Funny – Irishperson in Exile

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Awesome Reddit thread on untranslatable phrases from languages other than English. The Afrikaans ones are particularly great:

soutpiel

Which translates to “Saltcock”, implying that they have one leg in England, one leg in South Africa, and their dick is dangling in the ocean.

Some Irish Gaelic ones:

Scaoil amach do bhoibilín – Go for it (literally: set your glans free).
Is dócha nach bhfuil seans ar bith ann – Would sir/madam like to engage in a copulatory ritual (literally: I suppose there’s no chance of it?)
Ag deanamh neamhshuim – To engage in the act of excretion (literally: making bad jam)

Sidenote: Scaoil Amach an Bobailín was an Irish language youth show that ran from 1990 to 1993. Someone at RTÉ missed out on the literal translation.

(via Waxy Links)

A Brief History of Dagenham

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Ang and I recently attended a showing of “Made in Dagenham” at the Arts Cinema and were captivated by a movie that both immersed us in the feel of late-sixties London and managed to portray an important historical event without being stuffy.

However, during the climactic scene we started to hear a low but constant beeping. Ang, being much more generous than I am, only glared accusingly at the smoke alarm but I turned around to shush what I thought was a rampaging horde of huge thumbed happy-slappers. Cue a retreat of almost Gallic proportions when it turned out the source of the beeping was none other than Professor Hawking.

Obviously the erstwhile professor likes working class period drama – we’d already been graced with his presence during a showing of Kinky Boots.

My own contribution to the Wittertainment Code of Conduct for cinema patrons: No random beeping unless you’re a former holder of the Lucasian Chair of Mathematics.

Giving the Schafernaker

Ben and Tom had the idea of getting the phrase giving the Schafernaker into common usage, just like the Santorum (NSFW) and lifting your luggage (NSFHypocrites).

Next time you’re cut up on the motorway, pushed about on the Tube, or just plain fed up with the world consider giving the Schafernaker.

When nine hundred years old you reach…

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Based on a thread from Stack Overflow, Joey deVilla gives us a new dictionary of technical jargon. Sadly, definitions for Heisenbug and Bohrbug were missed off:

Heisenbug (n.) A computer bug that disappears or alters its characteristics when an attempt is made to study it. (named after the Heisenberg Uncertainty Principle)

Bohrbug (n.) A bug that manifests itself consistently under a well-defined (but possibly unknown) set of conditions. (named after the Bohr Atom Model)

(Wikipedia, 2010)

Apparantly, Yoda Conditions are considered best practice.

A tear heals faster than a cut

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Even though the terrible acoustics in the Corn Exchange forced him to slow down his trademark fast delivery but Dára Ó Briain managed to squeeze his entire show into two of the funniest hours I’ve ever spent in the company of a fellow countryman.

The set pieces ranged from our obsessions with keeping up with “stuff” to being stalked by the lonliest man in the world (Will Smith in the abominable I am Legend, coming soon to every format imaginable) and managed to keep the laughs going through the uneven audience participation section.

The tour is selling out quickly but it’s definitely worth traveling to get to a show if only to see there’s certainly more to Ó Briain than being the token Paddy on the BBC.

Triumph Rocket III – 21st Century Motorcycle Manufacture

I never wanted to get my motorcycle licence until now.

Movies don’t depict reality: News at eleven.

11. Not all computers are made by the Apple corporation.

Kinky Serenity

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A while ago I saw Kinky Boots, a very British comedy set in the north of England about a shoe factory saved from bankruptcy by changing their product line from quality mens’ brogues to womens’ boots that could hold the weight of a man for transvestites. While the film was very simple and had some quite sweet moments, it was made all the more odd because the transvestite in question was played by Chitwetel Ejiofor, who had previously played the Central government assassin in Serenity.

It’s not every day where you see someone as an assassin one week and a very convincing transvestite the next.

As if that weren’t strange enough, Stephen Hawking was in the front row and appeared the enjoy the movie quite a lot.

Only in Cambridge.

Tag: Funny

I Witnessed a Murder Today

“I’ll plant a mango tree in your mother’s posterior and copulate with your sister in the shade”