Saturday, August 2, 2008

Name My Smutty Font's Colon for Triple Word Score

Weekends are the perfect, lazy time for inflicting (I mean sharing) my collected curiosities.

1) Proving words have power, in several African countries, Scrabble is a prestigious national sport. And these intrepid word lovers play in a foreign tongue!

2) A New Zealand family judge takes pity on a 9 year-old calling herself K rather than the given name her wacked-out parents selected: Talula Does The Hula From Hawaii. Read about other disgraces from the annals of baby naming.

3) The Greeks used them as question marks, but Poe declared himself mortified by printers using too many semicolons. Vonnegut disdained them as ivory tower puffery, and legendary NYC mayor Fiorello LaGuardia mocked any egghead bureaucrat as a 'semicolon boy.' In Slate, Paul Collins asks: Has Modern Life Killed the Semicolon?

4) The Telegraph reports that within a 10th century codex, researchers believe they've discovered Britain's oldest recorded joke. It reads: “What hangs at a man’s thigh and wants to poke the hole that it’s often poked before?’ Answer: A key.” Other examples of ancient yuks include Egyptian ribaldry and Sumerian fart jokes. Dirty jokes, puns, and toilet humor are evergreen.

5) Fellow font geeks will love this skit from College Humor. The Fonts Council is heatedly debating whether Zapf Dingbats should be extended membership when evil Ransom kidnaps Courier and sweet little Curlz MT. Luckily, Windings knows the location of the villain's lair. "...Mouse-Scissors-Bomb...mailbox! Mailbox! MAILBOX!!!" Oh, the fontmanity.

3 comments:

Terrie Farley Moran said...

Clare,

What a fabulous post!

The African scrabble players (in French, yet) are extraordinary!

Good for the judge.

I still use semicolons;I like them.

Bawdy humor has a long history. Why am I not surprised.

Had to watch the video several times as my own laughter blocked out some of the dialogue!

Thanks for a happy Saturday post.

Terrie

Clare2e said...

My humble service is its own reward :)

Reb said...

I agree with Terrie; fabulous post.

That video was hilarious.