what’s in a name
“things” are getting pretty wild in my lighthouse pretty fast. the other day i flew a kite (that i made from a soiled dish towel) and just this morning i won two straight games of solitaire (without much cheating). because of my solitude, an army friend promised to send me some playboy pin-up posters to keep me company. the rascal failed to mention that the posters would be these, jason salavon’s graphical averages of playmates by decade. without the satisfaction i was looking for, i decided to create my own and thought it might be a larf to average other playmate statistics.
i came up with the above name chart though my methodology was sketchy. i determined through “algorithms” that both the playmates’ first and last names had an average of six letters. i then pieced together the most common first two letters + the most common middle two letters + the most common final letters to generate names. technically what i did was not averaging so much as moding, but that is splitting hairs and in the world of playboy playmates, there are not always a lot of hairs to split.
things to observe when looking at pictures of playmates’ [names]
watch how their first names change from ending in e to ending in a over time.
gawk at how their last names either end exclusively in er or on.
ponder why the relatively underused english letters j and k are oddly predominant.
fantasize about what the averaged playmate name for all playmates from 1955 to 2010 could be. hint: it’s the very unsexy “maarne collon.”
anywhosies, i’m off to meet my voluptuous invented girlfriend candra callon for some shrimp cocktails and couples foot massages, cheers.

what’s in a name

“things” are getting pretty wild in my lighthouse pretty fast. the other day i flew a kite (that i made from a soiled dish towel) and just this morning i won two straight games of solitaire (without much cheating). because of my solitude, an army friend promised to send me some playboy pin-up posters to keep me company. the rascal failed to mention that the posters would be these, jason salavon’s graphical averages of playmates by decade. without the satisfaction i was looking for, i decided to create my own and thought it might be a larf to average other playmate statistics.

i came up with the above name chart though my methodology was sketchy. i determined through “algorithms” that both the playmates’ first and last names had an average of six letters. i then pieced together the most common first two letters + the most common middle two letters + the most common final letters to generate names. technically what i did was not averaging so much as moding, but that is splitting hairs and in the world of playboy playmates, there are not always a lot of hairs to split.

things to observe when looking at pictures of playmates’ [names]

  • watch how their first names change from ending in e to ending in a over time.
  • gawk at how their last names either end exclusively in er or on.
  • ponder why the relatively underused english letters j and k are oddly predominant.
  • fantasize about what the averaged playmate name for all playmates from 1955 to 2010 could be. hint: it’s the very unsexy “maarne collon.”

anywhosies, i’m off to meet my voluptuous invented girlfriend candra callon for some shrimp cocktails and couples foot massages, cheers.

words wholly unrelated

schmuck (the the german word for jewel) & schmuck (the yiddish word for <ahem> dick)

what the smucker family fruit spread cartel doesn’t want you to know is that they were originally schmuckers, a long line of swiss jewelers. once they infiltrated america, they changed their name because if its connotations with—in a twist worthy of the one good m. night shyamalan movie—smoking. the fact that schmuck was also the yiddish word for the naughty male member has only recently bubbled to the surface with their current motto “with a name like smucker’s, it has to be good.”

i just assumed (and i swear i read somewhere)—since yiddish is a germanic language, and all of us have, from time to time, referred to our nuts as our sparkling jewels—that these two words were related. “not so fast,” says this atlantic monthly article if atlantic monthly articles could speak.

according to the lexicographer Michael Wex, a top-tier Yiddishist…the Yiddish and German schmucks are completely unrelated.

“Basically, the Yiddish word comes out of baby talk,” Wex said. “A little boy’s penis is a shtekl, a ‘little stick.’ Shtekl became shmeckle, in a kind of baby-rhyming thing, and shmeckle became shmuck

it seems like a stretch to me BUT michael wex is a top-tier yiddishist, and i am only a third tier yiddishist, so i will go with what he says for now.

__

un grand merci to mrs. p. b. legault who brought this important matter to my attention all the way from her home in the southwest of france.

April 27, 2011
tags

pronouncing sex words 102

you wake up to the sound of your zune alarm blasting rule, brittania! as it does every morning at 7:30 without fail. you feel the frictionless satin of foreign sheets, you smell an exotic waft of honeydew and musk, you taste the corners of your mouth and come up with hints of duck a l’orange. you realise at once that you are not in your own apartment; you are not in your own bed. and then an attractive chinese literature phd candidate rolls over and brushes across your favourite sex organ and you remember at once what happened last night.

instead of doing it like werewolves on a full moon, you had the well-intentioned idea of lighting some yankee candles and playing some brian eno through computer speakers. but when you returned to your date, you find that your date is fast asleep. sure you might be able to awaken this attractive phd candidate through grinding, but that is not what tru-playas do. tru-playas do a few quick crunches and then fall asleep with their teeth grit.

but all is not lost, you and your date and your favourite sex organ are now wide awake and it’s time for a mulligan. but don’t be hasty, tru-playa. if you floss that duck out of your teeth, fluff up the goosedown pillows, and keep your pronunciations of sexually-charged words as on point as your game, you might just get yourself a story to post on the internet under the guise of giving out pronunciation advice.

imbroglio: im-BROHL-yoh, not im-BROAG-lee-oh
liaison: LEE-uh-ZAHN, not LAY-uh-zahn
lingerie: lan-zhe-REE, not lahn-zhe-RAY or LAHN-je-ray
nuptial: NUHP-shul, not NUHP-shoo-ul
ogle: OH-gul, not AW-gul
proboscis: proh-BAH-sis, not pruh-BAHS-kis
tête-à-tête: TAYT-uh-TAYT is recommended over TET-ah-TET
venereal: vuh-NEER-ee-ul, not vuh-NAIR-ee-ul

__

source: the big book of beastly mispronunciations (1999).
more pronunciation advice here.

pronouncing sex words 101

you are on a first date with an attractive chinese literature doctoral candidate from an accredited university in cambridge. and you, being the tru-playa that you are, are doing everything right. your eyebrows have been waxed at the proper angles. you pop your pinky like the duchess of devonshire while sipping your vin blanc. you order duck a l’orange and not one of the more vulgar options like gorgonzola stuffed pork chops. and most importantly, every word that leaves your duck fat-smeared lips is pronounced perfectly.

because your game is tight, you are invited back to this attractive phd candidate’s apartment and find that your date’s regrettably “wholesome” roommate is away at some conference. it’s time to make your move, but don’t let your pounding libido get in the way of your spotless pronunciation record, less the deal becomes unsealed. for the future benefit of you, and for the future relief of your sex organs, here are the proper ways to pronounce some select sexually-charged words.

aphrodisiac: AF-ruh-DIZ-ee-ak, not AF-ruh-DEE-zee-ak
areola: uh-REE-uh-luh, not AIR-ee-OH-luh
boudoir: BOO-dwahr, not buh-DWAHR
clitoris: KLIT-ur-is, not kli-TOR-is
coitus: KOH-i-tus, not KOY-tus
commingle: kuh-MING-gul, not koh-MING-gul
cowper’s glands: KOO-purz GLANDZ, not KOW-purz GLANDZ
décolletage: DAY-kawl-TAHZH, not DEK-uh-luh-TAHZH
dishabille: dis-uh-BEEL, not DIS-huh-beel
divan: di-VAN, not di-VON

__

source: the big book of beastly mispronunciations (1999).
more pronunciation advice here.

bang the librarian hard
if you or one of your two dozen sex partners has a &#8220;thing&#8221; for sweaty, moany library intercourse (or sweaty, moany intercourse with sweaty, moany librarians) then you may enjoy dan and gail lester&#8217;s the image of librarians in pornography website a little too much. this page catalogues pulp novels published between 1978 and 1988 in the little-studied sub-genre of librarian kink.
here are a few stereotypes that you can expect to encounter in this odd genre: 
a frigid old librarian who just needs to be turned on
a virgin young librarian who is not interested in sex, but has an orgasm and is interested in more sex
a nymphomaniacal young female librarian
a virgin male head librarian who is seduced
also amusing is how dan and gail make semi-academic notes about the library-ness of each book 
Most of the library and librarian descriptions are reasonable, except for the number of books on a book cart.
There is much more privacy and isolation than typical in a school library.
finally, if you are not sure what to read on the ski lift or between triple salchow jumps at the local skating rink, here are a few titles that might restore your vigor:
Eager Beaver Librarian
Horny Balling Librarian
Hot Mouth Librarian
The Librarian Licks Big Ones
The Librarian&#8217;s Hot Urges
Line Up for the Librarian
What a Librarian! 

bang the librarian hard

if you or one of your two dozen sex partners has a “thing” for sweaty, moany library intercourse (or sweaty, moany intercourse with sweaty, moany librarians) then you may enjoy dan and gail lester’s the image of librarians in pornography website a little too much. this page catalogues pulp novels published between 1978 and 1988 in the little-studied sub-genre of librarian kink.

here are a few stereotypes that you can expect to encounter in this odd genre: 

  • a frigid old librarian who just needs to be turned on
  • a virgin young librarian who is not interested in sex, but has an orgasm and is interested in more sex
  • a nymphomaniacal young female librarian
  • a virgin male head librarian who is seduced

also amusing is how dan and gail make semi-academic notes about the library-ness of each book 

  • Most of the library and librarian descriptions are reasonable, except for the number of books on a book cart.
  • There is much more privacy and isolation than typical in a school library.

finally, if you are not sure what to read on the ski lift or between triple salchow jumps at the local skating rink, here are a few titles that might restore your vigor:

  • Eager Beaver Librarian
  • Horny Balling Librarian
  • Hot Mouth Librarian
  • The Librarian Licks Big Ones
  • The Librarian’s Hot Urges
  • Line Up for the Librarian
  • What a Librarian! 
February 28, 2011
tags
ellipsoid glandular bodies
longtime ragbag bosom buddy, ramona has written in to tell us that both salep (the turkish drink made from orchid flour) and orchids themselves both derive from words meaning testicle. 
salep supposedly comes from the arabic phrase: ḥasyu al-tha`lab which means fox balls. orchid is of course from the greek word for testicle (three guesses what an orchidometer measures or what an orchidectomy involves removing).
you would think that a flower as dainty as the orchid would be associated with feminine organs, but that is only because you are looking at the top half of the plant. once you start digging down below, you will quickly find yourself cupping a hairy pair of root nuggets.
who want&#8217;s to be the georgia o&#8217;keeffe of a flower&#8217;s bottom half?
__
ramona also tells us, a little too excitedly if you ask me, that avocado is the nahuatl word for the same little dangling sperm balloons, and if you said the word to a proper nahua spinster, she would probably die of extreme mortification on the spot.

ellipsoid glandular bodies

longtime ragbag bosom buddy, ramona has written in to tell us that both salep (the turkish drink made from orchid flour) and orchids themselves both derive from words meaning testicle

salep supposedly comes from the arabic phrase: ḥasyu al-tha`lab which means fox balls. orchid is of course from the greek word for testicle (three guesses what an orchidometer measures or what an orchidectomy involves removing).

you would think that a flower as dainty as the orchid would be associated with feminine organs, but that is only because you are looking at the top half of the plant. once you start digging down below, you will quickly find yourself cupping a hairy pair of root nuggets.

who want’s to be the georgia o’keeffe of a flower’s bottom half?

__

ramona also tells us, a little too excitedly if you ask me, that avocado is the nahuatl word for the same little dangling sperm balloons, and if you said the word to a proper nahua spinster, she would probably die of extreme mortification on the spot.

February 23, 2011
tags

words wholly unrelated

penthouse & house

i was leafing through a well-read 1998 penthouse magazine at my barbershop when i started to wonder what most gentleman wonder when reading this particular periodical—just what exactly is the etymology of penthouse and how has it come to mean the top level of a building?

had pent something to do with 5? was the penthouse the 5th floor? if so, that’s a pretty low top level. perhaps pent was in reference to pressure and the original penthouse was a boiler room or something.

after my haircut (i got the “junior executive”), i raced home and looked it up. i found that house (the word, not the curmudgeon doctor) has nothing to do with penthouse. it turns out that penthouse is actually from the middle english word, pentis which can be traced to the latin word, appendicium which meant something like “a small building depending on a larger one.”

thus penthouse is more closely related to appendage than house. a mnemonic device for remembering this is to think of an engorged wiener which is a type of appendage.

February 3, 2011
tags
he has 2 and they dangle nicely
as many of you know, i spent my formative years living in a trappist priory. while i am no longer affiliated with that order or the religion that it practices, i am still besieged from time to time with mnemonic flashes of arcane catholic lore. take yesterday for example when a friend of mine who restores antique furniture showed me his chaise percée, and all i could think of was the pope and his dangling holy testicles.
according to catholic rumormill, after the [potentially] mythical pope joan started giving birth to a baby during a papal mass and everyone realised that they had a reverse crying game situation on their hands—the college of cardinals had to devise some scheme to authenticate the masculinity of the next pope »

All subsequent popes were then supposedly subjected to an examination whereby, having sat on a dung chair containing a hole called sedia stercoraria, a cardinal had to reach up and establish that the new pope had testicles, before solemnly announcing &#8220;Duos habet et bene pendentes&#8221; — &#8220;He has two, and they dangle nicely.

while two such papal chairs do exist (one is in the louvre and the other is still in st. peter&#8217;s basilica), nobody—not even snopes dot com—can say whether or not this comically absurd practice is true, untrue or mega-true. 
__
see also: deuteronomy 23:1

he has 2 and they dangle nicely

as many of you know, i spent my formative years living in a trappist priory. while i am no longer affiliated with that order or the religion that it practices, i am still besieged from time to time with mnemonic flashes of arcane catholic lore. take yesterday for example when a friend of mine who restores antique furniture showed me his chaise percée, and all i could think of was the pope and his dangling holy testicles.

according to catholic rumormill, after the [potentially] mythical pope joan started giving birth to a baby during a papal mass and everyone realised that they had a reverse crying game situation on their hands—the college of cardinals had to devise some scheme to authenticate the masculinity of the next pope »

All subsequent popes were then supposedly subjected to an examination whereby, having sat on a dung chair containing a hole called sedia stercoraria, a cardinal had to reach up and establish that the new pope had testicles, before solemnly announcing “Duos habet et bene pendentes” — “He has two, and they dangle nicely.

while two such papal chairs do exist (one is in the louvre and the other is still in st. peter’s basilica), nobody—not even snopes dot com—can say whether or not this comically absurd practice is true, untrue or mega-true. 

__

see also: deuteronomy 23:1

November 2, 2010
tags
for bestiary: curupi, a guaraní fertility spirit with a penis so enormous that he wears it as a belt.
says wikipædia&#160;»

Kurupi is often blamed for unexpected or unwanted pregnancies. His penis  is said to be prehensile, and owing to its length he is supposed to be  able to extend it through doors, windows, or other openings in a home  and impregnate a sleeping woman without even having to enter the house.

what a party trick! i&#8217;m going to have to learn this one.

a more modern take on what curupi would look like as a super villain (or super hero depending on your view on enormous prehensile penises.) from here.

for bestiary: curupi, a guaraní fertility spirit with a penis so enormous that he wears it as a belt.

says wikipædia »

Kurupi is often blamed for unexpected or unwanted pregnancies. His penis is said to be prehensile, and owing to its length he is supposed to be able to extend it through doors, windows, or other openings in a home and impregnate a sleeping woman without even having to enter the house.

what a party trick! i’m going to have to learn this one.

a more modern take on what curupi would look like as a super villain (or super hero depending on your view on enormous prehensile penises.) from here.

September 16, 2010
tags

proof that boring linguistics papers are not always boring

i know what you’re thinking. you’re thinking that boring linguistics papers are always boring. but it ain’t always so, slacker! as evidence, i submit the paper* on the aforementioned adverbial prefixes in klamath. here, scott delancy discusses the prefix sg- (act with the penis) as it appears in several klamath myths.

the concluding line is the best line that ever appeared in all of linguistics (i bolded it for extra emphasis). i would wear a t-shirt of a tattooed version of a cross-stitched rendering of it, if such a thing existed.

sg- occurs in a set of semantically rather idiosyncratic stems:

  • /sgocaqta/ — bend the penis on
  • /sgena/ — take out the penis
  • /is goqo:tYe:nia/ — scrape the penis around inside

This is hardly surprising; there is a limited range of things which can be done with the penis, even in myth.

__

* “lexical prefixes and the bipartite stem construction in klamath” by scott delancey, international journal of american linguistics, (january 1999).

May 5, 2010
tags
kama chameleon
i was reading the kama sutra last night trying to figure out the mechanics of congress of the cow when i came across this charming illo by vātsyāyana. now if you&#8217;ll excuse me, i&#8217;m off to boston garden to find me a prostitute bibliophile who might be interested in performing the cobra with me on this radiant day of spring.

kama chameleon

i was reading the kama sutra last night trying to figure out the mechanics of congress of the cow when i came across this charming illo by vātsyāyana. now if you’ll excuse me, i’m off to boston garden to find me a prostitute bibliophile who might be interested in performing the cobra with me on this radiant day of spring.

the coolidge effect
the sum total of everything that i know about calvin coolidge, the 30th president of the you-ess-aye is from his interaction with the quipster dorothy parker. she sat next to the famously quiet president at a dinner once and said, &#8220;mr. coolidge, i&#8217;ve made a bet against a fellow who said it was impossible to get more than two words out of you.&#8221; his famous reply: &#8220;you lose.&#8221;
so you will excuse my shock when it came to my attention that calvin coolidge has a sexual phenomenon named after him. the coolidge effect states that &#8220;males show continuously high sexual performance given the introduction of new receptive partners&#8221; and has been observed in nearly every species in which it has been tested.
so what has calvin &#8220;silent cal&#8221; coolidge to do with sexual promiscuity? here&#8217;s what »

During a tour of a chicken farm, Mrs. Coolidge asked the farmer how often a rooster can mount a hen. The farmer replied, &#8220;About 40 times a day,&#8221; whereupon the first lady replied, &#8220;Please tell this to my husband.&#8221; After the farmer conveyed that information to the president, Coolidge asked whether the rooster mounted the same hen 40 times and was informed that it mounted 40&#160;different hens. Upon learning this information, Coolidge replied, &#8220;Please tell this to my wife.&#8221;

the coolidge effect

the sum total of everything that i know about calvin coolidge, the 30th president of the you-ess-aye is from his interaction with the quipster dorothy parker. she sat next to the famously quiet president at a dinner once and said, “mr. coolidge, i’ve made a bet against a fellow who said it was impossible to get more than two words out of you.” his famous reply: “you lose.”

so you will excuse my shock when it came to my attention that calvin coolidge has a sexual phenomenon named after him. the coolidge effect states that “males show continuously high sexual performance given the introduction of new receptive partners” and has been observed in nearly every species in which it has been tested.

so what has calvin “silent cal” coolidge to do with sexual promiscuity? here’s what »

During a tour of a chicken farm, Mrs. Coolidge asked the farmer how often a rooster can mount a hen. The farmer replied, “About 40 times a day,” whereupon the first lady replied, “Please tell this to my husband.” After the farmer conveyed that information to the president, Coolidge asked whether the rooster mounted the same hen 40 times and was informed that it mounted 40 different hens. Upon learning this information, Coolidge replied, “Please tell this to my wife.”

the first sex scene in scottish literature

the following steamy scene was written by ragbag role model, thomas urquhart way back in sixteen fitty two. like all things urquhart, it combines latin and greek neologisms, absurd euphemisms, wildly elaborate sentences, obscure allusions, and circumlocutious syntax. it also happens to be decidedly unerotic.

Thus for a while their eloquence was mute, and all they spoke was but with the eye and hand, yet so persuasively, by vertue of the intermutual unlimitedness of their visotactil sensation, that each part and portion of the persons of either was obvious to the sight and touch of the persons of both; the visuriency of either, by ushering the tacturiency of both, made the attrectation of both consequent to the inspection of either. Here it was that passion was active, and action passive, they both being overcome by other, and each the conquerour. To speak of her hirquitalliency at the elevation of the pole of his microcosme, or of his luxuriousness to erect a gnomon on her horizontal dyal, will perhaps be held by some to be expressions full of obscoeness, and offensive to the purity of chaste ears; yet seeing she was to be his wife, and that she could not be such without consummation of marriage, which signifieth the same thing in effect, it may be thought, as definitiones logicae verificantur in rebus, if the exerced act be lawful, that the diction which suppones it, can be of no greater transgression, unless you would call it a solaecisme, or that vice in grammar which imports the copulating of the masculine with the feminine gender.

if you had trouble getting turned on by this, much less understanding it, join the crowd—it was as hard to follow way back in sixteen fitty two as it is today. fortunately, i have found an online translation for you.

[Flash 9 is required to listen to audio.]

audiobooks out of context #7

this is the seventh post in the audio books out of context series. posts in this series publish themselves every (π²√5)² hours. the next post is scheduled for release on february 28th, 2010 at 12:35. by that time j.m. coetzee will have celebrated his 70th birthday and hunter s. thompson, his 5th yahrzeit.

achtung: while these excerpts are presented out of context, i should warn you that before you go blasting the audio throughout the church pew from which you normally browse the ragbag, that this excerpt gets kind of hot and heavy and is therefore enn-ess-eff-double-you. additionally, this audio sample serves to illustrate how what may be sublime on the page can quickly become ridiculous when read aloud.

the previous post in this series was excerpted from (an english translation of) jules verne’s around the world in 80 days (1873). mark matienzo was the first digital archivist at yale to point this out.

February 8, 2010
tags
for wunderkammer: a koteka (a decorative penis sheath made from a gourd) because if there&#8217;s one thing that the wunderkammer needs more of, it&#8217;s ornaments for one to decorate one&#8217;s penis with.
bonus koteka nugget from wikipædia »

In 1971-1972 the government of New Guinea launched &#8220;Operasi Koteka&#8221; (&#8220;Operation Penis Gourd&#8221;) which consisted primarily of trying to encourage the people to wear shorts and shirts because such clothes were considered more &#8220;modern.&#8221; But the people did not have changes of clothing, did not have soap, and were unfamiliar with the care of such clothes so the unwashed clothing caused skin diseases. There were also reports of men wearing the shorts as hats and the women using the dresses as carrying bags.

effyu operation penis gourd—stop trying to tell my friends what they can and can&#8217;t wear on their penises.

for wunderkammer: a koteka (a decorative penis sheath made from a gourd) because if there’s one thing that the wunderkammer needs more of, it’s ornaments for one to decorate one’s penis with.

bonus koteka nugget from wikipædia »

In 1971-1972 the government of New Guinea launched “Operasi Koteka” (“Operation Penis Gourd”) which consisted primarily of trying to encourage the people to wear shorts and shirts because such clothes were considered more “modern.” But the people did not have changes of clothing, did not have soap, and were unfamiliar with the care of such clothes so the unwashed clothing caused skin diseases. There were also reports of men wearing the shorts as hats and the women using the dresses as carrying bags.

effyu operation penis gourd—stop trying to tell my friends what they can and can’t wear on their penises.

January 27, 2010
tags
disclaimer