Simon Davis
Washington, D.C.
As seen in:
Medium,
The Atlantic,
VICE,
VICE UK,
Atlas Obscura,
Mental Floss,
Religion News Service,
BiggerPockets,
NewsBreak
Death, odd data, linguistics, pugs, food, DC, Greece, reality TV. Bylines: @VICE @TheAtlantic @atlasobscura @Gawker @mental_floss @RNS e: simonknowz@gmail.com
Articles by Simon Davis
6 Distinctive Vintage Baby Names for Each of the Past 7 Generations
Some vintage baby names remain popular year after year—we’re looking at you, James and Emma. But which old-fashioned baby girl and baby boy names characterize an entire generation? We break it down from the Greatest Generation to Gen Z. Meet Elmer, Betty, and Chad—three of the most distinctive vintage baby names of past generations.
property assessed improvements but no idea why
Hello I am asking this for my neighbor. She recently lost her husband and is taking care of all the finances herself which the husband used to do. She showed me her property tax statement and was surprised the tax is so much. I read the statement and it says she bought the condo for $x which she agrees with. But then there is something called improvements, and the improvements is just as much, making the assessed value $2x. she has no idea how this could be.
6 Distinctive Vintage Baby Names for Each of the Past 7 Generations
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Mighty Bear 2023 Review: Bears Building in a Bear Market
In 2023, Mighty Bear navigated the bear market with a blend of resilience and innovation, turning challenges into growth opportunities. This review sheds light on our efforts in workforce diversity, team restructuring for “Mighty Action Heroes,” and proactive wellness initiatives, underscoring our commitment to creating a work environment which is both dynamic and supportive.
"I Still Unload": This Man Is a "Nullo" Who Removed His Penis and Balls
In 1994, a South Florida man who goes by the name Gelding was surgically castrated. In 2011, he had his penis removed as well. He's a "nullo": A cisgender man who removes his external genitalia completely as a form of body modification, and he recently agreed to answer our questions—from "why?" to "what do balls taste like?" Gelding is a nudist and describes himself as a submissive bear.
6 Distinctive Vintage Baby Names for Each of the Past 7 Generations
Some vintage baby names remain popular year after year—we’re looking at you, James and Emma. But which old-fashioned baby girl and baby boy names characterize an entire generation? We break it down from the Greatest Generation to Gen Z. BySimon Davis|Feb 28, 2024, 12:37 PM EST Meet Elmer, Betty, and Chad—three of the most distinctive vintage baby names of past generations.
6 Idioms That Came From Film And Theater
Chances are, you’ve probably used an idiom from film or theater in an everyday context. There's blockbuster, close-up, and double take, to name a few. Others, such as cleavage or gaslighting are less well-known. In his new book, Totally Scripted: Idioms, Words, and Quotes from Hollywood to Broadway That Have Changed the English Language, journalist Josh Chetwynd presents a robust list of these terms. Here are the film-related origins of just six of the hundreds of terms included in the book.
What Is the Trendiest Baby Name in American History?
Walden is one of the most quotable books in American literature.
24,495 unusual names from the Social Security Death Master File | @SimonKnowz on WordPress.com
Below are the full lists of unusual names from my recent article for mental_floss. To keep the article at a digestible length, only a small portion of the names were used. However, some readers may wish to dig deeper.
7 Fun Facts About American Names
Most Americans are given a first and last name when they're born, but aggregate data on full names is not widely distributed by any federal government agency. Instead, data on first and last names is compiled and released separately by two different agencies. The Social Security Administration (SSA) releases an annual list of first names given to babies born in the United States, while the Census bureau provides a list of last names of individuals living in the U.S. once every decade or so.
The top 5 most distinctive last names by state | @SimonKnowz on WordPress.com
In addition to the above map and article for mental_floss, below is a list of the top 5 most distinctive last names by state. This is a larger subset of the same data. To keep the map readable, only the most distinctive last name for each state was used for the infographic. However, some readers may wish to dig deeper. Methodology: The starting point is the top 250 most prevalent last names based on the nationwide total.
Why do many ‘nones’ believe in life after death?
(RNS) Since atheist blogger Martin Hughes left Christianity, he hasn’t missed believing in God or in hell. But he does miss heaven.
The Most Popular Words In Heavy Metal Band Names
What are the most popular words used in the names of heavy metal bands? To find out the answer, we looked to Encyclopaedia Metallum, an online archive of heavy metal bands from around the world. The 109,579 bands in the database contain 60,271 unique words. After excluding entries like to, for, and the, as well as one letter initials, we calculated the top 50.
6 Words You Probably Didn't Know Came From Sports
Chances are, at one point or another you’ve used a sports related expression in a decidedly non-sports context. Some obvious ones are inside baseball, political football, and soccer moms. Others are less well known: go-to guy (basketball) and dead ringer (horse racing) for example. Sports journalist and former baseball player Josh Chetwynd has compiled what appears to be an exhaustive collection in his new book The Field Guide to Sports Metaphors: A Compendium of Competitive Words and Idioms.
Most Distinctive Obituary Euphemism for 'Died' in Each State
× CLOSE Click to enlarge If you’re an American alive today, chances are you’ve heard or used one of over 100 different euphemisms for death. A common reason many people don’t just say someone has “died” is a desire to not want to appear too harsh. This happens not just in everyday conversation, but also in obituaries we read in newspapers and increasingly online. Are some expressions for dying more prevalent in obituaries than others? Are there regional variations?
10 Ancient Greek Roots That Can Trip You Up in Modern Greek
Many English words today have roots from Greek, particularly in fields like medicine. Does that mean you can go from expert knowledge of classical Greek literature and scientific terminology directly to rapid fire dialogue with everyday Greeks in their native tongue? Well, you could try. But you’d probably come off as a bit of a neophyte (yes, that comes from Greek). Two thousand years is a long time.
21 Amusing Greek-Americanisms English Speakers Might Recognize
In the movie My Big Fat Greek Wedding, fictional Greek-American small business owner Gus Portokalos repeatedly issues a bold linguistic challenge: “Give me a word—any word—and I’ll show you how the root of that word is Greek.” Unfortunately for him, most words in the English language don’t come from Greek. To be sure, there are fields like medicine where English terminology has a very high concentration of words of Greek origin.
How the nonreligious are reshaping American funeral rituals
(RNS) Before his death a few years ago, Jim Underdown’s father, James, requested that he be cremated — becoming the first in his family to do so. A month later, the family had a memorial luncheon in Chicago. In accordance with his wishes, his cremated remains were scattered in a favorite wooded area in Wisconsin. The decision to forgo traditional burial was in line with his father’s rejection of religion, Jim Underdown said.
Indigent Burial in the U.S. is Shrouded in Confusion and Inconsistency-But There is Hope
On July 19, Rosaria Cortes Lusero was able for the first time to visit her stillborn daughter’s burial site. She had died just a few days after being born in 1995 and—as is the case with all stillborn infants where no private arrangements are made—buried in a mass grave site on Hart Island in the Bronx which the public could not access.
The Quest to Discover the World's Books Bound in Human Skin
While it may seem like the stuff of horror movies, an assortment of well-regarded libraries and museums in Europe and the United States own books bound in a very controversial material: human skin. According to experts, the practice of binding books with human leather ended around the late 19th century, and there are no known 20th-century examples.
Was an Epidemic in Ancient Greece Actually Ebola?
No one knows what caused the Plague of Athens in the 5th century B.C. One popular theory is Ebola—but to discover the source of an outbreak millennia after the fact, scientists need victims’ remains and a bit of luck. Simon Davis September 15, 2015 "Plague in an Ancient City," by the 17th-century painter Michael SweertsWikimedia In the summer of 430 B.C., a mass outbreak of disease hit the city of Athens, ravaging the city’s population over the next five years.
“Syriza is very heterogeneous”: Bruegel Senior Fellow Zsolt Darvas on post-referendum Greece
This Sunday, Greeks will go to the polls for their first referendum in over 40 years. The ballot asks voters to accept or reject a draft of the terms offered by Greece’s lenders on June 25 to continue lending to the heavily indebted country. The referendum was announced somewhat abruptly last Friday by Prime Minister Alexis Tsipras after he left the negotiations in Brussels without warning a few days before the current bailout program was set to expire on June 30.
Why the “battle with cancer” metaphor is problematic
According to news reports, Beau Biden — son of Vice President Joe Biden — died tonight from complications of brain cancer. He was 46. Somewhat predictably, news outlets reporting on his death spoke of his “battle” with cancer — a common metaphor. I’ve never had cancer myself, but I have helped family members being treated for it. Until tonight, I never gave it much thought, but the “battle” analogy never sat well with me whenever I heard it.
Most Distinctive Last Names by State
According to the most recent publicly available U.S. Census data from the year 2000, the five most common last names in the United States are Smith, Johnson, Williams, Brown, and Jones. But what are the regional variations? While the Census Bureau breaks out each last name by race and ethnicity, it doesn’t provide a count by state. There are other data sources, however. In 2014 Ancestry.com ran the numbers from their own database, and compiled the top three most common last names by state.
"I Still Unload": This Man Is a "Nullo" Who Removed His Penis and Balls
In 1994, a South Florida man who goes by the name Gelding was surgically castrated. In 2011, he had his penis removed as well. He's a "nullo": A cisgender man who removes his external genitalia completely as a form of body modification, and he recently agreed to answer our questions—from "why?" to "what do balls taste like?" Gelding is a nudist and describes himself as a submissive bear.
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