The Secret Lives of Fortune Cookie Writers

All about the first professional fortune cookie writer, why a lottery scam investigation led to a fortune cookie, and the banned “dreadful day” fortune.

There are varying opinions about who invented the fortune cookie as we know it, though everyone seems to agree that it happened in America. (There is a somewhat similar cookie in Japan --not China-- that is older.) My favored contender is David Jung, founder of the Hong Kong Noodle Company in L.A., for the biased reason that Jung seems to have hired the first fortune cookie writer.

His idea for fortune cookies stemmed from his desire to give impatient guests something to do while waiting for their food, so he served them as an appetizer of sorts (which explains their lack of sweetness), with the fortunes serving as both an activity and a conversation starter.

Jung’s first fortune cookie writer was a Presbyterian minister, who wrote condensed versions of Bible verses. He was later approached by Russell Raine, who was selling printing services. Jung told him that he would agree to use his printing if he could also provide the fortunes.

Old-school fortune cookies (called "Tea cakes") from the original Hong Kong Noodle Company.

Raine agreed, remembering that his wife had done some work writing lines for greeting cards. Marie Raines then became the woman that Robert Hendrickson in The Literary Life calls “The Shakespeare of fortune cookies,” crafting thousands of lines in a career that spanned decades.

In a 1970 newspaper interview, Raines said she jotted down ideas as she thought of them, “presumably while doing housework” speculated the somewhat sexist reporter. Many of the fortunes she penned reflect a certain domesticity, though, such as “Orderliness is the quality you most need” and “Are you taking your loved ones too much for granted?”

More recently, the New York Times interviewed David Lau, veep of Wonton Foods, Inc. in New York.  Lau performs the tasks you’d normally associate with being the vice-president of a large manufacturing company, but with one unusual addition: he also writes cookie fortunes.

A lottery investigation led to one of Lau’s creations in March 2005, when 110 people came forward with the same sequence of winning numbers for a 100,000 prize. The reason turned out to be the lucky numbers on one of Wonton Foods’ fortune cookies. The sequence “22-28-32-33-39-40” was backed with Lau’s fortune: “All the preparation you’ve done will finally be paying off.”

“We’ve had winners before, but never this many,” said Lau, who admitted that it’s a computer and not himself who picks the numbers. The fortunes, though, are pure Lau. He writes 3 or 4 fortunes a day, influenced by everything from ancient Chinese wisdom (“True gold fears no fire”) to smells on the subway (“Beware of odors from unfamiliar sources.”)

A few years after the interview with Lau, Wonton Foods’ marketing director Bernard Chow had to do a little damage control due to a negative fortune that ended up being pulled from circulation.  "Today is a disastrous day,” read the fortune. “If you can't beat 'em, join 'em.”

There’s no word on whether or not Mr. Lau wrote that one in particular, but Chow said that Wonton has over 10,000 fortunes in its catalogue. After several bloggers and other customers complained --including one who received the “disastrous day” fortune cookie at her engagement party-- the “disastrous day” fortune was retired.

While the unfortunate fortune cookie was an oversight, some modern cookies contain mean fortunes on purpose. Think Geek now sells Cookie Misfortune Evil Fortune Cookies, which contain phrases such as “You will die alone and poorly dressed.” Made to resemble traditional fortune cookies, the opportunities for pranks abound.

Evil fortune from Think Geek.

With more and more Chinese restaurants popping up every year, fortune cookie writing could prove to be a profitable, yet largely untapped, freelance market. If you find Twitter too wordy, hone your aphorisms down to about ten words or less and --who knows? You could be the next Marie Raines.

Try your hand at fortune cookie writing. Leave your own clever prediction in ten words or less.

Forget the Edgars: Which mystery author will win a morgue?

There’s a veritable slew of awards for crime writers of excellence, from the Edgars and the Agathas to the Neros and the Hammetts.

But the latest prize to be offered to a notable mystery writer will require a little more space than a bookshelf or trophy case will allow: It’s a new morgue. (Note: You have to imagine this in Bob Barkers’s voice, i.e. “It’s a newwwwww morgue!”)

Dundee University has come up with a revolutionary way to raise funds for the new addition to its Centre for Anatomy and Human Identification. Ten crime writers are competing in the Million for a Morgue competition for the chance to have the morgue named for them, with fans contributing a pound (or more) to vote.

The mystery mavens competing for the eponym are: Tess Gerritsen, Kathy Reichs, Lee Child, Harlan Coben, Mark Billingham, Jeffrey Deaver, Jeff Lindsay, Stuart MacBride, Peter James and Val McDermid.

Tess Gerritsen is in the lead as of this writing, so fans of Val McDermid’s likeable weirdo Tony Hill or Jeffrey Deaver’s quadriplegic Lincoln Rhyme should think about coughing up some coin.

The method of fundraising isn’t the only revolutionary thing about the project. The BBC reports that the newly built morgue “will adopt a "revolutionary" way of embalming - called the Thiel method - which keeps bodies flexible for longer.”

Which mystery writer are you pulling for? Or what would you like to see named for your favorite writer? (My answers are a. McDermid, and b. Martin Amis BBQ sauce, for no reason other than a larf.)

The 15 Most Disturbing Nursery Rhymes You've Never Heard

Nursery rhymes aren’t all pudding and pie. Look closely and you’ll start to notice the starving dogs, nose-severing blackbirds, women held captive in pumpkin shells, and tails lopped off with carving knives. Those horrific images are just the remnants, though. 

Mother Goose rhymes have been fairly sanitized over the years, and earlier versions were chock-full of atrocities. The farther back one looks, the more gruesome the rhymes become. Some even believe that the seemingly harmless “Eeny, meeny, miny, mo” counting rhymes derive from ancient methods of choosing human sacrifices (though the source material is sketchy.)


Domestic violence is one of the more common themes in old nursery rhymes, with wives and daughters bearing the brunt of the abuse, ranging from beating with a stick to flat-out murder. The early Victorians no doubt thought these rhymes were instructive to their daughters, who would learn to be obedient, dutiful wives.

Women weren’t the only ones to suffer in verse. Plenty of men are burnt, hacked or otherwise disposed of, as are children of any gender and a bevy of pets and wildlife.

Nursery rhyme reform was the rallying cause of a few upstanding gentlemen of the 1950s, including Geoffrey Handley-Taylor, who surveyed 200 popular rhymes and listed in detail what sorts of unsavoriness they contained (much as parents groups today decry animated films or video game content).

Handley-Taylor’s list of unsavory elements in the rhymes he read is a whole page long, and includes these bothersome incidents:

• 8 allusions to murder (unclassified)
• 2 cases of choking to death
• 1 case of cutting a person in half
• 1 case of death by devouring
• 15 allusions to maimed human beings or animals
• 23 cases of physical violence (unclassified)

Full list here



Here are 15 examples of nursery rhymes that don’t make the cut in childrens books today. Keep them handy if you have any children you need to keep awake.

There was a Man so Wise,
He jumpt into
A Bramble Bush,
And scratcht out both his Eyes.
And when he saw
His Eyes were out,
And reason to Complain,
He jumpt into a Quickset Hedge,
And scratcht them in again.


Originally from Tommy Thumb’s Pretty Song Book, 1744

Old father Long-Legs
Can’t say his prayers:
Take him by the left leg,
And throw him down the stairs.
And when he’s at the bottom,
Before he long has lain,
Take him by the right leg,
And throw him up again.


Originally from Nancy Cock’s Pretty Song Book for all little Misses and Masters, 1780





There was an old woman,
Her name it was Peg;
Her head was of wood and
She wore a cork leg.
The neighbours all pitch’d
Her into the water,
Her leg was drowned first,
And her head followed after.

From James Halliwell Phillips Nursery Rhymes, 1842 

THERE was a lady all skin and bone;
Sure such a lady was never known :
It happen'd upon a certain day,
This lady went to church to pray.

When she came to the church stile,
There she did rest a little while ;
When she came to the churchyard,
There the bells so loud she heard. 

When she came to the church door,
She stopt to rest a little more ;
When she came the church within,
The parson pray'd 'gainst pride and sin.

On looking up, on looking down,
She saw a dead man on the ground ;
And from his nose unto his chin,
The worms crawl'd out, the worms crawl'd in.

Then she unto the parson said,
Shall I be so when I am dead :
O yes ! O yes, the parson said,
You will be so when you are dead.

Here the lady screams.*


*The person reciting the rhyme is meant to scream bloody murder at the end of the verse.


Originally from Gammer Gurton’s Garland, 1784 (Full text online)


----

There was a man, he went mad,
He jumped into a paper bag;

The paper bag was too narrow,
He jumped into a wheelbarrow;

The wheelbarrow took on fire,
He jumped into a cow byre;

The cow byre was too nasty;
He jumped into an apple pasty;

The apple pasty was too sweet,
He jumped into Chester-le-Street;

Chester-le-Street was full of stones,
He fell down and broke his bones.


From an early Mother Goose

----

I charge my daughters every one
To keep good house while I am gone,
You and you and especially you,
Or else I'll beat you black and blue.

From an early Mother Goose

----

Here comes a candle to light you to bed,
Here comes a chopper to chop off your head.

From an early Mother Goose

Die, pussy, die,
Shut your little eye:
When you wake,
Find a cake,
Die, pussy, die.


From an early Mother Goose (Actually less threatening than it sounds, this is a rhyme to be recited while stopping a swing.)

---- 

Baby, baby, naughty baby,
Hush, you squalling thing, I say.
Peace this moment, peace, or maybe
Bonaparte will pass this way.


Baby, baby, he's a giant,
Tall and black as Rouen steeple,
And he breakfasts, dines, rely on't,
Every day on naughty people.


Baby, baby, if he hears you
As he gallops past the house,
Limb from limb at once he'll tear you,
Just as pussy tears a mouse.


And he'll beat you, beat you, beat you,
And he'll beat you into pap,
And he'll eat you, eat you, eat you,
Every morsel snap, snap, snap.


From an early Mother Goose lullaby

----


Here come I,
  Little David Doubt;
If you don't give me money,
 I'll sweep you all out.


Money I want,
  And money I crave;
If you don't give me money,
  I'll sweep you all to the grave!


From an early Mother Goose’s Almanack

----

John Ball shot them all;
John Scott made the shot,
But John Ball shot them all.


From James Halliwell Phillips Nursery Rhymes, 1842 (Full text of the poem, which continues on in "The House That Jack Built" style)

----

Little General Monk
Sat upon a trunk
Eating a crust of bread;
There fell a hot coal
And burnt into his clothes a hole,
Now little General Monk is dead.
Keep always from the fire,
If it catch your attire
You too, like General Monk, will be dead.


From Rhymes for the Nursery, 1824

---- 

I married a wife on Sunday,
She began to scold on Monday,
Bad was she on Tuesday,
Middling was she on Wednesday,
Worse she was on Thursday,
Dead was she on Friday,
Glad was I on Saturday night,
To bury my wife on Sunday.


From Tom Tit’s Song Book, 1790

----

 A man of words and not of deeds
Is like a garden full of weeds

And when the weeds begin to grow
It's like a garden full of snow

And when the snow begins to fall
It's like a bird upon the wall

And when the bird away does fly
It's like an eagle in the sky

And when the sky begins to roar
It's like a lion at the door

And when the door begins to crack
It's like a stick across your back

And when your back begins to smart
It's like a penknife in your heart

And when your heart begins to bleed
You're dead, and dead, and dead indeed.


Originally from Gammer Gurton’s Garland, 1784

---

A  long tail’d pig, or a short tail’d  pig,
Or a pig without any tail,
A sow-pig, or a boar-pig,
Or a pig with a curling  tail.

Take hold of his tail,
And eat off his head,
And then you will be sure
The pig-hog is dead.


Originally the street cry of the pig-pie man, reproduced in several early nursery rhyme books.

----

What's the grimmest nursery rhyme or story you recall? Give me your creepiest verse in the comments section.

From Nigeria to Nantucket: A Limerick Project of Epic Proportions

After my recent post about the legal kerfuffle between Chinua Achebe and rapper 50 Cent, a friend of mine reminded me that I once wrote a limerick about Achebe. I had to look it up to remember the words:

Achebe, Chinua

If reading has started to weary ya

And you'd like to read lit from Nigeria,
You'd do well to start
With Things Fall Apart.
Achebe should fit your criteria.

Chinua Achebe (ah-CHAY-bay, b. 1930) also wrote the novels No Longer at Ease and Arrow of God.

I’d love to be able to claim that I just sit around dashing off limericks about African novelists and stay up nights finding reasons to rhyme Nigeria and criteria (the second half is partly true), but I actually had a reason. The reason, though, might be even more unusual.

I created it as an entry into a dictionary made up completely of limericks. It’s not my project, but the brainchild of one Chris J. Strolin, the madman and genius behind the OEDILF, or the Omniscent English Dictionary in Limerick Form. (Originally the project was called the Oxford English Dictionary in Limerick Form, but the actual OED folks weren’t keen on it.)

Strolin’s goal is to ultimately define every word in the English language (and that includes the notable proper names often found in dictionaries, like Achebe above) with its own limerick. The project began in 2004, and is now up to the middle of the letter ‘E’ with around 75,000 limericks submitted.

The estimated completion date is 2037, though it’s acknowledged that with the changing language, the result will be merely a first edition of a work that will remain in progress.

The OEDILF only opens up small letter ranges of the dictionary at a time, mainly in order to keep writers from working ahead and claiming all the “good” words.

Anyone can contribute limericks to the OEDILF. Just browse through the list of open words (words not yet defined) and craft a limerick that in some way defines the word.

It’s that simple --sort of. Limericks don’t actually appear as part of the dictionary (though they are in the database and can be viewed) until they go through a workshopping process that is by turns exhilarating and maddening. The folks at the OEDILF know their stuff, and they’ll catch a forced meter, a wonky definition or an incorrect fact from miles away.

Even the best writers might have to revise a limerick a few times before it passes muster. It’s actually a fantastic way to hone writing and editing skills.

After you’ve had a certain number of limericks approved, you too can join in on the workshopping of others’ limericks.

The limericks in the OEDILF range from funny to downright sublime, and I highly recommend browsing even if you don’t want to contribute.

Some of my favorite entries from others:


ecru by Chris Doyle

To the Senate comes Brutus one day
In a toga that's yellowish-gray.
It's so out there that Caesar,
A notable teaser,
Can't help but say, "Ecru, Brute?"


disclaimer by Jeff Foster

A written disclaimer makes clear,
"We can't be responsible here."*
*The above definition,
By author's admission,
Was reached after 12 pints of beer.

 catarrhally by Janet McConnaughey
 
She gazed at me hotly, boudoirally,
Bosom heaving and eyes glowing starrily.
In spite of my virus
She made me desirous.
"Led's ged barried," I offered, catarrhally.


I spend time on the OEDILF in bursts, leaving off to pursue other projects, then becoming re-addicted. My first approved limerick was this one, for the word cheesesteak:


 cheesesteak
 
Said a passionate eater from Philly
Who believed haute cuisine was just silly,
"If your cheesesteak is twee
And it's made with French brie,
Though it's called one, it isn't one, really."


My favorite limericks to write were humorous ones that still gave enough context to define the word. I’m a sucker for a lame joke, and I went to town:


chaw
 
A yokel was heard to say "Aw!
I got somethin' stuck in my jaw!
But—wait now—by cracky!
It's just my tobacky.
I fergot I was chewin' my chaw!"



Or:


champagne flute

When at parties, I've seen the elite
Use the champagne-from-slipper conceit.
But when drinking my Brut
From a stemmed, tapered flute,
Then I'm certain it won't taste of feet.


Or even:

 chicken Kiev
 
For chicken Kiev that's divine,
Take a breast and then pound it 'til fine.
Roll with butter, then bake,
And that's how you make —
No, a chicken breast, moron, not mine!


Once I got the hang of the form, I ventured into more academic limericks, like the Achebe piece. One of my happiest achivements in life may have been the day a limerick I wrote to include the longest word in the works of Shakespeare was finally approved by the workshop editors. It took months of revisions (getting the meter right involved the tearing out of hair), but I finally wrested this feat of limerick-crafting from my keyboard, with help from one of the limerick luminaries.


Costard (with Chris Doyle)

As a clown, Costard often amuses,
But in Love's Labour's Lost when he uses
"Honorificabilitud-
initatibus," will a dude,
Upon hearing it, think the fool boozes?

(on-uh-RIF-uh-kuh-BIL-uh-tood-in-uh-TAT-uh-bus)

If you'd like to join the madness, register for the OEDILF. It's not for everyone, but you might be just the kind of brilliant oddball they need.

The OEDILF is browsable, so you can search the database for words beginning with A-El. If you find a fun word, post it here (not the whole limerick, unless you also cite the author). Do you dare join? If so, I'll see you around!

Guardian Designates Oct. 7th 'Talk Like a Beat Day'

                                      

The sun has barely set on Talk Like a Pirate Day, yet the UK’s Guardian is touting Talk Like a Beat Day. Set for October 7th, the staff admits that it’s their own invention, but they’re dead set on spreading the news in hopes of a latter-day --if for one day only-- beatnik revival.

October 7th is the date of the first official “Beat happening” in San Francisco, when Jack Kerouac used a wine jug to pound out an accompaniment to Allen Ginsberg’s recitations from “Howl.”

Gregory Corso may have said that “Three writers do not a generation make,” but the Beat Generation’s legacy moved far beyond the literary. The term “beatnik” --a portmanteau of ‘sputnik’ and ‘Beat,’ started being applied to anyone out of the mainstream, and, typical of the late ‘50s, potentially communist.

The stereotype became ubiquitous: a guy with a beret, goatee and a set of bongos hanging out with a long-haired chick in black leotards. Heavy, right?

The Beat invasion eventually reached even the Beverly Hillbillies, and for anyone who wants to skip the required reading, the episode “Clampetts a Go-Go” may be the best precis on Beat philosophy ever written:

Jethro: I’ve been goin’ to cool school
.
Granny: What kind of a fool school is cool school?

Jethro: It’s real groovy Granny. Why, already today I learned that I am one of the angry young men. How bout that?

Granny: Whatcha angry about?

Jethro: Well, uh, let’s see, uh. Oh, we got questions to ask about life, like uh, who am I, and where I'd come from, and where am I goin’. Them is angry young man questions.

Granny: Well, now you’re gonna get some angry old woman answers. You are Jethro Bodine, you just come outta there, and you're goin’ home to do your chores!

For those who’d like to pepper October 7th with more than a few “daddy-o’s” and “hep cats,” here’s a handy guide to beatnik slang.

For digging a little deeper, some recommended reading:

• On the Road by Jack Kerouac

• The Dharma Bums by Jack Kerouac

• Howl by Allen Ginsberg

• A Coney Island of the Mind: Poems by Lawrence Ferlinghetti

• The First Third by Neal Cassady

• Women of the Beat Generation: The Writers, Artists and Muses at the Heart of a Revolution by Brenda Knight

Don't forget to mark your calendar for Talk Like a Beat Day. Leave your favorite Beat expressions and book recommendations in the comments section --unless you're a square.