filibuster

In case you’re not an expert on political systems (which I definitely am not), a filibuster is a parliamentary tactic, often used in the United States’ Senate. It involves a member of the legislature speaking for a long time, or engaging in other tactics like raising lots of points of order, to try to delay a vote on a bill. This works because in the United States’ Senate there’s no time limit on individual speeches. So a senator can potentially speak for hours or even days to stop a vote.

There are a few ways to end a filibuster, including a three-fifths majority vote (usually 60 out of 100 senators in the US Senate) to invoke ‘cloture’ (another new-to-me word). This is a formal process that limits further debate and schedules a time for a vote on the bill.

So, why is this type of long speech called a ‘filibuster’? Well, it comes from a Spanish word ‘filibustero’, which originally referred to pirates or buccaneers doing naughty things in the West Indies and Central America during the 19th century. ‘Filibustero’ probably has its origins in the Dutch word ‘vrijbuiter’, which means ‘freebooter’ or ‘pirate’. It wasn’t long before this term that previously described pirates became a word for a parliamentary obstruction tactic.

Strom Thurmond – allegedly racist AND sexist (I cut the top of his head off on purpose)

The longest filibuster on record came from the awesomely named Senator Sturm Thurmond, who sounds like a Star Wars character. Despite his excellent moniker, Thurmond was a vehement opponent of the Civil Rights Act 1957, and supported racial segregation (apparently he also had a reputation for fondling women in elevators – he sounds like a massive dick). His filibuster to stop Black Americans getting the vote started at 8.54pm on 28 August and lasted until 9.12pm THE FOLLOWING DAY – that’s a massive 24 hours and 18 minutes. Thankfully it didn’t work, and the bill passed two hours after his filibuster ended. It was signed into law by President Eisenhower within two weeks. Up yours, Sturm.

picayune

If something is picayune, it’s trivial or paltry. So you could say to someone ‘your opinions are picayune’ (if you’re mean and don’t want the person to realise). You can also use it as a noun, as in ‘our lives don't amount to a picayune in the grand scheme of things’. Which is depressing, sorry.

One silver Spanish real, from the reign of Peter I of Castile (1350–1369).

Picayune is a relatively modern word. In the 19th century, in Louisiana and other southern American states, a picayune was a small coin which wasn’t worth very much. Specifically, it was a Spanish half real – the real (meaning ‘royal’) was a Spanish unit of currency used for several hundred years after the mid-14th century. It was eventually replaced by the peseta in 1868.

The coin’s name comes from ‘picaioun’, a word that means ‘small coin’ in Occitan, a language spoken in French luxury cosmetic shops. I jest, of course (and apologise for the bad joke and product placement – although if anyone from L’Occitane is reading and would like to send me some free stuff, please do. I’m a particular fan of your hand cream) – it was spoken in Southern France. ‘Picaioun’ comes from the Occitan word ‘pica’, which means ‘to jingle’, as in the noise coins make when you have lots of them.

Just in case you don’t know what an aeroplane looks like (this might not be a Cessna though – no idea).

Further investigation into the word ‘pica’ led me to an eating disorder when people crave things that aren’t food. First described by Hippocrates way-back-when, in this context ‘pica’ actually has completely different etymology, and comes from the Latin word for ‘magpie’, a bird believed to eat anything.

This investigation then took me back to France (the internet is a wonderful thing) and one Michel Lotito, an entertainer who was famous for eating things that you shouldn’t. Known as Monsieur Mangetout (‘Mr Eat-All’), over the course of his 57-year lifetime, he ate 18 bicycles, 15 shopping carts, 7 TVs, 6 chandeliers, 2 beds, a pair of skis, a computer, a waterbed, 500 metres of steel chain, a coffin (with handles), 45 door hinges and even a bloody aeroplane (a Cessna 150, if you’re interested), which took him two years to get through. He was awarded a brass plaque by Guinness World Records to commemorate his abilities, and he ate that too. Lotito died in 2007 after a heart attack – and his death was apparently nothing to do with his ‘unusual’ diet.

cacafuego

The Cacafuego getting its arse kicked by The Golden Hind.

You might know a cacafuego – it’s a swaggering braggart or boaster. Even if you’re not a linguist you’ve probably guessed that this is a Spanish word. And it literally means ‘fire shitter’, from the old Spanish verb cacar (now cagar), meaning ‘to void excrement’, and fuego, which means ‘fire’.

Cacafuego first appeared in English in the early 1600s, and that’s down to Sir Francis Drake, English explorer, sea captain, ahem, slave trader, naval officer, politician and circumnavigator of the globe (show-off). He was also a privateer, which is basically a government-sponsored pirate who went around attacking foreign vessels and stealing all their treasure. One of the ships he captured was a Spanish galleon called Cacafuego. Okay, the ship wasn’t actually called fire shitter (shame) – this was a nickname given to her by her crew due to her impressive cannon fire and other weaponry. Her real name was Nuestra Señora de la Concepción or Our Lady of the (Immaculate) Conception, which isn’t half as fun.

On 1 March 1579, while doing the aforementioned circumnavigation of the globe, Drake’s ship the Golden Hind caught up with Cacafuego near Ecuador. Having heard that she was packed to the rafters (not sure ships have rafters but never mind) with goodies, Drake decided to capture her. Rather than reduce the Hind’s sails in daylight (as this might look suspicious), Drake trailed some wine barrels behind to slow her down and wait for night to fall. In the early evening he came alongside and, because there weren’t many English ships in the Pacific at this time, the Cacafuego was taken completely by surprise and surrendered without much resistance. Drake sailed both ships to the South America coast and, after nicking all the treasure, treated the officers on board to a nice dinner, some presents (sadly Wikipedia doesn’t say what these were) and letters of safe conduct before offloading them. So that’s nice. And it wasn’t long before cacafuego became a byword for a swaggering person – probably due to the fact that Drake made such short work of taking control of such a supposedly impressive ship.