Orinoco Womble (tidy bag and all)’s Comments (group member since Sep 20, 2013)

Orinoco Womble (tidy bag and all)’s comments from the Net Work Book Club group.

It's a good avatar for the name, too!

I know what you mean about "team." I used to know a guy at church who was expert at finding wonderful projects for other people to carry out, without finding out if they wanted to do them at all. He is fortunately no longer with us. Not as in dead, just as in moved on to another unfortunate group. I had to learn the hard way that if he called me about something, 99% of the time he still hadn't made up his mind about it and 90% of a long conversation would be talking through and around it. The only thing worth listening to would be the last bit, when he had (usually) reached some kind of decision, most of which involved railroading others into doing something for which he would take the credit.

Well, the wise only need a word. The stupid need a whole bunch.

Scientific humour:

Why is there no mouse flavoured catfood?

And when they advertise a dogfood as "better tasting", how do they know? Who tests it?

How come you never read about a psychic winning the lottery?

Why does bottled lemon juice have lemon flavouring in it, while washing up liquid uses the juice of real lemons?

Why don't sheep shrink when they get wet, while sweaters do?

Why do we press harder when the batteries are down on the TV remote?

Why is it, when you're in the car and can't see something, you switch off the radio?

What do sheep count when they can't sleep?

I dunno, Emma, if I had talent to draw or chutzpah to pretend I did, I could create a children's picture book: "How Many Thumbs Does a Troll Have?" This troll has about 10 thumbs on each hand, but as they all point down, never up, he can't do good things like make cookies, or draw a picture, or pick flowers. He can't even pick his own nose because it goes the other way!

mrbooks wrote: "Ori that is the good thing about trying if you make a mistake it doesn't mean a thing. You only fail when you quit trying."

I was just remembering this...I baked a beautiful chicken...it was rather big and I was rather busy so I calculated my usual "20 min to the pound, plus 20 over", and then figured since DH likes his chicken well done, I'd use a higher temp...and the fanbake...and that poor chicken came out dehydrated! I absolutely ruined it.

Tried to save matters by making my mushroom gravy. I guess I used "mustrooms" because it tasted like a musty room.

Ohhhh dear. But I looked at DH and said, "Well, I ruined this, but I learned a couple of things. I can assure you it won't happen again!"

"At this point in time," "At this moment in time" or even just "at this time." Usually used by officialdom to tapdance around the facts, ie lie, about something they haven't done that should have been done long ago, since they already allocated (and squandered) the funding.

Or in letters to tell you that you are SOL about what ever it is you applied for, or have a legal right to.

Used by real people only when they are lying to you.

Anyone who has spent any time at all online, on message boards or Youtube or whatever, has been flamed and/or trolled at some point. It's not pleasant, even though we know it's not "important" what some unknown keyboard warrior thinks of our comments or reviews or whatever, it can still sting. I play these little "spot the difference" or hidden object games every morning on a certain website, as a form of brain training, and there is someone out there who always gives my comments a thumbs-down, no matter how anodyne they may be. No one else will get a TD on a given day, and there it is on mine. It's been going on for over two years now. Gosh, I must really be important in this sad person's world, right?

I mentioned this to one of my students who is a teacher, and she shook her head in disbelief, and replied: "He's two."

"Two what?" I asked, confused.

"No, I mean his mental age. What is he, two?"

This has become a reaction to any unreasonable idiotic behaviour, in our house. You hear about some head of state making an idiot of himself in public yet again? "He's two."
Someone offers an unsolicited criticism of something that is actually none of their business? "She's two."

I used to respond to the TD monkey by saying something in the comments, along those lines: "I see our little TD monkey is back!" or such as that. Now I just ignore them and when I see yet another TD, I say to myself, "He's two."

I just finished readingArsenic for Tea. One of the schoolgirls says that kelptomania is "a sickness only rich people get; they steal things, but they can't help it."

Yeah--because when poor people steal things, they get arrested. It is assumed that poverty makes you able to "help" stealing things if you'd just go out and get a job!

I was amused to download a book from Gutenberg, ca. about 1910, and find an (original) copyright warning at the beginning stating "All rights reserved, including the right of translation to other languages, including the Scandinavian." (Italics mine). Does this mean that the Scandinavian countries specialised in pirate translations--given their Viking ancestors, perhaps this is not surprising--and does it mean the publishers consider "the Scandinavian" to be a single language?

These be mysteries.

I just found a channel on Youtube called SouthernWomen. They have a bunch of short vids called "S**** Southern Women Say" and it cracks me up, hard! They have a companion vid called "Sh*** Southern Women NEVER Say," among which is "oh this tea is too sweet!" and "Don't fry that!"

MrBooks, that is one reason I make quilts. I have permission to fail! Whenever I cut into a big piece of fabric I always ask my husband, "What happens if I mess this up?" and he says "Nothing at all!" and I proceed. Of course I am mostly working with scraps other people gave me years and years ago, so that helps. Who cares what happens to leftovers? ;)

"Bless your heart" has many meanings from "I'm so sorry that happened to you" to "You're a flaming idiot but I'm to polite to tell you to your face".

"He made dinner for me all by himself...bless his heart." Could mean it was inedible, or that it moved you to tears. A lot has to do with how it's said, of course.

mrbooks wrote: "I know this one has been used before, but got it again, I don't mean to be rude, my answer is always "then why are you" Normally before they have a chance to finish."

That's like "Somebody had to say it." No they didn't. They wanted to.

"A heart set is a heart broken." It means don't get your hopes up, don't set your heart on this or that because you'll be disappointed. My mother was always throwing that one at me to stop me getting excited about anything. She enjoyed squashing me flat--and I often felt she enjoyed seeing me be disappointed, because she'd say it in a very sarcastic just-you-wait tone of voice.

Just make sure you have realistic eggspectations of what you'll find on the other side.

One of my mother's exclamations of surprise when I was very small was "Great socks in the morning!" Whatever that meant. If indeed it meant anything.

You just set for a while, Groovy, and see what you hatch!

Like I always say, when your soul gets too big for your body it leaks out at your eyes. Cry, tears are saline you know--a good disinfectant for the hurt.

Oh yes, "organic" is the new buzzword in Europe. In Spain instead of "orgánico" they chose the word "biológico", biological. I was once offered "biological eggs" and I asked the man, "Is there any other kind?"

While the funeral director's daughter is always dead serious.