Tag: Funny

Fun, History, Humor

Nomenclature

“Puritanism.  The haunting fear that someone, somewhere, may be happy.”
– H.L. Mencken

Recently, for reasons far too ridiculous and complicated to explain, Scarlett and I have a bit of an inside joke ending emails and phone calls with some sort of admonition followed by, “or God will smite thee.”  Have a good day, or God will smite thee, etc.  It’s silly and stems from a midnight conversation when her flatmates were getting drunk and crowding up her New York flat so she hung out in the hallway and called me up to chat until they descended on Greenwich Village.   Many an inside joke has found it’s birth in such events.

Anyway, it put me in a sacrilegious frame of mind, so these Puritan baby names made for a good Friday afternoon read.  Let’s have a look at some of these poor parenting choices and make a few guesses on how the Early Modern era panned out for them, based on their unfortunate epithets:

I disapprove strongly of this frivolity.

Wrestling Brewster, I can only surmise, turned out to be the dame school class bully.

Kill-sin Pimple, to no one’s surprise, ran off to live in the woods and found happiness among the Iroquois.

Continent Walker, a great colonial explorer.  Annoyed his relatives by insisting on dressing “in the manner of the heathens” in the privacy of his own home.

Preserved Fish refused all pickled food for the entirety of her life.

Anger Bull was unfortunately prone to fits of rage at the sight of red flags.  Laudanum helped.

Magnyfye Beard was appropriately enough, one of history’s earliest hipsters.  His whiskers were the pride of the early cavaliers.

Hope-still Peedle.  Pessimist.

Weakly Ekins: picked on in school.  Probably by Wrestling Brewster.

If-Christ-had-not-died-for-thee-thou-hadst-been-damned (known familiarly as “Dr. Damned”) Barebone, never really understood why his medical practice never did very well.  Scraped by as a body snatcher for the burgeoning field of anatomy and made many, sadly unrecognized, contributions to science.

Let’s play a game: pick a name, submit their life story in three sentences or less.  Winner get applause and acclaim from the minion coterie.  Off you go.  (Or God will smite thee!)

Humor, University, Work

Stress and Other Fractures

“The pain of the mind is worse than the pain of the body.”
– Publius Syrus (a chap who clearly didn’t know me)

You may have noticed, my gingerbread darlings, that I’ve not shared any good work stories with you of late.  There is a reason for that.

At this festive time of year on a university campus, the population is so collectively panicked about exams, projects, end of term presentations, and juggling the upcoming holiday that they are too harried to commit crimes.  Ergo, life at the police department is fairly mundane.  Wait until the week of Christmas itself when Hennessy and I will likely be the only ones here…you may be hearing from me hourly to alleviate boredom.

However, you will be happy to know that even though the human race is letting you down by not acting like its usual silly self, your faithful Small Dog still plugging away for your entertainment.  While work is full of  disappointingly well behaved people, I am as klutzy as ever.

J. has been staying up until 3 every morning finishing those crisis inducing assignments we just discussed and I haven’t been feeling well so last night we grabbed some takeaway dinner.  Charged with guarding this precious bundle I stooped to swing myself into the car…and promptly saw stars as my head collided with doorway.

McQueen shoes: made to cause C. to drool. And die. Horribly.

In my defense, high heels throw me off; I always wear very high ones to counteract my, ah, non-height, and I don’t always calculate things like car doors (or stairs, or how much further I have to fall after tripping, etc.) very well.  Yes, even after nearly a decade wearing them, shut up.  All told, I have a dirty great whacking lump on my head this morning and a bit of a headache.

I do it for you, my loves.

Family, Humor, Husband, Marriage, School

We Take You Now to the Small Dog Family Flat…

…where J. has asked C. to quiz him on information for his business law class’ upcoming exam.  For some clarification of the following snippets, it is helpful to note that his study guide seems to have been compiled by blind monkeys tap dancing on a typewriter.  Let’s listen in, shall we?

“Name the conditions for unconscionability.”
“One party is Comcast?”
“Focus.”

~~~

“Talk to me about minors.”
[J. grins slowly]
“Not the ones in Chile!”

~~~

“Term meaning that the Court will leave you as it finds you.”
“…”
“Impere-”
“Delecto.  I was mixing that up with In flagrante delicto, but I knew that wasn’t right.”
“Um, no.  No it’s not.”

~~~

“What is a ‘covenant not to complete?'”
“Uh, I think you mean ‘compete.'”
“Look.  It says ‘complete,’ right there.”
“Oh, so it does.  It’s wrong, though.”
“I could write a more coherent study guide than this!”

~~~

“Help, help, I’m being duressed!”

~~~

“Hold on!  Are they making up legal terms?”
“Looks like it.”
“But they can’t do that!  ‘Assign-ee?’  ‘Offer-or?’  ‘Oblige-or?’  These sound like video game character names!  And I’ve counted six spelling mistakes on this page alone.
“Calm down, C..”
“I can’t!  This is wrong!”

~~~

“That reminds me!  Have I showed you that YouTube clip -”
“Focus, J..”
“The one from the Simpsons?”
“Don’t.”
“It’s funny!”
“I don’t care.”
“You need to see it -”
“Pay attention or I will papercut you to death with this thing, so help me!”

~~~

“Ok.  Fraud.  Give me five examples.”
“Number one, inception.   DUNN.   DUNNNN.  DUNNNNNNNNNNN.”

~~~

“I am not a monkey.”
“Good.  Anything else you want me to mention on the blog?”
“Quiet, you.”

~~~

“Explain ‘reformation.'”
“Martin Luther nailed – ”
“We’re done.”

Humor, Office, Secretary, Stupid People, Work

Things You Say That Will Make Me Doubt You

**Don’t forget to enter the Shabby Apple giveaway!  Winner announced tomorrow!**

Now, while some people come into our office and say things that are just plain silly, other people say things that are, literally, unbelievable.  From this week (and it’s only Wednesday morning):

“I have a doctor’s note.  Uh…from…um…a doctor!”  *

“I’ve, uh, locked myself out of my car.  Don’t have my keys.  Could you guys open it for me?”
“Can you prove ownership of the car?”
“Um, no.  Can’t you just shoot the trunk lock open for me?” **

“You don’t understand, you are going to do what I tell you.  Don’t you know who I am?” ***

* I am a rhinoceros.  One of us is lying.
** I’ll bet lunch someone finds a body.  Any takers?
*** No.  I don’t.  And since it’s my job to be painstakingly aware of all requisite movers and shakers, that ought to tell you something.

Humor, Husband, Life, Snark

Mother. Nature.

“Nature’s all well in her place, but she mustn’t be allowed to make things untidy.”
– Cold Comfort Farm

Pictured: Summer, after a particularly impressive bender.

Of course, summer is moving towards its inevitable end.  Though not quite in her death throes, she’s sensing that they’re not far off and so is  looking to have a last fling with a boy a third of her age, wear skirts that are far too short, and spend all her money rather than let her grasping nephew Fall get a penny of it.  In other words, generally behaving badly.

The other day J. called me up.
“Are you coming home for lunch?” he asked.
“Wasn’t planning on it.  Why?”
“Because you need to go to the store.”
“Again, why?”
“Because you need to pick up ant traps and spray.”

Summer's attack German Shepherd. And although I didn't catch a glimpse of this guy, I am sure he was lurking back behind the suitcases.

Augh!  Apparently ants had descended on our flat.  They were crawling in from a closet runner, bent on global domination (For the record, Mum, our flat is in no way in a state to attract the wildlife, please don’t wring your hands and bemoan anything).  Anyway, I dashed home armed with chemicals, J. vacuumed everything, sprayed and booby-trapped our closet to the point that those famed nuclear-resistant cockroaches of lore couldn’t survive, and we waited with baited breath to see if it had worked.  So far, nary a six-legged fiend has been sighted.

However, marshalling the ants to send them indoors was only Old Lady Summer getting drunk at her granddaughter’s wedding.  She finished the night by climbing up on the buffet table, shaking her bon-bon, and collapsing spectacularly into the punch.

That night we had a massive lightning storm.  I read later that in a half hour period we had nearly 150 lightning strikes in the area.  And unlike normal storms, where the flashes and rumbles are spaced out a bit, this was explosion after explosion for hours.  Neither J. nor I slept because every few seconds our whole room would light up and it would sound like someone had cracked a whip right next to our heads.  And this sort of weather has continued, with varying degrees of intensity, for the last three days now.  The power was knocked out yesterday, making getting home from work a nightmare.

Small Dog gets Summered-out.

Summer and I have a middling relationship.  Round about February of each year I whine and long for sunlight, but as soon as we’ve made it through July, I start glaring at bank signs along the road with their publicly displayed roasting temperatures and start mumbling things like, “October sounds good.  I could do October right now.”

*Photo of cracked old biddy, from mygutinstinct.wordpress.com
*Photo of the vile insect invader, still from the 1954 film Them!
*Photo of my approximate face come mi-August from: findavet.us/blog/2010/04/how-to-keep-your-dog-safe-in-the-heat/

Fail, Humor, Office, Secretary, Stupid People, University, Work

Things You Say That Will Make Me Laugh at You

“If idiots could fly, this place would be an airport.”
– Sign on Lauper’s desk

I am constantly amazed at some of the conversations that we, as a police department, get to be a part of.  Read on for a sampling of THIS week’s pearls of wisdom:

“My child’s backpack went missing at your university over the weekend.  I’ve checked the Lost and Found, all the custodial departments, and with his camp counselors.  What do you think happened to it?”
“Honestly, ma’am, I think it very likely it was stolen.”
“(Gasp!) Would someone do that?!” *

“I just thought that if I didn’t pay these tickets they would just go away.”
“Sorry, sir, that’s not correct.  If you don’t pay tickets they go to collections after a certain number of months.  That information is found both on our website and printed on the ticket you recieved.”
“Well, I still wasn’t going to pay them.  It was the principle of the thing.” **

“I’ve been driving around for an hour looking for your pink parking lots.”
“I’m sorry, ma’am, I’m afraid I don’t understand.”
“The pink parking lots!  They’re pink on your map, but I haven’t found any parking lots painted pink.”
“Ma’am, we only depict them in pink on the maps to distinguish visitor parking lots from all the other lots on campus, they are really just normal parking lots.”
“What do you mean?  This is false information!” ***

“So, on Craigslist we found a listing for a scooter that we’re interested in, but I wanted a police opinion first.”
“Go ahead.”
“Well, it’s listed for $50, the guy says he doesn’t have paperwork for it, and doesn’t even have a key for it.  Does that sound normal to you?”
“…?” ****

* Yes, ma’am, they would.  Which is why we have police departments.
** Congratulations.  Your principles, which apparently do not include being a law abiding citizen, have just ruined your credit score.
*** I don’t think we’re going to be able to help you.
**** Let me guess, the owner is Mr. Jean Boogaloo from Nigeria.

Friends, Humor, Travel

I’m About to Say the Sooth!

“The oracle says Spain over Germany.  Discuss.”
“I’m sorry but I have to say German over Spain.  Spaniards eat a lot of octopus…the animal is afraid of saying they will lose, as it might end up on a barbecue.”
“True.  I had not sufficiently taken into account culinary pressures.”
– C. and Francois, Facebook conversation

The Romans used to slash creatures open and observe their livers and kidneys to tell the future.  By comparison, Paul the Oracle Octopus is less gruesome.  I’m sort of hoping Spain trounces Germany just so his status as a prophetic cephalopod is confirmed.

Unfortunately for the tentacled sucker in question, I have an everlasting hatred of the name Paul.  On a train ride from Holyhead, Wales to London, AbFab, Elizabeth, Kiri, Marie and I were seated with an odd couple.  They smoked like chimneys, drank like fish, and swore like sailors.  They both had saggy skin covered in tattoos while she had mad, frizzled hair and he was horrifically bald.  Apparently she was married to another person but the man with her, named Paul, was her lover.  There’s no accounting some people’s taste.

When we changed trains at Crewe the girls and I were happily esconced in our new car when Paul passed us coming down the corridor.  Suddenly something landed in my lap.  I looked down and saw a twisted up piece of paper and thought he’d dropped it, but he moved on before I could hand it back.  Unfortunately when I unfurled it, it was his name and number.

Commenced five women gagging enthusiastically and shuddering all the way to London.  They teased me to no end.

Paul the octopus looks cuddly by comparison.

Dork, History, Humor

Who Else Finds This Funny? …Anyone?

“Difficile est saturam non scribere.”
– Decimus Iunius Juvenalis

In continuing C.-is-a-history-dork news, I’ve discovered an entire internet meme genre I didn’t know existed, based on the Bayeux Tapestry.  How could I not have known of this?!

Oh, remember when this was a sassy comeback? In the 11th century?

Ye Olde CSI
Fresh Prince of Bel Air-ford.
The pun appropriately named Sir Mix-a-Lot.
J. likes Soviet Russia jokes.
My favorite! An old childhood computer game, "The Canterbury Trails!"
Books, Family, History, Humor

For My Future Spawn: History

“History: gossip well-told.”
– Elbert Hubbard

Hands down my favorite family holiday was trekking along this thing. Glean from this confession what you will.

In case you forgot, I love history.  I find it fascinating.  I joyfully memorized dates in school and wrote fantastic papers.  Not that I had a hope or prayer of doing otherwise – my family’s library is a massive thing divided into Theology, my father’s collection of Modern Library first editions, classics, children/young adult literature, and history with an emphasis in the development of Western Culture.  Our family vacations are not to theme parks as much as hiking Hadrian’s Wall, Normandy, Colonial Williamsburg, museums, castles, palaces, and ruins (true story about how all four kids, aged 20, 14, 12, and 10 climbed all over a Roman fort that was partially submerged in a stream looking for the carved symbols hidden at the base meant to protect it – which may or may not have been relief carvings of genitalia – because it was something we had never seen before in our many adventures in various Roman piles of rocks) .  We are DORKS.

And everyone knows the best way to grow a dork is to start young!  Ergo I bring you, Horrible Histories: a humorous, outrageous, and engrossing (emphasis on the “gross”) medium for bringing history to the masses.  “It’s history, with all the horrible bits left in.”  Timelines, explanations, and facts interspersed with tidbits of the unusual, gory, or just plain bizarre.  And Britishly funny!

Titles such as The Savage Stone Age (Horrible Histories), Villainous Victorians (Horrible Histories), and The Vicious Vikings and the Measly Middle Ages (Horrible Histories) virtually speak for themselves.  Illustrated by the delightful Martin Brown and others, there are puns, jokes, incredible stories, side-splitting captions, and all manner of fun.  I’d recommend them to anyone who wants to stuff their kids’ heads with something without the child catching on to the parent’s nefarious scheme to make them enjoy getting smarter.  You can buy them on the cheap, often starting as low as $.01 on Amazon, I already own a sizable (and growing) collection that still makes me laugh.

It’s history, almost as if told by Monty Python.  Oh, I own that too.
Terry Jones’ Medieval Lives

Books, Fail, Food, Humor, University, Work

The Fighting Quail

“Remember, kids, the Quail Call is not a toy!”
– Quailman (Doug)

Once upon a time, Margot began working in the university library in the Children/Young Adult  Literature section.  I take some credit for helping her get this job as one of the questions they asked her was, “What books are you currently reading?”  She responded with a book I’d lent her, entitled “I, Lucifer” (click for Amazon link).  Which, as you may have guessed, is not a children’s book, but absolutely fantastic.  But apparently she was the only person who didn’t say something like, “The Berenstain Bears,” “The Magic Schoolbus,” or “The Three Little Kittens,” and she got the job because of individuality (not to mention brilliance.  She’s annoying like that).

And I’m so glad she did because that meant she could share this gem (which pops up on library computers when an error occurs) with us!

See? Doesn't this make you happy?

I personally think we should set this up on all campus servers (particularly the parking system and its annoying offspring computer problems).  Wouldn’t seeing this make your technical issue so much less aggravating?  I think all universities should offer some sort of equivalent, though some mascots should not be used (such, as Pinto pointed out, a duck).

Also, the Fail Quail unintentionally reminds me of my youth:

Quail Man