COUNTESS "This young gentlewoman had a father,--O, that 'had'! how sad a passage 'tis!--whose skill was almost as great as his honesty; had it stretched so far, would have made nature immortal, and death should have play for lack of work." -Act I scene i, All's Well that Ends Well.
What a word, Ensorcell. From a West Wing rerun tonight:
JOSH Hey, this is not that. She's got... I really... I'm... bewitched. I'm ensorcelled. There's got to be some way we're screwing them over.
posted by grand_Panjandrum @ 4:37 PM
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Do not cross it.
posted by grand_Panjandrum @ 8:13 AM
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Be it resolved that another feature spurred on by this newly created site will be to find a suitably hilarious reason to email an anonymous person with a suitably random inquiry most Fridays. Spurred on by the debate over "infinity as number" below, who better to entreat in the first installment than the author of the excellent 2006 paper on the subject. Conveniently, the address was readily advertised at the top. And so:
Just thought you'd like to know that over Scotch and Smirnoff last night, a heated debate was had in Halifax over whether zero was in fact a number. Some foolhardy souls apparently were valiant enough to take the position that it was not, and were thusly chastised in a flurry of worthy rhetoric. The more interested debaters quickly moved the subject toward infinity, and whether it too should be considered a number. I was of the opinion that it must be, despite considerable opposition. So it was with no small measure of delight that I found your treatise on the subject via Google this Friday afternoon. I concur wholeheartedly with your conclusion, and you may be happy to hear that its arguments have swiftly crippled much of the opposition.
Many thanks. I wonder only if you could share a bit the story behind the research for the paper... and hope this Friday treats you wonderfully.
posted by grand_Panjandrum @ 11:38 AM
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Once upon a time, I spent a few hours toiling in the Stanstead lockdown with the security officers for some ill-timed remarks and newfound VISA requirements. Took much of the time talking of one Wayne Rooney's destination from Everton. Having just seen him for the first time in Portugal affronting the French on a television in Calgary and destined to consume a year in England, his choice of options mattered to me greatly then. And now, for all the annoyance over most things United, his appearances there yet make those games imminently watchable.
To listen to some people, you would think they had never heard of nightclubs north of Watford. That Manchester did not give the world pills, thrills and some of the biggest lunatics ever to be let loose on an island. That George Best was teetotal until he went to Fulham. That provincial England closed at nightfall, save for two bingo halls and some old boys playing dominoes in the snug. That London, by contrast, was pitched midway between Bangkok, New Orleans and Amsterdam, with the fairground scene from Pinocchio thrown in for good measure. Poor old Wayne. What chance would he stand with that lot? They would eat him alive in t’smoke. Stick with your own kind, lad. It’s not for the likes of you is London.
posted by grand_Panjandrum @ 10:59 AM
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I think scorn to sigh. Shakespeare Friday - as it will be known here henceforth. Though surely the Rum-and-Cokes will make their usual appearances on this grand, weekly occasion. If they prove as potent as last night's The Glenlivet, they will serve. Zero is most definitely a number, as I most vociferously argued. Perhaps Infinity is as well...
ADRIANO DE ARMADO
I will hereupon confess I am in love: and as it is
base for a soldier to love, so am I in love with a
base wench. If drawing my sword against the humour
of affection would deliver me from the reprobate
thought of it, I would take Desire prisoner, and
ransom him to any French courtier for a new-devised courtesy. I think scorn to sigh: methinks I should
outswear Cupid. Comfort, me, boy: what great men
have been in love?
MOTH
Hercules, master.
ADRIANO DE ARMADO
Most sweet Hercules! More authority, dear boy, name
more; and, sweet my child, let them be men of good
repute and carriage.
MOTH
Samson, master: he was a man of good carriage, great
carriage, for he carried the town-gates on his back like a porter: and he was in love.
ADRIANO DE ARMADO
O well-knit Samson! strong-jointed Samson! I do
excel thee in my rapier as much as thou didst me
in carrying gates. I am in love too. Who was Samson's
love, my dear Moth?
MOTH
A woman, master.
ADRIANO DE ARMADO
Of what complexion?
MOTH
Of all the four, or the three,
or the two, or one of the four.
ADRIANO DE ARMADO
Tell me precisely of what complexion.
MOTH
Of the sea-water green, sir.
ADRIANO DE ARMADO
Is that one of the four complexions?
MOTH
As I have read, sir; and the best of them too.
ADRIANO DE ARMADO
Green indeed is the colour of lovers; but to have a
love of that colour, methinks Samson had small
reason for it. He surely affected her for her wit.
MOTH
It was so, sir; for she had a green wit.
posted by grand_Panjandrum @ 9:40 AM
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In the great spirit of collective anonymity - let the first salute on this newly created space for words and wonder go out to Borf. Marvelous.
posted by grand_Panjandrum @ 8:19 AM
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COUNTESS "This young gentlewoman had a father,--O, that 'had'! how sad a passage 'tis!--whose skill was almost as great as his honesty; had it stretched so far, would have made nature immortal, and death should have play for lack of work." -Act I scene i, All's Well that Ends Well.
So she went into the garden to cut a cabbage-leaf to make an apple-pie; and at the same time a great she-bear, coming up the street, pops its head into the shop. “What! No soap?” So he died, and she very imprudently married the barber; and there were present the Picninnies, and the Joblillies, and the Garyulies, and the grand Panjandrum himself, with the little round button at top, and they all fell to playing the game of catch as catch can till the gunpowder ran out at the heels of their boots.
