I love the dollar store. Where else can you find wonderful Engrish products like these? Click to enlarge! (The last one didn’t come out very well, but if you squint at the full-size version you can make it out.)

Benign Girl	Seabed Worid Lamp Lighting Move	Plane crashing into WTC

I have such quick-thinking and witty friends! Here are two imagined conversations.

Evil Audiologist: You don’t sound like you have a hearing problem.
oihanen: Well, you don’t sound like you have a stupid bitch problem.

Here’s the other:

Idiot Parent: So, are you still in training to be an interpreter?
Dan: So, are you still in charm school?

I found the very interesting (but rather incomplete) Google Hacks page, and the Google Talk hack looked like fun: “Ever wondered what Google would say if it could talk? Wonder no more. Enter three or four words and Google will finish your thoughts by searching for what comes next after these words.” So I went to Google Talk and entered my first three words as do you think. Here is the result, click to enlarge:

Bwahahaha. This happens every day around the world, but rarely do I get to see it. This was on a mailing list from the linguistics department at George Mason University.

From: So-and-So
Subject:Subject: Master’s/Doctoral Student or Prof needed to share townhouse
I need a second person to share a townhouse in Herndon. This is a 3 level townhouse in great neighborhood (quiet, safe) in Herndon just off the Dulles Toll Road and Fairfax County Parkway, [etc. including pictures]

From: Somebody Else
Subject: Re: Master’s/Doctoral Student or Prof needed to share townhouse
For me or for you?

From: Complete Bozo
Subject: Re: Master’s/Doctoral Student or Prof needed to share townhouse
for you, silly! i already got a house.. actually, i looked at the photos and am thinking the person who posted this is a dumbass. might want to clean the kitchen before you take those pics, asswipe.

From: Complete Bozo
Subject: Re: Master’s/Doctoral Student or Prof needed to share townhouse
biiiig whoops!! sorry!
i take it back! didn’t mean it! christ..

On my way to work yesterday morning, my Sidekick suddenly buzzed with an instant message from a friend’s account. I immediately figured out that it was her son, who is four years old.

myfriend: gfdhgrhjeghjhdghjjhgdhjhggtr
myfriend: jfdhgfjhfhrjfhhejgrjhghtogeh kthkerhkfgrhhghjehghjethejyhguhr
myself: Hi LittleBoy!
myfriend: hi
myself: How are you?
myfriend: green juice
myself: Yummy!
myfriend: fine
myfriend: how are you
myself: I am very good, thank you!
myfriend: myfriend signed off at 7:53 am.

Isn’t that adorable?! It turns out that “green juice” is Odwalla’s Super Food drink, which I have never had. His mother reports that it tastes like bananas, but she doesn’t like it - just her son! But is that an awesome conversation or what? He identified that I was talking to him and even responded appropriately. And sure, kids can do that in person, but I wasn’t in front of him - this was just instant messaging. Whee!

I am so oblivious! As I was walking in this morning, one of my deaf clients waved me over and introduced me to his sons. (Today is Family Day, there are lots of activities and games and very little work gets done.) I said hello, nice to meet you, etc. and then my client said “You know their mom, right?” No… “You don’t know their mom?” No… “You don’t know who their mom is?” By this point I was thinking maybe he was using some bizarre new sign and wasn’t saying mom at all, because how could I have known who their mom is? So he told me her name…and she’s another one of our deaf clients! In all this time working here I never once connected their last names, even though it’s not a common name. She came up and hugged one of her sons while I told what her husband had just said to me, so we all had a good laugh at how I never realized the two of them were married.

I was given a new name sign today. This was rather perplexing to me, because I already have a name sign. I went to happy hour after the conference concluded (I wasn’t sure I wanted to socialize, but I didn’t want the event to be over just yet) and I met several new people. I told them my name, and had to repeat it several times for each of them because “Meredith” is hard to catch the first time if you’re not familiar with it as a name. (I think the people who get it right the first time are people who already know other Merediths.) I gave my name sign as well, but didn’t make a big thing of it.

Somebody else joined our table later, and said “who are you?” I said “I’m a ghost!” and he said “well what a lovely ghost.” He told me his name, and I told him mine. I had to spell it a couple of times for him, and before I could show him my name sign he announced that just using “M-R” was easier. I’m not sure I like being called Mister! But he used it again when I left. Very weird.

My alumni giving association has put out the best “give us money” letter I have ever seen. The envelope had the phrase “Had your fill of winter blahs?” in fake handwriting on the cover, but it was the inside that made it so cool. Note that I have typed this in verbatim.
(more…)

Have you ever noticed that when you really need to pee, the closer you get to the toilet the more urgent the need becomes? I hate that!

---

Here is an example of my wife’s sense of humor. This is from an actual incident that happened when she was not more than five years old, but she wrote it just this morning.

CHUCK THE HAMMSTAIR HE WANTED TO DRIVE THE TONKA TRUCK HE SED SO AND SO I PUT HIM IN THE DRIVER SEAT AND HE WENT VROOM VROOM AND HE DROVE AROUND VROOM VROOM SUM MORE AND I FIGURED WHEN HE IS DONE HE WILL GET OUT THE TRUCK BUT HE DID NOT WANNA COME OUT SO DADDY HADDA GET A SAW AND HE SAW OFF THE TOP OF THE TRUCK AND THEN CHUCK CAME OUT AND HE HAD FUN BECAUSE HE LIKES DRIVING TRUCKS THE END

I love her so much!

I was catching up on some old reading and read the Washington Post magazine article The Red Sea. A lot of it was disturbing to me, because of things like two of the most prominent high-rises in Oklahoma City lighting their windows at night in the shape of a cross. But this quote amused me:

“I’m proud to say we’re against the Lion’s Den [an adult store in Abilene], and that we don’t like that kind of pornography.” He shouldn’t have to wonder how to explain to his granddaughters what goes on next door.

So, Mr. Bruce Owen, what kind of pornography do you like?