Zuzu's Petals

"Zuzu's petals" is a phrase from the 1946 movie It's A Wonderful Life which since its release has become a Christmas-season film classic.

The petals belong to Zuzu Bailey, the youngest daughter of George Bailey the main character. Early in the film, Zuzu shows a flower that she brought home from school and became upset when the petals started to fall off. Her father pretended to reattach them but actually just slipped the lost petals into his pocket.

By the end of the movie, after considering suicide, George has been shown what the world might be like if he had never been born. Given a second chance by God, aided by the angel Clarence, all the changes he had seen in the world were undone. His first realization that his world had been returned to him was when he found that Zuzu's petals were once again in his pocket.

The unusual name, Zuzu, is sometimes used as a short nickname for Susan. But Grimes, who played Zuzu in the film, has another origin story. She says it came from a Nabisco cookie called Zu Zu Ginger Snaps. It was a widely advertised product in magazines of the period. If that sounds farfetched, remember that near the end of the film, George runs up the house stairs and when he meets his little daughter he says “Zuzu, my little ginger snap!“

The phrase has become a kind of shorthand way of reminding people of the hope that things can be mended and made better.

"Zuzu's petals...Zuzu... There they are!"

groggy

You are most likely these days to hear the word "groggy" to describe someone who is tired or has a hangover. Its origin story is not far off from that sense.

The story of groggy begins far from alcohol. It starts with grogram, the name of a coarse, loosely woven fabric made entirely or partly from silk. There was an 18th-century English Admiral, Edward Vernon, who was reputed to have been in the habit of always wearing a grogram cloak. This unique look earned him the nickname "Old Grog" among the sailors under his command.

In the 18th century, sailors in the Royal Navy in the West Indies were customarily given a daily ration of rum. Admiral Vernon was disturbed by the damage to the physical and moral health of his men this rum created. In 1740, he ordered that the rum should be diluted with water. The decision wasn't popular with the sailors, who supposedly dubbed this new mixture "grog" after the Admiral.

The word grog eventually became a general term for almost any liquor that led to people who moved with the unsteadiness characteristic of someone who has had too much grog. You might wake up groggy in the morning without even drinking the night before.

Pirates made a nice modification of the Navy grog which was really just watered down rum. They called the drink bumbo and mixed rum, water, sugar, and nutmeg. The Royal Navy's later grog recipe includes lemon juice, water, rum, and cinnamon. In the Caribbean, I have been served a much fruitier grog that had water, light rum, grapefruit juice, orange juice, pineapple juice, cinnamon, and honey.

Though I could not find an origin for the word "bumbo" I did find variations. Bumbu was commonly used during election campaigns in colonial British America as a way to entice voters to a candidate. The practice was known as "swilling the planters with bumbu." (Why "planters?") 

The not-a-pirate and respectable George Washington was particularly noted for using this technique. His papers state that he used 160 gallons of rum to treat 391 voters to bumbu during campaigning for the Virginia House of Burgesses in July 1758. At almost a half-gallon per person, there were surely some groggy voters from that campaign.

Aha! and A-ha

There is some version of the interjection "Aha!" in nearly all Indo-European languages. 

The simple Ah! appears in the mid-15th century as an expression of surprise, delight, disgust, or pain. It does not appear in Old English where the closest equivalent expression would be "La!" 

In Old French, there was "ah! oh! woe!"

The interjection "Ha!" is also a natural expression of surprise, distress, etc., and is found even earlier that Ah! in most European languages including Latin and Old French. Still, not in Old English which did, however, have the laughter expression "ha-ha."

The more modern Aha! is a way of expressing understanding, realization, invention, or recognition. "Aha! Now I understand this!" It can also mean surprise, exaltation, or contempt. "Aha! Now we've got you!"

a-ha in concert in Madrid, Spain, 2010
(L-R Magne Furuholmen, Morten Harket, Paul Waaktaar-Savoy)

Combing today's word origin with a band origin brings us to A-ha. This Norwegian synth-pop band (usually written as a-ha) formed in Oslo in 1982 with three members: Paul Waaktaar-Savoy (guitars), Magne Furuholmen (keyboards and guitars), and Morten Harket (vocals).

They achieved their biggest success with their debut album Hunting High and Low in 1985 which hit number one in Norway, number 2 in the UK, and number 15 on the US Billboard album chart. It had two international number-one singles: "Take On Me" and "The Sun Always Shines on T.V." The album earned the band a U.S. Grammy Award nomination for Best New Artist. 

When the three left Norway for London to try to make a career in music, they tried unsuccessfully to find a good Norwegian band name that would also be pronounceable easily in English." They jettisoned that idea when Morten spotted a song called "A-ha" in Guitarist Waaktaar had written a song in his notebook called "A-ha" and Morten thought it was "a terrible song but a great name." There is no greater meaning to the name, but the idea that their music might create "understanding, realization, invention, or recognition" certainly was a good thing.

The band released studio albums from 1986 to 1990 and had single hits including "Hunting High and Low", "The Living Daylights", "Stay on These Roads", and "Crying in the Rain."

Their studio album, Memorial Beach (1993), failed to achieve the commercial success of their previous albums, and the band went on hiatus. 

They reformed after a performance at the Nobel Peace Prize Concert in 1998 and released a sixth album, Minor Earth Major Sky, which was the number-one album in Norway and Germany. Their following was much greater in Europe than in America. 

For Americans, they might be best remembered for their music video for "Take On Me" which was played heavily on MTV and still is popular. In fact, it has a billion and a half views on YouTube. It used the rotoscoping animation technique. I've written about the video in much more detail on another site.