Category:
Love & Romance
Love & Romance
Dog-Collar Engagement Rings
An unusual fad, as reported by the San Francisco Examiner, June 19, 1927:Only the other day there came from Denver the startling news that the young women of this western city were wearing dog collars for engagement rings in lieu of the conventional band of gold, silver or diamond-set platinum. To further emphasize the departure from tradition, the girls wore this romantic token around their legs, as shown in the photograph of Miss Fay Rowe, of Denver, on this page. Thus the engagement ring-dog-collar became a garter as well as a symbol of betrothal, combining utility with romance...
The custom was started by a young woman in one of the college sororities and it spread rapidly. It was generally believed to be something entirely new in the way of betrothal tokens, but had the young woman been a careful student in her history class she would have known that the fad she started was an old one long before the Christian era was born. Jeweled anklets have been discovered in the cinerary urns of the ancient Greeks, with inscriptions which indicate they were tokens of engagement. Bracelets were also common in all ages as tokens of betrothal...
The principal objection to the dog-collar engagement token around the leg seems to be, "What's the use of wearing an engagement ring without anybody seeing it?" To which the answer is, "Nowadays a ring worn about the leg can easily be seen with the skirts of women growing shorter and shorter."
The custom was started by a young woman in one of the college sororities and it spread rapidly. It was generally believed to be something entirely new in the way of betrothal tokens, but had the young woman been a careful student in her history class she would have known that the fad she started was an old one long before the Christian era was born. Jeweled anklets have been discovered in the cinerary urns of the ancient Greeks, with inscriptions which indicate they were tokens of engagement. Bracelets were also common in all ages as tokens of betrothal...
The principal objection to the dog-collar engagement token around the leg seems to be, "What's the use of wearing an engagement ring without anybody seeing it?" To which the answer is, "Nowadays a ring worn about the leg can easily be seen with the skirts of women growing shorter and shorter."
I can think of a few more objections a bride-to-be might have, other than that the dog collar wouldn't be visible.
Posted By: Alex - Tue Nov 26, 2019 -
Comments (6)
Category: 1920s, Weddings, Love & Romance
Raising a Perfect Wife From Scratch
Sabrina Sidney, was a British foundling girl taken in when she was 12 by author Thomas Day, who wanted to mould her into his perfect wife. Day had been struggling to find a wife who would share his ideology and had been rejected by several women. Inspired by Jean-Jacques Rousseau's book Emile, or On Education, he decided to educate two girls without any frivolities, using his own concepts.
In 1769, Day and his barrister friend, John Bicknell, chose Sidney and another girl, Lucretia, from orphanages, and falsely declared they would be indentured to Day's friend Richard Lovell Edgeworth. Day took the girls to France to begin Rousseau's methods of education in isolation. After a short time, he returned to Lichfield with only Sidney, having deemed Lucretia inappropriate for his experiment. He used unusual, eccentric, and sometimes cruel, techniques to try to increase her fortitude, such as firing blanks at her skirts, dripping hot wax on her arms, and having her wade into a lake fully dressed to test her resilience to cold water.
The full story here.
Posted By: Paul - Tue May 07, 2019 -
Comments (0)
Category: Eccentrics, Education, Husbands, Wives, Eighteenth Century, Nineteenth Century, Love & Romance
My Clam Digger Sweetheart
Posted By: Paul - Wed May 01, 2019 -
Comments (1)
Category: Humor, Music, Oceans and Maritime Pursuits, 1940s, Love & Romance
Jerry Pulls the Strings
Imperious coffee magnate is wooed by his future son-in-law's puppets.
Posted By: Paul - Tue Apr 02, 2019 -
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Category: Business, Advertising, Corporate Mascots, Icons and Spokesbeings, Puppets and Automatons, Coffee and other Legal Stimulants, Marriage, 1930s, Love & Romance
Pagan Island
The IMDB entry.
Posted By: Paul - Sat Feb 23, 2019 -
Comments (7)
Category: Ineptness, Crudity, Talentlessness, Kitsch, and Bad Art, Movies, Sexuality, Stereotypes and Cliches, Foreign Customs, 1960s, Love & Romance
Cuddling as a commcercial industry
According to a recent article in the SF Chronicle: "The belief that touch is essential — a biological and social need — but often difficult to find without an intimate relationship is a guiding principle within the cuddling world, which in recent years has emerged as a major commercial industry. There are professional cuddlists who offer private cuddling sessions for as much as $100 per hour. Cuddling has pushed into the retail market with vigor."A Washington Post article adds, "In the past four years storefront cuddle shops have opened in Portland and Los Angeles, and one-on-one cuddle providers are proliferating across the nation."
The cuddling industry doesn't involve only person-to-person cuddling. There's also person-to-cow cuddling. The BBC reports: "A farm in upstate New York is offering self-care seekers the chance to spend 90 minutes cosying up to cows. The Mountain Horse Farm explains that cows are 'sensitive, intuitive animals' who will 'pick up on what's going on inside and sense if you are happy, sad, feel lost, anxious or are excited, and they will respond to that without judgement'... The farm in New York charges $300 (approx. £225) for 90 minutes of snuggles. That’s roughly £2.50 per minute of cow time."
There's even turkey cuddling, which has been gaining popularity as an alternative way to celebrate Thanksgiving.
image source: Instagram
Posted By: Alex - Fri Nov 23, 2018 -
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Category: Business, Emotions, Love & Romance
Married to a hologram
We recently posted about a Japanese company (Gatebox) that had created a "digital wife"... a device that created a holographic companion for lonely people. Now 35-year-old Akihiko Kondo has married his hologram companion. From sde.co.ke:Since March, Kondo has been living with a moving, talking hologram of Miku that floats in a ShSh280,000 ( $2,800) desktop device.
Gatebox, the company that produces the hologram device has issued a "marriage certificate," which certifies that a human and a virtual character have wed "beyond dimensions".
The singer welcomes Kndo home every evening and tells him when it is time for bed. He even sleeps with a doll of the hologram beside him.
Gatebox, the company that produces the hologram device has issued a "marriage certificate," which certifies that a human and a virtual character have wed "beyond dimensions".
The singer welcomes Kndo home every evening and tells him when it is time for bed. He even sleeps with a doll of the hologram beside him.
I'd bet money that the 'marriage' is a publicity stunt engineered by Gatebox.
Posted By: Alex - Sun Nov 18, 2018 -
Comments (4)
Category: AI, Robots and Other Automatons, Marriage, Love & Romance
Compliment Mirror
A new, weird invention from Japan. A mirror that compliments you. More info from JapanTrends.com:The mirror, apparently only available as a prototype right now, has a sexy male voice that will compliment and chat with the woman looking into the mirror. Incorporating a monitor display, camera, and speaker, the device can scan and read the emotions of the user from her face, changing the way it interacts accordingly.
This reminds me of the Digital Wife I posted about recently. Seems like another device aimed at the large number of Japanese people who seem to live alone.
The company website
Posted By: Alex - Fri Oct 12, 2018 -
Comments (2)
Category: Inventions, Technology, AI, Robots and Other Automatons, Love & Romance
Digital Wife
Gatebox recently announced that its Boku no Yome ("My Wife") device is now ready for sale. Though it'll cost you $1352, plus $13.52 a month if you want the subscription fee for future updates.I'm not sure if it would be cheaper to just get a cat.
More info: Social News Daily
Posted By: Alex - Tue Aug 14, 2018 -
Comments (8)
Category: Technology, AI, Robots and Other Automatons, Love & Romance
A Rose and a Baby Ruth
Apology on the cheap.
Posted By: Paul - Thu Nov 30, 2017 -
Comments (0)
Category: Music, Nature, Teenagers, Candy, 1950s, Love & Romance
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| Alex Boese Alex is the creator and curator of the Museum of Hoaxes. He's also the author of various weird, non-fiction, science-themed books such as Elephants on Acid and Psychedelic Apes. Paul Di Filippo Paul has been paid to put weird ideas into fictional form for over thirty years, in his career as a noted science fiction writer. He has recently begun blogging on many curious topics with three fellow writers at The Inferior 4+1. Contact Us |