Charles Byrne has a fun factoid that's a perfect watercooler topic for your office.
It started with a strange phrase he heard from a colleague:
"I'll be holding my thumbs for you!"
The e-mail was unexpected, welcome, but a bit puzzling. It was from a friend 
he had met at an international business affair in Europe a month earlier.
"Good luck on the marathon," her e-mail continued.
I remembered boasting to Teresa, the woman sending the e-mail, that I was scheduled to run in the Marine Corps Marathon in Washington, D.C. I guess she remembered too.
But what's this "I'll be holding my thumbs for you" thing? I assumed it meant "good luck"... but I'd never heard it before.
A quick research expedition online revealed the answer. According to the Phrases.org.uk website, "The German equivalent of 'crossing my fingers,' i.e. wishing someone good fortune, is 'Daumen drueken' - holding thumbs."
Teresa is from South Africa, and South Africa was a German colony from 1884 to 1915 - so apparently the phrase stuck.
"Danke schoen," he wrote back to Teresa.
So, the next time you need a little extra luck in signing that big deal, you know what to ask your sales manager to do....
I read this in Early to Rise, a popular Internet newsletter that comes to my Inbox daily. If you want to subscribe, I recommend it...it's a very interesting newsletter. You can do so at www.earlytorise.com.
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