“There are only two hard things in computer science: cache invalidation and naming things.

“Luncheon as a regular daily meal only developed in the US in the 1900s. In her first edition of Etiquette, in 1922, Emily Post had seen no need to explain that only hash or cold meat were to be served at supper; anything hot or complicated was served at dinner. But by the 1945 edition, she had to explain that luncheon was an informal midday meal and supper an informal evening meal, while dinner was always formal, but could occur at midday or evening. Later editions, such as the 1960 edition edited by Elizabeth Post, standardized the times and dropped all the old traditions of formality.. Timing had become more important than ritual; ritual became an optional and personal choice.

“Tea with biscuits and pastries had been popular since the 1700s as a refreshment to serve visitors. Now ladies began taking tea and snacks of light sandwiches and cakes around four or five in the afternoon, regardless of whether or not they had visitors. At first they had this snack in relative privacy, in their boudoir or private sitting room. But by the 1840s they had established afternoon tea as a regular meal in drawing rooms and parlors all over Britain.

“By the start of the victorian era, the main dinner meal could be eaten anywhere from five to eight hours later in the city than the country.

“Ladies.. established luncheon as a regular meal by about 1810. It was a light meal, of dainty sandwiches and cakes, held at noon or one or even later, but always between breakfast and dinner. And it was definitely a ladies’ meal; when the Prince of Wales established a habit of lunching with ladies, he was ridiculed for his effeminate ways, as well as his large appetite. Real men didn’t do lunch, at least not until the Victorian era.

“In the 1790s the upper class was rising from bed around ten a.m. or noon, and then eating breakfast at an hour when their grandparents had eaten dinner. They then went for “morning walks” in the afternoon and greeted each other with “Good morning” until they ate their dinner at perhaps five or six p.m. Then it was “afternoon” until evening came with supper, sometime between nine p.m. and two a.m.!

“From the Middle Ages to the age of Shakespeare, there are scattered references to occasional extra meals, called luncheon and nuntion or nuncheon. Nuntion was eaten between dinner and supper, and peasants were sometimes guaranteed nuntions of ale and bread on those days they worked harvesting the fields in the lengthy days of late summer and autumn, when sunset and supper came many hours after noon and dinner.

“Justifiably or otherwise, the former Indian captain carries a number of chips on his shoulder. In some ways he hasn’t forgotten umpire Rex Whitehead ruling him out leg-before at Melbourne in 1981, or forgiven Dennis Lillee for pointing a finger, calling him a four-letter word, and asking him to get going to the pavilion. There are other slights, too, that refuse to rest in peace. Gavaskar still pokes fun at the stuffy nature of the English establishment and the MCC, possibly because he was once refused entry to Lord’s by an official who didn’t recognise him.

“Today many people find it strange that the biggest meal of the day once centered around noon, but it made great sense at the time. Artificial lighting such as oil lamps and candles were expensive, and provided weak illumination at best. So people went to sleep at sundown, because it’s difficult to work and eat in the dark. The last meal of the day was a rushed affair, a quick snack before the lights (the sun) went out.

“..some of the most prolific [wikipedia] contributors about the Virginia Tech shootings said they were at a loss to explain how everything manages to come out as well as it does.