Tuesday, October 03, 2006

Random Thoughts

A few fleeting thoughts I've had today, in between the other, standard work-oriented, date and time oriented, plan-oriented, fantasy-oriented, screw-up oriented, and efficiency-oriented mental processes. How about you?

Amphibians are really really cool. They're, like, almost water. What percentage of water would you guess? I'm not sure. But amphibians are really really cool.

Where does the word 'boobs' come from? Old English, maybe? I should look this up.

Quack.

How do you say "what do you want" in Japanese? I can't remember. The closest I can get is "what is this?" Why can't I remember? Did I ever know? Did I ever say that?

Do they think I don't like dogs?

Maybe I won't be guilty if I just ignore it.

Quel asshole.

Does "Kant" really rhyme with "pissant"?

If I refill and replace the water jug inside the refrigerator before the door closes, I win.

Should one place quotation marks around fleeting thoughts had during the day?

UPDATE:

Would answering that last question in the affirmative entail a kind of schizophrenia or an attempt to wash my hands of responsibility?

5 comments:

MT said...

Obviously not random because I was thinking the same thing too. O.K., so only while reading. Oh, I remember now a dark laugh over the absurd wording of an NPR news story about a guy in custody who police say has mailed a succession of 50 anonymous letters to legislators and other officials containing white powder starting shortly after 9/11, but the powder wasn't Anthrax. In fact, investigators concluded that this guys mailings were "unrelated" to the Anthrax scare. Talk about your freak coincidences. For some reason they haven't let the guy go yet though.

roxtar said...

Here's one: Why is "turd" spelled with a "u" instead of an "e", as in "terd"?

It's not like it's been written so frequently that "terd" never had a chance to catch on.

And why doesn't this symbol @ have a cool, name, like ampersand (&) or octothorpe(#)?

helmut said...

As a member of the Royal Society of Etymologists, I believe "turd" derives from the early Welsh "tyrd," which meant something like "filthy ass stick." In the term's adaptation to English, its spelling could have gone in several directions. Like the early "byrd" (for which, incidentally, the name of the popular singing group "The Byrds" is an atavism) developing into "bird," "tyrd" could easily have been re-transcribed as "tird." "Terd" was never truly an option, as the letter "e" did not exist until the 18th Century.

Now, what explains the transformation of "tyrd" to "turd"? It is quite simple, really. The "stick" was dropped from its meaning by Puritan settlers who interpreted the stick in overly literal terms to include the ass-stick-like projection of the letter "y." By dropping the stick, the term became "tvrd." But this was unpronounceable and reeked of Roman Catholicism. Thus the "v" was ever so slightly curved to form a "u."

Thus, "turd."

Awzjeck!

roxtar said...

You couldn't possibly know this, and it's far to early to make this shit up, so I must logically conclude that you are possessed by the Devil.

I rebuke thee! I rebuke thee! I rebuke thee!

helmut said...

Did you know that "rebuke" used to be spelled "rbvk"?