If any of you want Tidbits emailed directly, let me know and I'll take care of it. Tidbits may be reprinted without charge -- with attribution and without change. Additionally, if you know of anyone who you think would enjoy Tidbits, please make them aware of us. URL
Or perhaps Golden Shoe Covers would be better. Doesn't quite have the same ring to it though, does it?
Anybody out there ever hear of a chap named Harvey Kennedy, G.B.? He was an inventor and he invented the shoelace. Nobody knows when. Nobody knows how. But here's the thing of it: We do know that he made $2,500,000 on his little doo-dad. And though we don't know when ... we can surmise it was way back when ... when two and a half mil was two and a half mil. Today two and a half mil is barely worth ten bucks. Maybe twenty. In any case ... I'm pretty sure you can't gas up your car with it.
Which brings us via some arcane and mysteriously impenetrable thought processes to ancient India where it was once decided by some arcane and mysteriously impenetrable mind that it would be pretty neat to have a pair of golden shoe covers. This of course was extravagance in its ultimate form. It's the kind of thinking that nearly brought the royal treasury of the Maharajahs to the point of total exhaustion. For those interested as to how the coffers were almost instantly replenished ... I offer the following solution: It was well know that back then--unlike today-- when the world was corrupt ... that government functionaries took the people for all they had. And so a proclamation was made by the Royal Court that all functionaries had better return to the court all sums they had gleaned from the populace for the last ten years ... or else. They royal coffers were back in full bloat within a month. And for a while at least ... all who wanted golden shoe covers could have them ... assuming they were of the right lineage. This last sentence is an extrapolation on my part and the manufacturers may well not have been so selective.
Want some little lore on shoes? Before tossing a bouquet of flowers over her head ... the bride used to toss one of her shoes for a bridesmaid to catch. Woe upon she who missed and had the shoe land upon her pate. Only crooks and cheats and swindlers wear showy and expensive shoes. We'll be selling some smudge around the corner for those of you who care to travel incognito.
So ... how many of you out there are dying to see a pair of golden shoe covers? Better than solving riddles ... eh wot?
For those of you who are new to this thing called Tidbits...may I direct you to my home page at
And there ya have it. That's it for this week folks. Catch you all next week. Benjamin Mark
All issues of Tidbits are copyrighted and available from our home page. All rights reserved.