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What are the pompitous of love? / pompatus
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Subject: What are the pompitous of love? From: GUEST,JTT Date: 02 Dec 01 - 05:48 PM According to the Steve Miller Band, some people call them a space cowboy, some call them other names, because: Cause I speak of the pompotous of love. What is a pompotous? What are pompotous? Is the lack of them the reason for my lack of success in this department over the years? |
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Subject: RE: What are the pompitous of love? From: Pene Azul Date: 02 Dec 01 - 06:25 PM Here's a previous thread about "The Joker" which includes this link about pompitous. You can find quite a few links with Google too. Jeff |
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Subject: RE: What are the pompitous of love? From: Jeri Date: 02 Dec 01 - 06:32 PM I think it comes from the French "pompe páteux" - pompe: to pump, to suck in and páteux, meaning pasty, clammy, thick I think it basicically means that love is like sucking in a thick, gooey substance, possibly like honey. It could be something rude, of course, since it's French. |
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Subject: RE: What are the pompitous of love? From: Gary T Date: 02 Dec 01 - 06:53 PM I think you'll find that the link in Pene Azul's post ("this link") gives the definitive answer, from the source. |
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Subject: RE: What are the pompitous of love? From: 53 Date: 02 Dec 01 - 07:43 PM never really given it much thought BOB |
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Subject: RE: What are the pompitous of love? From: Kim C Date: 03 Dec 01 - 11:53 AM Heehee! I guess Steve made up a new word. Like hey derry down derry dido, or dally dally dum dum day. ;-) |
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Subject: RE: What are the pompitous of love? From: GUEST Date: 03 Dec 01 - 12:02 PM I always thought it was a combination of "pompous" and "impetus". |
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Subject: RE: What are the pompitous of love? From: Liz the Squeak Date: 03 Dec 01 - 07:42 PM It's complete bollocks - he made it up because it sounded like a good word. Like portmanteau. LTS |
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Subject: RE: What are the pompitous of love? From: GUEST Date: 03 Dec 01 - 09:39 PM I always heard it as the PROPERTIES of love.... |
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Subject: RE: What are the pompitous of love? From: WyoWoman Date: 03 Dec 01 - 10:13 PM I had this once -- YEARS ago, of course -- and it was the dickens to get rid of. Sulpha drugs. That's the only answer ... ww |
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Subject: RE: What are the pompitous of love? From: catspaw49 Date: 03 Dec 01 - 10:16 PM What??? You mean it's venereal diease? Well shitfire.....I thought it was a hairdo. Spaw |
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Subject: RE: What are the pompitous of love? From: WyoWoman Date: 03 Dec 01 - 10:26 PM Well, it's actually both. One's named for its resemblance to the other ...
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Subject: RE: What are the pompitous of love? From: Liz the Squeak Date: 04 Dec 01 - 02:58 AM Hairdo as displayed on last Saturday's episode of 'The Vicar of Dibley'. LTS |
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Subject: RE: What are the pompitous of love? From: Kim C Date: 04 Dec 01 - 10:31 AM Portmanteau's a real word though, if you're French. It's like a suitcase. Something to carry your clothes in, or some such. The portmanteau of love... hmmm.... maybe a place to carry your lingerie? I sort of like the word "absquatulate." |
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Subject: RE: What are the pompitous of love? From: Mrrzy Date: 04 Dec 01 - 11:06 AM That's pêteux, not péteux; no acute accents on A in French, and the grave accent is only on the word à, doesn't occur within words. I remember hearing someone use the word portmanteau (in French, literally: coat carrier; means: big suitcase, or trunk) in English and was mightily confused for a while - you use a big, composite word and somebody says it's a suitcase? But I got there eventually. |
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Subject: RE: What are the pompitous of love? From: GUEST,The Buren Ranger Date: 04 Dec 01 - 01:52 PM Pompitous? Didnt he used to be the Prime Mister of France? TBR |
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Subject: RE: What are the pompitous of love? From: Gary T Date: 04 Dec 01 - 02:15 PM I remember hearing someone use the word portemanteau (in French, literally: coat carrier; means: big suitcase, or trunk) in English and was mightily confused for a while - you use a big, composite word and somebody says it's a suitcase? This tickled me because "suitcase" is a medium-size composite word. |
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Subject: RE: What are the pompitous of love? From: Jeri Date: 04 Dec 01 - 02:54 PM Or pâteux, even. Thanks Mrrzy. I actually looked in a French-English dictionary. I had my glasses on, but my left eye has been doing odd things lately that don't have anything to do with focusing, and those accents are SMALL! |
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Subject: RE: What are the pompitous of love? From: Lonesome EJ Date: 04 Dec 01 - 03:12 PM *Pompitous Noun POMP'-it-tus - 1)Any object typifying pompousness or intended showiness 2) archaicA medallion or locket presented as a token of love or obligation
*Smerck's Dictionary of the Obscure |
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Subject: RE: What are the pompitous of love? From: Dicho (Frank Staplin) Date: 04 Dec 01 - 03:54 PM Portmanteau is a "real" word in English, and useful. Its older meaning of a large traveling bag is becoming obsolete (often used in literature before abt. 1920), but the newer meaning, for words like smog, is useful (a blending of two or more words - smoke and fog = smog). It also means a combination of things. Pompitous has a nice sound to it. If we all decide on a meaning and use it regularly, soon it will become a real word (like proactive). |
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Subject: RE: What are the pompitous of love? From: Amos Date: 04 Dec 01 - 05:31 PM The "pompitoux of love" are French fried potatos of the specialest kind -- the sort which lovers who are still discovering each other share by popping them into each others' mouths. This is one of those French words which has found its way into other languages, but the English usually use bits of battery fish, while the Americans use the same term to describe very small onion rings. A |
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Subject: RE: What are the pompitous of love? From: mousethief Date: 04 Dec 01 - 06:15 PM I thought it was pomme pas deux meaning literally "apple two-step" which is very similar to what my grandmother called diarrhea. Why you'd call someone "Maurice" because they can talk about diarrhea, however, is beyond my ability to understand. Alex |
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Subject: RE: What are the pompitous of love? From: catspaw49 Date: 04 Dec 01 - 06:22 PM I wish this thread would go away before I write another Cletus story..........."Cletus' Pompadour of Love"....... Spaw |
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Subject: RE: What are the pompitous of love? From: Devilmaster Date: 05 Dec 01 - 03:08 PM Have you ever wanted a question asked? ya know, one of those questions like: "what is the pompitous of love" or "why is the sky blue"?
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Subject: RE: What are the pompitous of love? From: GUEST,Rob Date: 30 Jan 07 - 05:13 PM Pompitous of love really means something to one guy called Maurice. Steve Miller was let into this secretive clue to some alien form of love. Some people call him Maurice, because he has the same knowledge of love as Maurice. He is not Maurice, they just call him Maurice. Not many people call him Maurice, only some do. So few people know for a fact that he knows the true meaning of the pompitous of love, just like the real Maurice does. As far as I know, the real Maurice might even be the inventor of the pompitous. But I'm not sure, because it's still a mystery to me. Anyway, it sounds like a good word indeed. |
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Subject: RE: What are the pompitous of love? From: Charley Noble Date: 30 Jan 07 - 05:19 PM The word which will not go away. Charley Noble |
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Subject: RE: What are the pompitous of love? From: bobad Date: 30 Jan 07 - 05:30 PM From straightdope.com Dear Cecil: What does "pompatus" mean? There's a movie out now called The Pompatus of Love, and of course it contains the Steve Miller song as a theme. I can't find "pompatus" in the dictionary. Any clues? --Cane95, via America Online Cecil replies: Clues? Pfui. We have cracked the freaking case, thanks to some outstanding legwork by Jon Cryer--actor, cowriter, and coproducer of the movie Pompatus of Love--and my new assistant, J.K. Fabian. J.K. has what it takes to make a real impact in this business: pluck, luck, and an outstanding record collection. "Pompatus" mystified millions when Steve Miller used it in his 1973 hit "The Joker": "Some people call me the space cowboy. / Yeah! Some call me the gangster of love. / Some people call me Maurice, / Cause I speak of the Pompatus of love." "Space cowboy" and "gangster of love" referred to earlier Miller songs. Maurice was from Miller's 1972 tune "Enter Maurice," which appeared on the album Recall the Beginning ... A Journey From Eden. "Enter Maurice" had this lyric: "My dearest darling, come closer to Maurice so I can whisper sweet words of epismetology in your ear and speak to you of the pompitous of love." Great, now there were two mystery words. What's more, it appeared even Miller himself was uncertain how pompatus was spelled. It appeared as "pompatus" in at least two books of sheet music but as "pompitous" in the lyrics included with "Recall the Beginning." Miller has said little about the P-word over the years. In at least one interview, fans say, he claimed "it doesn't mean anything--it's just jive talk." Not quite. Some sharp-eared music fan noticed the "Enter Maurice" lyric above bore a marked resemblance to some lines in a rhythm and blues tune called "The Letter" by the Medallions. The song had been a hit in R & B circles in 1954. J.K. found the record. It had the lines, "Oh my darling, let me whisper sweet words of [something like epismetology] and discuss the [something like pompatus] of love." J.K. tried to find the sheet music for the song, but came up only with the Box Tops hit ("My baby, she wrote me a letter"). Then came a stroke of luck. Jon Cryer the movie guy had stumbled onto the secret of pompatus. Eager to reveal it to the world, he sent it to--who, Rolling Stone? The New York Times? Of course not. He sent it to us. Speculation about "pompatus" was a recurring motif in the script for The Pompatus of Love. While the movie was in postproduction Cryer heard about "The Letter." During a TV interview he said that the song had been written and sung by a member of the Medallions named Vernon Green. Green, still very much alive, was dozing in front of the tube when the mention of his name caught his attention. He immediately contacted Cryer. Green had never heard "The Joker." Cryer says that when he played it for Green "he laughed his ass off." Green's story: "You have to remember, I was a very lonely guy at the time. I was only 14 years old, I had just run away from home, and I walked with crutches," Green told Cryer. He scraped by singing songs on the streets of Watts. One song was "The Letter," Green's attempt to conjure up his dream woman. The mystery words, J.K. ascertained after talking with Green, were "puppetutes" and "pizmotality." (Green wasn't much for writing things down, so the spellings are approximate.) "Pizmotality described words of such secrecy that they could only be spoken to the one you loved," Green told Cryer. And puppetutes? "A term I coined to mean a secret paper-doll fantasy figure [thus puppet], who would be my everything and bear my children." Not real PC, but look, it was 1954. Green went on to record many other songs and is still writing today. He can be reached at P.O. Box 1394, Perris, CA 92572. Steve Miller must have loved R & B. Another line from "The Joker" goes "I really love your peaches, wanna shake your tree. / Lovey dovey, lovey dovey, lovey dovey all the time." A similar line may be found in the Clovers' 1953 hit "Lovey Dovey": "I really love your peaches wanna shake your tree / Lovey dovey, lovey dovey all the time." When I spoke to Miller's publicist Jim Welch about these remarkable coincidences, he said Miller's comment was "artistic license." Pressed a bit, Welch said Miller acknowledged that he'd been "influenced" by earlier artists. Not perhaps the most forthcoming statement in the world. But at least we now know it didn't come to him in a dream. FADE TO GREEN From Rockin' Radio News: Vernon Green, leader of the Medallions, died Dec. 24th [2000] in a hospital in Los Angeles. Best known for "The Letter" and "Buick 59," they were the first doo-wop group to record for Dootone Records. Their first release, "Buick 69," (based on Todd Rhodes' double-entendre R&B hit "Rocket 69"), backed with a ballad called "The Letter," was a double-sided West Coast hit. Green's famous recitation on "The Letter" contained the nonsense lyric, "the pulpitudes of love," which was later picked up by Steve Miller as "the pompitudes of love"—which became the title of a 1990s film. So, yet another spelling. But at least Vernon gets the credit he deserves. --CECIL ADAMS |
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Subject: RE: What are the pompitous of love? From: wysiwyg Date: 30 Jan 07 - 11:20 PM Pompitudinous, dude! ~S~ |
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Subject: RE: What are the pompitous of love? From: Bee Date: 31 Jan 07 - 12:02 AM That information is just stunningly cool, man. And I *rarely* say cool, man, let alone mean it. Puppetutes! |
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Subject: RE: What are the pompitous of love? / pompatus From: GUEST,mpostr Date: 16 Feb 11 - 10:39 AM The real question is not really what pompitous means. The real question is: Why the hell does it make people call him Maurice when he speaks of it? |
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Subject: RE: What are the pompitous of love? / pompatus From: catspaw49 Date: 16 Feb 11 - 10:46 AM Coming back to this thread ten years later, I think the phrase means fucking a cheerleader............ Spaw |
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Subject: RE: What are the pompitous of love? / pompatus From: GUEST,alain Whittle Date: 16 Feb 11 - 11:41 AM Maurice Chevalier who sang. Eef a nightingel could sing aberve Eet would seeng of the pompitus of lerve |
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Subject: RE: What are the pompitous of love? / pompatus From: open mike Date: 16 Feb 11 - 12:52 PM epismetology sounds a lot like episiotomy which you might need if the pompatus of love leads to pregnancy... also, there is an oil painting called The Garden of Pizmotality oh, so much to learn! |
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Subject: RE: What are the pompitous of love? / pompatus From: GUEST,leeneia Date: 17 Feb 11 - 12:34 AM Like the man who made up 'pompatus,' I debliviate words from time to time, usually when talking to my husband. He always understands what I mean. |
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