This is an I-Heart podcast.

This is our American stories, and we tell stories about everything here on this show.

And up next, author Andrew Thompson, here to share the stories behind curious phrases and everyday

sayings.

Take it away, Andrew.

Blowing hot and cold means to change one's mind or be inconsistent.

And it derives from classical mythology and one of the

fables of Aesop, the ancient Greek writer from 570 BC. In it he tells the story of a man who meets

a mythical beast who is part man and part goat on a winter's day. When he meets the beast,

the man blows on his hands to warm them up because it's cold,

and the beast invites the man into his house to have some porridge.

But then the man blows on the porridge to cool it down.

The beast couldn't believe it and said, out you go,

I will have naught to do with a man who can blow hot and cold with the same breath.

The expression was used figuratively by the 17th century when the English churchman

William Chillingworth referred to it in a book he wrote in 1638. The expression Blue Blood

means a member of a socially prominent or wealthy family. And it's a translation of the Spanish

phrase Sangre Azou which relates to aristocrats who lived in Castile.

In the 18th century, the Moors invaded Castile from northern Africa and they had dark skin.

Many interracial marriages took place, but the oldest and proudest families from Castile were quick to boast that they had never intermarried with

the Moors or any other race. As a result, they were pure and remained fair skin, making their

veins appear, very blue against their white skin. This was taken to be a mark of good breeding,

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