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wanted: Harem guard story

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Ignatios Souvatzis

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Oct 30, 2006, 7:46:49 AM10/30/06
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Hello,

I seem to recall having read a story featuring The Last Man and The
Last Woman on earth after The Big Catastrophe, where The Last Woman
is eager to (ahem) re-create mankind while The Last Man isn't.
It turns out that he was neutered before he started his former job
as a harem guard.

The author might be Robert Sheckley, Isaac Asimov or somebody else.
The title is something like "This doesn't bother me", which is also
the central theme of the last paragraph.
The story is very short, maybe one page in print.

Does anybody remember it? Who is the author?

Regards,
-is

Dorothy J Heydt

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Oct 30, 2006, 8:51:31 AM10/30/06
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In article <slrnekbt1p....@marie.beverly.kleinbus.org>,

I don't know that one, but there's a short-short called
"Khartoum" (reference to a dirty limerick) in which the aliens,
having wiped out most of mankind, get the last man and the last
woman alone in a room and expect them to breed. "Tough," the
woman says, revealing that he is a cross-dressing gay man.
"Maybe not," the man says, revealing that she is a cross-dressing
lesbian. That one's by Anthony Boucher.

Dorothy J. Heydt
Albany, California
djh...@kithrup.com

corbe...@juno.com

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Oct 30, 2006, 9:10:27 AM10/30/06
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> "Maybe not," the man says, revealing that she is a cross-dressing
> lesbian. That one's by Anthony Boucher.

"Maybe" is a very appropriate word here. The action can be done, but
neither will enjoy it much.

BTW, does the story explicitely state that the aliens were fooled by
the appearances? Maybe they knew all along which one was which, and not
caring a whit about humans' dress codes or sexual preferences, put an
objectively viable breeding pair together.

corbe...@juno.com

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Oct 30, 2006, 9:26:01 AM10/30/06
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Back in early 80's I read a short post-holocaust story (no idea when
it was written) in which the only survivors are a woman, a young man
and an old man. Two men get into a long argument over who gets to stay
and breed with the woman; all assume that the other man would not be
able to stand it and would have to leave. The old man argues that with
his superior education and experience he'll be able to teach children
more; the young man argues that he will be around to help the woman and
the children longer. Eventually the old man either kills the young one,
or tricks him into something suicidal -- I don't remember which.

Now, it was probably not the author's intention, but the story filled
me with a deep sense of frustration. "What fucking morons!" I was
thinking. "Don't they understand they are BOTH needed? To raise the
woman's and children's survival chances from none to slim, not to
mention for genetic diversity?" Apparently the idea of a woman
happily living with two men either never occurred to the author, or
he/she assumed it would not occur to the audience.

Dorothy J Heydt

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Oct 30, 2006, 10:17:54 AM10/30/06
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In article <1162217427....@i42g2000cwa.googlegroups.com>,

<corbe...@juno.com> wrote:
>> "Maybe not," the man says, revealing that she is a cross-dressing
>> lesbian. That one's by Anthony Boucher.
>
>"Maybe" is a very appropriate word here. The action can be done, but
>neither will enjoy it much.

Their attitude seemed to be, rather, along the line of "well,
this will be something new and different."

>
>BTW, does the story explicitely state that the aliens were fooled by
>the appearances? Maybe they knew all along which one was which, and not
>caring a whit about humans' dress codes or sexual preferences, put an
>objectively viable breeding pair together.

Well, you know, a short-short whose effect depends on its
surprise gotcha and its (veiled) reference to a dirty limerick in
the days when no way you could quote such a thing in print, is
not going to have much depth in the way of either world-building
or characterization.

My own reaction was to wonder whether they would be willing to
reproduce the human race under the rule of such ruthless aliens.

r.r...@thevine.net

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Oct 30, 2006, 10:55:01 AM10/30/06
to

Well, from the set-up, it sounds like the author didn't particularly
care what she thought. And I have wondered what would happen in these
sorts of stories if it turns out that the woman that the aliens
capture is young, beautiful, eager and willing... but infertile.

Rebecca

corbe...@juno.com

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Oct 30, 2006, 11:24:07 AM10/30/06
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> > Apparently the idea of a woman
> >happily living with two men either never occurred to the author, or
> >he/she assumed it would not occur to the audience.
>
> Well, from the set-up, it sounds like the author didn't particularly
> care what she thought.

Rephrase the above, then. "The idea of two men happily sharing a woman
never occured to the author." Which is equally stupid.

> And I have wondered what would happen in these
> sorts of stories if it turns out that the woman that the aliens
> capture is young, beautiful, eager and willing... but infertile.

I believe the relevant animal husbandry term in such situation is
"culling" ;-)

Dan Goodman

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Oct 30, 2006, 11:26:23 AM10/30/06
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Ignatios Souvatzis wrote:

It _might_ be this one:
Title: I Don't Mind
Author: Ron Smith
Year: 1956

Publications:

* The Magazine of Fantasy and Science Fiction, October 1956 (1956 ,
$0.35, 130pp) Cover: Frank Kelly Freas
* The Best from Fantasy and Science Fiction, Sixth Series (1957 ,
Doubleday, $3.50, 255pp, hc) Cover: Dick Shelton
* The Best from Fantasy and Science Fiction, Sixth Series (1962 ,
Ace, #F-131, $0.40, 254pp, pb)
* The Best from Fantasy and Science Fiction, Sixth Series (1968 ,
Ace, #G-715, $0.50, 254pp, pb)


--
Dan Goodman
All political parties die at last of swallowing their own lies.
John Arbuthnot (1667-1735), Scottish writer, physician.
Journal http://dsgood.livejournal.com
Links http://del.icio.us/dsgood
Political http://www.dailykos.com/user/dsgood

Message has been deleted

Gary R. Schmidt

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Oct 30, 2006, 6:51:06 PM10/30/06
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The Limerick is hardly dirty, more a bit rumpled:
Once a Pansy who lived in Khartoum,
Took a Lesbian up to his room.
Where they argued a lot,
About who would do what,
And with which, and how, and to whom.

Cheers,
Gary B-)

--
______________________________________________________________________________
Armful of chairs: Something some people would not know
whether you were up them with or not
- Barry Humphries

Dorothy J Heydt

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Oct 30, 2006, 7:45:19 PM10/30/06
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In article <bofi14-...@paranoia.mcleod-schmidt.id.au>,
Gary R. Schmidt <grsc...@acm.org> wrote:

>Dorothy J Heydt wrote:
>>
>> I don't know that one, but there's a short-short called
>> "Khartoum" (reference to a dirty limerick) in which the aliens,
>> having wiped out most of mankind, get the last man and the last
>> woman alone in a room and expect them to breed. "Tough," the
>> woman says, revealing that he is a cross-dressing gay man.
>> "Maybe not," the man says, revealing that she is a cross-dressing
>> lesbian. That one's by Anthony Boucher.
>>
>The Limerick is hardly dirty, more a bit rumpled:

>Once a Pansy who lived in Khartoum,
>Took a Lesbian up to his room.
>Where they argued a lot,
>About who would do what,
>And with which, and how, and to whom.

In 1955, when the story first saw light, THAT was a DIRTY
limerick. Which is why Boucher couldn't quote it (though, as you
observe, it's even shorter than the story), but merely make an
obscure reference to it.

I don't know how old you are, but I'm gonna guess that in 1955
you were either a little kid before whom such things would never,
never be mentioned, or not born yet.

The public attitude has changed, during my lifetime of 64 years
and counting, in ways younger people cannot even begin to
comprehend.

Consider the repeated discussions we've had on this and other
groups, about the unquestioned assumption, pre-1970s or so, that
a woman wearing glasses was _ipso facto_ ugly, which defect could
be instantly repaired by taking them off. That wasn't just in
the movies: that was in life. I lived through that.

Or the similar assumption that on the day a woman celebrated, no,
endured her thirtieth birthday, she became an old hag.

Or the one about how being married to the sleaziest jerk
imaginable was better than being single.

Walter Bushell

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Oct 30, 2006, 8:51:39 PM10/30/06
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In article <J7z63...@kithrup.com>,

Or that breathing while black could get you hanged, but an informal posy
who would grin for the cameras.

--
Divided we stand!

Howard Brazee

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Oct 30, 2006, 9:18:45 PM10/30/06
to
On Mon, 30 Oct 2006 15:17:54 GMT, djh...@kithrup.com (Dorothy J
Heydt) wrote:

>My own reaction was to wonder whether they would be willing to
>reproduce the human race under the rule of such ruthless aliens.

Human history says yes.

Gene Ward Smith

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Oct 30, 2006, 9:45:34 PM10/30/06
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Gary R. Schmidt wrote:
:
> Once a Pansy who lived in Khartoum,
> Took a Lesbian up to his room.
> Where they argued a lot,
> About who would do what,
> And with which, and how, and to whom.

I like the version I recall better:

There once was a queer from Khartoum
Who took a lesbian up to his room
And they argued all night
Over who had the right
To do what, and with what, and to whom.

Note that "whom" here is being used in less than formal diction.

Lawrence Watt-Evans

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Oct 30, 2006, 10:38:37 PM10/30/06
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On Tue, 31 Oct 2006 00:45:19 GMT, djh...@kithrup.com (Dorothy J
Heydt) wrote:

>In article <bofi14-...@paranoia.mcleod-schmidt.id.au>,
>Gary R. Schmidt <grsc...@acm.org> wrote:
>>>
>>The Limerick is hardly dirty, more a bit rumpled:
>
>>Once a Pansy who lived in Khartoum,
>>Took a Lesbian up to his room.
>>Where they argued a lot,
>>About who would do what,
>>And with which, and how, and to whom.
>
>In 1955, when the story first saw light, THAT was a DIRTY
>limerick. Which is why Boucher couldn't quote it (though, as you
>observe, it's even shorter than the story), but merely make an
>obscure reference to it.

Thing is, if you're familiar with the work of Gershon Legman you'll
know that there were far dirtier limericks than that around at the
time, some of them unspeakably filthy. You just couldn't publish
them.

There were seriously obscene limericks around in the 19th century, for
that matter.

--
My webpage is at http://www.watt-evans.com
The second issue of Helix is at http://www.helixsf.com
A new Ethshar novel is being serialized at http://www.ethshar.com/thevondishambassador1.html

Walter Bushell

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Oct 30, 2006, 11:17:02 PM10/30/06
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In article <1162262734....@k70g2000cwa.googlegroups.com>,

No, it's the object of "to" and hence objective case.

--
Divided we stand!

Dorothy J Heydt

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Oct 30, 2006, 11:30:58 PM10/30/06
to
In article <t4hdk29r4vtrb53da...@news.rcn.com>,

Lawrence Watt-Evans <l...@sff.net> wrote:
>On Tue, 31 Oct 2006 00:45:19 GMT, djh...@kithrup.com (Dorothy J
>Heydt) wrote:
>
>>In 1955, when the story first saw light, THAT was a DIRTY
>>limerick. Which is why Boucher couldn't quote it (though, as you
>>observe, it's even shorter than the story), but merely make an
>>obscure reference to it.
>
>Thing is, if you're familiar with the work of Gershon Legman you'll
>know that there were far dirtier limericks than that around at the
>time, some of them unspeakably filthy. You just couldn't publish
>them.

Oh certainly, but as you say, they didn't get published. For the
purposes of us who were simply reading science fiction, whatever
was below the publishable level didn't exist, so any gradations
in dirtiness within it didn't count.

Gene Ward Smith

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Oct 31, 2006, 12:26:23 AM10/31/06
to

It's also a limerick. Duh.

lal_truckee

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Oct 31, 2006, 12:57:09 AM10/31/06
to
Lawrence Watt-Evans wrote:
>
>
> There were seriously obscene limericks around in the 19th century, for
> that matter.

But none earlier - just ask anyone who was there...

Joe Bednorz

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Oct 31, 2006, 2:57:23 AM10/31/06
to

That explains the scene in the movie "Loaded Weapon 1" (1993) where
Allyce Beasley takes off her glasses - and turns into Kathy Ireland.


> That wasn't just in the movies: that was in life. I lived through that.


Apparently any woman in business was also ugly, or maybe sexless. As
illustrated in "It Walks in Beauty" by Chan Davis, from 1958:

<http://www.scifi.com/scifiction/classics/classics_archive/davis/davis1.html>

I read that recently. The point of the story passed over my head at
high speed. The story read well, it just didn't make any sense.


--
Tens of gigabytes of Free SF and more online:
<http://www.mindspring.com/~jbednorz/Free/>

All the best, Joe Bednorz

Gary R. Schmidt

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Oct 31, 2006, 7:29:23 AM10/31/06
to
Dorothy J Heydt wrote:

> In article <bofi14-...@paranoia.mcleod-schmidt.id.au>,
> Gary R. Schmidt <grsc...@acm.org> wrote:
>
>>Dorothy J Heydt wrote:
>>
>>>I don't know that one, but there's a short-short called
>>>"Khartoum" (reference to a dirty limerick) in which the aliens,
>>>having wiped out most of mankind, get the last man and the last
>>>woman alone in a room and expect them to breed. "Tough," the
>>>woman says, revealing that he is a cross-dressing gay man.
>>>"Maybe not," the man says, revealing that she is a cross-dressing
>>>lesbian. That one's by Anthony Boucher.
>>>
>>
>>The Limerick is hardly dirty, more a bit rumpled:
>
>
>>Once a Pansy who lived in Khartoum,
>>Took a Lesbian up to his room.
>>Where they argued a lot,
>>About who would do what,
>>And with which, and how, and to whom.
>
>
> In 1955, when the story first saw light, THAT was a DIRTY
> limerick. Which is why Boucher couldn't quote it (though, as you
> observe, it's even shorter than the story), but merely make an
> obscure reference to it.
>
> I don't know how old you are, but I'm gonna guess that in 1955
> you were either a little kid before whom such things would never,
> never be mentioned, or not born yet.

Or lived somewhere that was *not* as straight-laced as the USA in that
period.

Many English-speaking societies did not (and *do* not) suffer the taboos
which the USA puts upon itself.

For instance, I have a (shellac) record with the track "Let's all be
Fairies" on it, originally pressed in the 1930's and considered quite
unremarkable at the time, and it is most *certainly* not about those who
are found at the bottom of the garden!! Not necessarily a record you
would play when the Vicar was calling, but certainly acceptable at a party.

You usually aren't so parochial, remember that until quite recently US
culture was not as accessible to the rest of the world, _or_ as dominating.

(In many countries the word "toilet" has always been acceptable on
broadcast media. Is that one allowed on US TV/radio yet? It has always
amused me that it was (reported as) not.)

Dorothy J Heydt

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Oct 31, 2006, 8:56:38 AM10/31/06
to
In article <dbvdk2d81s4tmn60n...@4ax.com>,

Joe Bednorz <inv...@invalid.invalid> wrote:
>On Tue, 31 Oct 2006 00:45:19 GMT, Dorothy J Heydt wrote:
>
>>Consider the repeated discussions we've had on this and other
>>groups, about the unquestioned assumption, pre-1970s or so, that
>>a woman wearing glasses was _ipso facto_ ugly, which defect could
>>be instantly repaired by taking them off.
>
> That explains the scene in the movie "Loaded Weapon 1" (1993) where
>Allyce Beasley takes off her glasses - and turns into Kathy Ireland.

Exactly, only that was a fairly recent movie, so it was parodying
the idea? I assume ... haven't seen it.


>
>> That wasn't just in the movies: that was in life. I lived through that.
>
> Apparently any woman in business was also ugly, or maybe sexless. As
>illustrated in "It Walks in Beauty" by Chan Davis, from 1958:

Any indication that a woman was competent made her ugly or maybe
sexless. That was why glasses made her ugly: it meant she read a
lot, and therefore was intelligent, and therefore no man would
want her. The fragility of the male ego was not only more severe
than now, it was more thoroughly supported by the culture.

>
><http://www.scifi.com/scifiction/classics/classics_archive/davis/davis1.html>
>
> I read that recently. The point of the story passed over my head at
>high speed. The story read well, it just didn't make any sense.

Well, I just looked at the beginning of that ... it's hellishly
difficult to read, with two-thirds of each line vanishing before
that dark background. I'll try to look at it again later.

Joe Bednorz

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Oct 31, 2006, 9:20:06 AM10/31/06
to
On Tue, 31 Oct 2006 13:56:38 GMT, Dorothy J Heydt wrote:

>In article <dbvdk2d81s4tmn60n...@4ax.com>,
>Joe Bednorz <inv...@invalid.invalid> wrote:
>>On Tue, 31 Oct 2006 00:45:19 GMT, Dorothy J Heydt wrote:
>>
>>>Consider the repeated discussions we've had on this and other
>>>groups, about the unquestioned assumption, pre-1970s or so, that
>>>a woman wearing glasses was _ipso facto_ ugly, which defect could
>>>be instantly repaired by taking them off.
>>
>> That explains the scene in the movie "Loaded Weapon 1" (1993) where
>>Allyce Beasley takes off her glasses - and turns into Kathy Ireland.
>
>Exactly, only that was a fairly recent movie, so it was parodying
>the idea? I assume ... haven't seen it.

Parodying, yes. So I assume as well. Otherwise the scene doesn't
make a lot of sense. It seemed fairly weak as a joke before, much
stronger with your interpretation.

>>
>>> That wasn't just in the movies: that was in life. I lived through that.
>>
>> Apparently any woman in business was also ugly, or maybe sexless. As
>>illustrated in "It Walks in Beauty" by Chan Davis, from 1958:
>
>Any indication that a woman was competent made her ugly or maybe
>sexless. That was why glasses made her ugly: it meant she read a
>lot, and therefore was intelligent, and therefore no man would
>want her. The fragility of the male ego was not only more severe
>than now, it was more thoroughly supported by the culture.

Fascinating.

>>
>><http://www.scifi.com/scifiction/classics/classics_archive/davis/davis1.html>
>>
>> I read that recently. The point of the story passed over my head at
>>high speed. The story read well, it just didn't make any sense.
>
>Well, I just looked at the beginning of that ... it's hellishly
>difficult to read, with two-thirds of each line vanishing before
>that dark background. I'll try to look at it again later.
>

Sorry about that. I use Opera, which has a button that turns all that
stuff off and renders the page as black letters on white background, no
background image, one font, etc. It's called user-mode. (All it lacks
is automatically sending a scathing email to web master.) The font and
background color may be user-selectable as well.

It's a triumph over modern technology. I run a very old version of
Opera that's fast and light on my 400MHz PIII laptop. All versions of
Opera are available for free, including the latest bloated monstrosity.

Joe Bednorz

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Oct 31, 2006, 9:48:12 AM10/31/06
to
On Tue, 31 Oct 2006 13:56:38 GMT, Dorothy J Heydt wrote:

>In article <dbvdk2d81s4tmn60n...@4ax.com>,
>Joe Bednorz <inv...@invalid.invalid> wrote:
>>On Tue, 31 Oct 2006 00:45:19 GMT, Dorothy J Heydt wrote:
>>
>>>Consider the repeated discussions we've had on this and other
>>>groups, about the unquestioned assumption, pre-1970s or so, that
>>>a woman wearing glasses was _ipso facto_ ugly, which defect could
>>>be instantly repaired by taking them off.
>>
>> That explains the scene in the movie "Loaded Weapon 1" (1993) where
>>Allyce Beasley takes off her glasses - and turns into Kathy Ireland.
>
>Exactly, only that was a fairly recent movie, so it was parodying
>the idea? I assume ... haven't seen it.
>

Yes. Allyce Beasley was a Plain Jane. Kathy Ireland was a super
model / swimsuit model, capable of beautiful placid vacuity on demand,
with an emotional range reaching all the way from languid to vapid, and
an intensity rarely seen outside of opium dens. She has the unnerving
ability to make Quaalude-soaked Valium-poppers seemed hyper.

Jaimie Vandenbergh

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Oct 31, 2006, 9:54:08 AM10/31/06
to
On Tue, 31 Oct 2006 13:56:38 GMT, djh...@kithrup.com (Dorothy J
Heydt) wrote:

>><http://www.scifi.com/scifiction/classics/classics_archive/davis/davis1.html>
>>
>> I read that recently. The point of the story passed over my head at
>>high speed. The story read well, it just didn't make any sense.
>
>Well, I just looked at the beginning of that ... it's hellishly
>difficult to read, with two-thirds of each line vanishing before
>that dark background. I'll try to look at it again later.

I find that I have to shrink my browser horizontally to get the text
away from the dark part of the background. If that doesn't work for
you, you might find that edit/select-all (or just ctrl-a) will help
enormously. If not, than follow the select-all up with a Copy and
paste it into the text processing app of your choice.

Cheers - Jaimie
--
Whilst holidaying with the sprogs and watching Favourite Teddy Bear
trundling through the x-ray, I speculated on the fun that could be had
with a teddy bear containing a radio-opaque teddy-bear skeleton.
- K, asr

Dorothy J Heydt

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Oct 31, 2006, 10:35:35 AM10/31/06
to
In article <o6oek2trf5q13u840...@4ax.com>,

Joe Bednorz <inv...@invalid.invalid> wrote:
>On Tue, 31 Oct 2006 13:56:38 GMT, Dorothy J Heydt wrote:
>
>>In article <dbvdk2d81s4tmn60n...@4ax.com>,
>>Joe Bednorz <inv...@invalid.invalid> wrote:
>>>On Tue, 31 Oct 2006 00:45:19 GMT, Dorothy J Heydt wrote:
>>>
>>>>Consider the repeated discussions we've had on this and other
>>>>groups, about the unquestioned assumption, pre-1970s or so, that
>>>>a woman wearing glasses was _ipso facto_ ugly, which defect could
>>>>be instantly repaired by taking them off.
>>>
>>> That explains the scene in the movie "Loaded Weapon 1" (1993) where
>>>Allyce Beasley takes off her glasses - and turns into Kathy Ireland.
>>Exactly, only that was a fairly recent movie, so it was parodying
>>the idea? I assume ... haven't seen it.
>>
>
> Yes. Allyce Beasley was a Plain Jane. Kathy Ireland was a super
>model / swimsuit model, capable of beautiful placid vacuity on demand,

Hm. So you're saying that girl-with-glasses and girl-without-glasses
were played by two different actresses? Heh. I suppose that was
necessary in 1993. Back in the day, I assure you, it would have
been sufficient for the intrinsically beautiful and carefully
made-up actress to take off the glasses for the full effect.

Similarly, I remember reading a couple of years ago that to turn
a beautiful South American actress into Betty la Fea took hours
of makeup.

Jaimie Vandenbergh

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Oct 31, 2006, 10:52:59 AM10/31/06
to

Saw some posters advertising this recently, and it was immediately
obvious that Ugly Betty was actually gorgeous under the frumpy
hairdo/glasses/braces. I guess we're just better trained these days.

Closest ObSF I can think of is Adams' Somebody Else's Problem field.

Cheers - Jaimie
--
'The most merciful thing in the world, I think, is the inability of the human
mind to correlate all its contents' - H.P.Lovecraft, "The Call of Cthulhu"

Dorothy J Heydt

unread,
Oct 31, 2006, 10:46:31 AM10/31/06
to
In article <3noek21bgat8206rv...@newsposting.sessile.org>,

Jaimie Vandenbergh <jai...@sometimes.sessile.org> wrote:
>On Tue, 31 Oct 2006 13:56:38 GMT, djh...@kithrup.com (Dorothy J
>Heydt) wrote:
>
>>><http://www.scifi.com/scifiction/classics/classics_archive/davis/davis1.html>
>>>
>>> I read that recently. The point of the story passed over my head at
>>>high speed. The story read well, it just didn't make any sense.
>>
>>Well, I just looked at the beginning of that ... it's hellishly
>>difficult to read, with two-thirds of each line vanishing before
>>that dark background. I'll try to look at it again later.
>
>I find that I have to shrink my browser horizontally to get the text
>away from the dark part of the background.

Yes, I discovered that after a while.

If that doesn't work for
>you, you might find that edit/select-all (or just ctrl-a) will help
>enormously. If not, than follow the select-all up with a Copy and
>paste it into the text processing app of your choice.

Oh, that DIDN'T work. The formatting has been screwed up with
all kinds of sections and things, so that once I got it into Word
there were pages and pages unintentionally left blank, and some
of the text had a line length of four inches and some of it was
maybe ten or twenty.

But now I have read the story. My, my. This was written by a
man? in 1958??? One of the more insightful, and forward-looking,
pieces of SF I've seen. (Who was this Chad guy, of whom I never
heard before?)

But yeah, the attitude that to be a woman, a woman must be
totally sexually come-on all the time, and if she wants to read a
book, or work at an interesting job, or NOT be slavered over by
anonymous males, she must be not-really-a-woman-at-all who either
just can't compete, or has no sex drive.

There's still a lot of that around, here and there; this morning
I was looking at a site called "Undressed" which periodically
displays pictures of celebrities out in public in ridiculous
clothing. The first picture showed a young woman wearing a black
pantsuit with a white shirt, nice and plain, which *I* think
would've been just fine except for the flopsy black Dianne
Feinstein bow around the neck she was wearing with it. The
critic posting the picture first lambasted the bow, then dismissed
the rest of the outfit as "completely obscuring any vestige of
femininity she had left."

To be fair, the next photo in the set showed another young woman
displaying her femininity, or at least femaleness, for all it was
worth in a desperately cantilevered *plaid* bodice, and the
critic didn't think much of that either.

Peter Bruells

unread,
Oct 31, 2006, 11:03:00 AM10/31/06
to
djh...@kithrup.com (Dorothy J Heydt) writes:

> In article <dbvdk2d81s4tmn60n...@4ax.com>,
> Joe Bednorz <inv...@invalid.invalid> wrote:
> >On Tue, 31 Oct 2006 00:45:19 GMT, Dorothy J Heydt wrote:
> >
> >>Consider the repeated discussions we've had on this and other
> >>groups, about the unquestioned assumption, pre-1970s or so, that
> >>a woman wearing glasses was _ipso facto_ ugly, which defect could
> >>be instantly repaired by taking them off.
> >
> > That explains the scene in the movie "Loaded Weapon 1" (1993) where
> >Allyce Beasley takes off her glasses - and turns into Kathy Ireland.
>
> Exactly, only that was a fairly recent movie, so it was parodying
> the idea? I assume ... haven't seen it.


Then there's Marylin Monroe in How to Marry a Millionaire (1953),
where she believed herself to be not attrative with her glasses on,
yet found someone who insisted that she wears 'em.

Peter Bruells

unread,
Oct 31, 2006, 11:23:44 AM10/31/06
to
djh...@kithrup.com (Dorothy J Heydt) writes:

> In article <o6oek2trf5q13u840...@4ax.com>,
> Joe Bednorz <inv...@invalid.invalid> wrote:

> > Yes. Allyce Beasley was a Plain Jane. Kathy Ireland was a super
> >model / swimsuit model, capable of beautiful placid vacuity on demand,
>
> Hm. So you're saying that girl-with-glasses and girl-without-glasses
> were played by two different actresses? Heh. I suppose that was
> necessary in 1993.

Actually no. May I remind that "Loaded Weapon" is a National Lampoon
movie, which are generelly not known for subtletly. The German
expression would be "Holzhammermethode" or "Holzhammerhumor" (just
imagine getting hit with a rather large hammer made of wood), but I
don't remember the English expression right now. "In your face"?

Peter Trei

unread,
Oct 31, 2006, 11:59:01 AM10/31/06
to

"Sledgehammer humor" is probably the closest equivalent; however,
a sledgehammer can be either metal or wood.

Peter Trei

Joe Bednorz

unread,
Oct 31, 2006, 12:09:10 PM10/31/06
to


Allyce Beasley and Kathy Ireland are two completely different
actresses. (If I'm reading your post correctly as answering Dorothy's
question.)

As for necessary, it was the first time I noticed a difference in the
same girl's appearance with and without glasses. (Yes, having two
different actresses play the same role was necessary for me to notice a
difference.)

("Is it true that men don't make passes at girls who wear glasses?"
was asked in a Dear Abby column thirty-some years ago. The response was
"It depends on their frames.")

Wayne Throop

unread,
Oct 31, 2006, 12:10:32 PM10/31/06
to
: djh...@kithrup.com (Dorothy J Heydt)
: Hm. So you're saying that girl-with-glasses and girl-without-glasses

: were played by two different actresses? Heh. I suppose that was
: necessary in 1993. Back in the day, I assure you, it would have
: been sufficient for the intrinsically beautiful and carefully
: made-up actress to take off the glasses for the full effect.

Note that "the full effect" was to mock the whole concept. Like if
Superman were to put his glasses on right in front of Lois, still in his
supersuit, and she said "Clarke! Where did Superman go?" and look around
for him puzzledly.

Similar to the way Kronk never figures out Ysma is Amsy, even though she
repeatedly tells him so, and demonstrates by swapping outfits in front
of him. Only making fun of the whole concept, not just making fun of
Kronk. (This is in "The Emperor's New School", fwiw... I don't really
recommend it, but hey, I like Patrick Warburton, what can I say?)

And of course, I wonder how much of the ridiculousness of Superman's
clever disguise is due to this meme; that is, it may not have seemed
ridiculous to folks then. Hrm.


So anyways. "Loaded Weapon I" was (iirc) an over-the-top parody,
in the style of Naked Gun, Police Squad, and Scary Movie.
And, to put across the intended mockery back in the day, I think they
might have had to do something even *more* drastic than merely
having two people play the role.... heh! Though it boggles the
mind to ponder what might have been more drastic than their
choice of actresses... maybe Linda Hunt and Rebecca Romijn,
to get more height contrast. Or something. Oooh, ooh, I got it,
Hunt in her Billy Kwan outfit, and Romijn in her Mystique outfit!

I can imagine it done crudely, with a choppy scene cut, or done
smoothly with modern CGI morphing, and have the character put on and
take off the glasses several times in quick sequence. Heh.

But I digress...


Wayne Throop thr...@sheol.org http://sheol.org/throopw

Jaimie Vandenbergh

unread,
Oct 31, 2006, 12:54:15 PM10/31/06
to
On Tue, 31 Oct 2006 15:46:31 GMT, djh...@kithrup.com (Dorothy J
Heydt) wrote:

>In article <3noek21bgat8206rv...@newsposting.sessile.org>,
>Jaimie Vandenbergh <jai...@sometimes.sessile.org> wrote:
>>On Tue, 31 Oct 2006 13:56:38 GMT, djh...@kithrup.com (Dorothy J
>>Heydt) wrote:
>>
>>>><http://www.scifi.com/scifiction/classics/classics_archive/davis/davis1.html>

> If that doesn't work for


>>you, you might find that edit/select-all (or just ctrl-a) will help
>>enormously. If not, than follow the select-all up with a Copy and
>>paste it into the text processing app of your choice.
>
>Oh, that DIDN'T work. The formatting has been screwed up with
>all kinds of sections and things, so that once I got it into Word
>there were pages and pages unintentionally left blank, and some
>of the text had a line length of four inches and some of it was
>maybe ten or twenty.

My bad choice of phrasing. That's Word's fault - it thinks it
understands HTML (but is clearly wrong), so it takes the HTML off the
clipboard and makes a real mess displaying it. If you paste into
Notepad instead, all is well.

It's my standard beef with software that tries to be clever. I like my
software either dumb as rocks, or succesfully clever.

Cheers - Jaimie
--
"Shellfish are the prime cause of the decline of morals and the
adoption of an extravagant life style" -- Pliny the Elder

Mike Schilling

unread,
Oct 31, 2006, 1:11:46 PM10/31/06
to

"Dorothy J Heydt" <djh...@kithrup.com> wrote in message
news:J806q...@kithrup.com...

>
> Well, I just looked at the beginning of that ... it's hellishly
> difficult to read, with two-thirds of each line vanishing before
> that dark background.

Select the wnole thing (ctrl-A on a Windows PC). That turns all the text
into white on a blue background. And if you don't like *that*, copy it and
paste it into your favorite editor.


Dorothy J Heydt

unread,
Oct 31, 2006, 1:07:06 PM10/31/06
to
In article <ja0fk25bl8jae8ct4...@4ax.com>,

Joe Bednorz <inv...@invalid.invalid> wrote:
> Allyce Beasley and Kathy Ireland are two completely different
>actresses. (If I'm reading your post correctly as answering Dorothy's
>question.)
>
> As for necessary, it was the first time I noticed a difference in the
>same girl's appearance with and without glasses. (Yes, having two
>different actresses play the same role was necessary for me to notice a
>difference.)
>
> ("Is it true that men don't make passes at girls who wear glasses?"
>was asked in a Dear Abby column thirty-some years ago. The response was
>"It depends on their frames.")

But Dorothy Parker's poem "News Item" was written in the thirties
(I can't find a date for the poem by itself, but it appeared in
her collection _Not So Deep as a Well_, 1937). And I assure you,
back then (as well as in the 40s and 50s) it was true.

In the US anyway. I wouldn't be prepared to say about Europe.

Mike Schilling

unread,
Oct 31, 2006, 1:40:36 PM10/31/06
to

"Dorothy J Heydt" <djh...@kithrup.com> wrote in message
news:J80IB...@kithrup.com...

In the Mad Magazine parody of the movie Love Story, Ryan O'Neal tells a
friend that he has the hots for Ali McGraw because she wears such thick
glasses.

"Thick glasses? That's .. weird."

"Well, my parents were very repressed. They never talked about sex, and I
had to pick it up on the street."

"So?"

"We lived next door to an optometrist."


Gene Ward Smith

unread,
Oct 31, 2006, 3:27:58 PM10/31/06
to

Jaimie Vandenbergh wrote:

> It's my standard beef with software that tries to be clever. I like my
> software either dumb as rocks, or succesfully clever.

"Clever" software is often amazingly stupid. Any special "hot" keys
that you can bang against by accident and which do weird things such as
deleting your text or spending a lot of time doing something you don't
want done should be, at best, optional. The arrogance of programmers
makes that often not the case.

Dorothy J Heydt

unread,
Oct 31, 2006, 3:20:34 PM10/31/06
to
In article <ClM1h.6235$s6....@newssvr11.news.prodigy.com>,

As previously discussed, I was able to read it by shrinking the
window. But copying and pasting it didn't work because the
editor is Word, which (as somebody said upthread) thinks it
understands HTML but doesn't. And neither do I, so I had no way
of fixing it.

Gene Ward Smith

unread,
Oct 31, 2006, 3:34:34 PM10/31/06
to

Joe Bednorz wrote:

> Sorry about that. I use Opera, which has a button that turns all that
> stuff off and renders the page as black letters on white background, no
> background image, one font, etc. It's called user-mode. (All it lacks
> is automatically sending a scathing email to web master.) The font and
> background color may be user-selectable as well.

What a great idea! Maybe I need to shift from Firefox.

> It's a triumph over modern technology. I run a very old version of
> Opera that's fast and light on my 400MHz PIII laptop. All versions of
> Opera are available for free, including the latest bloated monstrosity.

Of course, it's only the bloated versions which would be easy to
find...one of the few nice features of IE is that it was much less of a
resource hog than Firefox; I wonder if they've now "fixed" that?

Mike Schilling

unread,
Oct 31, 2006, 3:46:29 PM10/31/06
to

"Dorothy J Heydt" <djh...@kithrup.com> wrote in message
news:J80oI...@kithrup.com...

Odd; it works fine for me in Word [1]. We must have different versions (I
have Office 2003 SP2.) It also works reasonably well in a text-only editor
(VIM), though AFAICY VIM doesn't do word-wrapping and this is annoying.

1. Both as a full HTML paste and as a "paste special" of unformatted text,
which gives a legible black-on-white text-only version.


Default User

unread,
Oct 31, 2006, 4:34:04 PM10/31/06
to
Gene Ward Smith wrote:

>
> Joe Bednorz wrote:
>
> > Sorry about that. I use Opera, which has a button that turns all
> > that stuff off and renders the page as black letters on white
> > background, no background image, one font, etc. It's called
> > user-mode. (All it lacks is automatically sending a scathing email
> > to web master.) The font and background color may be
> > user-selectable as well.
>
> What a great idea! Maybe I need to shift from Firefox.

You can do the same with Firefox. View->Style->No Style

Brian

--
If televison's a babysitter, the Internet is a drunk librarian who
won't shut up.
-- Dorothy Gambrell (http://catandgirl.com)

Joe Pfeiffer

unread,
Oct 31, 2006, 4:33:49 PM10/31/06
to
"Gene Ward Smith" <genewa...@gmail.com> writes:

> Joe Bednorz wrote:
>
> > Sorry about that. I use Opera, which has a button that turns all that
> > stuff off and renders the page as black letters on white background, no
> > background image, one font, etc. It's called user-mode. (All it lacks
> > is automatically sending a scathing email to web master.) The font and
> > background color may be user-selectable as well.
>
> What a great idea! Maybe I need to shift from Firefox.

Firefox doesn't do it in a single button, but you can set the colors
and tell it to override whatever the page wants to do.
--
Joseph J. Pfeiffer, Jr., Ph.D. Phone -- (505) 646-1605
Department of Computer Science FAX -- (505) 646-1002
New Mexico State University http://www.cs.nmsu.edu/~pfeiffer

Wayne Throop

unread,
Oct 31, 2006, 5:55:52 PM10/31/06
to
::: Joe Bednorz
::: I use Opera, which has a button that turns all that stuff off and

::: renders the page as black letters on white background, no background
::: image, one font, etc. It's called user-mode. (All it lacks is
::: automatically sending a scathing email to web master.) The font and
::: background color may be user-selectable as well.

:: "Gene Ward Smith" <genewa...@gmail.com>
:: What a great idea! Maybe I need to shift from Firefox.

: Joe Pfeiffer <pfei...@cs.nmsu.edu>
: Firefox doesn't do it in a single button, but you can set the colors


: and tell it to override whatever the page wants to do.

Meh. Lynx or links; either one works just fine. Doesn't matter what my
primary browser is, I can just select the url and click. Well... as long
as it has a location bar to select the url in, of course. Or, if I'm
using konqueror, just leftmenu->openPageIn->{whathaveyou}, where whathaveyou
can be any browser or browser-like tool.

Of course, that means you have to put up with linux
(oooooh, throw me in the briar patch wydoncha?).

Gene Ward Smith

unread,
Oct 31, 2006, 7:21:34 PM10/31/06
to

Default User wrote:
> Gene Ward Smith wrote:

> > What a great idea! Maybe I need to shift from Firefox.
>
> You can do the same with Firefox. View->Style->No Style

Thanks! Now all we need is the auto-flamer of the web page designer.

Dorothy J Heydt

unread,
Oct 31, 2006, 9:32:03 PM10/31/06
to
In article <1162326874.7...@i42g2000cwa.googlegroups.com>,

They have certainly put in a new Version 7 (which I am not using
and which my computer keeps trying to "upgrade" to). That it's
any kind ofimprovement, I seriously doubt: it's from Microsoft
after all.

Dorothy J Heydt

unread,
Oct 31, 2006, 9:33:20 PM10/31/06
to
In article <FCO1h.2264$wX....@newssvr12.news.prodigy.com>,

I have Word 2.0. Word 97 is also available to me, but I don't
use it, it's too complicated.

Howard Brazee

unread,
Oct 31, 2006, 10:07:25 PM10/31/06
to
On Tue, 31 Oct 2006 07:57:23 GMT, Joe Bednorz
<inv...@invalid.invalid> wrote:

> That explains the scene in the movie "Loaded Weapon 1" (1993) where
>Allyce Beasley takes off her glasses - and turns into Kathy Ireland.

On the other hand, in _That Touch of Mink_, Gig Young's character has
his secretary take off her glasses to fit that cliche, watches her
squint and tells her to put them back on.

r.r...@thevine.net

unread,
Oct 31, 2006, 11:13:23 PM10/31/06
to
On Tue, 31 Oct 2006 15:46:31 GMT, djh...@kithrup.com (Dorothy J
Heydt) wrote:

I've read the story, and was wondering what "jaypeed" means? I can
hazard some guesses, but I have a feeling it may have been a slang
term that has fallen out of favor since the story was written.

Rebecca

Dorothy J Heydt

unread,
Oct 31, 2006, 11:37:30 PM10/31/06
to
In article <7k7gk2lqed3d71m0q...@4ax.com>,

<r.r...@thevine.net> wrote:
>>
>I've read the story, and was wondering what "jaypeed" means? I can
>hazard some guesses, but I have a feeling it may have been a slang
>term that has fallen out of favor since the story was written.

Took me a minute to figure it out. It isn't a term that's fallen
out of favor, it's based on a practice that has become less
common, or at least less remarkable, since the story was written.

I betcha anything, it's for "J.P." standing for "Justice of the
Peace" meaning an officer of the court who could perform civil
marriages, frequently upon short notice (as distinguished from a
religious ceremony, like whosit's "real" marriage, which took
time to prepare for).

What the story is calling "J.P.ing" would otherwise be called
"shacking up," I think, or "cohabiting" or more commonly nowadays
just "living together". The point is that it's quickly,
informally, and easily arranged ... and the verb for undoing it
is "to reno." That need any explanation?

Mike Schilling

unread,
Oct 31, 2006, 11:49:40 PM10/31/06
to

"Dorothy J Heydt" <djh...@kithrup.com> wrote in message
news:J81BI...@kithrup.com...

> In article <7k7gk2lqed3d71m0q...@4ax.com>,
> <r.r...@thevine.net> wrote:
>>>
>>I've read the story, and was wondering what "jaypeed" means? I can
>>hazard some guesses, but I have a feeling it may have been a slang
>>term that has fallen out of favor since the story was written.
>
> Took me a minute to figure it out. It isn't a term that's fallen
> out of favor, it's based on a practice that has become less
> common, or at least less remarkable, since the story was written.
>
> I betcha anything, it's for "J.P." standing for "Justice of the
> Peace" meaning an officer of the court who could perform civil
> marriages, frequently upon short notice (as distinguished from a
> religious ceremony, like whosit's "real" marriage, which took
> time to prepare for).

That's my thought too.


Joe Bednorz

unread,
Nov 1, 2006, 12:47:53 AM11/1/06
to

All of the previous versions of Opera, for all OSes and all languages
are available free here:

<http://arc.opera.com/pub/opera/>

Pick your OS, then version, then language.

The version I'm running is v5.12, English for Windows:
<http://arc.opera.com/pub/opera/win/512/english/>

The version without java is only 2.2 MB. Makes FireFox look huge,
bloated, sluggish, and unstable. Seriously.


I liked it so much I paid to register it. I tried the free upgrade
when v6.0 came out and recoiled in horror.

If you want light and fast I highly recommend it.


(Always with the warning that installation of any software on a
Windows machine is fraught with peril.)


I still keep FireFox v1.5.0.2 installed as a backup browser. I've
usually found that sites that don't display properly in Opera v5.12
don't display properly in FireFox either.

r.r...@thevine.net

unread,
Nov 1, 2006, 12:31:05 AM11/1/06
to

Well, that was my thought too, but it seemed an odd term to use for
what seemed to be essentially a one-night stand event.

Rebecca

Mike Schilling

unread,
Nov 1, 2006, 12:56:57 AM11/1/06
to

<r.r...@thevine.net> wrote in message
news:s5cgk2tiosptje54v...@4ax.com...

Or a few nights or more; wosshisname was elated when wossername reno'd his
ass so she was available again.


Dorothy J Heydt

unread,
Nov 1, 2006, 1:02:41 AM11/1/06
to
In article <s5cgk2tiosptje54v...@4ax.com>,

But it's an extrapolation, look you, of the actresses,
singers/dancers, and other "celebs" of the late 1950s of running
off to Vegas or somewhere and being married by J.P.s and shortly
thereafter returning to the Silver State to get renoed.

It's more a two-week stand than a one-night stand, and it is, or
was, the projection of a trend of the 50s into the whatever
decade the story is supposed to be set in.

Joseph Nebus

unread,
Nov 1, 2006, 2:42:29 AM11/1/06
to
thr...@sheol.org (Wayne Throop) writes:

>Similar to the way Kronk never figures out Ysma is Amsy, even though she
>repeatedly tells him so, and demonstrates by swapping outfits in front
>of him. Only making fun of the whole concept, not just making fun of
>Kronk. (This is in "The Emperor's New School", fwiw... I don't really
>recommend it, but hey, I like Patrick Warburton, what can I say?)

I'd have to say ``The Emperor's New School'' is considerably
better than I was expecting, except that if I left it at that I'd
sound like I was making a crack at it. It's fairly enjoyable, though
it isn't expanding on the standard-joke-repertoire from the movie as
fast as it could.


>And of course, I wonder how much of the ridiculousness of Superman's
>clever disguise is due to this meme; that is, it may not have seemed
>ridiculous to folks then. Hrm.

I've seen it alleged that the idea of Superman being able to
disguise himself as Clark Kent basically by taking off his glasses
and putting on grown-up clothes is also inspired by the experience
of Harold Lloyd, who at the peak of his fame could go pretty well
anonymously in a crowd just by taking off his glasses. (He didn't
need glasses, and the ones he used in filming didn't have lenses.)

I'm a touch skeptical of any Really Good Stories like that,
particularly since the Superhero Secret Identity seems more likely to
trace back to the Scarlet Pimpernel notion of the Hero who, in public,
looks like the kind of drip who'd take the suicide pill by accident.

However, the Harold Lloyd DVD set includes a couple people
telling stories of the exquisite anonymity he had without his glasses,
and includes pictures in which, yeah, he doesn't look *anything* like
the screen character. Maybe someone with distinctive enough glasses
could pull off a Clark/Superman change even in front of people who are
good with faces.

--
Joseph Nebus
------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Marc Kupper

unread,
Nov 1, 2006, 3:48:00 AM11/1/06
to
re:
http://www.scifi.com/scifiction/classics/classics_archive/davis/davis1.html
and how painful it is to read.

> Firefox doesn't do it in a single button, but you can set the colors
> and tell it to override whatever the page wants to do.

What you can do in FireFox is View / Page Style / No Style.


r.r...@thevine.net

unread,
Nov 1, 2006, 10:14:15 AM11/1/06
to
On 1 Nov 2006 02:42:29 -0500, nebusj-@-rpi-.edu (Joseph Nebus) wrote:

> I've seen it alleged that the idea of Superman being able to
>disguise himself as Clark Kent basically by taking off his glasses
>and putting on grown-up clothes is also inspired by the experience
>of Harold Lloyd, who at the peak of his fame could go pretty well
>anonymously in a crowd just by taking off his glasses. (He didn't
>need glasses, and the ones he used in filming didn't have lenses.)
>
> I'm a touch skeptical of any Really Good Stories like that,
>particularly since the Superhero Secret Identity seems more likely to
>trace back to the Scarlet Pimpernel notion of the Hero who, in public,
>looks like the kind of drip who'd take the suicide pill by accident.
>
> However, the Harold Lloyd DVD set includes a couple people
>telling stories of the exquisite anonymity he had without his glasses,
>and includes pictures in which, yeah, he doesn't look *anything* like
>the screen character. Maybe someone with distinctive enough glasses
>could pull off a Clark/Superman change even in front of people who are
>good with faces.

It does work, to at least some degree. The way glasses look affects
the "image" you have of someone's face. If someone changes the shape,
size, or style of their glasses, it can be difficult to recognize them
on a casual glance, especially if it's not a place where you are used
to seeing them. (Say that you are walking past them at the store when
you normally see them at work, for example.) And sunglasses work even
better.

However, I have a hard time seeing it working for a long time, with
people who know both the Clark Kent and the Superman. But for the
average Joe on the street, yeah, it could work. For a while, at
least.

Rebecca

r.r...@thevine.net

unread,
Nov 1, 2006, 10:15:57 AM11/1/06
to
On Wed, 1 Nov 2006 06:02:41 GMT, djh...@kithrup.com (Dorothy J Heydt)
wrote:

>In article <s5cgk2tiosptje54v...@4ax.com>,

Ah, see, that's the bit that I wasn't getting. I'm used to JP
weddings being considered just as real as church weddings. And I
assume that renoed is equal to divorced, although I can't figure out
what word it's short for.

Rebecca

Mike Schilling

unread,
Nov 1, 2006, 10:38:22 AM11/1/06
to

<r.r...@thevine.net> wrote in message
news:4fehk2durjvfet0hs...@4ax.com...

>>
> Ah, see, that's the bit that I wasn't getting. I'm used to JP
> weddings being considered just as real as church weddings. And I
> assume that renoed is equal to divorced, although I can't figure out
> what word it's short for.

People used to go to Reno for quickie divorces, back when Nevada's divorce
laws were exceptionally liberal, effectively allowing divorce by mutual
consent.


Larry Caldwell

unread,
Nov 1, 2006, 12:03:09 PM11/1/06
to
In article <J7z63...@kithrup.com>, djh...@kithrup.com (Dorothy J
Heydt) says...

> Consider the repeated discussions we've had on this and other
> groups, about the unquestioned assumption, pre-1970s or so, that
> a woman wearing glasses was _ipso facto_ ugly, which defect could
> be instantly repaired by taking them off. That wasn't just in
> the movies: that was in life. I lived through that.

So did I. One of my first girlfriends wore these coke bottle glasses
that magnified her eyeballs and made her look really grotesque. When
she took the glasses off she was really pretty, but unfortunately
couldn't see herself in a mirror. I always hoped that when they
invented contact lenses she made the switch.

--
For email, replace firstnamelastinitial
with my first name and last initial.

Larry Caldwell

unread,
Nov 1, 2006, 12:04:24 PM11/1/06
to
In article <11623...@sheol.org>, thr...@sheol.org (Wayne Throop)
says...

> Meh. Lynx or links; either one works just fine. Doesn't matter what my
> primary browser is, I can just select the url and click. Well... as long
> as it has a location bar to select the url in, of course. Or, if I'm
> using konqueror, just leftmenu->openPageIn->{whathaveyou}, where whathaveyou
> can be any browser or browser-like tool.
>
> Of course, that means you have to put up with linux
> (oooooh, throw me in the briar patch wydoncha?).

Lynx has been ported to Windows since forever.

Bob Eager

unread,
Nov 1, 2006, 1:04:12 PM11/1/06
to
On Wed, 1 Nov 2006 17:04:24 UTC, Larry Caldwell
<firstnamel...@peaksky.com> wrote:

> In article <11623...@sheol.org>, thr...@sheol.org (Wayne Throop)
> says...
>
> > Meh. Lynx or links; either one works just fine. Doesn't matter what my
> > primary browser is, I can just select the url and click. Well... as long
> > as it has a location bar to select the url in, of course. Or, if I'm
> > using konqueror, just leftmenu->openPageIn->{whathaveyou}, where whathaveyou
> > can be any browser or browser-like tool.
> >
> > Of course, that means you have to put up with linux
> > (oooooh, throw me in the briar patch wydoncha?).
>
> Lynx has been ported to Windows since forever.

And *BSD. And OS/2. And even DOS...


Dorothy J Heydt

unread,
Nov 1, 2006, 1:06:24 PM11/1/06
to
In article <4fehk2durjvfet0hs...@4ax.com>,

It stands for Reno, Nevada, which back in the day of 1958 was
where much-married actresses (etc.) went to get quickie divorces,
just as they'd gone to Reno or Tahoe or Vegas or elsewhere in
Nevada to get J.P.'d. Because in California it took much longer.

Dorothy J Heydt

unread,
Nov 1, 2006, 1:10:33 PM11/1/06
to
In article <MPG.1fb272b0c...@news.peaksky.com>,

Larry Caldwell <firstnamel...@peaksky.com> wrote:
>In article <J7z63...@kithrup.com>, djh...@kithrup.com (Dorothy J
>Heydt) says...
>
>> Consider the repeated discussions we've had on this and other
>> groups, about the unquestioned assumption, pre-1970s or so, that
>> a woman wearing glasses was _ipso facto_ ugly, which defect could
>> be instantly repaired by taking them off. That wasn't just in
>> the movies: that was in life. I lived through that.
>
>So did I. One of my first girlfriends wore these coke bottle glasses
>that magnified her eyeballs and made her look really grotesque. When
>she took the glasses off she was really pretty, but unfortunately
>couldn't see herself in a mirror. I always hoped that when they
>invented contact lenses she made the switch.

Well, I wore glasses, which were by no means coke-bottles, but
they were *glasses.* When I was old enough and could afford it,
being young and vain and dumb, I scraped up the money for
contacts (they were hard lenses in those days, and cost a
bundle), and only then did I start getting -- nowadays we would
say "hit on," at the time I would've said merely "noticed" -- by
the opposite sex. That would've been 1963 or so.

Wayne Throop

unread,
Nov 1, 2006, 4:56:35 PM11/1/06
to
: Larry Caldwell <firstnamel...@peaksky.com>
: Lynx has been ported to Windows since forever.

True... I was more thinking of the way I use ad-hoc windows for everything. It's a style better suited to X windows than MS windows. But yah, lynx
runs most everywhere, I imagine.

Gene Ward Smith

unread,
Nov 1, 2006, 4:59:07 PM11/1/06
to

r.r...@thevine.net wrote:

> Ah, see, that's the bit that I wasn't getting. I'm used to JP
> weddings being considered just as real as church weddings.

Are they? Marriage is still not thought of as a civil contract; there's
a big woo-woo factor involved. That came out clearly in the recent NJ
Supreme Court decision. You've got to let gay couples marry, sez the
court, but you don't have to call it "marraige". And that's just fine
with many people uncomfortable with "gay marraige"!

David McMillan

unread,
Nov 1, 2006, 10:56:06 AM11/1/06
to
Mike Schilling wrote:

> In the Mad Magazine parody of the movie Love Story, Ryan O'Neal tells a
> friend that he has the hots for Ali McGraw because she wears such thick
> glasses.
>
> "Thick glasses? That's .. weird."
>
> "Well, my parents were very repressed. They never talked about sex, and I
> had to pick it up on the street."
>
> "So?"
>
> "We lived next door to an optometrist."

...I don't get it.

Although it does remind me of a cute bit in one of Madeline L'Engel's
novels ("A Wind In The Door," IIRC), where the heroine's sorta-boyfriend
finds her crying her eyes out, tugs off her (thick, unflattering)
glasses, and jokes that she should keep wearing them so that none of the
other boys at school notice what dreamboat eyes she has.

Mike Schilling

unread,
Nov 1, 2006, 5:47:36 PM11/1/06
to

"David McMillan" <spam...@skyefire.org> wrote in message
news:aPidnaW5Pf7igdTY...@giganews.com...

> Mike Schilling wrote:
>
>> In the Mad Magazine parody of the movie Love Story, Ryan O'Neal tells a
>> friend that he has the hots for Ali McGraw because she wears such thick
>> glasses.
>>
>> "Thick glasses? That's .. weird."
>>
>> "Well, my parents were very repressed. They never talked about sex, and
>> I had to pick it up on the street."
>>
>> "So?"
>>
>> "We lived next door to an optometrist."
>
> ...I don't get it.

He learned about sex on the street, which would be outside the optometrist's
office, so he associates sex with ....


Joe Bednorz

unread,
Nov 1, 2006, 8:32:48 PM11/1/06
to
On Wed, 1 Nov 2006 09:03:09 -0800, Larry Caldwell wrote:

>In article <J7z63...@kithrup.com>, djh...@kithrup.com (Dorothy J
>Heydt) says...
>
>> Consider the repeated discussions we've had on this and other
>> groups, about the unquestioned assumption, pre-1970s or so, that
>> a woman wearing glasses was _ipso facto_ ugly, which defect could
>> be instantly repaired by taking them off. That wasn't just in
>> the movies: that was in life. I lived through that.
>
>So did I. One of my first girlfriends wore these coke bottle glasses
>that magnified her eyeballs and made her look really grotesque. When
>she took the glasses off she was really pretty, but unfortunately
>couldn't see herself in a mirror. I always hoped that when they
>invented contact lenses she made the switch.


The "coke bottle" distortion explanation makes sense. I don't pick
that up in movies. Glasses worn in movies usually have windowpane
lenses. There's no distortion of the eyes, etc.

There may be something about people not wearing glasses for minor
visual correction, but only when the glasses would be thick and
grotesque looking.

r.r...@thevine.net

unread,
Nov 2, 2006, 12:02:50 AM11/2/06
to

You know, I was driving along and suddenly thought "oh... Reno!" My
problem was that a) I was pronouncing it as ren-o (short e like rend),
which b) made me think of renovate which c) made me think of renew,
which seemed wildly inappropriate for the action described. This just
goes to show the danger of trying to be hip and trendy with your slang
in stories. Thankfully the description was enough to make the action
clear, even if I couldn't figure out where in the world the term came
from.

Rebecca

r.r...@thevine.net

unread,
Nov 2, 2006, 12:06:34 AM11/2/06
to
On 1 Nov 2006 13:59:07 -0800, "Gene Ward Smith"
<genewa...@gmail.com> wrote:

I may be biased, considering the fact that at least one of the
marriages that my brother had (to a woman) was done at City Hall by
the JP in between a car accident case and a case involving a guy in
medical scrubs. And I have been to some fancy weddings at people's
houses that were indistinguishable from "church" weddings, except that
the officiating person was a JP. So I, at least, have no problem with
thinking of JPs/priests being interchangeable in weddings.

Rebecca

Mike Schilling

unread,
Nov 2, 2006, 12:36:45 AM11/2/06
to

<r.r...@thevine.net> wrote in message
news:6buik25qvsm78npvb...@4ax.com...

> On Wed, 01 Nov 2006 15:38:22 GMT, "Mike Schilling"
> <mscotts...@hotmail.com> wrote:
>
>>
>><r.r...@thevine.net> wrote in message
>>news:4fehk2durjvfet0hs...@4ax.com...
>>
>>>>
>>> Ah, see, that's the bit that I wasn't getting. I'm used to JP
>>> weddings being considered just as real as church weddings. And I
>>> assume that renoed is equal to divorced, although I can't figure out
>>> what word it's short for.
>>
>>People used to go to Reno for quickie divorces, back when Nevada's divorce
>>laws were exceptionally liberal, effectively allowing divorce by mutual
>>consent.
>>
> You know, I was driving along and suddenly thought "oh... Reno!" My
> problem was that a) I was pronouncing it as ren-o (short e like rend),
> which b) made me think of renovate which c) made me think of renew,
> which seemed wildly inappropriate for the action described.

I'm so pleased *I* never do anything like that [1].

1 Say, learn the Greek alphabet at about 10, but not realize until about 30
why omicron and omega have those particular names.


netcat

unread,
Nov 2, 2006, 9:36:41 AM11/2/06
to
In article <aPidnaW5Pf7igdTY...@giganews.com>,
spam...@skyefire.org says...

No, that was in _A Wrinkle in Time_.

rgds,
netcat


Larry Caldwell

unread,
Nov 2, 2006, 10:13:51 AM11/2/06
to
In article <mliik29p3pl8clfdm...@4ax.com>,
inv...@invalid.invalid (Joe Bednorz) says...

> The "coke bottle" distortion explanation makes sense. I don't pick
> that up in movies. Glasses worn in movies usually have windowpane
> lenses. There's no distortion of the eyes, etc.

You can't put an actor in real corrective lenses and expect them to walk
around normally.

Dorothy J Heydt

unread,
Nov 2, 2006, 10:26:09 AM11/2/06
to
In article <MPG.1fb3ab022...@news.peaksky.com>,

Larry Caldwell <firstnamel...@peaksky.com> wrote:
>In article <mliik29p3pl8clfdm...@4ax.com>,
>inv...@invalid.invalid (Joe Bednorz) says...
>
>> The "coke bottle" distortion explanation makes sense. I don't pick
>> that up in movies. Glasses worn in movies usually have windowpane
>> lenses. There's no distortion of the eyes, etc.
>
>You can't put an actor in real corrective lenses and expect them to walk
>around normally.

Unless he actually needs correction. In which case he'll have
trouble walking around normally when he takes them off.../

Kevin

unread,
Nov 2, 2006, 11:01:45 AM11/2/06
to
Gary R. Schmidt <grsc...@acm.org> wrote:

> Many English-speaking societies did not (and *do* not) suffer the taboos
> which the USA puts upon itself.

[...]

> You usually aren't so parochial, remember that until quite recently US
> culture was not as accessible to the rest of the world, _or_ as dominating.

> (In many countries the word "toilet" has always been acceptable on
> broadcast media. Is that one allowed on US TV/radio yet? It has always
> amused me that it was (reported as) not.)

I don't know where you got this interesting bit of misinformation, but
it has certainly been allowed as long as I can remember, and I was born in
1968. I would bet that there was never any problem with it at all.
You really do not appear to be well-informed enough about U.S. customs
to comment one way or the other about its "cultural taboos."


Kevin

Christopher J. Henrich

unread,
Nov 2, 2006, 11:47:27 AM11/2/06
to
In article <Ntf2h.21188$TV3....@newssvr21.news.prodigy.com>, Mike
Schilling <mscotts...@hotmail.com> wrote:

30...! Would you believe 55?

Precocious whippersnapper.

--
Chris Henrich
http://www.mathinteract.com
God just doesn't fit inside a single religion.

Lawrence Watt-Evans

unread,
Nov 2, 2006, 1:22:49 PM11/2/06
to
On Thu, 2 Nov 2006 16:01:45 +0000 (UTC), Kevin
<ktn...@linux3.ph.utexas.edu> wrote:

>Gary R. Schmidt <grsc...@acm.org> wrote:
>
>> (In many countries the word "toilet" has always been acceptable on
>> broadcast media. Is that one allowed on US TV/radio yet? It has always
>> amused me that it was (reported as) not.)
>
> I don't know where you got this interesting bit of misinformation, but
>it has certainly been allowed as long as I can remember, and I was born in
>1968. I would bet that there was never any problem with it at all.

You'd lose. You could not use the word "toilet" on TV prior to about
1964 -- ads for toilet cleaners had to call them "bathroom bowl
cleaners."

Since that was before you were born, though, I find your ignorance
excusable.


--
My webpage is at http://www.watt-evans.com
The second issue of Helix is at http://www.helixsf.com
A new Ethshar novel is being serialized at http://www.ethshar.com/thevondishambassador1.html

Michael Stemper

unread,
Nov 2, 2006, 1:45:27 PM11/2/06
to
In article <Ntf2h.21188$TV3....@newssvr21.news.prodigy.com>, Mike Schilling writes:

>1 Say, learn the Greek alphabet at about 10, but not realize until about 30
>why omicron and omega have those particular names.

[*]

--
Michael F. Stemper
#include <Standard_Disclaimer>
2 + 2 = 5, for sufficiently large values of 2

Peter Bruells

unread,
Nov 2, 2006, 2:17:20 PM11/2/06
to
mste...@siemens-emis.com (Michael Stemper) writes:

> In article <Ntf2h.21188$TV3....@newssvr21.news.prodigy.com>, Mike Schilling writes:
>
> >1 Say, learn the Greek alphabet at about 10, but not realize until about 30
> >why omicron and omega have those particular names.
>
> [*]

Hmm? O-mega and o-micron. "big O" and "small O".

Wayne Throop

unread,
Nov 2, 2006, 2:00:39 PM11/2/06
to
: Lawrence Watt-Evans <l...@sff.net>
: You'd lose. You could not use the word "toilet" on TV prior to about

: 1964 -- ads for toilet cleaners had to call them "bathroom bowl cleaners."

There's really no rational explanation for restrictions on TV content
of that era. Sex-related ones that boggled me when I heard about them
were "you can't say the word "pregnant"", and "you can't show a double bed".
And iirc, I was told even in the movies if you *did* show a double bed,
it must not be shown occupied by two people at the same time. Or was
that a TV one also, but after don't show it at all? Oh well. Such
things are better forgotten. Unless there's a "never again" aspect
to the rememberance.

By the late 60s, there were (according to the comedy routine)
only seven words you could not say on US TV. Although of course
many of the words you could say had to be portrayed as alternate meanings.
And of the seven, two were compounds, in the one case making it impossible
(or rather, prohibitively difficult) to pretend an alternate meaning, and
the other containing a form of one of the remaining five. So arguably,
only five. But of course, that list was mostly just for comedic effect.

One of South Park's claims to fame is an episode intentionally and blatantly
breaking that taboo for one of the five words. Over, and over, and
over, and over, and over. And over. And over some more.

"I think you've got an infinite loop."
"I don't know if it's infinite, but it sure is persistent."
--- geek humor, ar, ar

Mathematician: "Nine is not prime, it's obviously false."
Physicist: "Three's prime, five's prime, seven's prime,
nine isn't but that's probably experimental
error, eleven's prime, thirteen's prime;
so they probably all are."
Engineer: "Three's prime, five's prime, seven's prime,
nine's prime, eleven's prime..."
Programmer: <writes a program, which prints>
"three's prime, three's prime, three's prime..."
Lawyer: <looks around, leans in close, whispers>
"Do you *want* them all to be prime?"

Shawn Wilson

unread,
Nov 2, 2006, 2:29:50 PM11/2/06
to

"Peter Bruells" <p...@ecce-terram.de> wrote in message
news:m21wol8...@rogue.ecce-terram.de...

>> >1 Say, learn the Greek alphabet at about 10, but not realize until about 30
>> >why omicron and omega have those particular names.
>>
>> [*]
>
> Hmm? O-mega and o-micron. "big O" and "small O".


Oh... (41)

Peter Bruells

unread,
Nov 2, 2006, 2:39:10 PM11/2/06
to
"Shawn Wilson" <ikono...@yahoo.com> writes:


Oh, almost 40. Never thought about it, but then again, I never
learned the greek alphabet, just a couple of greek letters. Only
after he pointed out that there was sometingaboiut Omega and Omicron I
started to think about it.

Another thing was that I never "got" the meta-reasons for Matt
"Daredevil" Murdock to be both a blind superhero and a lawyer until 20
years after learning about him. And almost 20 years to see that the
Fanatstic Four have clear similiarities with the four elements.

Gene Ward Smith

unread,
Nov 2, 2006, 2:50:33 PM11/2/06
to

Peter Bruells wrote:

> Another thing was that I never "got" the meta-reasons for Matt
> "Daredevil" Murdock to be both a blind superhero and a lawyer until 20
> years after learning about him. And almost 20 years to see that the
> Fanatstic Four have clear similiarities with the four elements.

There are reasons for the things which happen in Marvel comics?

RPN

unread,
Nov 2, 2006, 2:52:26 PM11/2/06
to


There's also e-psilon and u-psilon--"simple E" and "simple U."

RPN

Wayne Throop

unread,
Nov 2, 2006, 3:18:54 PM11/2/06
to
: "Gene Ward Smith" <genewa...@gmail.com>
: There are reasons for the things which happen in Marvel comics?

Certainly. Sometimes the reason is "tradition!", such as names like
Peter Parker, Bruce Banner, Reed Richards, Sue Storm, and so on and on
and annoyingly on.

It's a miracle it wasn't George Grimm and Sammy Storm.

Hm. What was Xavier's first name again? Or was that it?

Lawrence Watt-Evans

unread,
Nov 2, 2006, 3:26:38 PM11/2/06
to
On Thu, 02 Nov 2006 19:00:39 GMT, thr...@sheol.org (Wayne Throop)
wrote:

>: Lawrence Watt-Evans <l...@sff.net>
>: You'd lose. You could not use the word "toilet" on TV prior to about
>: 1964 -- ads for toilet cleaners had to call them "bathroom bowl cleaners."
>
>There's really no rational explanation for restrictions on TV content
>of that era. Sex-related ones that boggled me when I heard about them
>were "you can't say the word "pregnant"", and "you can't show a double bed".

Oh, I know -- totally ridiculous, and not just TV. Otto Preminger got
a reputation as a troublemaker and iconoclast when he refused to cut
the word "virgin" from a movie in the early '50s. (Until then it was
_only_ allowable when referring to St. Mary.)

>And iirc, I was told even in the movies if you *did* show a double bed,
>it must not be shown occupied by two people at the same time. Or was
>that a TV one also, but after don't show it at all?

The rule was that if you had two people in a bed, at least one of them
must have a foot on the floor at all times.

>By the late 60s, there were (according to the comedy routine)
>only seven words you could not say on US TV. Although of course
>many of the words you could say had to be portrayed as alternate meanings.
>And of the seven, two were compounds, in the one case making it impossible
>(or rather, prohibitively difficult) to pretend an alternate meaning, and
>the other containing a form of one of the remaining five. So arguably,
>only five. But of course, that list was mostly just for comedic effect.

There were actually more than seven, but the others were pretty
obscure and unlikely. Even today, I think a lot of Americans don't
know some of them, e.g. "quim."

I don't think there's a single word left that you can't get away with
in certain cases, though.

Dorothy J Heydt

unread,
Nov 2, 2006, 3:28:38 PM11/2/06
to
In article <200611021845....@walkabout.empros.com>,

Michael Stemper <mste...@siemens-emis.com> wrote:
>In article <Ntf2h.21188$TV3....@newssvr21.news.prodigy.com>, Mike Schilling writes:
>
>>1 Say, learn the Greek alphabet at about 10, but not realize until about 30
>>why omicron and omega have those particular names.
>
>[*]

The Greek language has long and short vowels: that is, some of
the vowels take longer to sound than the others, to which they
are otherwise very similar. Omicron is short o, omega is long o.
The names mean "little o" and "big o".

Unfortunately, only two other vowel-pairs are marked for length
(eta, long e, and epsilon, short e). The other vowel letters
(alpha, iota, and ypsilon) aren't marked for length and you have
to figure out whether the vowel is long or short in a given word
by seeing how it is used in poetry, where long vowels and short
ones can appear only in certain places in the line.

Lawrence Watt-Evans

unread,
Nov 2, 2006, 3:31:10 PM11/2/06
to
On Thu, 02 Nov 2006 20:18:54 GMT, thr...@sheol.org (Wayne Throop)
wrote:

>Hm. What was Xavier's first name again? Or was that it?

Charles.

Derek Lyons

unread,
Nov 2, 2006, 3:32:27 PM11/2/06
to
Lawrence Watt-Evans <l...@sff.net> wrote:

>I don't think there's a single word left that you can't get away with
>in certain cases, though.

You have to be careful to differentiate between broadcast programs and
cable programs. The former, even though they enter most houses via
cable now-a-days, must obey rules that the latter are free of.

D.
--
Touch-twice life. Eat. Drink. Laugh.

-Resolved: To be more temperate in my postings.
Oct 5th, 2004 JDL

Lawrence Watt-Evans

unread,
Nov 2, 2006, 3:44:46 PM11/2/06
to
On Thu, 02 Nov 2006 20:32:27 GMT, fair...@gmail.com (Derek Lyons)
wrote:

>Lawrence Watt-Evans <l...@sff.net> wrote:
>
>>I don't think there's a single word left that you can't get away with
>>in certain cases, though.
>
>You have to be careful to differentiate between broadcast programs and
>cable programs. The former, even though they enter most houses via
>cable now-a-days, must obey rules that the latter are free of.

But even on broadcast TV, if it's seen as deserving enough, you can
get exemptions, e.g., "Saving Private Ryan."

Dorothy J Heydt

unread,
Nov 2, 2006, 3:30:32 PM11/2/06
to
In article <1162497146....@f16g2000cwb.googlegroups.com>,

And there's eta to match against epsilon, but no long U to match
against upsilon/ypsilon/however you want to transliterate it.

Dorothy J Heydt

unread,
Nov 2, 2006, 3:33:32 PM11/2/06
to
In article <11624...@sheol.org>, Wayne Throop <thr...@sheol.org> wrote:
>: Lawrence Watt-Evans <l...@sff.net>
>: You'd lose. You could not use the word "toilet" on TV prior to about
>: 1964 -- ads for toilet cleaners had to call them "bathroom bowl cleaners."
>
>There's really no rational explanation for restrictions on TV content
>of that era. Sex-related ones that boggled me when I heard about them
>were "you can't say the word "pregnant"", and "you can't show a double bed".

I assume everyone has seen the film _Pleasantville_?

>And iirc, I was told even in the movies if you *did* show a double bed,
>it must not be shown occupied by two people at the same time. Or was
>that a TV one also, but after don't show it at all? Oh well. Such
>things are better forgotten. Unless there's a "never again" aspect
>to the rememberance.

I know there was a point at which even if you did see two people
in the same bed, they couldn't be lying in it, only seated on it,
and each must have at least one foot on the ground. But it was
long ago and I forget when it was.

Dorothy J Heydt

unread,
Nov 2, 2006, 3:35:39 PM11/2/06
to
In article <tokkk2ljofr08agji...@news.rcn.com>,

Lawrence Watt-Evans <l...@sff.net> wrote:
>On Thu, 02 Nov 2006 19:00:39 GMT, thr...@sheol.org (Wayne Throop)
>wrote:
>
>>: Lawrence Watt-Evans <l...@sff.net>
>>: You'd lose. You could not use the word "toilet" on TV prior to about
>>: 1964 -- ads for toilet cleaners had to call them "bathroom bowl cleaners."
>>
>>There's really no rational explanation for restrictions on TV content
>>of that era. Sex-related ones that boggled me when I heard about them
>>were "you can't say the word "pregnant"", and "you can't show a double bed".
>
>Oh, I know -- totally ridiculous, and not just TV. Otto Preminger got
>a reputation as a troublemaker and iconoclast when he refused to cut
>the word "virgin" from a movie in the early '50s. (Until then it was
>_only_ allowable when referring to St. Mary.)

_The Moon is Blue,_ 1953. It was still on the League of
Decency's list of things they wanted you to stand up in public
and vow never to see, a decade later.

Charlton Wilbur

unread,
Nov 2, 2006, 4:00:37 PM11/2/06
to
Lawrence Watt-Evans <l...@sff.net> writes:

> But even on broadcast TV, if it's seen as deserving enough, you can
> get exemptions, e.g., "Saving Private Ryan."

Ah, but you can't get them in advance -- you have to hope that the FCC
finds you deserving after the fact. Telling you in advance that it's
okay means there's a chance that they'll tell you in advance that it's
NOT okay, which is eeeeevil censorship; fining you afterwards,
apparently, is not censorship, but Responding To Citizen Complaints.

Charlton

Christopher J. Henrich

unread,
Nov 2, 2006, 6:28:54 PM11/2/06
to

I am astonished to find that, according to the on-line dictionary
provide with Mac OS X 10.4, these two vowel names originate in the 17th
and 18th centuries. What the heck did anybody call these letters
previously?

Jaimie Vandenbergh

unread,
Nov 2, 2006, 6:43:30 PM11/2/06
to
On Thu, 02 Nov 2006 23:28:54 GMT, "Christopher J. Henrich"
<chen...@monmouth.com> wrote:

>In article <1162497146....@f16g2000cwb.googlegroups.com>, RPN
><rp...@hotmail.com> wrote:
>>
>> There's also e-psilon and u-psilon--"simple E" and "simple U."
>>
>I am astonished to find that, according to the on-line dictionary
>provide with Mac OS X 10.4, these two vowel names originate in the 17th
>and 18th centuries. What the heck did anybody call these letters
>previously?

This may be an artifact of the dictionary. The OED2 has the first
quote of Upsilon in 1642, and the quote is "In some places of the
Morea they confound these three leters (Eta, Iota, Upsilon)." which
implies that no edumacated person would.

For epsilon, the first reference is down as c1400 (but no quote).
Neither of them mention any such thing as originating that recently
either.

Cheers - Jaimie
--
Do not meddle in the affairs of wizards, even if you are soggy
and hard to light.

Jordan Abel

unread,
Nov 2, 2006, 6:43:50 PM11/2/06
to
2006-11-02 <021120061828544957%chen...@monmouth.com>,

Christopher J. Henrich wrote:
> In article <1162497146....@f16g2000cwb.googlegroups.com>, RPN
> <rp...@hotmail.com> wrote:
>> There's also e-psilon and u-psilon--"simple E" and "simple U."
>>
> I am astonished to find that, according to the on-line dictionary
> provide with Mac OS X 10.4, these two vowel names originate in the 17th
> and 18th centuries. What the heck did anybody call these letters
> previously?

No-one who spoke english talked about them?

RPN

unread,
Nov 2, 2006, 7:37:07 PM11/2/06
to

Christopher J. Henrich wrote:
> In article <1162497146....@f16g2000cwb.googlegroups.com>, RPN
> <rp...@hotmail.com> wrote:
>
> > Peter Bruells wrote:
> > > mste...@siemens-emis.com (Michael Stemper) writes:
> > >
> > > > In article <Ntf2h.21188$TV3....@newssvr21.news.prodigy.com>, Mike
> > > > Schilling writes:
> > > >
> > > > >1 Say, learn the Greek alphabet at about 10, but not realize until about
> > > > >30
> > > > >why omicron and omega have those particular names.
> > > >
> > > > [*]
> > >
> > > Hmm? O-mega and o-micron. "big O" and "small O".
> >
> >
> > There's also e-psilon and u-psilon--"simple E" and "simple U."
> >
> I am astonished to find that, according to the on-line dictionary
> provide with Mac OS X 10.4, these two vowel names originate in the 17th
> and 18th centuries. What the heck did anybody call these letters
> previously?

Even in Greek the two names are late, though not as late as that. They
date from medieval times, roughly the 14th century. In classical times
they were named for their sounds, like *a* or *o* in English--*ei*
(epsilon-iota) for the epsilon and *u* (upsilon) for the upsilon. They
got their names because in medieval Greek the diphthongs *ai*
(alpha-iota) and *oi* (omicron-iota) were pronounced the same as
epsilon and upsilon respectively, so epsilon and upsilon were the
"simple" ways of representing the sounds.

RPN

RPN

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