The History of the Word 'Weed' with David Bienenstock

What follows is a lightly edited transcript of a Stitcher Premium bonus podcast.

Grammar Girl: Hey, everyone! I have a special treat for you today because I'm here with David Bienenstock whom I met at the podcast movement conference last year, and he had a really interesting idea for a show about some interesting words because he hosts the “Great Moments in Weed History Podcast with David and Abdullah.” Hi David, thanks for being here today.

David Bienstock: Absolutely. I'm thrilled to talk with you.

GG: Yeah! I'm excited about these special words. So why don't you first tell the audience just a little bit about your podcast.

DB: Sure! We're a weekly podcast. Each episode covers a different—as the title strongly implies, I hope—great moment in weed history...cannabis history if you will, marijuana history if you will—we'll get into all those different words and their meanings. But this is everything from, you know, episode one is Willie Nelson smoked a joint on the roof of the White House to Maya Angelou's first time getting stoned, did Jesus use cannabis in the holy anointing oil to perform healing miracles, and some of this sort of lesser-known people who've had a huge impact on cannabis history and social change in this country and to me and my partner, from our perspective, a really important social movement that's been taking place toward legalization, towards allowing medical use of this incredibly helpful substance. So we're really proud to be telling these stories, sharing this history, and making sure people understand all the struggle and all the joy and and all the culture that's gone into our current moment of of legalization.

GG: Wow, I did not know any of those anecdotes. They all sound really interesting.

So, I live in Nevada, where marijuana recently became legal recreationally. It's been legal as medical marijuana for a little bit longer. Is it legal where you live too?

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4 Ways Failure Can Benefit Your Child

During the 25 years that I’ve been raising my kids, I’ve seen a range of academic-, sport-, social-, work-, and peer-related successes, wins, personal bests, and victories (big and small). I've also seen awkward mishaps, school struggles, social catastrophes, and everything in between. 

Watching your children grow up is an amazing journey with plenty of highs and lows. It’s always exciting to see them hitting new milestones and thriving. Of course, that’s when all is going well. It's a different story when your child hits a roadblock and you watch him fall flat on his face. 

Naturally, no parent wants to see their child have setbacks. But quite frankly, failure is not only a part of life, it’s necessary. The next time your child faces one of life’s struggles, don’t fret—instead, embrace it. Mighty Mommy shares four ways that failure can benefit your child and even leave you as the parent feeling stronger.

Four Ways Failure Helps Your Child

1. Learn From Their Mistakes
2. Helps Handle Life’s Setbacks
3. Encourages Growth
4. Keeps You Focused On Your Goals

We’ll explore each in more detail.

1. Learn From Their Mistakes

Raising as large a family as mine certainly has had its challenges, but it has also afforded me a big advantage: the ability to step back and let my kids do for themselves. I’ve been outnumbered for most of my parenting years, so I've had to rely on my gut instincts and I've had to trust in my children’s abilities to make their own choices, even when I wasn’t totally on board.

This includes things like their choice of friendships, how they’ve managed homework assignments, not studying for major exams, and making poor choices with their hard earned money ($200 sneakers that were outgrown in a month).

Each of these scenarios yielded a different outcome for my kids, and although some of the scenarios ended in full-blown meltdowns—for instance, flunking the Spanish II midterm because watching the final weeks of "The Voice" was apparently far more important than studying—the bottom line was that they had to learn to own their own decisions—good or bad—and continue moving forward.

In Psychology Today’s How Allowing Children to Fail Helps Them Succeed, columnist Susan Newman Ph.D. makes a very astute statement about how today’s parent is trying to raise superstar kids,...

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'A' Versus 'An'

A lot of people learned the rule that you put “a” before words that start with consonants and “an” before words that start with vowels, but it's actually more complicated than that. For example, here's Matthew with a question:

I've been wondering if it is actually “a hour” or “an hour.” “An hour” sounds more correct, but “a hour” reads more correct to me. I'm just curious what it should be.

The rule is that you use “a" before words that start with a consonant sound and “an” before words that start with a vowel sound.

Should You Use 'A' or 'An'?

So to answer Matt's question, “an hour” is correct, because “hour” starts with a vowel sound. People seem to ask most often about words that start with the letters H and U because sometimes these words start with vowel sounds and sometimes they start with consonant sounds. For example, it is “a historic monument” because “historic” starts with an H sound, but it is “an honorable fellow” because “honorable” starts with an O sound. Similarly, it is “a Utopian idea,” but “an unfair world.”

The letters O and M can be tricky too. Usually you put “an” before words that start with O, but sometimes you use A. For example, you’d use A if you were to say, “She has a one-track mind,” because “one-track” starts with a W sound. Similarly, you’d say, “She has an MBA, but chooses to work as a missionary,” because “MBA” starts with a vowel sound and “missionary” starts with a consonant sound.

Use “a” before words that start with a consonant sound and “an” before words that start with a vowel sound.

Other letters can also be pronounced either way. Just remember it is the sound that governs whether you use “a” or “an,” not the actual first letter of the word.

One complication is when words are pronounced differently in British English and American English. For example, the word for a certain kind of plant is pronounced “erb” in American English and “herb...

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Homework Done Right: What's a Parent's Role?

Lots of parents struggle with knowing what their role is when it comes to their kids’ and school. Should I (gasp) do their homework with them, to be sure it’s done right? Or should I stay out of it completely? How important is it to join the PTA, anyway?

In the process of researching my new book, Time To Parent, I came across a helpful mantra for parents of children at almost any stage and phase: Be Your Child’s Learning Coach.

When it comes to homework, you—as a parent—have the perspective to see homework for what it is:  a chance to help your child learn time management skills, monitor his own learning and asses whether not he’s meeting teacher standards. Those are important life skills. As your child’s “learning coach” it’s not your job to do the work—but you should be offering the space, time and support to work on assignments.

Here’s how:

Get to know your kids’ teachers. Invest time in building relationships with your kids’ teachers.  The better you understand their expectations, the better you can help your little student meet them. Don’t be afraid to ask teachers how much time your child should allocate to specific assignments, or even for clarification on how your child is being assessed (creativity, neatness, accuracy, and so on).

Make homework time a family affair. Starting when children are young, set a regular schedule that the entire family can follow: while kids do homework or read books, parents do their own quiet activity nearby (and stay available to answer questions if/when they come up). Make sure you create a quiet space and environment to support the routine—no one should be having loud fun or playing/watching an electronic device. Think of it as your daily opportunity to model good study habits.

Match your children’s age and stage. How you interact with your kids’ schoolwork will depend, in part, on how old they are. A few general guidelines:

• For kids younger than five-years old, your primary goal is to communicate that learning is fun. Don’t worry so much about giving your kids a head start—focus on talking, reading and play.
• By the time kids reach elementary age, parents can help their young students start to form good study habits.  Provide the right supplies and ensure kids are well-fed, rested and have the energy to do the work.
• By about 10-years old, kids may start to resist advice from their parents. Congratulations, you’ve reached the tween years. Consider enlisting outside help. A tutor—or even a “cool” older neighbor kid or cousin—can help your child start to learn how to keep track of a...

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10 Fresh Uses for Lemons

Keep your home and yourself feeling fresh and clean with this well-known household hero.

Around The House

1. Whiten Toilet Bowls
Forget the nasty chemicals and overpowering scents! You can use ½ cup lemon juice in your toilet bowl to deodorize and remove stains naturally. Let it sit for several minutes before scrubbing clean.

2. Green Cleaning for the Grill
Grill cleaners often contain harsh chemicals. But if you want to remove rust and sanitize your grill, you can use a simple lemon. Just cut in half and rub on the grill grate.

3. Quick Fix for a Stinky Microwave
Microwave odors? They plague every busy household. Simply cut a lemon into quarters and put it in a bowl of water, then place in the microwave on high for 2 minutes. Wipe the inside with a soft cloth and any stains will lift easily.

4. Beat Tough Fridge Odors
No matter how often you try to clean out the fridge, odor happens. The solution: Soak a sponge in lemon juice and let it sit in your fridge for a few hours. Ahh, better!

5. Keep Insects Out
Many little buggers—including ants, silverfish, roaches, and fleas—hate the smell of lemon. Squirt some lemon juice around cracks and openings where they may be tempted to enter in. For extra defense, mop your floors with a solution of the juice of four lemons and ½ gallon water.

Super Food Tips

6. Master That Marinade
Make a simple marinade for meats by combining lemon juice with your favorite oils and herbs. The acid in the lemon juice breaks down the meat to tenderize and allow flavor in.

Health And Beauty

7. Whiten Nails
Take advantage of the natural acid in lemons to lighten and brighten nails. Dip your fingers in a mixture of lemon juice and warm water for about 5 minutes. When you’re in a hurry, you can also just rub a lemon wedge right over your nails.

8. Drink to Better Digestion
Add lemon slices or squeeze fresh lemon juice into your water glass. The healthy acids in lemon help your stomach break down food and improve overall digestion. Experts say warming the water provides the greatest belly benefits.

9. Get Rid of Warts
Warts can be stubborn, and many remedies seem less than gentle. Start with a simple cure: lemon juice. Squeeze the juice of a lemon onto a cotton ball, then dab on two to three times a day until you see the wart disappear. The acidity of lemon juice breaks down warts gradually—and naturally.

10. Soften Corns
Soak your feet in warm water, then apply a lemon juice compress made with a...

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5 Signs You're Too Self-Critical

Being hard on yourself is double-edged—highly self-critical individuals are often successful achievers. But the road to those achievements isn’t a smooth ride; instead, it’s often riddled with potholes of stress, insecurity, and self-doubt. 

Self-criticism may be overt, such as calling yourself names like "idiot" or "loser" when you don’t meet your own standards, or disparaging your accomplishments to those who try to congratulate you. 

But self-criticism may be covert, too. And it may leak out in sneaky ways, like an eating disorder, social anxiety, or depression. Therefore, this week, we’ll talk about five signs it may be time to trade in your criticism for some kindness.

5 Signs You're Being Too Self-Critical

1. You're never content.
2. You feel constantly overwhelmed.
3. You always feel guilty.
4. You go it alone.
5. You’re too humble.

Here are the self-critical signs in more detail. 

Sign #1: You’re never content.

Even if we’ve run out of room on our trophy shelf, made the Dean’s list, or framed the first dollar from our newly launched business, we just don’t feel satisfied. Or perhaps we do, but it’s either fleeting or weighed down by qualifications: “Yeah, I got the promotion, but I don’t think it was unanimous,” or “Meeting the Dalai Lama was amazing, but I got star struck and babbled like an idiot.”

We may feel like a failure, even as others congratulate us on a job well done. We may feel like a loser, even when our life is objectively going well. 

Of course, it’s important to strive, aim high, and even kick our own butts from time to time, but too much time in thumbscrews slows our progress. Why? Our criticism has good intentions: we’re trying to motivate ourselves and accomplish great things. But it backfires. Focusing on all the ways we fall short either takes the wind out of our sails or fixates our attention on unimportant details rather than the big picture. 

Sign #2: You feel constantly overwhelmed.

Self-critical individuals are often responsible and reliable. This personality trait is called conscientiousness. Conscientiousness gets you a long way—it’s a better predictor of success than intelligence. However, it’s also a quality that often...

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What Does It Mean to Be ‘In the Limelight’?

Have you ever wondered what it means to be “in the limelight?”  

Let me tell you right now that it has nothing to do with limes.

Instead, it has to do with minerals, lighthouses, and the early days of theater.

For starters, “to be in the limelight” is an expression that means to be under intense public scrutiny—to have all eyes on you. This could be in the moment; for example, if you were an actor on stage in a critical scene. Or it could be over a period of time; if you were a celebrity caught in a scandal, for example. 

Limelight’s Invention, and Its Use in Surveying

This expression dates back to 1816. A young Scottish engineer named Thomas Drummond had been hired by Britain’s Ordnance Survey to create detailed maps of Scotland. But he struggled to get accurate readings in the murky Scottish weather. 

To solve this problem, he turned to English inventor Sir Goldsworthy Gurney. (What a name!) Gurney had developed a blowpipe that burned hydrogen and oxygen, which created an extremely hot flame. Gurney found that when he used the flame to heat calcium oxide—also known as “quicklime”—it produced an intense white light. 

This light was so spectacular, and so much brighter than other lights from that time, that viewers were stunned. Here’s what one witness said: “… when the gas began to play, the lime being brought now to its full ignition … a glare shone forth, overpowering … A shout of triumph and of admiration burst from all present.”

Limelight made it easier for surveyors to measure distances.

Drummond realized that if he placed a limelight on a reference point in the landscape, it could be seen from miles away—as many as 50 miles away. This would make the work of surveyors measuring distances immensely easier.

A New Light for Lighthouses?

Drummond’s light was used throughout the surveying of Scotland, and in the subsequent surveying of Ireland, and starting in 1829, it was put into trial for use in lighthouses. The light it created, said one witness, was “not only more vivid and conspicuous [than other types of light], but was peculiarly remarkable from its exquisite whiteness. Indeed, there seems no great presumption in comparing its splendour to that of the sun….”

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