Rules: This thread is for entertainment and scholarship, but from a linguistic perspective. Bring something you've read or heard that's interesting or amusing because of the use (or misuse) of the language. Concise definitions, unintentional double-entendres, that sort of thing.

If it's a joke, it should be more than just a great joke; you can post that in Free Thoughts. Explain a joke unless it's really obvious. (Remember, not everybody who will read it is an anglophone.) Perhaps a good rule of thumb for jokes about language is: if you did post it in Free Thoughts nobody would understand why you thought it was funny. :)

And please, no Bushisms! Yes they're hilarious, but so hilarious that we've got a whole separate thread for them.

Here's my starter.

This was in the weekly announcement from Angie's List, a U.S. organization that keeps a wiki-sort of directory of tradesmen and -women in major metropolitan areas. This week's feature is how to find a good electrician.
Electricity is simply one of those things you don't fool around with unless you know exactly what you're doing.Uh... wait a minute there Angie. If you know exactly what you're doing, then YOU'RE NOT FOOLING AROUND!

A linguist's joke. :)

back in '02, you wrote this about the 4-day workweek:
"I published a paper on this topic last year. Here is an extremely condensed abstract, re-edited and de-footnoted for a less academic press." (orig. link:
sciforums.com/Four-Day-Work-Week-USA-t-8935.html)

Might you still have a copy of that academic article? I wish to share it with some folks interested in the US moving toward a steady-state economy.

Thanks.

G

Note from F.R.: I'm taking this exchange offline to preserve anonymity.

Like the idea of quote of the day, and this is the right place for it, but I think that the rules of the thread are deterring posts. If you heard a really good quotation, you might not be able to justify posting it.
It is a linguistics thread and you need to tie it into use of language somehow, but it needs a rethink.
On Word of the day, you brought in etymology, which has worked well.

The qualification "amusing because of the misuse of language" is too delimiting. I could think of something if I thought really hard.
It needs to be a quote where you comment on the use of language,
without deterring non language graduates.

Oh, and if you do post a link to the article that George wanted, post it here.
2002? Whatever you said must have influenced the chap.
I don't venture much into the political sections, too much grief, but I'd like to see it too.

I'll definitely be posting some examples and I love the idea. When I read the this thread last night I thought I would have something I could offer but pretty much drew a blank. It's not that I haven't heard some brilliant clangers, I just couldn't recall them.

I'll cetainly be keeping my ears peeled though.

Like the idea of quote of the day, and this is the right place for it, but I think that the rules of the thread are deterring posts. If you heard a really good quotation, you might not be able to justify posting it. It is a linguistics thread and you need to tie it into use of language somehow, but it needs a rethink. On Word of the day, you brought in etymology, which has worked well. The qualification "amusing because of the misuse of language" is too delimiting. I could think of something if I thought really hard. It needs to be a quote where you comment on the use of language, without deterring non language graduates.Good suggestions, thanks. "Use of language" rather than "misuse of language." I'll change the rules or maybe just start a new thread.
Oh, and if you do post a link to the article that George wanted, post it here.
2002? Whatever you said must have influenced the chap.Sorry, I have to be diligent about my anonymity. If any of my clients or prospective clients read some of my exercises of free speech it might influence their decision to hire me. I'm still deciding how to deal with George's request.
I don't venture much into the political sections, too much grief, but I'd like to see it too.It wasn't written from a political perspective, it was about management. But overtones of sociology couldn't be avoided.

Here's some quotations to be going on with.
courtesy of Friedrich Nietzche, Adolf Hitler's philosphical hero.
(If you are not familiar with German names, pronounce it Kneechuh)

from:
http://www.quotationspage.com/quotes/Friedrich_Nietzsche/



A casual stroll through the lunatic asylum shows that faith does not prove anything.

At times one remains faithful to a cause only because its opponents do not cease to be insipid.

Be careful when you fight the monsters, lest you become one.

In heaven all the interesting people are missing.

In truth, there was only one Christian, and he died on the cross.

Insanity in individuals is something rare - but in groups, parties, nations and epochs, it is the rule.

It is hard enough to remember my opinions, without also remembering my reasons for them!

Man is the cruelest animal.

No price is too high to pay for the privilege of owning yourself.

One must have a good memory to be able to keep the promises one makes.

Talking much about oneself can also be a means to conceal oneself.

The advantage of a bad memory is that one enjoys several times the same good things for the first time.

The individual has always had to struggle to keep from being overwhelmed by the tribe. If you try it, you will be lonely often, and sometimes frightened. But no price is too high to pay for the privilege of owning yourself.

The irrationality of a thing is no argument against its existence, rather a condition of it.

The overman...Who has organized the chaos of his passions, given style to his character, and become creative. Aware of life's terrors, he affirms life without resentment.

The visionary lies to himself, the liar only to others.

To forget one's purpose is the commonest form of stupidity.

To predict the behavior of ordinary people in advance, you only have to assume that they will always try to escape a disagreeable situation with the smallest possible expenditure of intelligence.

What else is love but understanding and rejoicing in the fact that another person lives, acts, and experiences otherwise than we do…?

When one has much to put into them, a day has a hundred pockets.

When you stare into the abyss the abyss stares back at you.

You need chaos in your soul to give birth to a dancing star.

There is always some madness in love. But there is also always some reason in madness. "On Reading and Writing"

For anyone who might be influenced by this intoxicating stuff.
Don't. You may end up invading Poland.

Here's some quotations to be going on with. courtesy of Friedrich Nietzche, Adolf Hitler's philosphical hero. (If you are not familiar with German names, pronounce it Kneechuh). . . and spell it "Nietzsche." :) (Sorry, the other Moderators ganged up on me and made me promise to stop proofreading posts and correcting typographical errors, even though the only feedback I've ever gotten on it was a thank-you. They would rather I highlight the error and bring it to the attention of all the other readers by correcting it in a subsequent post.)

Hitler was seriously delusional if he did not see himself as the target of many of these:

Be careful when you fight the monsters, lest you become one. Insanity in individuals is something rare - but in groups, parties, nations and epochs, it is the rule. Man is the cruelest animal. The individual has always had to struggle to keep from being overwhelmed by the tribe. . . . To predict the behavior of ordinary people in advance, you only have to assume that they will always try to escape a disagreeable situation with the smallest possible expenditure of intelligence.For anyone who might be influenced by this intoxicating stuff. Don't. You may end up invading Poland.I don't think the Soviets were very big on Nietzsche, but it didn't help them. Or Poland. ::(

. . . and spell it "Nietzsche." :) (Sorry, the other Moderators ganged up on me and made me promise to stop proofreading posts and correcting typographical errors, even thought the only feedback I've ever gotten on it was a thank-you. They would rather I highlight the errors and it bring them to the attention of all the other readers by correcting it in a subsequent post.)

Hitler was seriously delusional if he did not see himself as the target of many of these:I don't think the Soviets were very big on Nietzsche, but it didn't help them. Or Poland. ::(

Leibniz/ Leibnitz signed his nameboth ways before what is now regarded as the correct version

Pepsi-Cola had a slogan for their carbonated soft drink "Diet Pepsi" that was widely advertised:

Think young.
Drink young.

Seems to me that if you really thought about it, you'd realize that this beverage has little nutritional value, has a stimulant drug (caffeine), and is proven to be a contributor to bone decalcification. If you really thought about these things, you probably wouldn't drink it. I'm just waiting for an alcoholic beverage to be paired with that same slogan!

http://www.thepostcard.com/gofetch/rack/rc131.jpg

Leibniz/ Leibnitz signed his name both ways before what is now regarded as the correct versionSure, but that's just a reflection of the ambiguity of German spelling before they reformed it about 125 years ago. Both spellings would be phonetically read correctly since German Z is pronounced as TS. The T in TZ is silent. This is one of the more confusing conventions in the modern spelling rules. Z is a single consonant and TZ is a double consonant, so the choice depends on the pronunciation of the preceding vowel. If it's short it has to be followed by a double consonant; schmutz and schmuz would be pronounced differently.

Of course that's not true if the vowel is an I. Niz and nitz are pronounced identically; if you want a long I you have to spell it nietz.

Which brings us to Nietzche, which is not an allowable sequence of letters in German. There is no phoneme which is transcribed TZCH or even ZCH. I can only imagine this if it were the German phonetic transcription of a Russian name, Neets-kha. But they tend to borrow the English transliteration system for Russian names, so they would probably write that Nitzkha to make it undeniably clear that it's a foreign name and let German readers stumble over the misspelled long vowel.

Leibnitz/Leibniz is a manifestation of the unnormalized spelling practices of the 17th century. He may have been trying out both ways to figure out which one he liked best, so he could contribute to the cause of spelling reform.

Nietzsche has no alternate spelling. I Googled it and there are no hits. Wait until tomorrow, and they'll probably hit your post on SciForums. :)

[QUOTE=Fraggle Rocker;1725399]Sure, but that's just a reflection of the ambiguity of German spelling before they reformed it about 125 years ago. Both spellings would be phonetically read correctly since German Z is pronounced as TS. The T in TZ is silent. This is one of the more confusing conventions in the modern spelling rules. Z is a single consonant and TZ is a double consonant, so the choice depends on the pronunciation of the preceding vowel. If it's short it has to be followed by a double consonant; schmutz and schmuz would be pronounced differently.

Of course that's not true if the vowel is an I. Niz and nitz are pronounced identically; if you want a long I you have to spell it nietz.

Which brings us to Nietzche, which is not an allowable sequence of letters in German. There is no phoneme which is transcribed TZCH or even ZCH. I can only imagine this if it were the German phonetic transcription of a Russian name, Neets-kha. But they tend to borrow the English transliteration system for Russian names, so they would probably write that Nitzkha to make it undeniably clear that it's a foreign name and let German readers stumble over the misspelled long vowel.

Leibnitz/Leibniz is a manifestation of the unnormalized spelling practices of the 17th century. He may have been trying out both ways to figure out which one he liked best, so he could contribute to the cause of spelling reform.

Nietzsche has no alternate spelling. I Googled it and there are no hits. Wait until tomorrow, and they'll probably hit your post on SciForums. :)

I speak German, in fact I spent two years lecturing there yonks ago , but have no knowledge of what you say about the spelling of Nietsche. I was kidding about Leibnitz but I have now learnt something.

The longest word I have come across took up three lines in a paragraph of a science magazine which I read some fifty years ago. I promise you I'm not making it up.

Ausserordentlichhochgescwindigkeitelektronenentwic kwlendschwerarbeitbeigollitron.

The name was subsequently changed to die Beta Maschine. I can't imagine why.

ausserordentlich = extraordinary
die Hochgescwindigkeit = high speed
die Elektronen = electrons
entwicklend = developing
das Schwerarbeit = heavy work
der/die/das Beigollitron = duh? If I didn't know better I'd say this was a phonetic transcription of the English phrase "by golly" concatenated with the suffix -tron to make it look like the name of a high tech machine.

Extraordinarily high-speed electron generation, "hard work by golly" -tron.

http://www.time.com/time/magazine/article/0,9171,812175,00.html?promoid=googlep

I can't believe it. I'm right! German scientists have a sense of humor!

Pepsi-Cola had a slogan for their carbonated soft drink "Diet Pepsi" that was widely advertised:

Think young.
Drink young.

Seems to me that if you really thought about it, you'd realize that this beverage has little nutritional value, has a stimulant drug (caffeine), and is proven to be a contributor to bone decalcification. If you really thought about these things, you probably wouldn't drink it. I'm just waiting for an alcoholic beverage to be paired with that same slogan!

http://www.thepostcard.com/gofetch/rack/rc131.jpg

It's advertising.

Tastes vile
Rots your Teeth

Just wouldn't work.
(actually it does taste ok with whisky in it)

ausserordentlich = extraordinary
die Hochgescwindigkeit = high speed
die Elektronen = electrons
entwicklend = developing
das Schwerarbeit = heavy work
der/die/das Beigollitron = duh? If I didn't know better I'd say this was a phonetic transcription of the English phrase "by golly" concatenated with the suffix -tron to make it look like the name of a high tech machine.

Extraordinarily high-speed electron generation, "hard work by golly" -tron.

http://www.time.com/time/magazine/article/0,9171,812175,00.html?promoid=googlep

I can't believe it. I'm right! German scientists have a sense of humor!


By the way, I still do not know what a gollitron is, not that I lose much sleep over it. I read it as " at/by gollitron. that is the gollitron is part of the apparatus which I believe was some sort of particle accelerator.

At the risk of going off thread can I say that I was told during a stay in Duesseldorf that Krueohnenseltenstrueoelcher was a variety of strawberry.

Karl Popper 1902-1994


“We all remember how many religious wars were fought for a religion of love and gentleness;
how many bodies were burned alive with the genuinely kind intention of saving souls from the eternal fire of hell”

“Our knowledge can only be finite, while our ignorance must necessarily be infinite.”

“No rational argument will have a rational effect on a man who does not want to adopt a rational attitude.”

“Those who promise us paradise on earth never produced anything but a hell.”


“It is impossible to speak in such a way that you cannot be misunderstood.”


“Science must begin with myths, and with the criticism of myths”

“Whenever a theory appears to you as the only possible one,
take this as a sign that you have neither understood the theory
nor the problem which it was intended to solve”


Popper thought that we could never know anything for certain.
We could make theories about things, but they were only true in so far as that they
had not yet been disproved.

Aw Jesus, I know this is in no way what FR was looking for but it is original.

Talking with my mate today, chatting about the tennis..Him " isn't Anna a Grand slam virgin?"..Me " Yes but presumably she won't remain unseeded for long."

Sorry Fraggle, I'll lift my game.

"Especially for the ginger-headed folk who have loads of freakles..."

Apologies to Reiku for quoting without his consent but it tickled my fancy.

Re quotations thread.

It seems a natural winner for Linguistics, if the right format can be found.
How about this. Pick a person. Take a number of quotes. And then make a short personal comment on some/all of them.

The comment should do one of the following:
Make a joke.
Say why you agree with the quotation, or provide the opposite point of view.
Explain what the person meant.
Give an example of the truth or untruth of the statement.

Or something roughly similar, the quotations themselves should be the linguistic heroes as good use of language. I don't think we have to justify having quotations here.


Featured Person
Jean-Paul Sartre
French Philosopher 1905-1980


Quotes

Three o'clock is always too late or too early for anything you want to do.
Shows his Frenchness. Always have to be doing something purposeful
3 o'clock in England s a perfect time for a cup of tea and a digestive biscuit.

Hell is other people.
Could have had sciforums in mind. Whatever you say, someone will disagree.

Words are loaded pistols.
or rotten bananas. Depends on who is using them.

If you are lonely when you're alone, you are in bad company.
Personally, I am never bored. Is loneliness the same as boredom?

Man is condemned to be free; because once thrown into the world,
he is responsible for everything he does.
Sartre thought that humans were free, but denied being so.
They were terrified by their freedom, and wanted to accept appointed roles instead.

I hate victims who respect their executioners.
Seems a bit harsh!

I'm just playing about with this quotations thread at the moment.

It seems a natural winner for Linguistics, if the right format can be found.
How about this. Pick a person. Take a number of quotes. And then make a short personal comment on some/all of them.

The comment should do one of the following:
Make a joke.
Say why you agree with the quotation, or provide the opposite point of view.
Explain what the person meant.
Give an example of the truth or untruth of the statement.



I like it.
I'll have a crack tomorrow.( bit knackered, awf ta baird)

[QUOTE=Captain Kremmen;1727309]Re quotations thread.

It seems a natural winner for Linguistics, if the right format can be found.
How about this. Pick a person. Take a number of quotes. And then make a short personal comment on some/all of them.

The comment should do one of the following:
Make a joke.
Say why you agree with the quotation, or provide the opposite point of view.
Explain what the person meant.
Give an example of the truth or untruth of the statement.

Or something roughly similar, the quotations themselves should be the linguistic heroes as good use of language. I don't think we have to justify having quotations here.


Featured Person
Jean-Paul Sartre
French Philosopher 1905-1980


Quotes

Three o'clock is always too late or too early for anything you want to do. Shows his Frenchness. Always have to be doing something purposeful3 o'clock in England s a perfect time for a cup of tea and a digestive biscuit.

This statement is ambiguous. Does he mean GMT, Single SST or Double SST ?
I think the public have a right to know.

Hell is other people.
Could have had sciforums in mind. Whatever you say, someone will disagree.

I have no problem with people who disagree with me; they are simply wrong

Words are loaded pistols. or rotten bananas. Depends on who is using them.

Pistols are an aid to early rising, generally before dawn. Rotten bababas are a rich source of prussic acid.

If you are lonely when you're alone, you are in bad company. Personally, I am never bored. Is loneliness the same as boredom?

This is a meaningless statement if one is a solipsist


Man is condemned to be free; because once thrown into the world, he is responsible for everything he does. Sartre thought that humans were free, but denied being so.They were terrified by their freedom, and wanted to accept appointed roles instead.

This statement is incomplete. He omitted the bit about chains

I hate victims who respect their executioners. Seems a bit harsh!

A typical atheist , this guy. No respect for god

One omission: Heaven is shagging Simone de Beauvoir under a chestnut tree, and not becoming nauseous in the process

By the way, I still do not know what a gollitron is, not that I lose much sleep over it. I read it as " at/by gollitron. that is the gollitron is part of the apparatus which I believe was some sort of particle accelerator.You have it right. It was their attempt at humor, a "by golly!"-tron. Ausserordentlich-hochgescwindigkeit-elektronen-entwicklend-schwerarbeit- is "extraordinarily high-speed electron-generating hard-working-" which to me means "particle accelerating-" something-or-other. They couldn't figure out what to call the "something-or-other" that they just invented, which is rather surprising since German is an excellent language for coining new words (as good as Chinese but the problem is that the words come out much, much longer). So they called it a "by golly!"-tron. Which is remarkable since German academics are loth to borrow foreign words!
At the risk of going off thread can I say that I was told during a stay in Duesseldorf that Krueohnenseltenstrueoelcher was a variety of strawberry.This illustrates both my theses: 1. German is a very good language for coining new words; 2. The coinages often turn out to be ridiculously long. In Chinese this would probably have four syllables. "Television" has two: dian shi, and "computer programmer" has four: dian nao cheng xu. Notice how many syllables it takes to say "particle accelerator" by using only German words. We get it in eight syllables by borrowing Latin words. The Chinese get the prize by borrowing virtually no foreign word because they can't be normalized to their phonetics, yet they still economize on syllables.
Hell is other people.This is certainly true in America, at least if what he meant was "Hell is for other people." (Perhaps not, although that would mean he had a serious problem with misanthropy!) In the last poll I saw, about three-fourths of Americans believe in heaven, but only about 15% believe in hell. We call this "Chinese menu" religion: choose one from Column A and one from Column B.
If you are lonely when you're alone, you are in bad company. -- Personally, I am never bored. Is loneliness the same as boredom?No. Loneliness is sadness or even bleakness, caused by lack of company. Boredom is a state of weariniess or restlessness due to inability to be interested in what one finds at hand. One can be bored while in the company of others, even the company of friends; an entire group of friends can be bored. And one can be lonely while pursuing an interesting endeavor alone.
I hate victims who respect their executioners. -- Seems a bit harsh!I agree. A criminal could have an epiphany on his way to the gallows. Many sincerely religious people fervently hope so, because it might allow him to be forgiven by their god and thereby not doomed to go to hell--which of course they only believe in for other people.:)

Jack Benny.
A pennypinching comedian and bad violinist. That was his act anyway. (1894-1974)
He never admitted being older than 39. When he died, some newspapers ran the headline Jack Benny dies at 39.


Quotations

“A scout troop consists of twelve little kids dressed like schmucks following a big schmuck dressed like a kid.”

“Give me golf clubs, fresh air and a beautiful partner, and you can keep the clubs and the fresh air.”

"I went to a meeting for premature ejaculators. I left early."

"A cannibal is a guy who goes into a restaurant and orders the waiter."

"My mother never saw the irony in calling me a son-of-a-bitch." - Jack Nicholson

"Democracy is a pathetic belief in the collective wisdom of individual ignorance." - HL Mencken

"[Trying to obtain information from Mr. Mitchell was] Like trying to nail a drop of water to the wall." - George E. Danielson

"Life is a sexually transmitted disease." - Guy Bellamy

"She’s got to learn to reconcile herself to being Mrs Aristotle Onassis because the only place she’ll find sympathy from now on is in the dictionary between shit and syphilis." - Aristotle Onassis following his marriage to Jackie

"In all life one should comfort the afflicted, but verily, also, one should afflict the comfortable, and especially when they are comfortably, contentedly, even happily wrong." John Kenneth Galbraith (b. 1908), U.S. economist. Guardian (London, July 28, 1989).

"Puritanism...the haunting fear that someone, somewhere, may be happy" - H.L. Mencken

"My mother never saw the irony in calling me a son-of-a-bitch." - Jack Nicholson

I tried to get the O.K from Orleander before quoting her, I haven't yet so here goes anyway and noting that there is a massive misuse of than and then on sci ( I swear they seem interchangeable at best and misused more likely; nearly as frequently as your meaning you're)

From the suntan thread..
"No, we spend more time looking at a persons face then their boobs :p "

"I know body hair bothers some women, but a lot of men like a fluffy partner."

Dame Edna Everage

Yes and I like a woman with long hair flowing down her back... and some on her head.

I'm claiming that but I suspect Kremmen will say Benny Hill beat me to it.

George Burns (1896-1996) Jewish-American Comedian. Friend to Jack Benny.

Quotations

When I was a boy the Dead Sea was only sick.

Actually, it only takes one drink to get me loaded. Trouble is, I can't remember if it's the thirteenth or fourteenth.

Too bad that all the people who know how to run the country are busy driving taxicabs and cutting hair.

I can't afford to die; I'd lose too much money.

You've got to be honest; if you can fake that, you've got it made.

I so desperately want to be taken seriously around here but it's clear I'm a freud.
I want to quote some famous philisophical folk but my repressed sexual memories from a jung age just seem to get in my way.
When I'm homer lone my I console myself that I bloody well don't nietzsche approval!

* cries and goes off to watch new rimbaud movie to lose self in poetic mayhem*

Steve Martin. Born 1945. Still Alive. Comedian and composer.
(never heard any of his music, is it any good.


Quotations:
A day without sunshine is like, you know, night.


An apology? Bah! Disgusting! Cowardly! Beneath the dignity of any gentleman, however wrong he might be.


Boy, those French: they have a different word for everything!


Chaos in the midst of chaos isn't funny, but chaos in the midst of order is.


Comedy may be big business but it isn't pretty.


Don't have sex man. It leads to kissing and pretty soon you have to start talking to them.

I so desperately want to be taken seriously around here but it's clear I'm a freud.
I want to quote some famous philisophical folk but my repressed sexual memories from a jung age just seem to get in my way.
When I'm homer lone my I console myself that I bloody well don't nietzsche approval!

* cries and goes off to watch new rimbaud movie to lose self in poetic mayhem*

Spud. If you want to quote Rimbaud, quote Rimbaud

Rambaud:
"I could have killed 'em all, I could kill you. In town you're the law, out here it's me. Don't push it. Don't push it or I'll give you a war you won't believe. Let it go. Let it go."

Thats From Rimbaud First Blood, the only Rimbaud film worth watching.

Written on a wall in Athens with spray paint:

Beauty Standards Burn Beautifully
(from the movie title Beautiful Villages Burn Beautifully)

"Never interrupt your enemy while he is making a mistake"
Napoleon

This is such smart advice. I wish I had heard it years ago.

Seems to me that if you really thought about it, you'd realize that this beverage has little nutritional value, has a stimulant drug (caffeine), and is proven to be a contributor to bone decalcification. If you really thought about these things, you probably wouldn't drink it. I'm just waiting for an alcoholic beverage to be paired with that same slogan!

http://www.thepostcard.com/gofetch/rack/rc131.jpg


You may or may not have heard, I am a heavy caffiene drinker. Could you please post a link to the pertinent information ?

"Rape the Wall not the Kids" Written on a wall in KL.

Also,

"I like an escalator because an escalator can never break, it can only become stairs. There would never be an escalator temporarily out of order sign, only an escalator temporarily stairs. Sorry for the convenience."
- Mitch Hedberg

Could you please post a link to the pertinent information?That was Pepsi's 2002-03 advertising campaign. (http://www.pepsi-collector.com/slogans.htm) 1970s-80s supermodel Cindy Crawford did the spots. (http://www.pepsinut.com/pepsi_stars.htm)
You may or may not have heard, I am a heavy caffeine drinker.I too am a never-quite-recovering caffeine addict. I'm very sensitive to it; a little chocolate is enough to give me a buzz. Two ounces of cola in a measuring cup on Saturday morning will keep me bouncing off the ceiling until Monday; if I drank a whole can of Diet Pepsi I'd probably do something that would make the evening news. It really ruins my judgment; for a couple of decades I screwed up my life (school, marriage, job) with caffeine worse than most people do with the "hard" drugs that never gave this unrepentant hippie any grief.

"A Coffee a day Keeps Alzheimers away"

Caffeine may be beneficial to the elderly.
http://www.medicalnewstoday.com:80/articles/102703.php

That was Pepsi's 2002-03 advertising campaign. (http://www.pepsi-collector.com/slogans.htm) 1970s-80s supermodel Cindy Crawford did the spots. (http://www.pepsinut.com/pepsi_stars.htm)I too am a never-quite-recovering caffeine addict. I'm very sensitive to it; a little chocolate is enough to give me a buzz. Two ounces of cola in a measuring cup on Saturday morning will keep me bouncing off the ceiling until Monday; if I drank a whole can of Diet Pepsi I'd probably do something that would make the evening news. It really ruins my judgment; for a couple of decades I screwed up my life (school, marriage, job) with caffeine worse than most people do with the "hard" drugs that never gave this unrepentant hippie any grief.

I wonder if i can substitute it with a placebo. Caffiene seems to have built up a tolerance in moi. But what happened with the decalcification of the bones ?I'm pretty tall (for my age/background), does this mean I'm going to become prematurely brittle ?.

"A Coffee a day Keeps Alzheimers away"

Caffeine may be beneficial to the elderly.
http://www.medicalnewstoday.com:80/articles/102703.php

If my liver doesn't give out, I'll be sure to remember that.

"Sucking the kumara"

This saying comes from the Maori of NZ. A kumara is a sweet potato, and after cooking goes quite soft.
Old toothless people "sucking the kumara" were a common sight on marae back in the day.
"Sucked the big kumara", means: kua mate koe (one has died).

In case you needed to know

The cotton clothing is made of grows in Mississippi.

Time flies like an arrow. Fruit flies like a banana.

We gave the bananas to the monkeys because they were ripe. We gave the bananas to the monkeys because they were hungry.

Buffalo buffalo Buffalo buffalo buffalo buffalo Buffalo buffalo.
Grammatically correct sentence. Don't believe me? Wikipedia it.

It's like morning at Buffalo Roam's house " 'allo Buff" " Ahh, Buff, 'allo!", " Buffalo, 'allo!" " 'Allo Buffalo, 'allo"

Etc.etc.

Had Had had had Had had, Had would have been correct.

I don't drink water; fish fuck in it.~ W. C . Fields

Moving forward is like moving backward backward

Vegetarians go nuts

fighting for peace is like fucking for virginity.

A good one altough I forgot from who it was

Heisenberg didn't know his L from his S, Bo.

(Bo is a Physics student, if he was doing QM, he'd hear the entangled phonemic pun)

Maybe you could get away with

"Heisenberg didn't know his L from his S..."

on the wall of a Physics Lab, say.

Woman on bed in maternity ward: "Nhnngnnghhhnngghhh!"

Nurse: "Looks like another one's getting ready to drop in on the world."

Doctor: "My god! It's another laboured pun!"

Learning the Piano
Lesson 1:
Playing different notes together is like playing them at different times, only quicker.

Don't worry Vkothii, he wouldn't know his arse from his 'L', Bo!

Is it a pun?, Is it a double entendre? Is it both?

It might be funny, but then it might not.

It might not even be a pun, somehow I couldn't be certain.

It might not even be a pun

Yeah but you'd 'ave to admit, it was a 'ell of a good try.

I'm treading carefully 'cos one thing I'm wary of is being at the wrong end of a cross Bo.

No, the thing is, if he got his ell entangled with his ess, then he needs Bo.

Bo can tell him which is his s and which his l, you see.
Of course, everyone knows you cant have an arse-bow...or can you?

“When the power of love overcomes the love of power, the world will know peace.”
Jimi Hendrix

Yeah, but Jimi was little-winging that one.

Music for Supermarkets

(at the fruit stand:))
" hey banana, like the way you groove
gonna make you sweet, gonna make you smooth
banana nana na na
nana nana na, nana na na
nana nana nana na na..."


maybe I should see if Letterman wants it?

And over at the veges:
(cue piano :cool:)

"...there's leeks and spuds, and broccoli
or if you search our shelves, there's always pumpkin, rice or peas
if you allow you're peckish, you may try
our celery...
da da da da da (etc)"

When it comes to taking yourself seriously, it never pays to do it to the extent you start to take yourself seriously.

Seriously not taking yourself too seriously.
It's an art form and a life style.
Well picked Vkothii

From 'Do you love America?' thread ...Pjdude with numbers.. "was i couldn't spell opportunity and i know your anal about spelling. also chance and opportunity are synanyms."

Is that 5 grammatical errors in a rant about one's spelling ability?

Good work!

From 'Do you love America?' thread ...Pjdude with numbers.. "was i couldn't spell opportunity and i know your anal about spelling. also chance and opportunity are synanyms." Is that 5 grammatical errors in a rant about one's spelling ability? Good work!I count eight errors although not all are grammatical:1. was -- dangling fragment 2. was -- first word in sentence should be capitalized 3. i -- should be capitalized 4. opportunity -- should be in quotation marks 5. i -- should be capitalized 6. your -- should be "you're" 7. also -- first word in sentence should be capitalized 8. synanyms -- should be "synonyms"We all make mistakes but this is sheer laziness and it's disrespectful of the readers. In aggregate it takes far more of our time to read a sentence one letter at a time instead of holistically, than for the writer to proofread his own work.

Quote off of BBC worldwide service 'Whatever you want to do you might as well do while you're alive'

Quote off of BBC worldwide service 'Whatever you want to do you might as well do while you're alive'A few years back there was an advertising slogan in America: "You can rest when you're dead."

From Kinky Friedman:

"The trouble with truth is, supply always exceeds demand."

"Love is not only blind, it also has attention deficit disorder."

"The cat, of course, said nothing. Too much dogma."

"Everything's funny if you wait long enough."

"What the hell, I thought. A sick sense of humor’s better than none at all.”

And one from Ogden Nash:

"Purity
Is obscurity."


Lee

"We drive on a parkway and park on a driveway." - Steven Pinker, I think.

Sorry if already posted - I only went back a page.

"We drive on a parkway and park on a driveway." - Steven Pinker, I think.I don't know who said it first, but we Americans usually credit it to our comedian Gallagher. It doesn't matter. The secret to being funny is not being able to think up funny stuff. It's being able to remember funny stuff you already heard, and repeat it correctly.

I don't know who said it first, but we Americans usually credit it to our comedian Gallagher. It doesn't matter. The secret to being funny is not being able to think up funny stuff. It's being able to remember funny stuff you already heard, and repeat it correctly.

disagreed.

although you are older and have more experience sitting at bars and keeping the conversation exciting... it's sure a hell of a lot easier to keep laughs with previously recorded jokes. But it's just not pure, you know? And laughs are only good if you really appreciate them.

Although you are older and have more experience sitting at bars and keeping the conversation exciting.Probably not. I'm not much of a drinker and hanging out in bars is not my idea of a good time. Although as a musician I've seen the inside of quite a few. I'll go to a bar to dance to a live band, especially if my friends are playing, but not to sit around and get stupid. I have dogs for that. :)
It's sure a hell of a lot easier to keep laughs with previously recorded jokes.No, I'm not talking about being the life of the party or rattling off one-liners for the sole purpose of making people laugh. I'm talking about having a conversation and remembering a point somebody like George Carlin or Jon Stewart or John Cleese made, and made it a little better because he found a humorous side to the issue. Passing on the wisdom of Eric Idle and Steve Martin is just as valuable a service to civilization as the wisdom of Aristotle and Winston Churchill.
But it's just not pure, you know? And laughs are only good if you really appreciate them.I'm not sure what "pure" humor is. Laughs are good because they release endorphins and make people feel better, at least temporarily. Of course laughing at someone's misfortune, which is the predominant type of humor these days at least here in America, is not something I'm very sanguine about. We all do it, we can't help it, we seem to be programmed to appeciate slapstick when it's one remove from the actual unfortunate event. But there are other types of humor that doesn't capitalize on anyone's suffering, or at least makes a more general comment on the human condition rather than an individual's misfortune.

Puns and other wordplay fall into that category. The joke about driving on parkways and parking in driveways, or the one about calling domiciles "apart"ments when they're all stuffed "together," or the one about how there seems to be no complementary condition of a thing being "in whack"... those are funny without anyone having to suffer.

"An Elementary Particle is something so simple that one knows nothing whatever about it." -- J. Robert Oppenheimer

Fraggle -

If I were sitting at home with my dogs and George Carlin, I would rather listen to him improvise and 'associate our current environment and conditions into our conversation' than listen him reciting an old act.

I agree it's good to pass on old wisdom, but generating wisdom on the fly is more relevant and startling. Pure humor has got shock value that practiced humor does not.

Maybe you can relate the difference in live music and cd`s?

BTW, I'm inventing some new terms like 'pure humor' but it's just to get my meaning across.

Search& Destroy, I concur completely. Pure humour is priceless and by that I mean original. Listening to an old hack trotting out tired old gags is worth a chuckle at best but new, fresh contemporary angles and observations are where the real cackles are to be had.

And Fraggle, I concur implicitly with your observation that the wisdom of Cleese, Martin, Idle etc. is as important to Man's history
as Churchill or Aristotle.

BTW, OilIsMastery is a particularly droll individual and his wisdom has been passed like an abiogenically produced kidney stone. If he goes on much longer, he'll be pissing diamonds and the skidmarks in his too high, white cotton 'y' fronts will be selling for $100 a barrel.

Michigan has lost 40,000 manufacturing jobs in 2008 alone, thus you find the following at UAW local 723 amoung the signs in the main hall, reading:

"A worker voting Republican is like a chicken voting for Colonel Sanders''
and
"Out of a job yet? Keep voting Republican.''

McCain has given up on the "swing state" of Michigan - pulled his team entirely out of the state to deploy elsewhere.

Reported here:
http://www.bloomberg.com/apps/news?pid=20601087&sid=adM8Fq0RTis0&refer=home

If I were sitting at home with my dogs and George Carlin, I would rather listen to him improvise and 'associate our current environment and conditions into our conversation' than listen him reciting an old act.Yes. But again, I'm not talking about the creative sense of humor I expect from a professional entertainer. I'm talking about what the average person says in the course of normal conversation that gives people a smile and makes them think, "He's funny." Being able to recall something witty and use it in a discussion so it helps shed new light on a subject.

Most people don't seem to be able to remember jokes, judging by how badly them mangle them when they try to repeat them. Sure, if a comedian recites the same 45-minute set that they heard him recite two months ago on another channel, they'll start to sound familiar. But if you toss a Lewis Black quote about tennis into a conversation about tennis--even giving Lewis Black the credit--they're likely to say something like, "Oh that was a great observation he made. I'm so glad you reminded me of it."
Maybe you can relate the difference in live music and cd`s?Not a good analogy. Good music bears up very well under repetition. My wife, the English major, assures me that good prose does too, in the very same way. She gets things out of it the second or third time through that she didn't notice before. Stand-up comedy doesn't usually work that way.

And you'd be surprised how few comedians can improvise. Writing humor is hard work. Steve Martin is absolutely terrible at ad libbing. They're intelligent people and they're good with words, so they can hold an animated conversation with you, but most of them won't be able to make it funny.

...Writing humor is hard work. Steve Martin is absolutely terrible at ad libbing. They're intelligent people and they're good with words, so they can hold an animated conversation with you, but most of them won't be able to make it funny.Even writing poor original humor is tough. I was impressed, even 50 years ago, how rapidly a good joke sweeps the country. I decide to try to write one and tell it to many and see if anyone told it to me later. (No one ever did, but will tell it again)

First thing I did was look for the characteristic of a good joke. I actually made an ordered list and gave some thought to the psychology. I do not remember much now, but No.1 on list was "Related to sex" & "about common human experiences, which are difficult or unpleasant" was high up on the list (lot of mother in law jokes, etc.) Other than noting laughing about something embarrassing or uncomfortable helps you to cope is all the psychology I have time for now.
Here is my genuinely bad, but at least original joke:

Prostitute, who was growing old, started reading help wanted adds to find a new line of work. At first she was very discouraged as most required "college degree" or "high typing speed", or "X years of sales experience in major firm" etc. but then she found the perfect job for her in a CIA ad - The CIA wanted a female Under Cover Agent.

At least you know why good a joke writer is well paid. That was the best I could do after several hours of analysis and thought. If you think it is easy try it and post it.

"The only crank I can see is the one firmly attached to your ego"

So I'll take that as noone got the the three gags in one oilIsMastery original..tough crowd at sci but that's been noted before.

There are some great ad libbers on sci..gustav, clusteringflux, Captain Kremmen, Bells, Dr. Lou, Vkothii, Myles, Orleander, Cosmic, draqon, Killjoy, Sniffy, ..plenty more. Redarmy for FFS!

Even writing poor original humor is tough. I was impressed, even 50 years ago, how rapidly a good joke sweeps the country. I decide to try to write one and tell it to many and see if anyone told it to me later. (No one ever did, but will tell it again)As I said, people rarely even remember really good jokes from star comedians. Remembering one that is merely funny from the likes of us is very unlikely, so they're not going to be repeating it to anyone else. And even if they do it will be forgotten before it makes the rounds and comes back to you. So don't feel bad. The fact that you haven't heard your own joke doesn't mean they didn't think it was funny.
First thing I did was look for the characteristic of a good joke. I actually made an ordered list and gave some thought to the psychology. I do not remember much now, but No.1 on list was "Related to sex" & "about common human experiences, which are difficult or unpleasant" was high up on the list (lot of mother in law jokes, etc.) Other than noting laughing about something embarrassing or uncomfortable helps you to cope is all the psychology I have time for now.I prefer puns and other word jokes because they are the one form of humor that doesn't depend on someone else's misfortune. And oddly enough, I find that people remember them.
So I'll take that as noone got the the three gags in one oilIsMastery original..tough crowd at sci but that's been noted before.I thought that was a hoot. The kind of jokes we used to tell at Caltech. But you almost have to be a physics major to get it, not just a science groupie.

Again, that's a type of humor that doesn't revolve around someone's misfortune. "Elephant" jokes (What do you get if you cross an elephant or other humorous animal with a...?) were really big back around 1960, and another joke that was going around Caltech was: What do you get if you cross a grape with an elephant? Answer: Grape elephant cosine theta.

[laugh track plays loudly]

...I prefer puns and other word jokes because they are the one form of humor that doesn't depend on someone else's misfortune. And oddly enough, I find that people remember them....Then tell a couple of your all-time favorites. (You do remember them of course. :D )

.I thought that was a hoot.




O.K , that's all the encouragement I need.

Why did the elephant drink?
To forget.

What do you get when you cross Fraggle Rocker with an elephant?
A keen linguistics moderator who works for peanuts.
( and remembers everything..everything!)

And what do you get when you cross Billy T with an elephant?
A old grey guy with a bank balance as fat as his arse is wide and a share portfolio as long as his trunk.

I'd come up with an elephant pun but ivory much doubt my chances.

So anyway, Fraggle Rocker was on the train.An Indian chap and his Pakistani friend were arguing.. Indian chap, head wobbling almost imperceptibly and doing delicate finger gesticulations " It's Woomb" and spells it out " W.O.O.M.B!...Woomb!"
The Pakistani fellow pulls at his luxuriant moustache.." No,no,no!..it's vomb! V.O.M.B"
Fraggle Rocker can't resist and pipes up " Excuse me gentlemen ( Fraggle is very polite) I couldn't help overhearing and seeing as I'm an editor and the moderator on a distinguished linguistics forum, I feel I should point out the correct spelling which is womb..W.O.M.B"
The two subcontinentals exchange puzzled looks then exclaim in unison.." It is clear our learned friend has never been hearing an elephant fart!'

"...then G a linear group of vector spaces V exists, with an ideal fiber F which is a locally trivial tangent bundle T on M a smooth differentiable manifold, which admits tensor products as functorials on pairs of fibers in the tangent bundle, ..."

Yeah, sure it does.

You blew me away with that one Spud. - It seems Fraggle does not know everything about words after all.

I don't know if that sounds hilarious to you, but Berlusconi said a few days ago: "I am worried but optimist", (of course in Italian because doesn't speak any english). Now, if you are optimist, you shouldn't be worried, right?

I don't know if that sounds hilarious to you, but Berlusconi said a few days ago: "I am worried but optimist", (of course in Italian because doesn't speak any english). Now, if you are optimist, you shouldn't be worried, right?An optimist does not have to be irrationally optimistic to the extent that he does not believe there are any problems.

Rehab Center motto:
"Abandon dope, all ye who enter here"

Dadaist Center motto:
"Abandon trope, all ye who bend an ear"

"Catch a man a fish and you feed him for a day
Teach him how to fish and you ruin a wonderful business opportunity."
Karl Marx


Or was it Karl Marx?
If you look up this quotation on the internet you will find thousands of sites attributing it to Marx, but none which quote chapter and verse.
They all say, "he wrote it somewhere", or "Marx said"

Oddly, others argue that "Jesus said it" or "It's in the Bible".
If people as divers as Marxists and Christians want to take the credit, there must be a lot of truth in it.
But no-one ever gives any factual information.

The jist of the saying is that if you sell a man a fish he only eats for a day, but if he knows how to fish he can feed himself.

I agree with that too.

Rehab Center motto:
"Abandon dope, all ye who enter here"

Dadaist Center motto:
"Abandon trope, all ye who bend an ear"

Sciforums Motto:
Abandon Tripe all ye who enter here.

Hold the liver & onions?

Traffic Control motto:
"U bend in slope, all ye who tend to veer"

You can't have everything...where would you put it?

George Carlin

Buffalo buffalo Buffalo buffalo buffalo buffalo Buffalo buffalo.
Grammatically correct sentence. Don't believe me? Wikipedia it.

That's CRAZY!

"Buffalo buffalo Buffalo buffalo buffalo buffalo Buffalo buffalo."
Grammatically correct sentence.That's CRAZY!It's because:A buffalo is a bovine animal; The word was adapted as a slang verb meaning "to confuse or intimidate"; And it was also taken as the name for a city in New York.So if you use alternate words and add some implied grammatical particles, you get:

"New York bison, (whom) (other) New York bison deceive, (themselves) (deceive) (other) New York bison."

In Danish, Swedish and Norwegian this can be done without any capital letters for cues, and without using slang words or proper names all derived from the same word. It relies on bar having three meanings: "tavern," "naked" and "carried"

Bar barbarbarbarbar bar bar barbarbarbarbar.

"Naked barbarian-bar barbarian carried naked barbarian-bar barbarian."

It's a newspaper headline, with articles (a, the) omitted, and it relies on the ability of the other Germanic languages to build compound words more freely than we can in English. A barbarbarbarbar is a barbarian who hangs out in barbarian bars.

Newton's lament:

"As I looked thru a piece of glafs
Light went all a-wavey, on my afs"

"Consumers are not consuming; Bankers are not lending; Investors are not investing; and Employers are not hiring. If that is not a Catastrophe, what is?"

By directory of Span's central bank. (In Spanish of course, and perhaps I have re-order these four observations, as I read a few days ago and forgot to post.)

"If mathematics is a crime, I'm looking for clues."

"I cannot grok its fullness."

--Vaughan Micheal Smith, Stranger in a Strange Land, by Robert Heinlein

"I cannot grok its fullness." --Vaughan Micheal Smith, Stranger in a Strange Land, by Robert Heinlein* * * * MODERATOR'S CORRECTION * * * *

His name was Valentine Michael Smith, an orphaned human raised by Martians. The book was published in 1961. The verb "to grok," meaning "to understand in ways not typical for human beings," gained some popularity among the "counterculture" of "the sixties," the misnamed twelve-year period that began with the first Beatles song and ended with the close of the Vietnam War.

Ah, yes of course. It must be that I have not grokked this. Or haven't read it for a while.
...

"Dave, my mind is going, I can feel it.
I can feel it..."

HAL, from 2001 A Space Odyssey, by Arthur C. Clarke

"Mathematicians are just people who can't afford a decent hobby."

--Anon