A must read from the New York Times:
A specialist at one of Britain’s leading medical museums called them “the teeth that saved the world,” and a private British investor who bought a set of Winston Churchill’s wartime dentures at auction on Thursday appeared to agree. The anonymous buyer paid the equivalent of $23,750, more than three times the pre-sale estimate, after bidding at an auction house in Aylsham that recently sold one of Churchill’s half-smoked cigars for the equivalent of $6,130.The dentures were sold by the family of Derek Cudlipp, the dental technician commissioned by Churchill to make them, and had been kept for years in a drawer in the Cudlipp family home. Mr. Cudlipp’s son Nigel told the BBC that his father had told him that Churchill would flick the dentures out and “throw them across the room” when he was angered by setbacks to the Allied cause, and that the prime minister tore up Mr. Cudlipp’s enlistment papers at Downing Street, telling him “he would be more important to the war effort if he stayed in London to repair his dentures.”
(I looked through hundreds of photos but couldn’t find one of him smiling with his mouth open. Probably George Washington never did either.)
"Well, isn't that precious....”
From a story my friend Bob from NY sent me this morning:
Southern Charm
Two informally dressed ladies happened to start up a conversation during an endless wait in a big airport.
The first lady was an arrogant California woman married to a wealthy man.
The second was a well mannered elderly woman from the South.
When the conversation centered on whether they had any children, the California woman started by saying, "When my first child was born, my husband built a beautiful mansion for me."
The lady from the South commented, "Well, isn't that precious?"
The first woman continued, "When my second child was born, my husband bought me a beautiful Mercedes-Benz..”
Again, the lady from the South commented, "Well, isn't that precious?"
The first woman continued boasting, "Then, when my third child was born, my husband bought me this exquisite diamond bracelet.”
Yet again, the Southern lady commented, "Well, isn't that precious?"
The first woman then asked her companion, "What did your husband buy for you when you had your first child?"
"My husband sent me to charm school," declared the Southern lady.
"Charm school?" the first woman cried, "Oh, my God! What on earth for?"
The Southern lady responded, "Well for example, instead of saying "Who gives a shit?" I learned to say, "Well, isn't that precious....”
Well, isn't that precious!
(Sorry, couldn't resist)
Posted by: Fast Eddie on July 30, 2010 5:40 PM