Q.  What is the origin of the phrase "it’s raining cats and dogs?"   A.  We don’t know.  The phrase might have its roots in Norse mythology, medieval superstitions, the obsolete word catadupe (waterfall), or dead animals in the streets of Britain being picked up by storm waters.  The first recorded use of a phrase similar to “raining cats and dogs” was in the 1651 collection of poems Olor Iscanus. British poet Henry Vaughan referred to a roof that was secure against “dogs and cats rained in shower.”  One year later, Richard Brome, an English playwright, wrote in his comedy City Witt, “It shall rain dogs and polecats.”  (Polecats are related to the weasel and were common in Great Britain through the end of the nineteenth century.)  In 1738, Jonathan Swift published his “Complete Collection of Genteel and Ingenious Conversation,” a satire on the conversations of the upper classes.  One of his characters fears that it will “rain cats and dogs.”   Whether Swift coined the phrase or was using a cliché, his satire was likely the beginning of the phrase’s popularity.   Other British writers have employed less popular phrases, such as “it’s raining pitchforks” or “it’s raining stair-rods,” to describe the shaft-like appearance of heavy rains.  Swift also wrote a poem, “City Shower” (1710), that described floods that occurred after heavy rains.  The floods left dead animals in the streets, and   may have led locals to describe the weather as “raining cats and dogs.”  Read more and see delightful pictures at https://www.loc.gov/rr/scitech/mysteries/rainingcats.html

Tarmac (short for tarmacadam) is a type of road surfacing material patented by English inventor Edgar Purnell Hooley in 1902.  The term is also used, with varying degrees of correctness, for a variety of other materials, including tar-grouted macadam, bituminous surface treatments, and modern asphalt concrete.  The term is also often used to describe airport aprons (also referred to as "ramps"), taxiways, and runways regardless of the surface.  While the specific tarmac pavement is not common in some countries today, many people use the word to refer to generic paved areas at airports, especially the apron near airport terminals despite the fact that these areas are often made of concrete.  The Wick Airport at Wick in Caithness, Scotland, is one of the few airports that still have real tarmac runways.  Similarly in the UK the word "tarmac" is much more commonly used by the public when referring to asphalt concrete.  Tarmac is a registered trademark although it is frequently written with a lower-case initial letter.  https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tarmac

CLIPPED WORDS  piano (pianoforte) deli (delicatessen) tux (tuxedo) pants (pantaloons) flu (influenza) exam (examination)  Find dozens of examples of shortened words and link to idioms and games at http://all-things-relevant.blogspot.com/2010/12/word-shorteningclipping.html

At Tree House Brewing, The Line For Beer Can Take Hours by Bob Oakes and Yasmin Amer  Bob Oakes and Yasmin Amer   Craft beer is big business in Massachusetts.  There are at least 143 brewers in the state right now, according to Beer Advocate’s Andy Crouch, who writes for the Boston-based magazine.  That number is up from around 80 five years ago.  There are two main factors behind the craft beer boom:  a growing passion for variety among beer consumers and a low cost-of-entry barrier for brewers.  Crouch says the long beer lines like the one in front of Tree House are a relatively new phenomenon that started at Midwest breweries, when crowds would show up to celebrate the release of a new beer.  The enthusiasm caught on across the country.  http://www.wbur.org/news/2017/03/29/craft-beer-tree-house

Jean Bellette (occasionally Jean Haefliger;1908–1991) was an Australian artist.  Born in Tasmania, she was educated in Hobart and at Julian Ashton's art school in Sydney, where her teachers included Thea Proctor.  In London she studied under painters Bernard Meninsky and Mark Gertler.  A modernist painter, Bellette was influential in mid-twentieth century Sydney art circles.  She frequently painted scenes influenced by the Greek tragedies of Euripides and Sophocles and the epics of Homer.  The only woman to have won the Sulman Prize more than once, Bellette claimed the accolade in 1942 with For Whom the Bell Tolls, and in 1944 with Iphigenia in Tauris.  She helped found the Blake Prize for Religious Art, and was its inaugural judge.  Read more and see pictures at https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jean_Bellette

Q.  Have you heard of the saying you might as well be tried for a lamb rather than a sheep or something like that?  A.  Something like is right.  The standard form is one might as well be hanged for a sheep as a lamb, though you sometimes come across it as one might as well be hanged for a goat as a lamb.  Strictly, it’s a justification or excuse for going on to commit some greater offence once one has perpetrated a minor one.  These days it often suggests that once one has become involved in some affair or incident (not necessarily illegal), one may as well commit oneself entirely.  The origin lies in the brutal history of English law.  At one time, a great many crimes automatically attracted the death penalty: you could be hanged, for example, for stealing goods worth more than a shilling.  Sheep stealing was among these capital crimes.  So if you were going to steal a sheep, you might as well take a full-grown one rather than a lamb, because the penalty was going to be the same either way.  Since the law was reformed in the 1820s to end the death penalty for the crime, the proverb must be older; in fact the earliest example known is from John Ray’s English Proverbs of 1678:  “As good be hang’d for an old sheep as a young lamb”.  http://www.worldwidewords.org/qa/qa-one3.htm

Wiktionary:  in for a penny, in for a pound  Etymology:  Originally with reference to the fact that if one owed a penny, one might as well owe a pound, as the penalties for non-payment were virtually identical in severity.  "In for a dime, in for a dollar” is an American version of “in for a penny, in for a pound” (the British pound currency, in a saying that dates to the 1600s).  The saying means that once something has started—even a little—that party is stuck until the end.  The saying was used by U.S. Secretary of Defense Robert McNamara (1916-2009) to describe the Vietnam War.  “In for a dime, in for a dollar” is cited in print from at least 1956 and has been used in gambling (especially poker).  Read more at http://www.barrypopik.com/index.php/new_york_city/entry/in_for_a_dime_in_for_a_dollar

uptalk  verb  (linguistics, intransitive) To speak with a rising intonation at the end of a sentence, as if it were a question; to upspeak.  Wiktionary

The Toledo GROWs program is housed at the Robert J. Anderson Urban Agriculture Center, located at 900 Oneida Street, on a three acre farm in the heart of the city of Toledo.  The site serves as home base for services provided to 125+ community gardens throughout the city and surrounding area.  Services provided to community gardens in the Toledo GROWs network include:  technical expertise in assisting gardeners to plan, build, and maintain their community garden; free seeds and seedlings for each growing season; free loan of tools for large work days at gardens; assistance with recruiting volunteers for large work days; educational opportunities, including workshops and opportunities to learn from the growing efforts at the urban farm; networking with other community gardeners; materials, such as wood, rain barrels, and compost as they become available; and advocating in the community for urban gardening.  The commercial kitchen is steadily taking shape to train youth in preparation and packaging; instruction and certification in safe food handling; and classes for all ages on preparing healthy foods using fresh vegetables grown in the garden.  The kitchen needs $12,000 to get items necessary and get the project through final inspection.  To support these efforts, please contact  Yvonne Dubielak at 419.720.8714 or yvonne.dubielak@toledogarden. org.

Always do your best.  What you plant now, you will harvest later.  Og Mandino, American author (1923-1996)   https://www.brainyquote.com/quotes/quotes/o/ogmandino164003.html

http://librariansmuse.blogspot.com  Issue 1694  April 18, 2017  On this date in 1906, An earthquake and fire destroyed much of San Francisco, California.  On this date in 1912, the Cunard liner RMS Carpathia brought 705 survivors from the RMS Titanic to New York City.