For jars, I'm telling ya, tip that jar upside-down and whack it three times on the floor (a wooden threshhold is great).

Even easier - just whap it on the counter top or counter edge. Or, use the back of a knife to rap at the corner of the lid in a few places. Breaks up the hardened whatever stuck in the threads.

My aunt uses these textured pieces of rubber she refers to as 'rubber husbands' for jars or anything like that. I had never heard the term (and had no knowlege of the product) at 16, so boy did my head snap around in confusion and a fair bit of horror when she asks me one day "Sara, can you get me a rubber husband?"

And shrift corrects my half-assed memory.

It's the instructions for using the Holy Hand Grenade in "Monty Python's Holy Grail."

"Right! One! Two! Four!"

"Three, sir!"

Five is right out.

who, being naughty in My sight, shall snuff it.

And it's Palin's delivery that really sells it.

Also, I'm amused to learn of ita's achilles tendon. I just need to poke her in the soft fleshy palms.

Unfortunately, most paperbacks are stripped instead of being sent back to the publisher.

What's the argument behind this? It seems like such a huge waste. Is it just a matter of nobody being willing to store them?

And shrift corrects my half-assed memory.

A mighty fortress is our Google.

Is it just a matter of nobody being willing to store them?

Yep. Shipping and storage cost way more than reprints (bonus: you can inflate the hell out of your "over 20 million copies sold!!one!" claims).

Hee. Is that from something, or did you just make it up?

t gasps

It's the instructions for using the Holy Hand Grenade in "Monty Python's Holy Grail."

Book of Armaments, Chapter 4, verse 3.

IIRC.