Archive for October, 2018

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Revisiting 19: more proxy names

October 31, 2018

Following up on my 10/20/18 posting “Numbers and names”, where I wrote:

The current avalanche of comments spam comes from a proxies site that creates random usernames for its comments from a gigantic database of names, thus producing many entertaining FN + LN combinations.

Another wave in recent days. Yesterday’s comments spam queue began with:

Frank Gwilt, Sebastian Tentler, Dovie Weasel

I was especially taken by Dovie Weasel, combining a high-positive FN (referring to the bird conventionally associated with peace and love) and a high-negative LN (referring to the conventionally deceitful small furry mammal). Later that day came the remarkable Shawnee Handshoe, which I merely note in wonder here.

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Posted in Language and animals, Metaphor, Names, Signs and symbols | Leave a Comment »

A reading

October 31, 2018

Posted on Facebook, this Peter Steiner cartoon from 2016:


(#1) From a 1/28/16 posting on Steiner’s blog

The humor turns on an ambiguity of the verb read, and also on a specialization of the derived nominal reading to a very culture-specific event.

(Then some words on the artist, who now has a Page on this blog.)

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Posted in Abbreviation, Ambiguity, Books, Collages, Linguistics in the comics, Technology | 1 Comment »

Famous wolf on the Yellow Brick Road

October 31, 2018

In today’s comics feed, the One Big Happy from 10/4, in which Ruthie mondegreens:

(#1)

Yes: the song “We’re Off to See the Wizard”, from the 1939 movie of The Wizard of Oz, with we’re off (mis)heard as Rolf.

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Posted in Books, Errors, Gender and sexuality, Language and medicine, Language play, Linguistics in the comics, Mishearings, Movies and tv, Music, Names, Onomatopoeia | Leave a Comment »

Annals of appalling trifles

October 30, 2018

On Pinterest today, a collection of astounding trifles, notably this item:

Layers of brownie, caramel cream and Snickers make a dessert that everyone will love! (30 minutes; serves 10)
Ingredients: 6 Snickers bars (full size), 1 can caramel syrup, chocolate syrup, 1 pkg. brownie mix, 1 (16 ounce) container Cool whip

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Posted in Language and food, Slang | Leave a Comment »

Revisiting 18: hypallage in the garden

October 29, 2018

Photo from Andy Rogers on Facebook today, from a garden supply store:

(#1)

Andy quipped: “So, what is “AMATEUR MULCH”, Mulch you don’t have to pay for?” — playing on the N/Adj amateur as contrasted with the N/Adj professional.

But, I protested, professional here is hypallagous: professional mulch is mulch used professionally, i.e., used by or made for professional gardeners; it’s the gardener, not the mulch, that’s (a) professional.

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Posted in Figurative language, Hypallage, Language of sex, Opposition, Slang | 1 Comment »

63 years of green beans, mushroom soup, and fried onions

October 29, 2018

On the bon appétit magazine site on 10/26/18, “A moment of silence” by Alex Beggs:


(#1) Green bean casserole (photo from bon appétit)

Rest in peace, dear Dorcas Reilly, inventor of the green bean casserole [who died on 9/15]. Let’s toast a can of cream of mushroom soup in honor of the woman whose vision not only saw how a soup could bind a pot of green beans, but topped the whole thing with crunchy fried onions. Reilly worked in the Campbell’s test kitchen and loved cooking so much that after a full day of developing recipes, she’d go home and cook some more — a lot of soup, according to her husband. While our recipe gets a little bougie with homemade [Cremini] mushroom béchamel, the French’s fried onions on top stay true to the 1955 original. According to Campbell’s, over 20 million homes will serve green bean casserole on Thanksgiving, which is an incredible culinary legacy to leave, if you ask me.

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Posted in Art, Death notices, Language and food | 1 Comment »

holibolups

October 28, 2018

From Jeff Shaumeyer on Facebook, this plush Xmas Peep (an XChick?):

(#1)

A holibolup, a holiday/symbol mashup.

Horrified reader: I find the idea of a Christmas peep offensive. Next we’ll have werewolves with Valentines, groundhogs with Easter baskets, and leprechauns with sparklers. Where does it end??

Jeff: It doesn’t! What great ideas!

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Posted in Holidays, Prototype semantics, Signs and symbols | Leave a Comment »

Another food holiday

October 28, 2018

Today, Sandra Boynton tells us, is National Chocolate Day:


(#1) “October 28 is National Chocolate Day. Pace yourself.”

In the world of chocolate delights, there are many extreme pleasures. But extremism in the consumption of chocolate is no great vice, entirely pardonable. It can be bent to the service of other holidays, as it routinely is at Easter, Halloween, and Christmas.

Then there’s Death by Chocolate for the Day of the Dead…

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Posted in Holidays, Language and food, Linguistics in the comics | 1 Comment »

The holidays of our lives

October 27, 2018

(Near the end, there will be a hunky male model wearing nothing but a Halloween jockstrap. A warning in case you’d prefer to avoid a holiday men’s underwear discussion.)

Yesterday’s Zippy features a Dingburg-local idiomatic holiday:

(#1)

Of course, I immediately went to sources to discover what was celebrated on October 26th. Well, not only is October National Pumpkin Month, the 26th is the day specifically devoted to the fruit of Cucurbita pepo, this orange squash / gourd / melon / cucurbit: National Pumpkin Day. The day ushers in the Pumpkin Season, which is prefigured by a period in which pumpkin spice erupts as a ubiquitous descriptor of foods and much more (see my 10/20/17 posting “A processed food flavor”); which embraces a number of Halloween-specific cultural practices and symbols (jack-o-lanterns, dressing up in costumes, and trick-or-treating, plus witches and black cats as symbols — and orange and black as a decorative theme); and which is culinarily realized in pumpkin pie as a holiday food for Halloween, Thanksgiving, and Christmas.

So pumpkin pie can last you from mid-October to early January. Meanwhile, some riffs on the cartoon and some on edible pumpkiniana.

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Posted in Books, Catchphrases, Categorization and Labeling, Color, Formulaic language, Holidays, Idioms, Language and food, Language play, Linguistics in the comics, Proverbs, Titles, Underwear | 2 Comments »

At duty on the moors

October 26, 2018

(#1)

Ripped from our posts,
Dumped in this wasteland,
Together we rust

Crankily, nastily
“Old fool’s gone all mottled”
“Her door don’t work”

We hiss and huddle,
Waiting for a ring.

Why don’t you
Ever call? Why?

(more…)

Posted in Books, Captions, Language and plants, Linguistics in the comics, Names, Placenames | 1 Comment »

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