Longest pun in English?
N Mitchum
David Spero <mrro...@igc.apc.org> wrote:
-----
>What is the longest pun you have ever heard in English? I.e., the
>pun containing the most words, or the most syllables?
>
>For example, as a child, I heard about the Hotel Mercy, in Australia,
>whose tea, made from koala fur, contained a lot of fuzz, because:
>"The koala tea of Mercy is not strained." That pun is pretty long,
>but I'm sure there are longer ones.
>.....
Some of the punch lines in the story-telling segments of the BBC's
old *My Word!* radio show ran considerably longer than this. One
of the more famous lines is Frank Muir's explanation of
"Supercalifragelisticexpialidocious."
--- NM : my address <aj...@lafn.org>
Ross Smith
David Spero <mrro...@igc.apc.org> wrote:
>
> What is the longest pun you have ever heard in English? I.e., the
> pun containing the most words, or the most syllables?
>
> For example, as a child, I heard about the Hotel Mercy, in Australia,
> whose tea, made from koala fur, contained a lot of fuzz, because:
> "The koala tea of Mercy is not strained." That pun is pretty long,
> but I'm sure there are longer ones.
I read a science fiction story once that involved an automatic recording
station making weather records during some planet's cold season.
Unfortunately, some of the local vegetation got into the disk drive and
scrambled the data. "Thus was the content of our winter's disk made a
spurious summary by this scum of cork."
--
Ross Smith ............................. <mailto:ross....@nz.eds.com>
Internet and New Media, EDS (New Zealand) Ltd., Wellington, New Zealand
"I'm as interested as anybody else in all the things no decent
person would be interested in." -- Ashleigh Brilliant
Martin A. Mazur
In article <APC&1'0'4e815a6f'c...@igc.apc.org>,
David Spero <mrro...@igc.apc.org> wrote:
>I thought you folks might be the ones who could answer this:
>
>What is the longest pun you have ever heard in English? I.e., the
>pun containing the most words, or the most syllables?
>
>For example, as a child, I heard about the Hotel Mercy, in Australia,
>whose tea, made from koala fur, contained a lot of fuzz, because:
>"The koala tea of Mercy is not strained." That pun is pretty long,
>but I'm sure there are longer ones.
>
>
If I were punish-ed
For every pun I shed,
I'd have to find a puny shed
In which to hide my punnish head.
- Shaw (?)
--
Martin A. Mazur .................... Representing only himself
To reply by e-mail, remove spam filter (SPAM-BE-GONE)
http://www.personal.psu.edu/mxm14/
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"Subjectivism is the epistemology of savages." - Leonard Peikoff
Jitze Couperus
On Wed, 23 Jul 1997 03:51:09 GMT, s.m...@merde.ix.netcom.com (Polar)
wrote:
>>
>Slightly off-topic: The English radio program "My Word" features ,
>improvised (I think?) shaggy-dog stories which end in long, witty,
>sometimes horrendous puns.
>
The best of these were published in book form, title was
"You can't have your kayak and heat it too".
Also circulating many years ago was a cassette of an
alleged program from this series (but I suspect faked
or a deliberate spoof) where one of the punch lines
was "Abscess makes the fart go Honda"
Jitze
---
If replying - first remove the .spam.filter from my address
Wolf Lahti
Then there's the one where Dale Evans asked her hubby who brought back
the pelt of a mountain lion that had been teething on his recently
purchased boots:
Pardon me, Roy, is this the cat that chewed your new shoes?
=======================================================
"I hate quotations!" Wolf Lahti
-- Ralph Waldo Emerson Allen, Washington
-------------------------------------------------------
wd...@paccar.com wolf-...@usa.net
=======================================================
Lloyd Zusman
On Wed, 23 Jul 1997 12:39:05 GMT, Pan troglodytes <mitc...@cs.uchicago.edu> wrote:
> In article <33d57293...@news.mindspring.com>, njk...@no-spam.mindspring.com wrote:
> >On Tue, 22 Jul 1997 00:49:24 -0700 (PDT), David Spero
> ><mrro...@igc.apc.org> wrote:
> >
> >>"The koala tea of Mercy is not strained."
> >
> >were equal to the sons of the squaws on the other two hides." You can
> >probably extrapolate the rest.
> >
>
> That's a relief! I recall that unfortunate squaw on the
> hippopotamus herself having to equal the sons of the squaws on the
> other two hides, and was saddened by the corpulent stereotype.
>
> But I've had considerable leisure to contemplate such matters of
> late, as I'm serving my time on a Mann Act conviction for
> transporting gulls past sedate lions for immortal porpoises.
Well, that should keep you out of wilds of Africa, where everyone
knows that people in grass houses shouldn't stow thrones.
--
Lloyd Zusman
l...@asfast.com
Philippa Laing
Polar wrote:
>
> >On Tue, 22 Jul 1997 00:49:24 -0700 (PDT), David Spero
> ><mrro...@igc.apc.org> wrote:
> >
> >>
> >>What is the longest pun you have ever heard in English? I.e., the
> >>pun containing the most words, or the most syllables?
> Slightly off-topic: The English radio program "My Word" features ,
> improvised (I think?) shaggy-dog stories which end in long, witty,
> sometimes horrendous puns.
Isaac Asimov wrote a number of shaggy dog stories ending in puns. In
fact, one of his stories was called "Shah Guido G." which ended
(something like) "once more Atlantis sank beneath the Waves".
The longest pun that I remember from IA, however, was
"Give my big hearts to Maud, Dwain.
Dismember me for Harold's Choir.
Tell all the Foys on Sortibleckenstrete.
That I will soon be there."
I don't think this was one of his best, though, because I wasn't
familiar with the original at the time and it always seemed contrived.
One of the best stories on these lines that I have read was written by a
friend in an SF society and ended:
"Of all the pin points, installed and oiled, you had two forks
intertwined."
Philippa Laing.
--
Having got fed up with people trying to sell me "adult" web sites every
time I post I have added two extra '.'s in the first part of my e-mail
address. If they appear, they should be removed before attempting to
reply.
Peter Moylan
Wolf Lahti <wd...@techcenter.paccar.com> wrote:
>Then there's the one where Dale Evans asked her hubby who brought back
>the pelt of a mountain lion that had been teething on his recently
>purchased boots:
>
> Pardon me, Roy, is this the cat that chewed your new shoes?
You've just reminded me of the joke which finishes with a
young lion saying "That is the end of the gnus. Here again
are the head lions."
--
Peter Moylan pe...@ee.newcastle.edu.au
http://www.ee.newcastle.edu.au/users/staff/peter/Moylan.html
N.Mitchum
Polar wrote:
------
> The English radio program "My Word" features ,
> improvised (I think?) shaggy-dog stories which end in long, witty,
> sometimes horrendous puns.
"Shaggy-dog stories" does not, I believe, apply to the elaborate
jokes told by Muir and Norden. Theirs were very funny and clever
on the way to the punch line, whereas the purebred shaggy dog
waits and waits and *waits* till the very end before delivering
the goods. It seems the technique is to set up a colorfully odd
situation, keep the listener wondering where it's going, and then
leave him gasping in disbelief that he has sat through the whole
thing. It's also a test of the story-teller's skill.
As a child I learned what I assume to be the original shaggy-dog
story. It's a fairy tale with a large cast of characters and much
personal interplay (and an authentic shaggy dog). It goes on
forever and, when told with proper respect to the rules of the
form, it keeps the audience nodding and smiling slightly in
anticipation of the payoff, then leaves them screaming insults at
the teller.
The *My Word!* stories were less improvised than they were cobbled
together. Over time, you find the same mini-gags popping up in
different situations during the shows. You get the feeling that
these pros have thousands of little such routines stored away,
ready to be assembled as needed. Which does not make them any
less funny.
--
--- NM
[Replies copied to my e-mail are appreciated]
Ben Walsh
I'll spare you the incredibly contrived jokes that lead up to them, but
amongst my favourites are:
"Chess nuts boasting in an open foyer"
and
"Transporting young gulls across a staid lion for immoral porpoises"
Philippa Laing wrote:
>
> Polar wrote:
> >
> > >On Tue, 22 Jul 1997 00:49:24 -0700 (PDT), David Spero
> > ><mrro...@igc.apc.org> wrote:
> > >
> > >>I thought you folks might be the ones who could answer this:
> > >>
> > >>What is the longest pun you have ever heard in English? I.e., the
> > >>pun containing the most words, or the most syllables?
>
> > Slightly off-topic: The English radio program "My Word" features ,
> > improvised (I think?) shaggy-dog stories which end in long, witty,
> > sometimes horrendous puns.
>
Bob Cunningham
SPAM-BE-G...@psu.edu (Martin A. Mazur) said:
[...]
>If I were punish-ed
>For every pun I shed,
>I'd have to find a puny shed
>In which to hide my punnish head.
-- Shaw ?
If I were punish-ed
For every pun I shed,
I wouldn't have a puny shred
Upon my punish head.
-- Samuel Johnson
So I've been told, anyway.
SLHinton17
Bob Lieblich <lieb...@erols.com> wrote:
<<A local (D.C. area) radio station many years had a contest to come up
with the worst pun that approximated the first line of the popular song
"Chattanooga Choo-Choo," said first line being "Pardon me, Boy, is this
the Chattanooga Choo-Choo?" (Racial slur in original. Sorry.) I won't
tax you with the set-up, but the winner was "Pardon me, Joy, is this the
chatty new guru's shoe, too?" I have, mercifully, long since forgotten
all the others.>>
**************************
Unmercifully, there was also a long tale involving Roy Rogers affering a
reward for the killing of a wildcat that had attacked him while he was on
horseback, and scratched his expensive cowboy boots: "Pardon me, Roy --
is this the cat that chewed your new shows?"
The original request was by David Spiro, asking about "the longest pun."
To me, a pun is a single word, and the question might well be "What
sentence has the most puns in it?" These stories are ofen called
"shaggy dog" stories, as in some of the postings to this thread, but I
think of a shaggy dog tale as one that SOUNDS as if it had a point but
really hasn't. The name is probably from the story of a tramp reading a
want ad offering a reward for the return of a shaggy dog, and at that
moment he sees a stray shaggy dog. Upon taking this dog to the address
given, however, he is rudely kicked out the door by the butler, who says
"Yes, but not THAT damn shaggy!"
In a paper for the California Folkore Society, I called stories like
the one about the Koala Tea "Reversed Wellerisms." A Wellerism, as
propounded by Dickens's Sam Weller, pronounces some cliche, then makes
it into a joke by revealing unusual circumstances in which it is said.:
"A little of that goes a long way, as the goose said when it defecated at
an altitude of 5,000 feet." In a reversed Wellerism, the scene and
circumstances are laid first, then the pronouncement of the cliche, often
in garbled or Spoonerized form, makes the joke.
Whatever you call 'em, they're lots of fun!
Sam Hinton
La Jolla, CA
joy beeson
njk...@no-spam.mindspring.com (Mimi Kahn) wrote:
>On Tue, 22 Jul 1997 00:49:24 -0700 (PDT), David Spero
><mrro...@igc.apc.org> wrote:
>>I thought you folks might be the ones who could answer this:
>>
>>What is the longest pun you have ever heard in English? I.e., the
>>pun containing the most words, or the most syllables?
>
Asimov's short-short story "Death of a Foy" ends:
Give my big hearts to Maude, Ray,
Dismember me for Harold's Choir,
And tell all the Foys on Sortibackinscreek
That I shall soon be there.
Joy Beeson
To use my address, replace the "x" with my first initial.
John Ings
>"The koala tea of Mercy is not strained." That pun is pretty long,
>but I'm sure there are longer ones.
There was once an African tribal chief who owned a golden throne.
He was afraid it might be stolen so he hid it in the rafters of his
grass hut. Unfortunately the rafters broke under the weight of the
thing and it fell on him and killed him.
The moral of the story is that
people who live in grass houses shouldn't stow thrones.
colf...@minn.net
>What is the longest pun you have ever heard in English? I.e., the
>pun containing the most words, or the most syllables?
I think the longest I had encountered before reading this thread was
"the furry with the syringe on top."
Carol from Mpls.
Robert Lieblich
Mimi Kahn wrote:
>
> There was also the series of short-shorts about Ferdinand Feghoot --
> originally published in _The Magazine of Fantasy & Science Fiction_
> and collected as (I think) "The Life and Times of Ferdinand Feghoot."
> If I remember correctly, the author was Avram Davidson. Anyhow, each
> of these led up to a pun, often an outrageous one.
> I've seen a Feghoot story recently in a collection of stories by Isaac
Asimov. Possibly Asimov stole the character from Davidson, but I'd bet
that Feghoot is Asimov's. Regardless, Asimov was an inveterate and
shameless punster. One recent instance was a story about trying to
persuade the human inhabitants of Mars to vote yes on an important
referendum. The antis were playing a song with a chorus of "No, no, no"
all over the radio, so the pros countered by playing the old French
national anthem. The referendum won in a walk. Reason - the name of
the old French anthem: "Mars say yes."
Blame Asimov. I'm only quoting.
Bob Lieblich <lieb...@erols.com>
Truly Donovan
How come no one has yet mentioned "People who live in grass houses
shouldn't stow thrones"?
--
Truly Donovan
reply to truly at lunemere dot com
Greer/Taylor
On Tue, 22 Jul 1997 19:55:11 -0400, Robert Lieblich
<lieb...@erols.com> wrote:
>A local (D.C. area) radio station many years had a contest to come up
>with the worst pun that approximated the first line of the popular song
>"Chattanooga Choo-Choo," said first line being "Pardon me, Boy, is this
>the Chattanooga Choo-Choo?" (Racial slur in original. Sorry.) I won't
>tax you with the set-up, but the winner was "Pardon me, Joy, is this the
>chatty new guru's shoe, too?" I have, mercifully, long since forgotten
>all the others.
>
>Bob Lieblich <lieb...@erols.com>
Roy Rogers came to town to kill the man eating cougar that had been
terrorizing the small western town. He was dressed from head to toe
in his western finery and in fact had even gotten a brand new outfit
for the occasion. He cornered the cougar but before he could kill
the animal it chewed on Roy's boots for awhile. But, being the best
shot in the west, he killed the animal and brought it back to town
draped over the back of his faithful horse, Trigger. As he was
spotted by the townspeople, one of them shouted, > "Pardon me, Roy,
is that the cat that chewed your new shoes?"
There is also one about an alcoholic baseball pitcher named Milt
Famey, who walked the entire opposing team. As they walked around the
bases they passed the dugout filled with empty beer cans. They
taunted the drunken pitcher by asking, " Is that the beer that made
Milt Famey walk us?"
Jeff Pack
There was one from "Bred Any Good Rooks Lately?" that I only partially
remember, concerning "The Routine Teuton, Haifa-Lootin'... [son of a gun
from... however the song goes]". Unfortunately, the only copy of that book
I've seen is currently on the other side of the country (the country being the
U.S., so it's a *long* way).
--
Jeff Pack (cu...@brown.edu) Brown University, Class of 1999
St. Anthony Hall, K'96 English and American Literature
Pithy quotes suck.
Richard F Ulrich
On the subject,
: If I were punish-ed
: For every pun I shed,
: I wouldn't have a puny shred
: Upon my punish head.
: -- Samuel Johnson
In the science fiction section of your bookstore, you may find
Spider Robinson's collections of stories from (and about) Callahan's
saloon - where, on Tuesday nights, the competition is in puns....
Rich Ulrich, wpi...@pitt.edu
The Chocolate Lady (Davida Chazan)
On Wed, 23 Jul 1997 11:36:42 +0100 during the alt.usage.english
Community News Flash, Ben Walsh <be...@iona.com> reported:
>I'll spare you the incredibly contrived jokes that lead up to them, but
>amongst my favourites are:
>
>"Chess nuts boasting in an open foyer"
>and
>"Transporting young gulls across a staid lion for immoral porpoises"
>
Not bad. My personal favorites:
"Abcess makes the fart go 'honda'."
And
"I left my harp in Sam Frank's disco."
The Chocolate Lady
Davida Chazan <davida at jdc dot org dot il>
~*~*~*~*~*~
De chocolatei non est disputandum! Ergo, carpe chocolatum!
~*~*~*~*~*~
Support the Jayne Hitchcock HELP Fund:
http://www.geocities.com/~hitchcockc/story.html#fund
Ben Walsh
Polar wrote:
> Slightly off-topic: The English radio program "My Word" features ,
> improvised (I think?) shaggy-dog stories which end in long, witty,
> sometimes horrendous puns.
>
As, of course, did Myles na gCopaleen's old "Keats & Chapman" stories.
Keats and Chapman were taking the air downtown one afternoon when they
spotted, coming in the opposite direction, a local alcoholic well-known
for his predilection for sleeping in a fully-fitted funeral pyre,
complete with kindling and oil. Keats waited until the man had passed
and said to Chapman:
"Did you see our friend?"
"Yes," replied Chapman, with some trepidation.
"A terrible man for his bier"
Similarly, TV stars Zig and Zag (alien puppets now on British Channel 4
television, but previously Irish) used to have a radio programme in the
morning which would take this sort of form:
Bono was in New York, and he was being chased by a giant, long slug. The
slug wouldn't leave him alone and finally had backed him into a corner
and grabbed hold of him. Bono tried to hit it and beat it to get it to
let go of him, but it wouldn't. In desperation, he sang out
"It's so long, and the slug won't let me go..."
ben
Rhiannon Macfie
Peter Moylan assembled this on a fridge door:
> David Spero <mrro...@igc.apc.org> wrote:
> >I thought you folks might be the ones who could answer this:
> >
> >pun containing the most words, or the most syllables?
> There must be plenty of good examples from the old radio
> show "My Word", but I don't know whether any transcripts are
> available.
They are not only available, but in print. A collection of the best was
published under the title `Oh My Word`.. but unfortunately I can`t remember
who by. I had a copy, but my brother stole it.
Rhiannon
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T. Shannon Gilvary
It's not the longest, but I was always fond of the punchline from a
joke which goes "If the foo sh*ts, wear it."
pat gilvary
T. Shannon Gilvary wrote:
>
> It's not the longest, but I was always fond of the punchline from a
> joke which goes "If the foo sh*ts, wear it."
and then there's the ever popular "...I'm sure that Rudolph, The Red
knows rain, dear."
00nzwi...@bsuvc.bsu.edu
> Slightly off-topic: The English radio program "My Word" features ,
> improvised (I think?) shaggy-dog stories which end in long, witty,
> sometimes horrendous puns.
>
Nah! I'll bet they get their assignments a week ahead of time. (Same
for Cartalk)
However, I'll readily believe that the quiz portion is spontaneous.
--
Nyal Z. Williams
00nzwi...@bsuvc.bsu.edu
colf...@minn.net
>There was also the series of short-shorts about Ferdinand Feghoot --
>originally published in _The Magazine of Fantasy & Science Fiction_
>and collected as (I think) "The Life and Times of Ferdinand Feghoot."
>If I remember correctly, the author was Avram Davidson. Anyhow, each
>of these led up to a pun, often an outrageous one.
I am coming to the conclusion that this newsgroup has on it entirely
too many people who read science fiction and fantasy.
Carol from Mpls.
T. Shannon Gilvary
On Thu, 24 Jul 1997 20:20:59 -0700, a computer belonging to pat
gilvary <p...@superlink.net> exploded leaving a pile of letters in the
following pattern:
>and then there's the ever popular "...I'm sure that Rudolph, The Red
> knows rain, dear."
OK, I have to share this one. For those of you who haven't figured it
out, pat gilvary is my father. The joke he's referring to goes like
this:
A couple go to Moscow. They hire a tour guide named Rudolph The Red.
While Rudolph is giving them their tour of the city, it starts to
snow. The husband mentions this to his wife only to be answered by
the tour guide, "Is not snow, is rain." [insert broken Russian
accent]. The husband and tour guide argue over whether it is snow or
rain for 5 minutes before the wife says "I'm sure that Rudolph, The
Red, knows rain, dear."
The inside joke to this is that my grandmother (my father's mother)
used to love to tell this joke except that the tour guide's name was
Ivan.
Bob Cunningham
njk...@no-spam.mindspring.com (Mimi Kahn) said:
>On Fri, 25 Jul 1997 11:28:12 GMT, ad...@lafn.org (Bob Cunningham)
>wrote:
>
>>njk...@no-spam.mindspring.com (Mimi Kahn) said:
>
> Absolutely nothing quoted below.
That's not true. You were the one who posted the eleven lines starting
with "On 24 Jul 1997" as a part of a longer posting. When you say that
Richard F. Ulrich has written something then it's correct for me to say
that Mimi Kahn said he wrote it. I therefore said you said he wrote it.
(Note that in this context "wrote" and "said" have the same meaning.)
>>>On 24 Jul 1997 20:28:56 GMT, wpi...@pitt.edu (Richard F Ulrich)
>>>wrote:
>>>
[Richard F Ulrich said this:]
>>>>On the subject,
>>>>
[and then Richard F Ulrich quoted the following five lines from my
posting without attributing them to me:]
>>>>: If I were punish-ed
>>>>: For every pun I shed,
>>>>: I wouldn't have a puny shred
>>>>: Upon my punish head.
>>>>: -- Samuel Johnson
Misleading attributions, mostly caused by careless snipping of
attribution lines or by careless retention of attribution lines that
should be snipped, are quite common in a.u.e, as are postings
complaining about them.
In this case Richard F Ulrich was the one who failed to attribute
properly, but when Mimi Kahn quoted Richard F Ulrich's posting with its
missing attribution, it made it appear that Mimi Kahn had failed to
attribute properly.
Usually, a careful reader can see that attribution lines have been
improperly omitted, or that attribution lines have been improperly left
in, by examining the ">"s, but in this case this was a little harder to
do because the last quotation flag was the inconspicuous colon.
The lesson I have learned from this is that I should make it a future
practice, when I quote material from which attributions are clearly
missing, to insert a line something like "[attribution missing in the
quoted message]". This will make it clearer -- to the reader of my
posting -- who said what, and it will also avoid making it appear that
I'm the one who's guilty of misattribution.
Curtis Cameron
T. Shannon Gilvary wrote:
>
> It's not the longest, but I was always fond of the punchline from a
> joke which goes "If the foo sh*ts, wear it."
That is one of my favorites too. Another joke is one that takes forever
to tell, about Roy Rogers and Dale Evans and a pair of his new boots
which was destroyed by a mountain lion, with long descriptions of the
hunting trip, and very long description of Roy riding back to the house
with the dead animal hung over the back of his horse, at which point
Dale asks:
"Pardon me Roy, is that the cat that chewed your new shoes?"
-Curtis Cameron
Truly Donovan
Truly Donovan wrote:
> How come no one has yet mentioned "People who live in grass houses
> shouldn't stow thrones"?
Ask and ye shall receive.
pat gilvary
I'm sorry, but I don't think I am your father. Besides, the key to the
joke was that your grandmother never understood why nobody got her
wonderful joke. We corrected her often, but she insisted on telling the
one about "...Ivan the Red, knows rain, dear."
Larry Preuss
The triple pun:
Two brothers went west to start a cattle ranch. When they wrote to their
mother asking her idea for a name for the spread she suggested "Focus -
Where the Sons Raise Meat.
LP
--
Ross Smith
Truly Donovan wrote:
>
> How come no one has yet mentioned "People who live in grass houses
> shouldn't stow thrones"?
At least two people have. (Three counting you.) Feel free to throw
something spiky at your news server.
--
Ross Smith ............................. <mailto:ross....@nz.eds.com>
Internet and New Media, EDS (New Zealand) Ltd., Wellington, New Zealand
"I'm as interested as anybody else in all the things no decent
person would be interested in." -- Ashleigh Brilliant
N.Mitchum
Truly Donovan wrote:
-----
> How come no one has yet mentioned "People who live in grass houses
> shouldn't stow thrones"?
Somebody has, though it may not have reached you yet.
I myself wonder if anyone else will mention the shaggy-dog story
that ends in "Boy-foot bear with teaks of Chan!"
I have serious doubts however that either of these lines qualifies
as a genuine pun, which I would define as a figure that takes a
double meaning from words having similar spellings or sounds,
rather than rearranges some initial letters of a popular saying.
(The dying Mercutio says, "Ask for me tomorrow and you shall find
me a grave man." Come to think of it, Hamlet's dialogue with the
gravedigger is waist-deep in puns.)
But if such lines be not puns, what be they?
--
--- NM (say, what's a Grecian urn, anyway?)
[Replies copied to my e-mail are appreciated]
Jon Robert Crofoot
njk...@no-spam.mindspring.com (Mimi Kahn) wrote:
>On 24 Jul 1997 20:28:56 GMT, wpi...@pitt.edu (Richard F Ulrich)
>wrote:
>
>>
>>
>>: If I were punish-ed
>>: For every pun I shed,
>>: I wouldn't have a puny shred
>>: Upon my punish head.
>>: -- Samuel Johnson
>>
>>
>>Spider Robinson's collections of stories from (and about) Callahan's
>>saloon - where, on Tuesday nights, the competition is in puns....
>
>originally published in _The Magazine of Fantasy & Science Fiction_
>and collected as (I think) "The Life and Times of Ferdinand Feghoot."
>If I remember correctly, the author was Avram Davidson. Anyhow, each
>of these led up to a pun, often an outrageous one.
>
About 30 years ago there was a story in Astounding
Science Fiction called "Come You Nigh -- Kay Shuns", in
which the hero, who was trapped behing enemy alien lines
had to send a message to the good guys (humans). He
encoded the message in puns, which the aliens couldn't
decode. [The kicker was that humans had a hard time
decoding the message, too.]
The story inspired my co-workers to send punning
"messages" to one another. I can recall ony one:
Tomb
Agates
Swerve
Vie
Teen
Indebt
Earnest
You have to read it aloud and listen to what you said,
in order to make any sense out of it.
Bill Shatzer
In a previous article, Jitze.C...@cdc.spam.filter.com (Jitze Couperus) says:
>The best of these were published in book form, title was
>"You can't have your kayak and heat it too".
>
>Also circulating many years ago was a cassette of an
>alleged program from this series (but I suspect faked
>or a deliberate spoof) where one of the punch lines
>was "Abscess makes the fart go Honda"
Hmmm - and I had thought it was "absinthe makes the tart go flounder"
Or was it, "with fronds like these, who needs anemones"?
Shrug!
Cheers,
--
- Bill Shatzer bsha...@orednet.org -
- Cave ab homine unius libri! -
BILLM...@delphi.com
Quoting ad841 from a message in alt.usage.english
>>On 24 Jul 1997 20:28:56 GMT, wpi...@pitt.edu (Richard F Ulrich)
>>wrote:
>>
>>>On the subject,
>>>
>>>: If I were punish-ed
>>>: For every pun I shed,
>>>: I wouldn't have a puny shred
>>>: Upon my punish head.
>>>: -- Samuel Johnson
Somewhere I saw a version of that that I think improved the third line.
If I were to be punish-ed
For every pun I shed
I'd hie myself to the punny shed
And hang my punish head.
Bill McCray
Lexington, KY
(BillMcCray at delphi dot com)
Caius Marcius
How about the female farmer who grew this magnificent berry that was so
ornate and majestic that people came from miles around just to look at
the berry and declare how wonderful and spectacular it was.
Unfortunately, a thief showed up one day, and when asked what he was up
to, he proclaimed
"I have come to seize her berry, not to praise it."
Et tu.
- CMC
M. Price
Apologies if this reference has been posted, but surely this prize
must go to Thomas Pynchon in _Gravity's Rainbow_. His set-up goes on for
several pages, and I must admit I entirely missed the pun, and was
merely mystified (common response to Pynchon). The line itself is "For
De Mille, two thousand furhenchmen can't be rowing."
--
"A woman is not a basket you place your buns in to keep them warm, not a
brood hen you can slip duck eggs under, not a purse, holding the coins
of your descendants till you spend them in wars." (Marge Piercy)
mp
Ben Walsh
M. Price wrote:
>
> Apologies if this reference has been posted, but surely this prize
> must go to Thomas Pynchon in _Gravity's Rainbow_. His set-up goes on for
> several pages, and I must admit I entirely missed the pun, and was
> merely mystified (common response to Pynchon). The line itself is "For
> De Mille, two thousand furhenchmen can't be rowing."
Forty million Frenchmen can't be wrong ...
T. Shannon Gilvary
There is another (bad) joke, fairly lengthy, that leads up to the
punchline: "Silly rabbi, kicks are for Trids." I can't remember it,
though.
Karthikeyan Madathil
>>>>> "Robert" == Robert Lieblich <lieb...@erols.com> writes:
Robert> Asimov. Possibly Asimov stole the character from
Robert> Davidson, but I'd bet that Feghoot is Asimov's.
Robert> Regardless, Asimov was an inveterate and shameless
Robert> punster. One recent instance was a story about trying to
Robert> persuade the human inhabitants of Mars to vote yes on an
Robert> important referendum. The antis were playing a song with
Robert> a chorus of "No, no, no" all over the radio, so the pros
Robert> countered by playing the old French national anthem. The
Robert> referendum won in a walk. Reason - the name of the old
Robert> French anthem: "Mars say yes."
Ah Asimov. King of 'em all ...
And then he had the one about the chap called Stein who used
a time machine to exploit a legal loophole. The judgement read:
'A niche in time saves Stein'
And then there was the one about a chap called Sloan, who entered
his pet called 'teddy' (a creature called a 'rockette') in a race
and won against all odds
'Sloan's teddy wins the race'
--Karthik
John Bailin
In <1997Jul29.2...@galileo.cc.rochester.edu>,
mp...@troi.cc.rochester.edu (M. Price) wrote:
> Apologies if this reference has been posted, but surely this prize
>must go to Thomas Pynchon in _Gravity's Rainbow_.
Hey, how's about Pynchon's _Vineland_, in which a landscape and garden
professional, "The Marquis de Sod", uses the jingle:
"A lawn savant, he'll lop a tree-eeuh,
nobody beats Marquis de Sod."
-------
John
Replies to jbailin at cris dot com
M. Price
In article <1997Jul29.2...@galileo.cc.rochester.edu>,
M. Price <mp...@troi.cc.rochester.edu> wrote:
> Apologies if this reference has been posted, but surely this prize
>several pages, and I must admit I entirely missed the pun, and was
>merely mystified (common response to Pynchon). The line itself is "For
>De Mille, two thousand furhenchmen can't be rowing."
self-correction: "For De Mille, young fur henchmen can't be rowing."
Otherwise, it makes no sense.
Michael L. Ardai
In article <dgsowv9...@india.ti.com> Karthikeyan Madathil <kar...@india.ti.com> writes:
->>>>> "Robert" == Robert Lieblich <lieb...@erols.com> writes:
- Ah Asimov. King of 'em all ...
And of course
"Give my big hearts to Maude, Duane; dismember me for Harold's choir.
Tell all the Foys on Sortibrakenstrete that I will soon be there..."
(from Death of a Foy)
/mike
--
\|/ Michael L. Ardai N1IST n1...@netcom.com \|/
-*- === Boston Amateur Radio Club: http://www.barc.org/barc === -*-
/|\ or send "info barc-list" to list...@majordomonetcom.com /|\
T. Shannon Gilvary
I think this .sig qualifies:
>Tom Scudder aka tom...@umich.edu
> I do not want 3 megs of SPAM
> I will not read it, Sam-I-am.
Martin Rebas
Karthikeyan Madathil <kar...@india.ti.com> writes:
>
> And then there was the one about a chap called Sloan, who entered
> his pet called 'teddy' (a creature called a 'rockette') in a race
> and won against all odds
> 'Sloan's teddy wins the race'
As a 13-year-old, I read many of the short stories mentioned in this
thread. Unfortunately, the puns were lost on me, as I didn't understand
the references. Now, ten years later, I see them mentioned again, and I
still don't understand them. :)
Could someone please enlighten me as to what the original quotes are, and
where they're from, in the case of "Death of a Foy" and the "rockette"
story above?
/Martin
--
Martin Rebas My home page. Visit it. Comics, comic
d3r...@dtek.chalmers.se reviews, atheism, pi, weird stuff.
------------------------ Tremendously stupid.
www.dtek.chalmers.se/~d3rebas/ Also, no annoying sentence fragments.
Gary
On 4 Aug 1997 10:00:09 GMT, d3r...@dtek.chalmers.se (Martin Rebas)
wrote:
>Karthikeyan Madathil <kar...@india.ti.com> writes:
>>
>> And then there was the one about a chap called Sloan, who entered
>> his pet called 'teddy' (a creature called a 'rockette') in a race
>> and won against all odds
>
>> 'Sloan's teddy wins the race'
>
>As a 13-year-old, I read many of the short stories mentioned in this
>thread. Unfortunately, the puns were lost on me, as I didn't understand
>the references. Now, ten years later, I see them mentioned again, and I
>still don't understand them. :)
>
>Could someone please enlighten me as to what the original quotes are, and
>where they're from, in the case of "Death of a Foy" and the "rockette"
>story above?
>
>/Martin
>
I don't know the original quotes, but 'Sloan's teddy wins
the race' translates to 'slow and steady wins the race.'
Gary
email: Replace the x with g
Lloyd Zusman
On 4 Aug 1997 10:00:09 GMT, Martin Rebas <d3r...@dtek.chalmers.se> wrote:
> Karthikeyan Madathil <kar...@india.ti.com> writes:
> >
> > And then there was the one about a chap called Sloan, who entered
> > his pet called 'teddy' (a creature called a 'rockette') in a race
> > and won against all odds
>
> > 'Sloan's teddy wins the race'
>
> As a 13-year-old, I read many of the short stories mentioned in this
> thread. Unfortunately, the puns were lost on me, as I didn't understand
> the references. Now, ten years later, I see them mentioned again, and I
> still don't understand them. :)
>
> Could someone please enlighten me as to what the original quotes are, and
> where they're from, in the case of "Death of a Foy" and the "rockette"
> story above?
>
> /Martin
>
>
>
>
> Martin Rebas My home page. Visit it. Comics, comic
> d3r...@dtek.chalmers.se reviews, atheism, pi, weird stuff.
> ------------------------ Tremendously stupid.
> www.dtek.chalmers.se/~d3rebas/ Also, no annoying sentence fragments.
--
Lloyd Zusman
l...@asfast.com
Lloyd Zusman
On 4 Aug 1997 10:00:09 GMT, Martin Rebas <d3r...@dtek.chalmers.se> wrote:
> Karthikeyan Madathil <kar...@india.ti.com> writes:
> >
> > And then there was the one about a chap called Sloan, who entered
> > his pet called 'teddy' (a creature called a 'rockette') in a race
> > and won against all odds
>
> > 'Sloan's teddy wins the race'
>
> As a 13-year-old, I read many of the short stories mentioned in this
> thread. Unfortunately, the puns were lost on me, as I didn't understand
> the references. Now, ten years later, I see them mentioned again, and I
> still don't understand them. :)
>
> Could someone please enlighten me as to what the original quotes are, and
> where they're from, in the case of "Death of a Foy" and the "rockette"
> story above?
"Sloan's teddy wins the race" == "Slow 'n' steady wins the race."
(from The Tortoise and the Hare)
--
Lloyd Zusman
l...@asfast.com
Hugh Tonks
In article <33e665f4...@news.erols.com>, Gary
<URL:mailto:xbm...@erols.com> wrote:
> On 4 Aug 1997 10:00:09 GMT, d3r...@dtek.chalmers.se (Martin Rebas)
> wrote:
> I don't know the original quotes, but 'Sloan's teddy wins
> the race' translates to 'slow and steady wins the race.'
While we're on bear-related puns, there is the story of the child who named
his new teddy bear "Gladly". When asked why he said it was because it was
cross-eyed.
It took the parents some time to realise that their son had recently been
singing the hymn "Gladly the cross I'd bear" in morning assembly at school.
Cheers
Hugh
--
Hugh Tonks, Project Manager, Future Technologies Group
Acorn Computers Ltd Tel: +44 (0) 1223 725 513
Acorn House, 645 Newmarket Road Fax: +44 (0) 1223 725 613
Cambridge, CB5 8PB, United Kingdom WWW: http://www.acorn.com/
Bore, n.: Someone who insists on talking when you want him to listen.
[Ambrose Bierce, "The Devil's Dictionary"]
Richard Weatherill
Hugh Tonks <hto...@acorn.com> wrote:
<nested reference snipped>
>While we're on bear-related puns, there is the story of the child who named
>his new teddy bear "Gladly". When asked why he said it was because it was
>cross-eyed.
>It took the parents some time to realise that their son had recently been
>singing the hymn "Gladly the cross I'd bear" in morning assembly at school.
>Cheers
>Hugh
Hardly a pun, but a mondegreen. See Michael Quinion's excellent site
at:
http://www.quinion.demon.co.uk/words
(specifically, /monde.htm).
By the way, where is Michael? I don't seem to have seen an a.u.e.
posting from him in recent weeks.
Richard
Ben Walsh
Garry J. Vass wrote:
> So as the cold, dark days of Winter approached, I sought to maintain my
> summer tan by going to a tanning studio. I was fortunate enough to find
> a studio offering a 50% rebate and registered my entire family. It was
> to be the Winter of our discount tans!
May I suggest:
So as the cold, dark days of Winter approached, I thought ahead to the
summer, holidays and camping. I decided to buy all my camping equipment
then as prices would be cheaper out of season. Sure enough, I found a
shop offering 50% off all equipment. I bought stuff for everyone. It was
to be the winter of our discount tents.
We've already had the "transporting young gulls across a staid lion for
immoral porpoises" one, and if you haven't seen it, any leadup you
invent for the punchline will suffice.
ben
O&W
Mimi Kahn <njk...@no-spam.mindspring.com> wrote in article
<33f46f99...@news.mindspring.com>...
> >
> >While we're on bear-related puns, there is the story of the child who
named
> >his new teddy bear "Gladly". When asked why he said it was because it
was
> >cross-eyed.
> >
> >It took the parents some time to realise that their son had recently
been
> >singing the hymn "Gladly the cross I'd bear" in morning assembly at
school.
>
> Ah, but that's not a pun, but a mondegreen!
"Gladly the Cross-Eyed Bear" by Ed McBain, Warner Books, copyright 1996.
Garry J. Vass
In article <33EB44...@iona.com>, Ben Walsh <be...@iona.com> writes
>We've already had the "transporting young gulls across a staid lion
So there was this mink on a fishing trip in Alaska that helped rescue
some birds injured in the aftermath of an oil spill. And the headlines
read...
...a trolling stoat catheters Nome maws...
--
Garry J. Vass
Lloyd Zusman
OK, folks. You asked for it:
Two Eskimos sitting in a kayak were chilly, but when they lit a
fire in the craft it sank -- proving once and for all that you
can't have your kayak and heat it, too.
+++++
A guy goes into a restaurant for a Christmas breakfast while in
his home town for the holidays. After looking over the menu, he
says, "I'll just have the eggs benedict." His order comes a while
later, and it's served on a huge fancy chrome plate. He asks the
waiter, "Whats with the fancy plate?" The waiter replies,
"There's no plate like chrome for the hollandaise!"
++++++
Did you hear about the Buddhist who refused his dentist's Novocaine
during root canal work?
He wanted to transcend dental medication.
--
Lloyd Zusman
l...@asfast.com
Brian J Goggin
On Thu, 14 Aug 1997 00:10:40 +0100, John Davies
<jo...@redwoods.demon.co.uk> wrote:
[...]
>Speaking of Brian O'Nolan, I've just been listening to the first episode
>of "Cruiskeen Lawn" on BBC Radio 4 (Thursdays, 11 pm). I was less
>disappointed than I expected to be--they've actually made quite a good
>job of transferring his genius to radio, just as they did years ago with
>the works of Beachcomber. Despite the title, they've included extracts
>from "At Swim Two Birds" as well as from the newspaper column. I'd be
>interested to hear what other fans of Myles/Flann thought of it. Brian
>Goggins?
>--
John Nurick very kindly tipped me off about the programme; I listened
through the crackles (Radio 4 reception is not very good here).
Many years ago, when I was a student, three of us put on a
"performance" very similar to last night's (in design, if not in
professionalism of execution). I agree, therefore, that they did a
good job!
Two things irritated me:
- I felt there were too many changes of voice, sometimes in the middle
of an item. Some of those changes were just distracting. That is,
however, merely a matter if degree: on the whole the approach worked
well
- one of the accents allocated to Myles rang false. Myles was, IIRC,
from Tyrone, and would have had a northern rather than a southern
Irish accent.
I'll be listening again next week; I hope there will be more for steam
men.
bjg
Dan Schmidt
Someone may have already mentioned this, since I just now noticed this
thread, but in _Gravity's Rainbow_, Thomas Pynchon spends an entire
chapter setting up an awful pun; some guy (Major Marvy?) has a
black-market fur operation going, with lots of kids helping him out,
and someone brings up the possibility of the kids going to America and
being put in Cecil B. DeMille movies, to which someone replies that
they'd probably just end up being galley slaves or something in some
big epic (it makes a lot more sense in context, since the scene is a
few pages long), prompting the retort
"For DeMille, young fur-henchmen can't be rowing!"
I guess you had to be there.
--
Dan Schmidt -> df...@harmonixmusic.com, df...@alum.mit.edu
Honest Bob & the http://www2.thecia.net/users/dfan/
Factory-to-Dealer Incentives -> http://www2.thecia.net/users/dfan/hbob/
Gamelan Galak Tika -> http://web.mit.edu/galak-tika/www/
the Robot Vegetable
The entire Iain Banks novel _Feersum Endjinn_ (?engine spelling?)
is a set-up for the pun on the last line.
veg
Don Tuite
the Robot Vegetable <v...@teleport.com> wrote in article
<5svdhs$79a$1...@nadine.teleport.com>...
> The entire Iain Banks novel _Feersum Endjinn_ (?engine spelling?)
> is a set-up for the pun on the last line.
>
> veg
>
So is that longer or shorter than PJ Farmer's *Riders of the Purple Wage*?
(And is the pun longer or shorter than "Winnegan's fake"? (*With
apostrophe*)
Don
the Robot Vegetable
In rec.arts.books Don Tuite <don_...@kvo.com> wrote:
> the Robot Vegetable <v...@teleport.com> wrote:
> > The entire Iain Banks novel _Feersum Endjinn_ (?engine spelling?)
> > is a set-up for the pun on the last line.
> >
> So is that longer or shorter than PJ Farmer's *Riders of the Purple Wage*?
> (And is the pun longer or shorter than "Winnegan's fake"? (*With
> apostrophe*)
Longer that *RotPW*; I'm not familiar w/ "W's f".
Thanks for the reminder, I think I'll reread _Dangerous Visions_
and see how radical it would be today. I remember Sturgeon's; many
would be more appalled today that when it was published.
veg
David E Latane
A young bank clerk, Ms. Patricia Black, is new on the job, and is
surprised to see standing in line not a human being but a giant frog of
some kind. When it gets up to the front of the line, she greets it and
the amphibian replies that it would like to apply for a loan. Perplexed
she seeks advice from management. "Customers are customers, even if
green" she's told. We love green. Ask it if it has any collateral. She
returns to the window, and the frog pulls out a small gem-encrusted
object of no obvious purpose and meaning. Patricia doesn't know what to
do, so she takes it into the manager, who is getting exasperated.
"I don't even know what this is," she says, "what am I supposed to do?"
"It's a knicknack Patty Black--Give the frog a loan," is the reply.
Other famous one's punch line, supply own story:
Pardon me Roy, is that the cat that chewed your new shoes?
Chess nuts boasting in an open foyer
&c &c &c
John Davies
In article <slrn5uvd...@ljz.asfast.net>, Lloyd Zusman
<l...@asfast.com> writes
>On Sat, 9 Aug 1997 17:36:57 +0100, Garry J. Vass <Ga...@gvass.demon.co.uk>
>wrote:
>> In article <33EB44...@iona.com>, Ben Walsh <be...@iona.com> writes
>> >We've already had the "transporting young gulls across a staid lion
>> for...
>
>Two Eskimos sitting in a kayak were chilly, but when they lit a
>fire in the craft it sank -- proving once and for all that you
>can't have your kayak and heat it, too.
>
Those who like this sort of thing should take a look at the "Irish
Times" pieces by "Myles na Gopaleen" (Brian O'Nolan, aka Flann O'Brien),
who devised many such tales, involving the two characters Keats and
Chapman. Extracts from his "Cruiskeen Lawn" column, which appeared from
1940 to 1966, are published in the following:
The Best of Myles. Grafton Books, 1987, ISBN 0-246-13144-6.
Further Cuttings from Cruiskeen Lawn. Grafton Books, 1988, ISBN
0-246-13325-2.
In fact, anyone who loves the English language, especially the rococo
varieties spoken in Ireland, will find much to delight them in these two
books.
Speaking of Brian O'Nolan, I've just been listening to the first episode
of "Cruiskeen Lawn" on BBC Radio 4 (Thursdays, 11 pm). I was less
disappointed than I expected to be--they've actually made quite a good
job of transferring his genius to radio, just as they did years ago with
the works of Beachcomber. Despite the title, they've included extracts
from "At Swim Two Birds" as well as from the newspaper column. I'd be
interested to hear what other fans of Myles/Flann thought of it. Brian
Goggins?
--
John Davies (jo...@redwoods.demon.co.uk)
Matthew P Wiener
In article <yF0olFAw...@redwoods.demon.co.uk>, John Davies <john@redwoods writes:
>In article <slrn5uvd...@ljz.asfast.net>, Lloyd Zusman
><l...@asfast.com> writes
>>On Sat, 9 Aug 1997 17:36:57 +0100, Garry J. Vass <Ga...@gvass.demon.co.uk>
>>wrote:
>>> In article <33EB44...@iona.com>, Ben Walsh <be...@iona.com> writes
>>> >We've already had the "transporting young gulls across a staid
>>> lion for... OK, folks. You asked for it:
>>Two Eskimos sitting in a kayak were chilly, but when they lit a
>>fire in the craft it sank -- proving once and for all that you
>>can't have your kayak and heat it, too.
>Those who like this sort of thing should take a look at the "Irish
>Times" pieces by "Myles na Gopaleen" (Brian O'Nolan, aka Flann O'Brien),
>[...]
The longest pun (to consider the actual question above) that I can
recall off-hand is Isaac Asimov's short short story that concludes
with a mangled version of the entire first stanza of "Give my regards
to Broadway". It begins something like, "Give my big hearts to Maude,
dear". (It's about a dying alien donating his body parts. The next
two words are "Dismember me".) Every so often, alt.books.isaac-asimov
gets a poster who does not get it, for some reason often a German who
has read it in translation and just knows he's missing out.
--
-Matthew P Wiener (wee...@sagi.wistar.upenn.edu)
Robert Parson
In article <5svi2l$hm2$1...@netnews.upenn.edu>,
Matthew P Wiener <wee...@sagi.wistar.upenn.edu> wrote:
>
>The longest pun (to consider the actual question above) that I can
>recall off-hand is Isaac Asimov's short short story
"Death of a Foy."
> that concludes
>with a mangled version of the entire first stanza of "Give my regards
>to Broadway". It begins something like, "Give my big hearts to Maude,
>dear". (It's about a dying alien donating his body parts. The next
>two words are "Dismember me".)
IIRC it goes as follows:
"Give my big hearts to Maude, Dwayne. Dismember me for Harold's choir.
Tell all the Foys on Sortibackenstrete that I will soon be there."
------
Robert
Rainer Thonnes, rwt at dcs.ed dot ac.uk
In article <slrn5uvd...@ljz.asfast.net>,
> his home town for the holidays. After looking over the menu, he
> says, "I'll just have the eggs benedict." His order comes a while
> later, and it's served on a huge fancy chrome plate. He asks the
> waiter, "Whats with the fancy plate?" The waiter replies,
> "There's no plate like chrome for the hollandaise!"
Pah! I thought we were after *long* puns. I haven't been following
this thread, have we had the Fairy Liquid one yet?
A guy goes into a restaurant specialising in seafood, you order your
food while it's still alive in the aquarium. Our hero takes a liking
to a squid, a particularly attractive one, and rather unusual, too,
being green and sporting what resembles a moustache. But the waiter,
Gervaise (French restaurant, see?) is mortified. Such a beautiful
specimen, no, he couldn't possibly have any part in the killing of this
delightful creature. Our customer calls for the manager to complain,
so the manager says, "OK, I'll fish it out for you, Sir, no problem.",
but when he sees it, he, too, is unable to bring himself to harm the
cute little critter. But business is business, and he can't really
disappoint his customers, and he suddenly remembers Hans, an awe-inspiring
brute of a man, employed to wash dishes. He is duly summoned and instructed,
but, against all expectations, he too is overwhelmed by the beauty of
our beastie, and reduced to tears at the prospect of it being chopped up
for someone's supper. And what does this go to show?
"Hans, that does dishes, can be as soft as Gervaise with wild, green,
hairy-lip squid."
Unfortunately, you need a bit of background to understand this. Some years
ago there was a slogan used in the advertisements by a manufacturer of
detergent (what we call washing-up liquid over here). They stress that
unlike their competitors' products, it's not tough on your hands.
"Hands that do dishes can be as soft as your face, with mild, green,
Fairy Liquid".
--
I'm experimenting with poisoning my address to foil the advertisers
Ted Samsel
In rec.arts.books David E Latane <dla...@saturn.vcu.edu> wrote:
: A young bank clerk, Ms. Patricia Black, is new on the job, and is
Or
"Taking young gulls across stately lions for immortal porpoises."
--
Ted Samsel....tejas@infi.net
"do the boogie woogie in the South American way"
Rhumba Boogie- Hank Snow (1955)
Richard Harter
Ted Samsel <te...@sl001.infi.net> wrote:
>Or
No, no, it's
Transporting young gulls across staid lions for immortal porpoises.
One mustn't forget
I left my harp in Sam Clam's Disco
The Koala Tea of Mersey is not strained
Ask not for whom the Tell bowls, the Tell bowls for thee.
>--
>Ted Samsel....tejas@infi.net
> "do the boogie woogie in the South American way"
> Rhumba Boogie- Hank Snow (1955)
Richard Harter, c...@tiac.net, The Concord Research Institute
URL = http://www.tiac.net/users/cri, phone = 1-508-369-3911
Men were designed for short, nasty, brutal lives.
WOmen are designed for long, miserable ones.
Patrick Gillard
In article <EEx209.24q.0.sta...@dcs.ed.ac.uk>, "Rainer
Thonnes, rwt at dcs.ed dot ac.uk" <r...@guess.where> eventually produced
the punch-line:
>"Hans, that does dishes, can be as soft as Gervaise with wild, green,
>hairy-lip squid."
>
>Unfortunately, you need a bit of background to understand this.
Got the background, and can even mentally add the tune. Good pun!
--
Patrick Gillard
fido
Richard Harter writes:
The Koala Tea of Mersey is not strained
To a Liverpuddlian familiar with the non-treatment of his local
sewage "The quality of Mersey is not strained" has more significance.
FIDO
Chris Mattern
Richard Harter wrote:
>
> Ted Samsel <te...@sl001.infi.net> wrote:
>
> >In rec.arts.books David E Latane <dla...@saturn.vcu.edu> wrote:
> >: A young bank clerk, Ms. Patricia Black, is new on the job, and is
> >: surprised to see standing in line not a human being but a giant frog of
> >: some kind. When it gets up to the front of the line, she greets it and
> >: the amphibian replies that it would like to apply for a loan. Perplexed
> >: she seeks advice from management. "Customers are customers, even if
> >: green" she's told. We love green. Ask it if it has any collateral. She
> >: returns to the window, and the frog pulls out a small gem-encrusted
> >: object of no obvious purpose and meaning. Patricia doesn't know what to
> >: do, so she takes it into the manager, who is getting exasperated.
> >: "I don't even know what this is," she says, "what am I supposed to do?"
> >: "It's a knicknack Patty Black--Give the frog a loan," is the reply.
>
> >: Other famous one's punch line, supply own story:
>
> >: Pardon me Roy, is that the cat that chewed your new shoes?
> >: Chess nuts boasting in an open foyer
> >: &c &c &c
>
> >Or
>
> >"Taking young gulls across stately lions for immortal porpoises."
> No, no, it's
> Transporting young gulls across staid lions for immortal porpoises.
>
> One mustn't forget
> I left my harp in Sam Clam's Disco
>
drink beer):
It's the beer that made Mel Famey walk us.
and
When you're out of slits, you're out of pier.
Chris Mattern
Mark K. Sealey
Anyone who can listen to KUSC (Los Angeles) and possibly some PRI feeds
at 9 pm (PDT) on Saturdays will hear 'My Word' from the BBC in the
1970s.
Apart from its entertainment value anyway, the last 'round' is taken up
with the two chief panelists, Frank Muir and Dennis Norden (reposnsbile
for many of the best BBC TV and radio show scripts) telling a story
which always ends with a pun - often of 20 or more words. Try it!
best
Mark Sealey
<http://home1.gte.net/msealey/>
Will&Jane Duquette
c...@tiac.net (Richard Harter) wrote:
>>"Taking young gulls across stately lions for immortal porpoises."
>No, no, it's
>Transporting young gulls across staid lions for immortal porpoises.
Or, as P.D.Q. Bach immortalized it in his choral cantata, _Knock,
Knock_, it's "Transporting young gulls across a sedate lion for
immoral porpoises." Sung in four-part harmony. See the album
_Oedipus Tex and other Choral Calamities_.
Will
--
Will Duquette, duqu...@cogent.net | It's amazing what you can
Visit Will & Jane's Book Page: | do with the right tools.
http://www.cogent.net/~duquette | -- Me
David E Latane
I just remembered my actual introduction to this low form of humor--It
was the Rocky and Bullwinkle Show, which had an entire fractured history
lesson set in the period of the American Revolutionary War that ended
with a pun on Chicken catch a Tory.
c. 1964?
D. Latane'
Ray Butterworth
On 16 Aug 1997 20:00:34 -0400,
And the episode in Ancient Egypt ended with "Pork Cheops".
They were from the "Peabody's Improbable History" segment of the show,
which always ended with a pun.