Re: Kioshu update, plea for help.

Roberto Suarez Soto scripsit:

>         BTW, does someone know what's the origin of the "only my two
> cents" thing? I've seen it everywhere, but don't know where it comes
> from. And I'm sure it has a nice story behind it :-)
Indeed it does.  From the alt.usage.english FAQ:

# "put in one's two cents' worth"
# -------------------------------
#
#    This expression meaning "to contribute one's opinion" dates from
# the late nineteenth century.  Bo Bradham suggested that it came from
# "the days of $.02 postage.  To 'put one's two cents' worth in'
# referred to the cost of a letter to the editor, the president, or
# whomever was deserving".   According to the Encyclopaedia
# Britannica, the first-class postal rate was 2 cents an ounce between
# 1883 and 1932 (with the exception of a brief period during World War
# I).  This OED citation confirms that two-cent stamps were once
# common:  "1902 ELIZ. L. BANKS Newspaper Girl xiv, Dinah got a letter
# through the American mail.  She had fivepence to pay on it, because
# only a common two-cent stamp had been stuck on it."  On the other
# hand, "two-cent" was an American expression for "of little value"
# (similar to British "twopenny-halfpenny"), so the phrase may simply
# have indicated the writer's modesty about the value of his
# contribution.

--
First known example of political correctness:   John Cowan
"After Nurhachi had united all the other        http://www.reutershealth.com
Jurchen tribes under the leadership of the      http://www.ccil.org/~cowan
Manchus, his successor Abahai (1592-1643)       jcowan@reutershealth.com
issued an order that the name Jurchen should       --S. Robert Ramsey,
be banned, and from then on, they were all         _The Languages of China_
to be called Manchus."