Ramblings & ephemera
Scott: Pronounce this word: A - G - I - N - C - O - U - R - T.
Robin: Why?
Scott: I just want to hear you pronounce it.
Robin: Welllll … I would pronounce it the way it’s spelled: Again-kort.
Scott: (starts laughing & snickering) Haha!
Robin: I *knew* that would send you into proxyisms of [...]
Posted on June 8th, 2008 by Scott Granneman
Filed under: Language & Literature, overheard | No Comments »
Denise is talking to our class about how people are slowly giving up their civil liberties, a bit at a time: “It’s like the story about how you gradually turn the heat up on a pot of water and slowly boil the lobster!”
(Hint: she meant frog.)
Related posts
That poor polish sausage
Denise-ism #98
Denise-ism #92
Denise-ism #92
Denise-ism #90
Posted on April 20th, 2008 by Scott Granneman
Filed under: Language & Literature, True Stories, overheard | No Comments »
Denise & I are in the car, talking about her friend Scott E., when her cell phone rings. It’s Scott E.!
Denise: “Scott! We were just talking about you! Your ears must have been ringing!”
Related posts
Denise-ism #601
That poor polish sausage
Scott-words #17
My new business idea
Denise-ism #98
Posted on April 20th, 2008 by Scott Granneman
Filed under: Commonplace Book, True Stories, overheard | No Comments »
So a bunch of us are talking at the Central West End Linux User Group meeting. Somehow the topic of surgery during World War I comes up.
Robert: What was really bad was that those guys were operated on without any anaesthetic.
Me: Huh? Doctors had anaesthetic then.
Robert: They did? What?
Me: Ether.
Robert: Huh. How’d they deliver [...]
Posted on December 10th, 2006 by Scott Granneman
Filed under: overheard | Comments Off
From Entertainment News, 21 March 2004:
“Zombies Push Jesus from Top of North American Box Office”
(About Dawn of the Dead and The Passion of the Christ)
Related posts
Transcendence, described by the East & West
The strictest of teachers
She’s a poet and don’t know it
Robin-ism #6
Now that is one good insult
Posted on November 3rd, 2006 by Scott Granneman
Filed under: art, overheard | Comments Off
We went to see Troy last week. At the end of the movie, the Trojans drag the Trojan Horse into the city. They party, celebrating what they think is the abandonment of the war by the Greeks, and everyone collapses into a drunken stupor. Cut to the waiting Greek ships, hidden a few miles away, [...]
Posted on November 3rd, 2006 by Scott Granneman
Filed under: overheard | Comments Off
Joe (my cousin from England): I just read somewhere that the average house in Missouri has 65 brown recluse spiders in it.
Mom: Really? I wonder why we never see them if there’s so many?
Scott: Hel-loo?! Because they’re re-clu-sive! They’re not called “brown friendlies”!
Related posts
Scottism #43
Jans on vagueness
Conversation with Robert
The strictest of teachers
That poor polish sausage
Posted on November 3rd, 2006 by Scott Granneman
Filed under: overheard | Comments Off
A few weeks ago I had my eyes fixed with LASIK eye surgery. So far I’ve been completely happy with the results - it works! In preparing for the surgery, you receive lots of printed materials to read, including a booklet titled “Patient Information”. Inside that booklet is an explanation of the surgery which contains [...]
Posted on May 14th, 2006 by Scott Granneman
Filed under: Commonplace Book, overheard | Comments Off
“You’re just creating a straw horse here!”
Related posts
The strictest of teachers
That poor polish sausage
Robin-ism #6
Jans clarifies it for us
Great story about Shaw
Posted on April 16th, 2006 by Scott Granneman
Filed under: Language & Literature, overheard | Comments Off
We’re hanging out with Barry and Hilde, & the subject turns to pickup truck commercials.
Me: Here’s the voiceover: “If I have to choose between my truck and my woman …”
Hilde: You’d better choose right.
Barry: You’d better choose your dog. (pause) Dodge Ram Charger.
Related posts
The value of learned experience
The strictest of teachers
That poor polish sausage
Robin-ism #6
My [...]
Posted on April 16th, 2006 by Scott Granneman
Filed under: overheard | Comments Off
Big wheel keep on Turing
Related posts
Word of the day: Synecdoche
Weldon Kees, polymath
The escape of Mr. Flitcraft
That’ll work too
A grammarian’s haiku
Posted on April 8th, 2006 by Scott Granneman
Filed under: Commonplace Book, Writing Ideas, overheard | Comments Off
From Ben Jones’s “Benblog“:
That is our challenge, unique in the cosmos, to know that our own brief existence is simply a moment in time, and to experience that breath in the universe with a smile, knowing that we will fade once again into the oneness, floating someday, cosmic dust in a snowflake, minerals floating the [...]
Posted on April 1st, 2006 by Scott Granneman
Filed under: Commonplace Book, overheard | Comments Off
From Ben Jones’s “Benblog“:
In thinking through my sadness about whether or not I alone can help stave off the destruction of humanity, as important as I feel it is to ensure we do not subject future generations to endless strife, I couldn’t help seeing the aged sadness in my eyes, facing the near futility of [...]
Posted on April 1st, 2006 by Scott Granneman
Filed under: Commonplace Book, overheard | Comments Off
History is interesting. Do you know why Hitler had that little moustache? Because Charlie Chaplin had one. It’s true! He knew that Germans liked Charlie Chaplin, and he thought it would help them like him more, so he grew a moustache like Charlie Chaplin. Can you imagine how history would have changed if The Three [...]
Posted on February 18th, 2006 by Scott Granneman
Filed under: Commonplace Book, overheard | Comments Off
Jans & I work in the same room, about 8 feet apart, with our backs to each other.
Jans: What the heck is that?
Me: What is “that”? What do you mean by “that”?
(A couple of hours pass …)
Jans: Huh. Where is it? Do you know where it is?
Me: What do you mean by “it”? I have [...]
Posted on February 15th, 2006 by Scott Granneman
Filed under: overheard | Comments Off
Me (talking to myself): Where did I put that sweater?
Me (talking to myself, but in a different voice): Oh, there it is.
Denise: What was that?
Me: I talk to myself in different voices so it’s more like a conversation.
Related posts
Overheard at home, 20031110
Jans on vagueness
Conversation with Robert
The strictest of teachers
That poor polish sausage
Posted on February 8th, 2006 by Scott Granneman
Filed under: overheard | Comments Off
Denise is reading Ben Jones’ blog & laughing uproariously every minute or so. Then she finds a post that really kills her.
Denise (laughing): Listen to this one: “People make fun of the fact that I wear a Speedo when I swim.”
Scott: Like you are now.
Denise (outraged): I’m not wearing a speedo!
Related posts
That poor polish sausage
Denise-ism [...]
Posted on December 30th, 2005 by Scott Granneman
Filed under: overheard | Comments Off
From Giampaolo Garzarelli’s Open Source Software and the Economics of Organization:
Whenever organizational forms present rapid change because of their strong ties to technology, public policy issues are always thornier than usual. Indeed, historically, it seems that every time that there’s the development of a new technology or production process, the government has to intervene in [...]
Posted on November 29th, 2005 by Scott Granneman
Filed under: business, overheard, politics, science | Comments Off
In January 2002, I was running for the position of Vice President of the St. Louis Unix Users Group. On the SLUUG listserv, someone proposed that those running for office come clean on any ethical lapses. Here’s what I wrote:
Fine … I’ll go first and admit my ethical lapses.
I used to use Windows. A lot. [...]
Posted on November 27th, 2005 by Scott Granneman
Filed under: Technology, overheard | Comments Off
Denise Lieberman, 15 November 2001:
“I’m up to my earballs with work!”
Related posts
That poor polish sausage
Denise-ism #98
Denise-ism #92
Denise-ism #90
Denise-ism #65
Posted on November 27th, 2005 by Scott Granneman
Filed under: True Stories, overheard | Comments Off