When it is a heavy rain, why do we say, "It's raining cats and dogs,"?
Houses had thatched roofs. Thick straw, piled high, with no wood underneath. It was the only place for animals to get warm, so all the pets... dogs, cats and other small animals, mice, rats, bugs lived in the roof. When it rained it became slippery and sometimes the animals would slip and fall off the roof.

Canopy Beds - not just a pretty piece of furniture.
There was nothing to stop things from falling into the house. This posed a real problem in the bedroom where bugs and other droppings could really mess up your nice clean bed, so they found if they made beds with big posts and hang a sheet over the top, it addressed that problem. Hence those beautiful big 4 poster beds with canopies.

Why are people who are really poor called "dirt poor"?
The floor was made of dirt. Only the wealthy had something other than dirt, ergo the saying "dirt poor".

Why is the opening of a doorway called a "threshold"?
The wealthy had slate floors which in the winter they would get slippery when wet. So they spread thresh on the floor to help keep their footing. As the winter wore on they kept adding more thresh until when you opened the door it would all start slipping outside. A piece of wood was placed at the entry way, later named a "thresh hold".

Did they really keep a pot of "peas porridge" for 9 days like it says in the rhyme?
          Peas porridge hot, peas porridge cold, peas porridge in the pot nine days old.
They cooked in the kitchen in a big kettle that always hung over the fire. Every day they lit the fire and added things to the pot. They mostly ate vegetables and didn't get much meat. They would eat the stew for dinner leaving leftovers in the pot to get cold overnight and then start over the next day. Sometimes the stew had food in it that had been in there for a month.
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