WWI

I wondered aloud if a relative might have been of the right age to fight in World War One.

I should have tried to do the math in my head first. Gary rolled his eyes and snapped:

"Ellen, don't talk about things when you know nothing. " I braced myself for the mathematical ridicule.

He continued, "The United States didn't fight in World War One."

And he did it with a tone, even. 

I laughed heartily and directly in his face.  He held fast to his contention that the US didn't fight in World War I. I can tell you after the fact, if you ask Alexa, "Was the United Staes in World War One?" that her first word is Yes.

One hour later Gary finally stopped reading the Wikipedia page List of Wars Involving the United States aloud to me. If I were in his situation, yes, I would go to Wikipedia to educate myself, yet what I would NOT do is educate my spouse for an hour on something she already knows.

And actually, I know he knows. He has to know. He watched 1917 - but then, were there Americans in that movie? All Quiet on the Western Front? Wait, we spent hours in the WWI museum in Kansas City. I know he knows this.

I actually checked to see if "forgetting historical facts you have known for years" is a sign of Alzheimers or dementia. Luckily, I only need to worry if he forgets recently-learned information. 

Comments

[KC]

The US did take a while to get into WWI, but... yeah.

Maybe if he reads one of the books where boy scouts are bike/motorbike messengers in WWI, he'll remember?

[theQueen]

KC - what are these books?

[KC]

There are... a lot... of them, but one of the more-plausible (note: not *plausible* but *more-plausible*) can be found at: https://www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/19495 - it is part of a series, and the preceding book may also be in WWI? I can't remember. If you want a stack of motorcycle messenger books, let me know; most of them are amazingly flimsy and improbable, though.

(other fun/weird topics with the US and WWI: the Salvation Army sent over units of women to cook doughnuts for the front lines, closer to battle than most of the canteens. Why doughnuts? I do not know. But the memoirs, both of the doughnut girls and the soldiers who incidentally encountered a surprise pop-up doughnut stand, are fascinating. Some number of Americans volunteered in the war before the US entered the war, joining foreign groups of troops, usually French since it seems it was easier to enter military service under the French army's auspices than the British; some pilots brought their personal airplanes (!!!) and some drivers/doctors/nurses/chaplains brought over their own cars or ambulances on boats from the US.)

[theQueen]

KC - I never knew about the doughnuts, so I never knew about the doughnuts > doughboys connection.. https://www.worldwar1centennial.org/index.php/communicate/press-media/wwi-centennial-news/3929-doughnut-girls-the-women-who-fried-donuts-and-dodged-bombs-on-the-front-lines-of-world-war-i.html

[KC]

... okay, the doughnut thing starting with "well: what ingredients do we have?" and then being exceptionally popular and going from there makes sense. I guess also something that doesn't require an oven makes sense!

They may have been doughboys before the doughnuts - apparently it existed as a military nickname before WWI, sometimes, in the US. But who knows, maybe the doughnuts cemented it as The Nickname for US troops, like Tommy and such?

Anyway: very definitely US soldiers in WWI, but glad that only means mild humiliation rather than dementia for Gary.

(and if you haven't run into these from WWII, it's... really something. A force of women with outdated planes, who managed to extra-freak-out the German troops: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Night_Witches There was a lot of fiction/exaggeration swirling around with both world wars, but then *also* you get a whole ton of definitely-factual things where the truth is way weirder and wilder than anything dime novel authors could make up.)

[theQueen]

KC - and all the ingredients transportable (but for the eggs, and I guess you could transport the hens). And you could re-use the frying oil.