"Both Ends" Is Never Enough

Why AllFourEndsoftheCandle? Because I've always liked the saying "burning the candle at both ends". It says a lot with few words, and makes me think of fun times and Babe Ruth. But lately I've been thinking the saying is maybe a bit of a platitude, too reductive. I wished to add to or twist the saying to make the imagery more dynamic, and have the result be a catchy title for a web log.
So, I did some cursory research into the origins of the saying. Coincidentally, 2011 is the 400^th anniversary of its introduction into the English language (a translation of a French saying) so I am certainly not the first person to think the remark a bit stale (the Fourth Earl of Sandwich likely uttered the phrase over 100-years later, really; we’ll get to him next week). In 1611, Randle Cotgrave included it in his A Dictionarie of French and English Tongues, defined as ‘dissipating one’s material wealth’. As this first definition points out, the original application was financial, the imagery aimed at less than thrifty folks; specifically, husbands and wives who burned through income and/or assets. Through the miracle of living language, the meaning of the phrase evolved away from matters of the purse to become the biting but playful late-night lifestyle allegory most Americans understand it as today. (If you still use it in a financial context, you’re really old, but good for you) It occurred to me sometime ago that a need existed in the Annals of American Idiom for a slightly more complex, updated version of “burning the candle at both ends”, a version that better reflects life 400-years advanced from the time of the original dissemination into English. I settled upon “burning all four ends of the candle” as version 2.0.  
You may say immediately, "well, popular phrases are simple for a reason, it’s what keeps them popular and familiar” or “what kind of candle's got four ends?" or "Four ends isn't much less reductive than two, nitwit",  all fair point points. But I thought we could take the current meaning of the original phrase and conjure up a helpful, modern take that retains the simple imagery of the original and adds a wrinkle of dimension. Consider the potential combinations of four entities versus two; it allows for more complex meaning. Instead of the assumed day-life versus night-life or work versus play juxtaposition of a double-lit candle, my candle can incorporate two additional facets of life—good and bad, or whatever I want them to represent, whenever--that enrich the dynamic of the imagery and, maybe, improve perspective. Why not eight or ten ends, then? Because a candle that looks like a four-point tire iron is about as cool as candles can get, and more than four-points would too closely resemble spokes in a wagon wheel for my taste, as well as complicate the quick-glance benefit of a simple mental framework. Besides, the familiarity and power of four-point symbols hardly needs touched on here (four cardinal points of the compass, the cross, X marks the spot, etc.)
Next time somebody asks you how you’re doing, offer this: “I’m burning all four ends of the candle, but it’s not so bad.” When the status-requesting party looks at you like you’re nuts, explain why you chose your words; and if the party looks at you with deep admiration for the image you implanted in her mind, just nod with a smile.
Who knows, maybe in 400-years some kid on Mars will broadcast a thought to the universe on the stale nature of the saying, “burning all four ends of the candle.”

Go Cavs