Amazing what you learn

Post date: Nov 21, 2015 4:52:32 AM

Three blog posts in one day - is this our record?

And this one marks post 999 - who will write the 1000th blog?

Today I have been at the Arthritis New Zealand AGM - not a task I can get out of. Meant being at the airport (meeting venue) at 9am this morning with a fair bit of hanging around until 11:30 when the formalities started. One of the many conversations before the meeting was with a group of the Board members who were preparing for their photo shots - so discussions about where gerberas got pinned and whether ties were straight led into some did you knows about men's tailoring.

Did you know:

And yes i did have to work as well as have innane conversations

Apparently it was Phyllis Diller who said she couldn't understand why a man finished getting dressed by tying a noose around his neck

The convention for leaving the bottom button of your waistcoat undone dates back to the court of Henry VIII. He was so large that he couldn't do up all the buttons on his waistcoat so the men of the court left their bottom buttons undone so he was not a figure of fun.

Frederick of Prussia was the person responsible for having buttons on jacket sleeves? Apparently he got annoyed by soldiers on guard duty using their sleeves to wipe their noses on cold days. The soldier's sleeves were left with snot trails - so he ordered brass buttons be sewn onto the sleeves. The brass buttons got so cold they froze the soldier's noses so they no longer used their sleeves.

The reason stripes on ties are diagonal is because that was the direction you wiped your bloody sword after attacking your opponent - and ties were handy for the task.