Ohhh... NOW I get it!

[PamelaJaye]

dropping by.
used to happen a lot
like the time I figured out Quaker Oats might have something to do with Quakers or, appropriately, that the Mormon Tabernacle Choir was made up of Mormons...

The lyrics to Beatles songs I was too young to figure out...

Reverse Parody: After seeing Airplane, finally standing in the drop off area at LAX and hearing The White Zone is for loading and unloading... and breaking into hysterical laughter that confused everyone around me except my husband, who was having the same reaction.

It still happens now and then. I'll remember when I see the original post again.

yup, the winner. in 1974 on WRKO the song TSOP by MFSB. They continually told me it was the sound of Philadelphia by Mothers, Fathers, Sister, Brothers, but I was brought up on "the sound of this and that", and it wasn't connecting. I knew what MFSB stood for but I kept wondering what TSOP stood for.

Then one day a DJ joked: "TSOP - the sound of pigs."

Dawn broke over Marblehead (and Westwood)
The other day I was reading of the Buffy plot where no one could figure out that Ben and Glory were the same person, no matter how many times they were told. It was sort of like that.

[Whatsahoe]

Frank Sinatra is "Chairman of the Board" not "Chairman of the Bored"

[skullturfq]

For many people, the primary use of pipe cleaners is in children's art projects.

I bet there have been more than a few people who, one day, suddenly realized that they can also be used to clean pipes. "Ohhhh. PIPE. CLEANER."

[jzerocsk]

For many people, the primary use of pipe cleaners is in children's art projects.

I bet there have been more than a few people who, one day, suddenly realized that they can also be used to clean pipes. "Ohhhh. PIPE. CLEANER."

I can't remember when I made that connection, but I happen to own some pipes (and the requisite cleaners) and when cleaning my daughter's humdifier for the 3rd or 4th time and finding that simply soaking the narrow pipestem-like uptake tube in vinegar then bleach never seemed to really get it cleaned, it finally occurred to me that I could use a pipe cleaner on it. Works like a champ.

[braggtastic]

I'm listening to a podcast about boxing movies while I'm reading this thread, and they mentioned how Max Baer wore a Star of David on his boxers, and I just realized why they're called boxer shorts.

[melissa]

I and 500+ of my classmates took Psych 101 my freshman year, and about halfway through my very first final, the professor wrote, "SHOW YOUR ID WHEN HANDING IN YOUR EXAM BOOK," on the blackboard. I read it as "Show your freudian id when handing in your exam book." It didn't help that everyone was going out in the hall with the professor, then just the prof would return. I was in total confusion as to what to do, so I turned in my exam book, smiled at him, and he said, "I've seen you enough to know that you're for real."

It wasn't until I was complaining to a bunch of other people ("What a pervert! What did he expect??") that someone told me, "ID, Melissa, he wanted to see your ID card." I still smile when I see the abbreviation "ID".


LOL about the Revolver AHAs! Actually, AHA was one that I had trouble figuring out, Real Simple magazine aside.

Ken, great catch on the 4:20!

[Momma Snider]

I was watching Gilmore Girls one time, and Lorelai's uppity father said something about his valet, VAL-it, pronouncing the T. I scoffed, but then I looked it up and found out he was perfectly correct.

[skullturfq]

I was watching Gilmore Girls one time, and Lorelai's uppity father said something about his valet, VAL-it, pronouncing the T. I scoffed, but then I looked it up and found out he was perfectly correct.

That also came as a surprise to me just now. I'm not sure I've ever heard the version that rhymes with "ballot" or "mallet", but both Wiktionary and Merriam-Webster list that version first (if the order in which they list pronunciations means anything).

[srah]

I was watching Gilmore Girls one time, and Lorelai's uppity father said something about his valet, VAL-it, pronouncing the T. I scoffed, but then I looked it up and found out he was perfectly correct.

That also came as a surprise to me just now. I'm not sure I've ever heard the version that rhymes with "ballot" or "mallet", but both Wiktionary and Merriam-Webster list that version first (if the order in which they list pronunciations means anything).

I've always thought of a gentleman's gentleman as a VAL-et and a guy who parks your car as a va-LAY, but I don't know if there's an actual divide between pronunciation and job duties.

[Paucle]

Just now picking my chin up off my desk. WOW. This one has to be top 10 all time mispronunciations. I know literally (and I use literally literally) nobody who pronounces it correctly. And if I did, I would've "corrected" them.

Kudos to writers of Gilmore Girls for getting it right, but boo hiss also to writer (and director) of episode for no "reality bite" of another character "correcting" him. You just know it would happen that way! (Go ahead, see what happens first time you "VAL-it" in a crowd).

Looking it up in the big book of beastly mispronunciations (charles harrrington elster):

valet Traditionally, VAL-it, but in the U.S. now usually va-LAY or VAL-ay.
"The overwhelming majority of Americans say vaLAY, which they think is the
French pronunciation of the word but which finds, somewhat strangely, no
support in any dictionary," writes Charles Allen Lloyd in We Who Speak English (1936)

There's lots more- it's one of the longer entries. Great book, actually:can look at it HERE.

[Muskrat]

Just now picking my chin up off my desk. WOW. This one has to be top 10 all time mispronunciations. I know literally (and I use literally literally) nobody who pronounces it correctly. And if I did, I would've "corrected" them.

Kudos to writers of Gilmore Girls for getting it right, but boo hiss also to writer (and director) of episode for no "reality bite" of another character "correcting" him. You just know it would happen that way! (Go ahead, see what happens first time you "VAL-it" in a crowd).
....

I have a man who pronounces things for me. He works on a team with the man who swears for me and the man who writes my internet comments.

[Lolly92459]

When I see the word, "abed", I ALWAYS think of it as a verb (though I have no idea what "to abe" would mean!). It takes me several readings to think of it as "a-bed."

[Dobie]

Cary Grant always pronounced it "VAL it", and he's never steered me wrong yet.

[naurae29]

though I have no idea what "to abe" would mean!

to be spectacularly honest, of course.

[Muskrat]

though I have no idea what "to abe" would mean!

to be spectacularly honest, of course.

Or "to put a spectacular, long-armed wood-chopping, country-lawyer style smackdown on your opponent," as in "Richmond got Abed last night -- they're still putting out the fires."

[Whatsahoe]

"I wouldn't touch that with a 10 foot pole" is not a reference to a really tall guy from Warsaw.

[gameshowcongress]

"I wouldn't touch that with a 10 foot pole" is not a reference to a really tall guy from Warsaw.

In the spirit of the season: Boris Karloff would not touch the Grinch with a thirty-nine-and-a-half foot pole

[marpocky]

"I wouldn't touch that with a 10 foot pole" is not a reference to a really tall guy from Warsaw.

In the spirit of the season: Boris Karloff would not touch the Grinch with a thirty-nine-and-a-half foot pole

Do you mean Thurl Ravenscroft?

[gameshowcongress]

"I wouldn't touch that with a 10 foot pole" is not a reference to a really tall guy from Warsaw.

In the spirit of the season: Boris Karloff would not touch the Grinch with a thirty-nine-and-a-half foot pole

Do you mean Thurl Ravenscroft?

Indeed I stand corrected and thank you for the correction that I have held as trivial knowledge, entirely appropriate for the topic at hand!

[gameshowcongress]

I never thought to look at this location with this phrasing for such a list

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_co ... onceptions

[skullturfq]

Only today do I fully "get" the name Boris Badunov from Rocky & Bullwinkle. I mean, I was always clued in that "Badunov" sounds like "bad enough" and also sounds like a stereotypically Russian last name. But it's also an oblique reference to this guy:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Boris_Godunov

[rockgolf]

And now for your next surprise: Wassamatta U isn't really a university.

[melissa]

I probably shouldn't admit this, but my sister & I both thought that "funk" was the bad word until wer were in about the sixth grade... My family obviously didn't swear a lot.

[grodney]

I just realized the "strong" connection between Armstrong and LIVESTRONG.

[Whatsahoe]

"Of thee I sing" is right

"Of thee icing" is wrong