...and the red sawdust spilled out onto the grass
- Thread starter MarkQuinn
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Okay, now I'll show my age. LOL. I once owned a stuffed animal (it was a hand puppet too) that was stuffed with sawdust. Yep back in the dark ages when dinosaurs roamed.
For an idea of timing, I'm about to turn 50 and I'm pretty sure, the toy - a leopard hand puppet was an antique even then that had possibly belonged to my mother.
So yeah, back in the old days, before we used to have fiberfill, many stuffed animals were filled with sawdust. Cotton, shredded rags, shredded paper and straw were the other popular options.
I could be wrong, but I seem to recall that in the Velveteen Rabbit, it speaks of the rabbit (or perhaps one of the other toys) leaking sawdust because it had been well loved.
So sawdust blood is not much of a stretch, and if Martin is my age or older, not terribly surprising that he'd recall it.
I also recall that when I was a child, sawdust was regularly used to clean up oil spills and such. (Of course grandpa was a carpenter, so we had plenty of the stuff in stock.)
Incidentally, when I studied as an "auto bodyman" I found that the stuff we used to clean up oil spills was basically the same clay as kitty litter without the scent, and WAY WAY less expensive. You could buy a 100 lb bag of the stuff for about $5.
Anyway, for whatever reason, you could often buy sawdust that had been dyed red for use in cleaning up spills. I have no idea what the purpose behind the red dye was. It wasn't paint, but probably the same kind of dye that's used in food coloring. So very simple to translate red sawdust into puppet blood and probably something that was common in the past.
Oh yeah, GRRM is born in 48, 4 years after my Mom. They definitely still had sawdust filled stuffies/puppets back then. Probably not a matter of great research, but one of simple memory.
That doesn't stop it from being an evocative phrase, but maybe makes it less of a mystery. Some of us just know old tech, not because of research but because we're well...old.
ETA: The red thing. My hubby says he can't recall the particular red chemical, but he seems to recall that the chemical used was a fire-retardant included to keep the cleanup sawdust from spontaneously combusting.
For an idea of timing, I'm about to turn 50 and I'm pretty sure, the toy - a leopard hand puppet was an antique even then that had possibly belonged to my mother.
So yeah, back in the old days, before we used to have fiberfill, many stuffed animals were filled with sawdust. Cotton, shredded rags, shredded paper and straw were the other popular options.
I could be wrong, but I seem to recall that in the Velveteen Rabbit, it speaks of the rabbit (or perhaps one of the other toys) leaking sawdust because it had been well loved.
So sawdust blood is not much of a stretch, and if Martin is my age or older, not terribly surprising that he'd recall it.
I also recall that when I was a child, sawdust was regularly used to clean up oil spills and such. (Of course grandpa was a carpenter, so we had plenty of the stuff in stock.)
Incidentally, when I studied as an "auto bodyman" I found that the stuff we used to clean up oil spills was basically the same clay as kitty litter without the scent, and WAY WAY less expensive. You could buy a 100 lb bag of the stuff for about $5.
Anyway, for whatever reason, you could often buy sawdust that had been dyed red for use in cleaning up spills. I have no idea what the purpose behind the red dye was. It wasn't paint, but probably the same kind of dye that's used in food coloring. So very simple to translate red sawdust into puppet blood and probably something that was common in the past.
Oh yeah, GRRM is born in 48, 4 years after my Mom. They definitely still had sawdust filled stuffies/puppets back then. Probably not a matter of great research, but one of simple memory.
That doesn't stop it from being an evocative phrase, but maybe makes it less of a mystery. Some of us just know old tech, not because of research but because we're well...old.
ETA: The red thing. My hubby says he can't recall the particular red chemical, but he seems to recall that the chemical used was a fire-retardant included to keep the cleanup sawdust from spontaneously combusting.
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Let me say, just weird shit when you can remember a world that was completely different.
When plastic toys were a new thing and plastic shopping bags just didn't exist.
When computers and iPhones weren't even a dream. When our parents sent us outside to play stickball, stoopball, hide and seek because they couldn't tell us to log on to our non-existent Playstations to get out of their hair.
It's sort of weird being an "older person" in this very modern age. Technology has speeded up beyond anything I could have imagined as a child. I can only imagine it will happen faster as the years pass.
And yet I'll always wonder why imaginative games such as "lets make a fort" (and the attendant theft of car seats etc from abandoned vehicles) are being drowned out by stuff like Playstation.
When plastic toys were a new thing and plastic shopping bags just didn't exist.
When computers and iPhones weren't even a dream. When our parents sent us outside to play stickball, stoopball, hide and seek because they couldn't tell us to log on to our non-existent Playstations to get out of their hair.
It's sort of weird being an "older person" in this very modern age. Technology has speeded up beyond anything I could have imagined as a child. I can only imagine it will happen faster as the years pass.
And yet I'll always wonder why imaginative games such as "lets make a fort" (and the attendant theft of car seats etc from abandoned vehicles) are being drowned out by stuff like Playstation.
True, and of course, all the words in our language come from a variety of older cultures and languages and often reference things that wouldn't exist in said fantasy world. Of course, we're essentially "translating" what the people are saying in the pretend world anyway. The culture in a given fantasy world may well have a word/concept in their language that translates to "christening," with or without the actual Christian connotation.
Still, some things do tend to knock people out more than others. Few people would likely complain about a volcano exploding in a fantasy world (and being called a volcano instead of a "smert") where the god Vulcan was never worshiped, or about someone's speech being "laconic" in a world which never had a place named "Laconia."
But refer to something being "spartan," and you'll knock people out right, left and center. Why? Because everyone and their dog knows (at least since the movie 300) that the word "spartan" refers to the ancient Greek city state "Sparta."
Christening is one of those words that conjures up a very specific real world connotation for most readers as well, even if the word and concept are actually older and not specific to Christendom.
I'd definitely agree with this. In cases where most people aren't particularly conscious of the etymology of certain words and phrases, it's fine to use them, but sometimes the words and their meanings are still so recognisable, that one can't help but make the mundane association whenever they hear it.
I have to say, I'd accept "spartan" as an adjective in a secondary-world fantasy. Ditto "christening," and even "Roman nose" for that matter. If I had trouble with "scotch" and "Bordeaux" it would be less for the place origin than for the fact that they are specific types of beverage that exist here and now. On the other hand, I'd be fine with "butterscotch."
There's no way to please every reader.
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