Halloween

Halloween History & Origin

Halloween is the one of the oldest holidays still celebrated today. It's one of the most popular holidays, second only to Christmas. While millions of people celebrate Halloween without knowing its origins and myths, the history and facts of Halloween make the holiday more fascinating.

Some people view Halloween as a time for fun, putting on costumes, trick-or-treating, and having theme parties. Others view it as a time of superstitions, ghosts, goblins and evil spirits that should be avoided at all costs.

As the Christian debate goes on, celebrating Halloween is a preference that is not always viewed as participating in an evil holiday. Halloween is often celebrated with no reference to pagan rituals or the occult.

Halloween History

Halloween is on October 31st, the last day of the Celtic calendar. It was originally a pagan holiday, honoring the dead. Halloween was referred to as All Hallows Eve and dates back to over 2000 years ago.

All Hallows Eve is the evening before All Saints Day, which was created by Christians to convert pagans, and is celebrated on November 1st. The Catholic church honored saints on this designated day.

Origin of Halloween

While there are many versions of the origins and old customs of Halloween, some remain consistent by all accounts. Different cultures view Halloween somewhat differently but traditional Halloween practices remain the same.

Halloween culture can be traced back to the Druids, a Celtic culture in Ireland, Britain and Northern Europe. Roots lay in the feast of Samhain, which was annually on October 31st to honor the dead.

Samhain signifies "summers end" or November. Samhain was a harvest festival with huge sacred bonfires, marking the end of the Celtic year and beginning of a new one. Many of the practices involved in this celebration were fed on superstition.

The Celts believed the souls of the dead roamed the streets and villages at night. Since not all spirits were thought to be friendly, gifts and treats were left out to pacify the evil and ensure next years crops would be plentiful. This custom evolved into trick-or-treating.

The Batcave's been discovered

Batman's secret hideout has been discovered using the magic of the internet, and surprisingly it's not under Wayne Manor. No, it's located on a US military base in Okinawa. Who'd have thunk?

Why does this building sport the Batman insignia? Says one Reddit user, "There are two squadrons of [F15s] here on Okinawa, the bats, which sport blue tail flashes, and the cocks, which sport red tail flashes." That sounds perfectly logical. Perhaps a little too logical. I'm inclined to believe that that hangar hides a device more along these lines...

Source: http://io9.com

Word of the Day: Drowsy

Drowsy - adj - [drauzi] - being in a state between sleeping and being awake. Sonolento

English Placement Test

Encontrei esse http://www.englishenglish.com/englishtest.htm na internet. É mais ou menos um teste de nivelamento, pois é sobre conhecimentos gerais do inglês. É interessante. Quem tiver algum tempo, eu recomendo.

Então, clica aí: http://www.englishenglish.com/englishtest.htm

Word of the Day: louse

Louse - [Láuz] - 1 - an unpleasant person. 2 - a small insect that lives on the bodies of animals and people.

Ou seja, uma pessoa xarope ou piolho. Desta palavra saiu o adjetivo Lousy [Lauzy], que é algo ruim ou desagradável.

SPAM

Dizem que está é a origem do termo SPAM, aqueles e-mails indesejáveis.
Talvez seja verdade!

Curiosities about the English Language

*The word “alphabet” is derived from the first two letters in the Greek alphabet: “alpha” and “beta”.

*The word "queue" is the only word in the English language that is still pronounced the same way when the last four letters are removed.

*Of all the words in the English language, the word 'set' has the most definitions.

*The only word in the English language that has 4 sets of double letters in a row is balloonneer.

*The shortest complete sentence in the English language is “I am.”

*“Rhythm” is the longest English word without a vowel.

*The most used letter in the English alphabet is ‘E’, and ‘Q’ is the least used!

*Goddessship is the only word in the English language with a triple letter.

*The sentence “The quick brown fox jumps over the lazy dog.” uses every letter of the alphabet!

*The sentence “Pack my box with five dozen liquor jugs” uses every letter of the alphabet and uses the least letters to do so!

*The world’s longest-named lake has 45 letters (Lake Chargoggagoggmanchauggagoggchaubunagungamaugg).