Friday, February 27, 2009

I do not think it means what you think it means

The title is from the 1987 movie, The Princess Bride, where Vizzini keeps on using the word "inconceivable!"




[Vizzini has cut the rope The Dread Pirate Roberts is climbing up]
Vizzini: HE DIDN'T FALL? INCONCEIVABLE.
Inigo Montoya: You keep using that word. I do not think it means what you think it means.



Here's a couple of people with Vizzini Disease.

First, a video about dirty pillows. Did you watch it? It was about mites and fungus in your pillows. You thought it would be about breasts, didn't you? So did I. Ever since the movie Carrie (1976) "dirty pillows" has meant breasts to pretty much everyone. The announcers on CBS never used the phrase and possibly knew. But the naughty website designer either didn't know or, more probably, thought he could get away with it.

Here's the famous clip from Carrie:

(Note: Google wants you to know this clip might be objectionable. This might
be so if your Mormon great-grandma is watching over your shoulder.)




More weirdness: Here is a fascinating video of Lawrence Welk and his guests Gale and Dale singing





One Toke Over the Line

I really want to climb through the screen and ask them what they thought a toke was. I mean, do they sing every weird hepcat lyric that someone puts in front of them without looking it up? Did they ever do Walk on the Wild Side? Their version of Anarchy in the UK must be rockin'.

I was alerted to the Lawrence Welk song by the fun blog Power Pop. Now, you might ask yourself, since the dateline on the dirty pillows video was 2007 and Peromyscus is not mentioning why she saw it, was she intentionally looking up the words "dirty pillows" on the interwebs? Guilty as charged. Someone on yet another website was quoting the P J Harvey song Sheela-na-gig.

I've never heard it myself. This is what "sheela-na-gig" means to me. Odd thing to write a song about.



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2 comments:

Juli Page Morgan said...

Although I have no evidence, I would guess Gale and Dale did a bit of toking before choosing those outfits.

I had a friend in college who thought the word "ravished" meant the same as "famished." I never corrected her. In hindsight, this was mean of me, but I enjoyed the reactions she got when she'd exclaim, "I'm ravished!" in restaurants.

Lyle Hopwood said...

How funny! I remember someone with almost exactly the same mistaken impression. She thought "ravishing" meant "starving" - from "ravenous" I suppose. I remember her exclaiming "I'm ravishing!" once in a large crowd once and got a mixed reception, since at the time it meant 'unbelievably beautiful'.

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