“Mind your own beeswax” and “it’s none of your beeswax” are common phrases you might hear being shouted by six-year-olds on the school playground.  For the uninitiated, they basically mean “mind your own business” or “it’s none of your business,” but some people think it’s more complicated than that.  There is a popular story that says back in the 18^th and 19^th centuries, women who suffered from disfiguring marks left by small pox used beeswax to smooth out their complexion.  One suggested theory is that if someone got too close or was staring too long, a woman would say “mind your own beeswax,” as in, “stop staring at mine.”  Another is that the beeswax would start to melt if a woman sat too close to the fire, and their companions would have to tell them to “mind their own beeswax” which was dripping off their chins.  Beeswax has been commonly used in cosmetics for years, most notably in Burt’s Bees products, but this origin story is pure myth.  The story started being circulated by a chain e-mail called “Little History Lesson” which made the rounds in 2000.  The first record of “mind your own beeswax” actually appears in 1929 in a children’s book, with additional early records following in 1934 and 1939, quite a few years after women were supposedly slathering wax on their faces and coining popular expressions about it.  There is no evidence to suggest that “beeswax” is anything more than a funny, and convenient, substitution for “business.”  The phrase “mind your own business” has been around for a long time, and is incredibly straightforward:  it is a phrase to tell someone to pay attention to their own affairs rather than yours.  It’s thought that changing “business” to “beeswax” probably softened the phrase, making it sound a little less harsh.  One etymologist, Mark Forsyth, has noted that the word “beeswax” was slang for “tedious bore” in the 19^thcentury.  Therefore, the phrase “mind your own beeswax” might in fact be “mind your own, beeswax.”  That is, “nose out, you bore.”  However, Forsyth admits that the substitution theory carries a lot of weight too, since the words “business” and “beeswax” sound quite similar.  Emily Upton  http://www.todayifoundout.com/index.php/2014/05/origin-phrase-mind-beeswax/

Ten amazing facts about bees  http://www.todayifoundout.com/index.php/2010/12/10-amazzzzing-bee-facts-infographic/

The “bee” in “spelling bee” simply means something to the effect of “gathering” or “get together”.   The earliest documented case of this word appearing with this meaning was in 1769, referring to a “spinning bee”, where people would gather to protest purchasing goods from Britain due to the high taxes on those items.  Other gatherings that were commonly labeled with “bee” were:  apple bee, logging bee, quilting bee, barn bee, hanging bee, sewing bee, field bee, and corn husking bee, among others.   Basically, any sort of major competition or work gathering, with a specific task in mind tended to get the “bee” label added on the end.  With many of these bees being tedious work events, it was also customary to serve refreshments and provide entertainment at the end of the task.  The first documented case of a spelling bee called such was in 1825.  However, it is likely that there were spelling bees before this date.  Daven Hiskey  Find theories on the etymology of "bee" as a gathering  at http://www.todayifoundout.com/index.php/2011/06/what-the-bee-in-spelling-bee-means/

The Idler Academy http://idler.co.uk/academy/, an offshoot of the magazine which offers courses in everything from philosophy to ukulele playing, has announced the shortlist for its 2014 Bad Grammar award, set up to highlight "the incorrect use of English by people and institutions who should know better".  The shortlist is headed by Tesco, for using "less" not "fewer" in reference to numbers on loo-roll packaging – "Same Luxury. Less Lorries" – and for describing its orange juice as "most tastiest".  Next comes the NHS, for confusing subject and object in a letter – "Your appointment has now been organised to attend Queen Mary's Hospital … " – and featuring a rogue apostrophe:  "The RDC Suite's are clearly signposted".   Unfortunately named cafe chain Apostrophe also fell victim to the curse of the apostrophe in a marketing slogan, "Great taste on it's way".  Historian and MP Tristram Hunt is indicted for "tautology and other errors".  He was accused by Michael Gove of bad grammar in the House of Commons earlier this year, for the tautology "ongoing continuing professional development".  The Army Careers Office is included for using "you're" for "your" on a sign in a window:  "For any inquires [sic] please contact you're nearest Army Careers Office."  http://www.theguardian.com/books/2014/apr/28/bad-grammar-award-shortlist-english-language-nhs-tesco

Executive Order  A presidential policy directive that implements or interprets a federal statute, a constitutional provision, or a treaty.  The president's power to issue executive orders comes from Congress and the U.S. Constitution.  Executive orders differ from presidential proclamations, which are used largely for ceremonial and honorary purposes, such as declaring National Newspaper Carrier Appreciation Day.  Executive orders do not require congressional approval.  Thus, the president can use them to set policy while avoiding public debate and opposition.  Presidents have used executive orders to direct a range of activities, including establishing migratory bird refuges; putting Japanese-Americans in internment camps during World War II; discharging civilian government employees who had been disloyal, following World War II; enlarging national forests; prohibiting racial discrimination in housing; pardoning Vietnam War draft evaders; giving federal workers the right to bargain collectively; keeping the federal workplace drug free; and sending U.S. troops to Bosnia.

http://legal-dictionary.thefreedictionary.com/Executive+Order  Find a list of executive orders (EOs) from George Washington to Barack Obama as of January 20, 2014 at http://www.presidency.ucsb.edu/data/orders.php  Presidents issuing the highest numbers of EOs are Franklin D. Roosevelt (3, 522) and Woodrow Wilson (1,803).  William Henry Harrison is the only president to issue no EOs.  John Adams, James Madison and James Monroe each issued one.

How to Begin and Lead a Book Discussion Group  http://www.iowacenterforthebook.org/discussion-groups

A Novel Idea "Librarians reimagine book clubs with the help of technology" by Apryl Flynn Gilliss  pp. 45-49 in May 2014 issue of American Libraries  Find 5 tips to starting your own online book club (p. 47) and 3 tools to help with your online book club (p. 48) at http://www.americanlibrariesmagazine.org/issue/may-2014

reduplicative by Richard Nordquist  A word or lexeme (such as mama) that contains two identical or very similar parts.  Also called a tautonym.  The morphological and phonological process of forming a compound word by repeating all or part of it is known as reduplication.  The repeated element is called a reduplicant.

Examples: chit-chat, flim-flam, riff-raff, dilly-dally, shilly-shally, mumbo-jumbo, wishy-washy  http://grammar.about.com/od/rs/g/redupterm.htm

Argle-barle is a reduplication of argle (alteration of argue).  Read about Supreme Court Justice Antonin Scalia's use of argle-bargle in dissent of the U.S. Supreme Court ruling in 2013 that struck down the Defense of Marriage Act.  http://www.thewire.com/national/2013/06/brouhaha-behind-argle-bargle-linguistic-explanation/66630/

Fake stories on Internet:  1.  Those identical twin girls were not born holding hands.  2. Solange did not send that tweet about Jay-Z.  3.  New York Times publisher A.G. Sulzberger is not on Twitter.  4.  Mallard Air is not “the Midwest’s newest budget airline.”   Read more at http://www.washingtonpost.com/news/the-intersect/wp/2014/05/16/what-was-fake-on-the-internet-this-week-ufo-attacks-solange-tweets-and-those-twins-born-holding-hands/

Amazon’s power over the publishing and bookselling industries is unrivaled in the modern era.  Seeking ever-higher payments from publishers to bolster its anemic bottom line, Amazon is holding books and authors hostage on two continents by delaying shipments and raising prices.  “How is this not extortion?  You know, the thing that is illegal when the Mafia does it,” said Dennis Loy Johnson of Melville House, echoing remarks being made across social media.  The battle is being waged largely over physical books.  In the United States, Amazon has been discouraging customers from purchasing titles from Hachette, the fourth-largest publisher by market share. On May 22, 2014, it escalated the dispute by making it impossible to order Hachette’s forthcoming books.  It is using some of the same tactics against the Bonnier Publishing Group in Germany.  But the real prize is not the physical books.  It is control of e-books, the future of publishing.  Amazon is by far the dominant e-book company and feels it deserves more of the digital proceeds than it is getting.  James Patterson, one of the country’s best-selling writers, described the confrontation between Amazon and the publishers as “a war” in a Facebook post titled “Four of the most important paragraphs I’ll ever write.”  “Bookstores, libraries, authors, and books themselves are caught in the cross fire of an economic war,” he wrote.  “If this is the new American way, then maybe it has to be changed — by law, if necessary — immediately, if not sooner.”  Patterson is published by Hachette.  His forthcoming novels are now impossible to buy from Amazon in either print or digital form.  Amazon has begun to refuse Hachette books, including J.K. Rowling’s new novel, published under the pseudonym Robert Galbraith.  In some cases, even the webpages promoting the books have disappeared.  Anne Rivers Siddons’ new novel, The Girls of August, coming in July, no longer has a page for the physical book or even the Kindle edition.  Only the audio-player edition is still being sold (for more than $60).  Otherwise it is as if it doesn’t exist.  

David Streitfield and Melissa Eddy  http://www.dispatch.com/content/stories/national_world/2014/05/24/amazon-holds-books-to-hurt-publishers.html

http://librariansmuse.blogspot.com  Issue 1153  May 26, 2014  On this date in 1805 Napoléon Bonaparte assumed the title of King of Italy and was crowned with the Iron Crown of Lombardy in the Duomo di Milano, the gothic cathedral in Milan.  On this date in 1830, the Indian Removal Act was passed by Congress.  On this date in 1865, General Edmund Kirby Smith, commander of the Confederate Trans-Mississippi division, is the last general of the Confederate Army to surrender, at Galveston, Texas.