love of the colour blue
Blog Archive
Sunday, 15 June 2008
Monday, 9 June 2008
Three Colours: Blue
Saturday, 7 June 2008
Blue-footed Booby
Blue that isn't the result of iridescence, as in many butterflies and birds, is rare in the animal kingdom; the Blue-footed Booby, Sula nebouxii, is a glorious exception.
Blue Chip
A blue chip stock is the stock of a well-established company having stable
earnings and no extensive liabilities. The term derives from casinos, where blue
chips stand for counters of the highest value. Most blue chip stocks pay regular
dividends, even when business is faring worse than usual.
The phrase was coined by Oliver Gingold of Dow Jones sometime in 1923 or 1924. Company folklore recounts that the term apparently got its start when Gingold was standing by the stock ticker at the brokerage firm that later became Merrill Lynch. Noticing several trades at $200 or $250 a share or more, he said to Lucien Hooper of W.E. Hutton & Co. that he intended to return to the office to “write about these
blue chip stocks.” Thus the phrase was born. It has been in use ever since,
originally in reference to high-priced stocks, more commonly used today to refer
to high-quality stocks. In contemporary media, Blue Chips and their daily
performances are frequently mentioned alongside other economic averages like the
DJIA.
What else...a blue chip cookie
The Blue Lamp
KitKat
Did You Know... KitKat was once blue?
Seriously. KitKat may be famous for its red white wrapper, but it did, however, sport a blue wrapper in 1945 when plain chocolate was used due to shortages of milk after the war. The Blue KitKat was withdrawn in 1947 when the standard milk chocolate KitKat was reintroduced.
If anyone has an image of a genuine 1945-47 "blue KitKat" I would love to see it...
Blue Joke
Friday, 6 June 2008
Rekitt's Blue
We were on a family holiday in the Lake district, some time in the late sixties I think, when we came across a place called Backbarrow where there used to be a dye works where they made Reckitt's Blue. This was a little block of blue pigment with a cloth covering which people added to their wash, in pre-biological detergent days, to give it that "blue whiteness." The whole area was littered with this stuff dumped by the side of the road, some of it intact in its packaging some of it crumbling to blue powder. The colour was the exact ultramarine of International Klein Blue and it transformed the whole village - basically one street and a river, also stained blue - into an unintentional art installation. I seem to remember we took home boxes of the stuff. It's all gone now and the works is an hotel.
Some hoodoo and spiritist protection spells call for "blue water" to keep a residence clear of evil spirits. This use of blue water seems to derive from Mediterranean beliefs, in which both the colour blue and liquids such as water are used to keep away and to cure the damage done by the evil eye. Blue water should NOT be made from bluestone, especially if it is to be used for ritual hand-washing or sprinkling. Only laundry blueing should be used for this.
In short, the blue colour of copper sulphate can be safely duplicated in the form of laundry blueing and, in the interest of health, i would recommend that any time you see an old magical spell that calls for bluestone, you substitute liquid blueing, Reckitt's Crown Blue, or Mexican anil balls. The latter are particularly versatile: the small balls can be carried with herbs or roots in a mojo bag, and the large ones are easy to dissolve in water to set out in pans around a location to keep away evil, or made into a purifying floor wash."
"Reckitts Rugby League Club are the oldest amateur rugby league club in Hull. We were established in 1911 and are celebrating our 90th anniversary this year. The club was formed by members of the large pharmaceutical company Reckitt and Colman who, initially, played inter-departmental games prior to having other opposition to pit their skills against."
Reckitt's were based in Hull and have since been taken over by Holliday Pigments "the world's leading supplier of ultramarine and manganese violet pigments and has been established for over 120 years."