Assorted comments

[James A. Landau <JJJRLandau@netscape.com>]

On Wed, 8 Apr 2009 19:43:40 Zulu minus 0400  "Baker, John" <JMB at STRADLEY.COM>
quoted:

<q>A slightly different version was used in the original book of the same name, ostensibly by S. Morgenstern but really by William Goldman:

"He'll never catch up!" the Sicilian cried.  "Inconceivable!"

"You keep using that word!"  the Spaniard snapped.  "I don't think it
means what you think it does."
</q>

As in "a barren woman is inconceivable, impregnable, and unbearable"?

As for "bird" meaning "penis", I heard a dirty joke based on that meaning at a job I worked in 1967.  A little boy walking on the beach sees a man whose penis is sticking out of his swimming trunks.

"What’s that?" the little boy asks.

"That’s my bird, " the man replies…

If "pajaro" [literally "bird"] is used to mean "penis" in Spanish, then there is an unfortunately double-entendre, since "Las Man~anitas", the common Spanish birthday song, has the line "All the little birds are singing"

About Obama’s “unscheduled” visit to Iraq, I think a man named Sandip (who is under the delusion that he knows enough English to do crossword puzzles) had the best comment.  During a test run he typed into the computer "FZ AF1/007 F18/L …" which is controller talk for "the President is flying in an F-18 fighter and his flight has the computer identification number 007".  As the test log stated, "Sandip has to keep himself amused".



           James A. Landau
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