Monthly Archives: December 2020

Pop the Cork for 2021!!!

Storage Inn Blog Post Happy New Year 2021

The New Year is a upon us here at The Storage Inn self storage in Egg Harbor Township New Jersey, and our storage rental customers seem to be happy moving on to a new year!

Yesterday, one of our self-storage tenants who happens to be a wine aficionado, was at his rental storage unit, returning his holiday decorations to his storage space. “Hey Bob!” I called out – “What are we drinking for New Year’s Eve this year?”. ”Why champagne, of course!” came his reply. We wished each other good luck in the new year, and went on our way, but this made me think –  what is it about champagne that people love?

Champagne is synonymous with celebration, and nothing says New Year’s quite like popping a bottle of bubbly. Throughout the year it might be seen as slightly snobbish, but on December 31 Champagne becomes a holiday revelers’ drink of choice in countries all over the world. It seems that simply letting those bubbles fly sets the tone for a festive celebration.

Here are some fun facts about Champagne you likely never knew…

There are about 49 million bubbles in a 7500ml bottle of Champagne – A standard-sized glass emits 30 bubbles every second.

The French consume 162.5 million bottles of Champagne every year, or about 52 percent of the entire world’s production of Champagne.

Champagne has 3 times more carbonation than beer – The pressure in a Champagne bottle is about 3 times the amount of pressure of a car tire.

When popped, a Champagne cork can reach a velocity of 24.8 miles per hour – The longest recorded cork flight was 177 feet and 9 inches.

Marilyn Monroe famously took a bath in Champagne. More than 350 bottles were needed to fill up the tub.

About 28,000 bottles of champagne are served at Wimbledon every year.

James Bond has been spotted drinking Champagne more than 35 times in his films. It’s the drink he reaches for more than any other… (and we thought he was a Martini man)

CPJGDF Goldfinger

If you’re drinking good Champagne, you’ll be able to see the “collerette” or the bubble trains traveling up the sides of the glass.

The first glass of Champagne has the most bubbles, meaning the first glass will also get you feeling drunk the fastest. Every glass thereafter poured from that bottle will be less potent than the one preceding it.

Winston Churchill was one of the biggest Champagne drinkers on record.  Between 1908 and 1965 he drank an estimated 42,000 bottles. A special one pint bottle was served to him every day at precisely 11 a.m.

In the 19th century, Champagne makers wore metal masks to protect their faces when handling Champagne bottles, which had a tendency to explode. Eventually, stronger glass bottles and metal clasp closures made the stuff more stable.

The most expensive bottle of Champagne was $2.07 million. It was designed by Alexander Amosu and Swarovski, handcrafted from 18-carat solid gold, with a deep-cut 19-carat white diamond at its center. It was mostly the bottle that caused the hefty price tag. Only a few were ever made, making it a rare and valuable collectors edition.

So, there you have it – some Champagne knowledge that you can take with you into the new year, courtesy of The Storage Inn. As for me, I’m considering enjoying some Champagne this New Year’s Eve, but first I need to find out – does Champagne pair well with hot wings?

Happy New Year!

 

 

A Christmas Carol… Bah Humbug!

Well, December is here at The Storage Inn in Egg Harbor Township New Jersey, and the temperatures are dropping. Just yesterday I saw one of our tenants at his 10×12 storage unit gathering his Christmas decorations.

” Hey Bob – Happy Holidays!”, I yelled.

“Bah Humbug!” Bob yelled back with half a laugh.

Bob spends the winter in Florida and is not a fan of cold weather. His response, though, made me think of Charles Dickens, “A Christmas Carol”. I wondered  what “bah humbug” meant, So I did a little research, and… 

Charles Dickens loved to celebrate Christmas.  His favorite time during the holidays was Twelfth Night, the feast of the Epiphany.

Early in 1843, as a response to a government report on the abuse of child laborers in mines and factories, Dickens vowed he would strike a “sledge-hammer blow . . . on behalf of the Poor Man’s Child.” That sledge-hammer was the book, A Christmas Carol. Below are a few interesting tid-bits about this great work of fiction.

A Christmas Carol was first published in 1843.

Initially, six thousand copies of the book were printed.  More copies were ordered after the first printing was sold in only five days.

Technically speaking,  A Christmas Carol was published by Chapman & Hall.  However, in an interesting turn of events, Dickens paid the publishing costs himself.

Dickens would fund the publication of A Christmas Carol and would receive the profits. Chapman & Hall would be paid for the printing costs and receive a fixed commission on the number of copies sold.

It only took Dickens about six weeks to write A Christmas Carol.  

As Dickens wrote A Christmas Carol he said that the Cratchits were “ever tugging at his coat sleeve, as if impatient for him to get back to his desk and continue the story of their lives”.

Marry for Love – Not Money

“If you were free today, tomorrow, yesterday, can I believe that you would choose a dowerless girl?”

Belle, Scrooge’s long-lost girlfriend, says the above to Scrooge in Dream Two of A Christmas Carol.  A dowry is a gift given by the bride’s parents to the newly married couple. To marry a dowerless girl means that no money, property or goods would be given by the bride’s parents to the groom or couple.  It means that the groom would be marrying for love – not money.

Marley is very Dead!

“Old Marley was as dead as a door-nail.” This line appears toward the beginning of the novel. Dickens included this because of a dream. He had dreamt that one of his good friends was pronounced to be “as dead Sir . . . as a door-nail”.

Christmas…Bah Humbug!

The words are well-known as the catchphrase of miserly old Ebenezer Scrooge, the main character in Dickens’ 1843 novel, “A Christmas Carol.” Scrooge, who thinks Christmas is an enormous deception, retorts, “Bah! Humbug!” to anyone who dares to wish him a merry Christmas. There are many possibilities on where the phrase came from, but each points back to a meaning of deception. Which makes sense in the way that Scrooge used it in A Christmas Carol, as he thought that Christmas itself was a hoax or deception. In fact, this is not the only literary use of the phrase, as the venerable Wizard of Oz declares himself to be “just a humbug.”

The Cratchit family is based on Dickens’s Childhood

Dickens lived in poor circumstances in a “two up two down” four-roomed house which he shared with his parents and five siblings.

Like Peter Cratchit, young Charles, the eldest boy, was often sent to pawn the family’s goods when money was tight. Also, like many poor families, the Cratchit’s had nothing in which to roast meat. They relied on the ovens of their local baker which were available on Sundays and Christmas when the bakery was closed.

Dickens Revives the Christmas Spirit

At the time Dickens wrote A Christmas Carol, Christmas wasn’t commonly celebrated as a festive holiday. In The Pickwick Papers and A Christmas Carol, Dickens’s descriptions of feasting, games and family unity combined with his message that Christmas was a time “when want is keenly felt and abundance rejoices” helped to revive popular interest in many Christmas traditions that are still practiced today.

So, there you have it –  a little Charles Dickens / A Christmas Carol knowledge, courtesy of The Storage Inn. We wish all of our Customers and Friends a Happy Holiday Season, filled with Good Cheer, Eggnog, and Christmas Cookies!