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Thread: Old wives tales

  1. #1
    Craftsman
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    Old wives tales

    Suffer cramp in the legs a lot. Last year my partners aged dad mentioned similar and that a lady had once told him to put a bar of soap under his pillow each night, to his amazement it worked and reduced his cramps to next to nothing. Sceptically I tried similar and yes it worked and is working for me, has cut my cramps down considerably and just get the odd twitch now and then, about the only twitch I seem to get these days :)

    So lets hear your tales and experiences

  2. #2
    Grand Master AlphaOmega's Avatar
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    Quote Originally Posted by LRB255 View Post
    ...a lady had once told him to put a bar of soap under his pillow each night...
    Doesn't it get uncomfortable?

    Presumably, after a month or two, the bed is full of soap. Unless you just keep one bar there.

  3. #3
    My life as a doctor is full of this stuff.
    My mother in law even suggested, in my presence, for one of my children to put butter on a burn.

    One of my patients was importing Emu oil from Australia to rub into her painful knee.

    MiL also has a conker in the corner of every room in her house to ward off spiders



    ... And warned me that 5G is dangerous and the Japanese have banned it
    Last edited by The Doc; 5th June 2020 at 10:24.

  4. #4
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    This one is not an old wives tale, more a tale of lack of intelligence.
    A guy that used to help my father out around the house firmly believed that miners drank a pint of milk after their shift to wash the dust out of their lungs. I tried to explain to him that the milk would go into their stomach not their lungs and that a pint of milk in their lungs would kill them.
    He wouldn’t have none of it.

  5. #5
    Grand Master AlphaOmega's Avatar
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    Is it true that wearing a watch on a Nato attracts socially inept middle-aged introverts?

    Asking for a friend.

  6. #6
    Master Alansmithee's Avatar
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    "common law wife".

  7. #7
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    We have conkers on the window ledges and definitely see less(almost nil) spiders in the house, they were free so no loss there for minimal effort.

  8. #8
    Master Maysie's Avatar
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    If you eat your crusts your hair will go curly (or was it the other way around?).

    When you pulled a 'funny face' as a kid - 'if the wind changes you will stay like that'

    WTF is that all about?!

  9. #9
    Don't mix ham and banana.

    My Great Uncle George(?) did that and it killed him.

  10. #10
    Master
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    Quote Originally Posted by Maysie View Post
    If you eat your crusts your hair will go curly (or was it the other way around?).

    When you pulled a 'funny face' as a kid - 'if the wind changes you will stay like that'

    WTF is that all about?!
    I remember them too growing up along with eating carrots so you could see in the dark.

    I also recall looking to buy my first house around the early 90’s and looking at a place that belonged to an old lady - all the window cills had a clove of garlic on to ward off vampires. The estate agent who was himself was retirement age said that over the years he’d seen that a few times. Mainly from old ladies living alone.

  11. #11
    Master Zephyr's Avatar
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    Don’t pick your nose your head will cave in. 😄

  12. #12
    Master sish101's Avatar
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    Don't sleep in the subway, darling.

    Don't put your daughter on the stage, Mrs Worthington.

    Sent through the ether by diddling with radio waves

  13. #13
    Don't play with yourself, you will go blind, hang on wheres my glasses :)

  14. #14
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    When I was an amateur boxer and fighting with the scales to make weight I was encouraged to eat Grapefruit before I went to bed as the Grapefruit would burn excess weight off while I slept.

    What a load of crap !!!

    Sent from my SM-A105FN using Tapatalk

  15. #15
    Grand Master hogthrob's Avatar
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    When my grandad had a bad chest, grand mother said we should rub goose fat on his back. He went downhill fast after that.

  16. #16
    Quote Originally Posted by hogthrob View Post
    When my grandad had a bad chest, grand mother said we should rub goose fat on his back. He went downhill fast after that.
    Boo.

    We got a cat recently, and two people independently advised that we should put butter on her paws to make sure that, when she gets out of the house, she comes back!

  17. #17
    My grandmother often said "it's too cold to snow" (North Nottinghamshire). Not true, having endured three Northern Albertan winters where it would be -35 and bucketing down...

  18. #18
    Quote Originally Posted by Pitfitter View Post
    We have conkers on the window ledges and definitely see less(almost nil) spiders in the house, they were free so no loss there for minimal effort.
    Can you send me some? I seem to spend half of my life clearing cobwebs at the moment!

  19. #19
    Quote Originally Posted by jaytip View Post
    This one is not an old wives tale, more a tale of lack of intelligence.
    A guy that used to help my father out around the house firmly believed that miners drank a pint of milk after their shift to wash the dust out of their lungs. I tried to explain to him that the milk would go into their stomach not their lungs and that a pint of milk in their lungs would kill them.
    He wouldn’t have none of it.
    I can only think that milk may increase mucous production in the body (lungs generally) as It does for me being lactose intollerant - and helps cough up the dust

  20. #20
    Grand Master Sinnlover's Avatar
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    Quote Originally Posted by Devonian View Post
    I remember them too growing up along with eating carrots so you could see in the dark.
    This was based on a bit of British Propaganda from WW2

    In an effort to hide the fact the RAF had airborne radar and to explain John ‘Cats Eyes’ Cunningham’s high kill ratio the government claimed that he had great night vision helped in part by eating carrots.
    It also helped get the the public (children) to eat more carrots improving nutrition under rationing.

    https://www.smithsonianmag.com/arts-...dark-28812484/

  21. #21
    Grand Master Passenger's Avatar
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    Put a clean cobweb on a cut helps stop the bleeding and healing so they say and one via my FIL which came down from his mother, brushing your hair daily in the early years will prevent it thinning later in life, didn't work for him though.

  22. #22
    Master TheGent's Avatar
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    Quote Originally Posted by Sinnlover View Post
    This was based on a bit of British Propaganda from WW2

    In an effort to hide the fact the RAF had airborne radar and to explain John ‘Cats Eyes’ Cunningham’s high kill ratio the government claimed that he had great night vision helped in part by eating carrots.
    It also helped get the the public (children) to eat more carrots improving nutrition under rationing.

    https://www.smithsonianmag.com/arts-...dark-28812484/


    My grandmother fully bought into this one. Although she did temper it by saying “you never see a rabbit wearing glasses do you?”


    Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

  23. #23
    Journeyman
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    I tested this with my son who heard it at school. We put a conker in the corner of his wardrobe and went back to it a few weeks later to find it covered with cobwebs. There were none anywhere else in the wardrobe
    Quote Originally Posted by Pitfitter View Post
    We have conkers on the window ledges and definitely see less(almost nil) spiders in the house, they were free so no loss there for minimal effort.
    Sent from my POT-LX1 using TZ-UK mobile app

  24. #24
    Master brigant's Avatar
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    Quote Originally Posted by The Doc View Post
    My life as a doctor is full of this stuff.
    My mother in law even suggested, in my presence, for one of my children to put butter on a burn.

    One of my patients was importing Emu oil from Australia to rub into her painful knee.

    MiL also has a conker in the corner of every room in her house to ward off spiders



    ... And warned me that 5G is dangerous and the Japanese have banned it
    The butter on a burn is (or was) a very common one. My sister in law does actually put conkers in her rooms as a spider deterrent.

  25. #25
    Grand Master GraniteQuarry's Avatar
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    Quote Originally Posted by Qatar-wol View Post
    We got a cat recently, and two people independently advised that we should put butter on her paws to make sure that, when she gets out of the house, she comes back!
    There's some background logic to that iirc - the cat will lick its paws clean outside the door and think the world is like that so will come back to the "clean" house being the spick and span creatures they are. Something along those lines, definitely been discussed here before!

    I'll add the throwing salt over your shoulder after spilling some otherwise bad luck concept; talk about self-defeating!

  26. #26
    Quote Originally Posted by TheGent View Post


    My grandmother fully bought into this one. Although she did temper it by saying “you never see a rabbit wearing glasses do you?”


    Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

    It's not exactly a myth, there is a connection between carotene and sight. Maybe the mechanism wasn't known at the time but it is now. Carrots have high carotene which the body makes into Vitamin A. Vitamin A is converted to 11-cis-Retinal which is a visual pigment in the eyes. When visible light "hits" this pigment it is converted to all-trans-Retinal which is used in a neuronal signal to the brain (sight).

  27. #27
    Quote Originally Posted by brigant View Post
    The butter on a burn is (or was) a very common one. My sister in law does actually put conkers in her rooms as a spider deterrent.
    I worked for six months on a hospital burns unit. We admitted from 15%, up to about 70% burns on people. Lots of them died. The severely burned patient is a terrible thing. We used zero butter.

    On a lighter note, in the burns unit kitchen there was an old recipe book which I leafed through one evening. I found a diet from the 1970s called the 20 Egg Burns Diet.
    In an attempt to get protein into these unfortunate souls, it called for 20 eggs to be eaten, a day. And a large quantity of whole milk and butter.

    Oh and I'm also a licenced arachnid disposer, and I can say that they have no fear of conkers.

    One of these stories is true.

  28. #28
    Quote Originally Posted by The Doc View Post
    Lots of them died. ... We used zero butter.
    I know correlation is not causation, but..No buts, it's got to be butter.

  29. #29
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    You can not fail to "pull" on a night out if you wear a kilt .

    I can confirm this works 100% of the time. It also seems to work regardless of the normal attractiveness of the kilt wearer.

  30. #30
    Master PhilipK's Avatar
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    "There's great healing in a dog's tongue".

    Friends of my parents used to get their dog to lick any cuts or scrapes that their children acquired.

  31. #31
    Grand Master magirus's Avatar
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    Quote Originally Posted by Mr.D View Post
    You can not fail to "pull" on a night out if you wear a kilt .

    I can confirm this works 100% of the time. It also seems to work regardless of the normal attractiveness of the kilt wearer.

    Should underwear be worn when kilted on a night out? Asking for a friend.
    F.T.F.A.

  32. #32
    Grand Master GraniteQuarry's Avatar
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    Quote Originally Posted by magirus View Post
    Should underwear be worn when kilted on a night out? Asking for a friend.
    If you don't want loads of birds sexually assaulting you, then yes

  33. #33
    Quote Originally Posted by magirus View Post
    Should underwear be worn when kilted on a night out? Asking for a friend.
    It certainly should have been worn by the groom aboard the paddle steamer Waverley some years back, one good gust and the last poussin in the shop was there for all to see!

  34. #34
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    Quote Originally Posted by magirus View Post
    Should underwear be worn when kilted on a night out? Asking for a friend.
    Never .

  35. #35
    Grand Master hogthrob's Avatar
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    Quote Originally Posted by GraniteQuarry View Post
    If you don't want loads of birds sexually assaulting you, then yes
    Birds? What is this? 1975? 😜

  36. #36
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    Quote Originally Posted by GraniteQuarry View Post
    If you don't want loads of birds sexually assaulting you, then yes
    That look they have when they take a peek fully expecting there to be a pair of calvin’s under there and instead finding an unleashed one eyed beastie staring back at them.

    Its a mixture of fear , surprise and keen predatory interest.

    Don’t wear pants , it spoils the fun. Like arm bands in the grown ups pool.

  37. #37
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    Quote Originally Posted by Qatar-wol View Post
    Boo.

    We got a cat recently, and two people independently advised that we should put butter on her paws to make sure that, when she gets out of the house, she comes back!
    Yep my Nan insisted we did that, kitten came back so cant argue with that:)

  38. #38
    Master unclealec's Avatar
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    Quote Originally Posted by Zephyr View Post
    Don’t pick your nose your head will cave in. 
    Astoundingly, this one proved true.

    Someone I knew was picking his nose when a lorry ran over his finger.

  39. #39
    Master Zephyr's Avatar
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    Quote Originally Posted by unclealec View Post
    Astoundingly, this one proved true.

    Someone I knew was picking his nose when a lorry ran over his finger.

    😂😂😂

  40. #40
    Quote Originally Posted by hogthrob View Post
    Birds? What is this? 1975? 
    I think he meant chicks.

  41. #41
    Grand Master Sinnlover's Avatar
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    Quote Originally Posted by Holsterman View Post
    I think he meant chicks.

    Surely a ‘bit of skirt’?

  42. #42
    Master grey's Avatar
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    When I was a young child, my granddad once said 'Eatin' strong cheese late at night will make yer costive'.

    No it doesn't! These days nothing does. Not Viagra or mucky magazines. And certainly not eating bloody strong cheese!

    All I got from that was constipation. Perhaps I heard him wrong?
    Last edited by grey; 13th June 2020 at 17:18.

  43. #43
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    Quote Originally Posted by grey View Post
    When I was a young child, my granddad once said 'Eatin' strong cheese late at night will make yer costive'.

    No it doesn't! These days nothing does. Not Viagra or mucky magazines. And certainly not eating bloody strong cheese!

    All I got from that was constipation. Perhaps I heard him wrong?
    I got it...took me a while but I got it!

  44. #44
    Master deerworrier's Avatar
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    Quote Originally Posted by Kingstepper View Post
    Don't mix ham and banana.

    My Great Uncle George(?) did that and it killed him.
    i think i can add to this, i remember a war story my grandfather told me when i was a kid.

    they were out on patrol for days and were down to nothing but the last drops of water in their canteens and half a biscuit brown each, it was getting pretty desperate and granddad recalled how he'd rather go out fighting than starving. it looked hopeless until their sergeant spotted a life line, a banana tree just off in the distance, they moved toward it but at around 30yrds out all hell broke loose, lead was flying in all directions, boys were being cut down, the sergeant called out for them to get down and my granddad took cover behind a low wall. with his body forced as far into the ground as he could he called out to the sergeant "what the hell's going on?"

    the sergeant then broke the dreaded news "its not a banana tree, its a ham bush!"

    im so sorry, i couldn't resist. i'll ban myself.

  45. #45
    Craftsman
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    Quote Originally Posted by Sinnlover View Post
    This was based on a bit of British Propaganda from WW2

    In an effort to hide the fact the RAF had airborne radar and to explain John ‘Cats Eyes’ Cunningham’s high kill ratio the government claimed that he had great night vision helped in part by eating carrots.
    It also helped get the the public (children) to eat more carrots improving nutrition under rationing.

    https://www.smithsonianmag.com/arts-...dark-28812484/
    And discussed in Most Secret War by R V Jones. A great book.

  46. #46
    Craftsman Kevin's Avatar
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    Quote Originally Posted by LRB255 View Post
    Suffer cramp in the legs a lot. Last year my partners aged dad mentioned similar and that a lady had once told him to put a bar of soap under his pillow each night, to his amazement it worked and reduced his cramps to next to nothing. Sceptically I tried similar and yes it worked and is working for me, has cut my cramps down considerably and just get the odd twitch now and then, about the only twitch I seem to get these days :)

    So lets hear your tales and experiences
    If you see a doctor and complain of leg cramps at night you may well be prescribed quinine.
    I was and it worked very well.
    I asked a doctor friend how this works he said 'We have no idea'

    Old wives tales often have an element of truth about them, after all most scientific exploration and research starts with observing cause and effect then finding out why

  47. #47
    Grand Master Saint-Just's Avatar
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    Since so many expressions in English came from France originally, which itself comes from Latin, it could be the origin of the expression.
    In French, they are called "remèdes de bonne femme". In popular French, bonne femme is the equivalent of "women" in a condescending way (good old dears would carry the spirit) but in this case it's quite different as it comes from the Latin bona fama, of good reputation.
    So they are basically empirical remedies that were thought to work. In some cases they are indeed very good. For example, the meadowsweet was used against headaches. Modern analysis has shown it contained a substance close to the active molecule in aspirin. In others they are just superstition.
    'Against stupidity, the gods themselves struggle in vain' - Schiller.

  48. #48
    My late gran was a great one

    I had warts on my hands as a teenager - was very conscious

    One day she got a cube of stewing steak and rubbed it raw all over them
    She then buried the meat in the ground

    Imagine my disbelief when a few weeks later they had ALL gone - all at once in one hit

    100% true story

  49. #49
    Grand Master AlphaOmega's Avatar
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    Quote Originally Posted by grey View Post
    When I was a young child, my granddad once said 'Eatin' strong cheese late at night will make yer costive'.

    No it doesn't! These days nothing does. Not Viagra or mucky magazines. And certainly not eating bloody strong cheese!
    What about a 5512 on a Nato?

  50. #50
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    I went to Junior School having had a glass of rum and olive oil with my breakfast,what was that about ?

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