Colleen at The Thursday 13 holds a weekly blogging prompt where bloggers make a list of 13 things on Thursdays. The topic is for you to choose. The blog host doesn't have any official graphics to display on the Thursday 13 posts, so I decided to whip one up myself. 🙂
With the last penny having been minted more than a week ago, I got to thinking of phrases that contain the word "penny" and what might become of them. Some of those phrases include (from this link and this one):
- A bad penny always turns up
- A penny for your thoughts
- A penny saved is a penny earned
- A pretty penny
- Cut off without a penny
- Pennies from heaven
- Penny-pinching
- Worth every penny
- Find a penny pick up and all day long you'll have good luck
- Penny wise and pound foolish
- Penny dreadful
- Spend a penny
- The penny drops
Another thing that came to mind was the traditional Christmas rhyme that goes:
Christmas is coming, the goose is getting fatPlease [do] put a penny in the old man's hatIf you haven't got a penny, [then] a ha'penny will doIf you haven't got a ha'penny, [then] God bless you!
How many people have had to explain what a half-penny was? Yes, it was half a penny, and it was British. The US had a similar coin called the half-cent. Half-cents were the last coins discontinued by the US mint, in 1857. There also used to be large cents, which were replaced by the familiar cent that has now been discontinued.
The other day at work we played Pictionary, and on one of my turns, I picked a card that included the phrase "penny candy" as one of the options. I chose this one and drew an image of a coin with the 1¢ sign, followed by a drawing of a candy, but somehow no one guessed "penny" at first. "Cent" and "one cent" somehow did come to some people's minds, however. The phrase "penny candy" went out years ago, because of the penny's loss of value.
This also brought to mind the dated lyrics of The Turtles' hit, "Happy Together," and the line "If I should call you up, invest a dime." How many people today have had to explain this to younger people who have no idea about pay phones and how they cost a dime? (Not mention what a pay phone even was, but that's a whole other topic) Even the pay phone cost went up with inflation. Are we going to now say "a nickel for your thoughts" or "put a nickel in the old man's hat" (from the aforementioned Christmas rhyme? This could easily be a topic for another time, songs with dated lyrics about technology or costs.
2 comments:
Canada discontinued the penny many years ago and I can't say I've missed pennies one bit. In fact, good riddance to them! Nickels and dimes should go too, in my opinion.
Because I'm an old geezer, I would have got your "penny candy" Pictionary clue IMMEDIATELY, hahahaha!
I like your idea about doing a post of song lyrics with outdated lyrics. Another coin one is Jim Croce's "Operator" with its line "you can keep the dime."
I'm kind of surprised the dollar coins, the half-dollar and $2 bills are still made, even though it's rare to see any of these.
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