrases as ” good day” and ” good night.”
  • The word Ciao actually means both “hello” and “goodbye” and origianlly meant “servant” in Venetian

fired
  • Clans of long ago that wanted to get rid of unwanted people without killing them used to burn their houses down — hence the expression “to get fired”

nerd
  • The word “nerd” was first coined by Dr. Seuss in “If I Ran the Zoo.”

karaoke
  • Karoke means “empty orchestra” in Japanese

scrabble
  • Mr Butts originally named Scrabble “Criss Cross Words.”
  • The Malaysian version has the highest number of single letters - 18 As
  • In the Polish version, Z is worth only one point
  • The highest recorded single word score in English is 392 for CAZIQUES, meaning “native chiefs of West Indian aborigines”
  • London hosted the first world championship in 1991
  • The recently released Welsh version has left out the letters X, Q and Z.


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