Not very exciting at first glance.
I found it discarded in a garden centre car park, probably fallen off a vehicle.
I pocketed it, and this morning I was discussing it with Mrs Fox…
So what do we know about it? Well it’s stainless steel, so it can’t be older than the beginning of the 20th century…It is an 8mm thread, so it was probably produced after the sixties. Most British bolts were threaded with BSW (British Standard Whitworth) or BSF (British Standard Fine) there are a few more obscure threads of British origin.
But the most interesting thing about the bolt is:- It is virtually indestructible and will still exist long after everyone on the forum, and their kids and grandkids will have been long since consigned to history.
After photographing and documenting the bolt, I’ve thrown it in the bin…So unless it is exposed to temperatures of over 1500 degrees C where it would turn into a blob of melted metal…It will survive forever.
It just goes to show that nobody could have made such a bolt in the past otherwise we would be able to find one. But somebody might find this one in the future…
It is thought that one of the reasons why we drink milk with tea is because originally it was so expensive that only the very wealthy could afford it. This meant that the making of tea involved the use of fine bone china teapots and teacups that only the wealthy could afford.
These tea sets could easily withstand the temperature of boiling water required to make tea. Water must be at 97 c or hotter otherwise tannin is not released thus diminishing the tea’s fine flavours.
When the price of tea reduced due to bulk imports, the middle and later the working classes could afford it, but couldn’t afford fine bone china such that their utility pots and cups would crack and split open when boiling water was used. To get around this problem, milk was put in the cups first, and thus the tradition of milk in tea was born.
Other uses for tea.
My late dad told me that when he was a day border at a private school in Bristol in the 1930s, they would have (used) tea leaves donated by the rich and wealthy locals spread upon bread and butter as a treat … bleugh
In Victorian times, damp tea leaves would be spread upon carpets and allowed to dry. Dust would stick to the leaves and the whole lot would be swept up once everything was dry.
Perhaps Victorian carpets were more resilient to stains than the modern counterparts. The tea-leaves would be slightly damp, not sodden, but I know what you mean. It doesn’t take much for the tannin to taint anything it touches.
In medieval Germany, husbands & wives would legally settle disputes through marital duels. The man fought with 1 arm tied, woman with weights & rock-filled sack. If husband lost, he was beheaded, if wife lost, she was buried alive. Peace was encouraged before combat.
The American term, “kitty-corner” meaning diagonally opposite is thought to come from the French term for a cross roads, quatre-coin, meaning four corners.
Waterloo Bridge, London, is often referred to as the Ladies Bridge because it was built predominantly by women during WW2.
At the inaugural opening, an English politician thanked … all the men who worked on it.
Seemingly, that is only one of multiple theories, including the exact opposite:
Milk first - the argument
Back in the early days, milk was apparently added to delicate fine china to prevent the cups from cracking, but once tougher porcelain began being made it became unnecessary and more a matter of snobbery.
More recently:
Scientists have waded in on the matter too, with a doctor at Loughborough University in the United Kingdom declaring putting milk in after the boiling water was wrong as it caused the milk to heat unevenly, making some of the proteins change structure and influencing the taste.
But who, nowadays, would put milk in before the teabag and water …
The Somerset Levels of south west England has always been prone to flooding. Vast areas were permanently flooded until drainage rhynes (dykes) were built several hundred years ago. Before then, Glastonbury Tor would have been an island.
Other parts of the low lying Levels would flood in winter, but then dry out enough for farmers from the Mendip Hills to bring their cattle to graze on the lush grass when the ground dried out during summer.
These folk were known as the Summer Settlers, which is how the county of Somerset got its name.
