Todd Stadler's blog

Fake but short dialogue

Skinny guy: Jumpin' Jehoshaphat! You're incredibly obese!

Fat guy: Hm. Must've been something I ate.

ROTFESL

My friend Gerry has a wife, Wai Yee, who is Malaysian. Though they met and married while she was working in America, she is currently back in Malaysia, wrapping up her job, with the intent of moving to the States permanently in a little while.

So it was that while she was visiting Portland for a short trip this summer, someone asked Wai Yee, "So, are you here for good now?"

To which Wai Yee replied, with a wonderfully straight face, "No, this time for evil."

Which makes me wonder if one way to consistently be funny is simply to find a language's idiomatic expressions confusing or odd.

I've certainly done my part to amuse people in a foreign (for me) language. One time in Mexico, I tried to talk to someone about cogiendo un tren — which five years of high school Spanish and several years of forgetting same led me to believe had something to do with catching a train.

As it turns out, the action I mentioned performing with a train that I actually conveyed to that surprised Mexican was not a subject that any of my Spanish teachers had ever brought up {clears throat}.

Pun contest!

For some reason, I recently found myself reading the BBC's Magazine Monitor, whatever that is, and I came across the Punorama entry form, with the following instructions:

The rules are straightforward — we choose a story which has been in the news, and invite you to create an original punning headline for it.

The story for this week is the inventor who has come up with a pedal-powered washing machine. Alex Gadsden, a keen cyclist, designed the machine in an attempt to improve his fitness while keeping fit.

Well, no one likes a pun more than I (my favorite sandwich is the punino — you might even call me a punivore!), so here are my entries for the Punorama contest, which you will be sad to know I didn't actually submit:

• Rinse Cycle [this is the obvious choice, no?]
• Inventor Of Cycle-Powered Washing Machine Is Out Standing In Field
• Pedal (Which Sounds Like "Petal", Which Is Part Of A Flower) Power!
• Washing Ma-Schwinn™
• Spic and Spandex Shorts
• A Laundry Basketcase!
• Washing Ma-Shimano™ (Components)
• Stacked Washer/Tire Combo
• Giving His Bike Wheels A Whirl(pool™)
• Surf(actant)'s Up! [Admittedly, this works better if the washing machine is surfing-board-powered, but that invention is left as an exercise for the reader]
• Tour De Tergent
• Starch Trek™
• Human-Powered Laundry (But It's Not By The Chinese!)
• Clothes Washed By Hamstring [as opposed to "by hand" — trust me, this is clever]
• Cleanondale™
• Set This Washing Machine On "Bicycle"!
• Downy™ Tube
• A Bicycle Built For Two Medium Laundry Loads
• Laundro-hel-met
• Washing Clothes By Hand(lebars)
• This Man Is A Washing Machine (Literally! ... Well, Sort Of)
• Machine Wash, Seventh Gear
• Greg LeMondromat

Note to the random reader who does not know me: yes, I know most of these are painfully stupid. Thanks.

A series of unfortunate puns

Suzanne at work pointed at the silver circle around my finger and asked, "Is that your wedding band [1) a flat ring worn to denote that one is married, and 2) a musical group that plays at a wedding]?"

"Well," I replied, "not really. The full band [a group of musicians] would also have horns [1) brass wind instruments, and 2) bony protrusions]."

"Oh," she said, slowly. "So then that, on your finger, is ... ?"

"This," I said, relishing things more than I probably should have, "is just the ringmaster [the leader of a performance, including perhaps of a band]."

I expectorated better of you

In my mind, I am a rather effective force for public good, pointing out loudly and clearly when someone in my sight has done something stupid or offensive, and thereby shaming them into stopping or correcting their behavior.

So it was that yesterday, when I saw public mores being transgressed, I had the perfect idea of how I would handle the situation — all in my mind, you understand. I would walk right up to the man who had just spit on the sidewalk and say to him, "Excuse me sir, but you dropped your saliva."

Supplication

At work, our administrative assistant sends out emails every Wednesday asking people if they need any supplies. As this is a repetitive task, she has taken to reminding people in poetry to email their pen and paper needs.

Feeling a need for something different, I composed an acrostic for next week's email:

Somewhere
Under all those
Piles of paper is a
Passion for something more.
Live life bereft no longer!
I will fill that void.
Email me your needed
Supplies.

I realize that the degree to which this is interesting is only matched by the frequency with which I post items here, but hey.