Word: broom
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...outside the most charitable houses. It was hard for me to imagine a gang of digital hoboes so hard up for Internet access that they had to squat outside my house, huddled around a Thinkpad. But if they did, I could hardly chase these virtual varmints away with a broom. After all, my network was open. It was as if I had left milk and cookies on the sidewalk. They wouldn't be trespassing on my property. Or would they...
...Brooms were indeed associated with witches but not to the exclusion of other objects—churns, hayforks, farm animals and many other everyday objects were also supposedly ridden by witches to their gatherings. Brooms also sometimes had a protective function against witches. In Tyrolean tradition, for example, a broom placed against a door would bar a witch from moving through it. As to the question of the phallic symbol, yes, one can read it that way, I suppose, although some of the other objects (e.g., the churn) might be even better candidates. Certainly its presentation in well-known contexts...
...witches’ broom a phallic symbol...
...lesson to be learned from California's wild recall, it is that there is no one lesson. At a moment when the stakes could not have been higher, voters turned out a seasoned if bloodless technocrat and put their faith in an action hero who waved a broom. In an era of interminable campaigns, this one lasted nine weeks. At a time when other politicians hauled around briefcases full of 100-page platforms, Arnold Schwarzenegger spouted lines from his movies, gave no substantive interviews and agreed to exactly one debate, for which he knew the questions in advance...
...corner was a little light in a kind of broom closet and there was Dunlop,” Bok said. “He had a total lack of pretension; he was more at home in a rundown office...