Showing results by author "Dan Lewis" in All Categories

The term "government bailout" emerged in the collective consciousness in 2008, when the US government threw gobs of money at big banks, insurance companies and the automotive industry, all in hopes of propping up businesses. The term "too big to fail" was a part of that conversation – many economists and politicians believed that if major companies in those sectors were to go under, the general economy would fall down the sinkhole after them.

Television is a very powerful medium, the value of which extends well beyond the escapism and entertainment that it brings into our homes. If you're a marketer, for example, you can use TV to introduce a new product to consumers and, via the magic of product placements, make it seem like a must-have item. After all, if your customers' favorite characters use your product, maybe your customers will too.

"Don't scream if you meet a cow. If she sees you first, she will run/Don't undertake a long ride if you are not confident of performing it easily/Don't contest the right of way with cable cars/Don't emulate your brother's attitude if he rides parallel with the ground"—those four "don'ts" are from the now-defunct New York World newspaper.

EMI was a British music company that once had many different labels under it. But the company's history is more robust than simply putting music onto records, cassettes, CDs and iTunes.

"You can't win if you don't pay"—that's a slogan used by a number of different state-run lotteries in the United States. It's a truism of sorts—the statement is obviously correct (both in the context of lotteries and more generally) and says nothing really interesting, but it makes for good ad copy.

The German town of Bochum is the 16th largest in the country by population; as of 2015, Bochum was home to roughly 365,000 people. In the fall of 2014, though, at least one of those people was in a little bit of trouble.

Scotland and England (and Wales, too, but that's another story) share the island typically known as Great Britain.

The 2009 Disney/Pixar movie Up is an animated film and, therefore, was able to take liberties with the truth pretty easily. That's good, because the film's premise centers on the travels of Carl Fredricksen, a 78-year-old widower who ties tens of thousands of helium balloons to his house and, as the title suggests, goes up into the sky. The flight of Mr. Fredricksen is as fictional as it gets.

Robert Campbell served as a captain in the British military in World War I. As the conflict went on, so did the number of prisoners of war held by both sides, and by the summer of 1916, Germany held more than 1.6 million such POWs.

Charles Dodgson was an English mathematician. He taught at Christ Church, a college that is part of the University of Oxford, from 1855 until retiring in 1881, and he remained at the college in residence until his death in 1898.

For the latter part of the 20th century, Vincent Gigante was a household name in his Greenwich Village neighborhood. On any given day, beginning when he was in his mid-to-late-30s, Gigante would walk around the community talking to himself under his breath, incoherently, to either no one whomsoever or figments only he could see.

The term "caloric stimulation" sounds like a medical term, and that's probably because it is one. Unfortunately, the term has nothing to do with eating an absurd amount of apple pie, but on the plus side, it's evidence that our ears can detect differences in temperature, with our eyes serving as their thermometers.

Pineapples are indigenous to South America and were domesticated and spread throughout the tropical areas of the Americas well before Europeans landed in the New World.

Take some paper and various other materials, bundled into one neat package. Light it on fire. Use it for a bit and then, when you're done, throw it away, still lit.

Typhus is a bacterial-borne disease that is transmitted by flea, tick and mite bites. It can be fatal if untreated, but, thankfully, in almost all cases antibiotics, are effective.

George Miller Beard was born in 1839. He attended Yale University, graduating in 1862, and in 1866 he earned a medical degree at the school now affiliated with Columbia University.

The Supreme Court of the United States reconvenes after its summer recess on the first Monday in October. Over the following months, the Court hears many cases, some of which are seen as more important than others.

In 1984, a Michigan man named Donald Magett won the big one – the Michigan Lottery's $1,000 Cash for Life scratch off game. He was 41 or 42 years old at the time, and while the monthly prize (paid in $12,000 annual chunks) wasn't quite "quit your job" money, it certainly sounded like he was on his way to financial security. Alas, that was not the case. In 2005, the U.S. Department of Labor sued Magett.

Crack – a smokable form of cocaine which is all too common – is highly addictive and very dangerous. At $50 to $100 per gram on the street (that's a Google-fueled guess by the way; sorry if I have that wrong, but I've never been in the market for crack), it's also a lower-cost alternative to those cocaine addicts who need a hit but don't have the dollars for the straight, snort-able kind. Oh, and in most places, it's illegal – including in the United States, which includes the state of Tennessee.

Checks are, basically, IOUs. The person writing the check promises to pay the check's recipient at some point in the very near future. The check writer isn't even part of the transaction at that point – the writer's bank is instructed, literally, to "pay" the amount specified "to the order of" the person to whom the check is made out. The bank plays a critical role in the transaction beyond the delivery of cash, too – it helps ensure that the check writer is good for the debt now owed.