BS: language positives

Subject: BS: language positives
From: The Sandman
Date: 12 Sep 24 - 04:54 AM

A positive thread about the use of language that people like

Subject: RE: BS: language positives
From: The Sandman
Date: 12 Sep 24 - 08:40 AM

Oscar Wilde quote
There is no mode of action,no form of emotion, that we do not share with the lower animals, it is only by language that we rise above them

Subject: RE: BS: language positives
From: meself
Date: 12 Sep 24 - 11:31 AM

Before everyone weighs in with the classics - I find there are turns of phrase that pop up in song lyrics of various genres that are striking in their blunt directness or in their casual indirectness. These are usually more clever than deep - even, as one of my English profs once put it, "devoid of intellectual content" - but catchy and memorable. For instance, the Beach Boys: "I'm getting bugged driving up and down the same ol' strip,/I gotta find a new place where the kids are hip" - you could write a (short?) essay on the attitude, sub-culture, social implications, and imagery evoked by those two simple lines.

Subject: RE: BS: language positives
From: The Sandman
Date: 18 Sep 24 - 02:01 AM

golf is a good walk spoiled. MARK TWAIN

Subject: RE: BS: language positives
From: Neil D
Date: 18 Sep 24 - 04:32 AM

English and Americans: Two peoples separated by a common language.
G B Shaw

Subject: RE: BS: language positives
From: The Sandman
Date: 18 Sep 24 - 04:37 AM

Trump, a fart in a circus quote Dick Miles

Subject: RE: BS: language positives
From: Tattie Bogle
Date: 18 Sep 24 - 04:49 AM

When two positives make a negative, as in the Scottish expression of scorn:
“Aye right!”

Translation for any John McEnroe fans - “You cannot be serious!”

Subject: RE: BS: language positives
From: meself
Date: 18 Sep 24 - 10:44 AM

Every once in a while, it occurs to me that I haven't heard some old, useful, and somewhat colourful expression in a long time - e.g., the phrase "without so much as a by-your-leave" popped into my head a few minutes ago - has anyone heard that one lately?

Subject: RE: BS: language positives
From: Lighter
Date: 18 Sep 24 - 11:27 AM

Here in the States we say, "Yeah, right!" with the same meaning.

Subject: RE: BS: language positives
From: robomatic
Date: 18 Sep 24 - 02:12 PM

I like the hopefulness of "Artificial Intelligence" as if there is such a thing as "REAL Intelligence".

Subject: RE: BS: language positives
From: Black belt caterpillar wrestler
Date: 18 Sep 24 - 02:52 PM

As opposed to Military Intelligence?

Robin

Subject: RE: BS: language positives
From: BobL
Date: 19 Sep 24 - 03:18 AM

"Artificial Incompetence"

Subject: RE: BS: language positives
From: The Sandman
Date: 19 Sep 24 - 03:51 AM

ere in ireland a fine soft day, is in relation to drizzle, very poistive and optimistic whilst the scots refer more pessimistically to a dricht or dreich day

Subject: RE: BS: language positives
From: The Sandman
Date: 19 Sep 24 - 02:02 PM

gone for a burton.

Subject: RE: BS: language positives
From: Mr Red
Date: 25 Sep 24 - 12:00 PM

the GF is a gardener and out in all weathers. Her expressions are:

"rain by 7, fine by 11" which relates to a weather pattern common in the SW of England where the rain get channeled by the Severn Estuary.

"morning pride" - the sort of light rain that wouldn't trouble most people. Or any rain she continues to work in, which makes the word light work very hard!

"a scud" heavier rain that doesn't last very long. Say 5 minutes.

and she never says "looks black over Bill's mother's"

And a GF long ago used to say "take a lot of no never". ie ignore

Subject: RE: BS: language positives
From: The Sandman
Date: 25 Sep 24 - 04:30 PM

A cynic is a man who knows the price of everything, and the value of nothing.O Wilde

Subject: RE: BS: language positives
From: Lighter
Date: 27 Sep 24 - 09:19 AM

"Memory is not a clear glass pane but a stained-glass window through which we see our own pasts more vividly." - Samuel Hynes, literary historian and WWII memoirist.

(In my case it's more like a dirty glass pane....)

Subject: RE: BS: language positives
From: gillymor
Date: 27 Sep 24 - 11:05 AM

That reminds of something I've seen on a bumper sticker-
The Older I Get the Better I Was

Subject: RE: BS: language positives
From: gillymor
Date: 27 Sep 24 - 11:17 AM

Someone sent this to me. No idea where it came from-

Donald Trump is a poor man's idea of a rich man, a weak man's idea of a strong man, and a stupid man's idea of a smart man.