In the 3/16 New Yorker, this cartoon by Jack Ziegler:

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Giant buttocks instead of giant heads. And the outrageous pun keister on the rhyming Easter.

This is not the only exploitation of the keister/Easter relationship. There is, in particular, keister bunny, as in ornaments available from Cafe Press:

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And on the Cop Slang website, we find an entry for keister bunny ‘an inmate who hides contraband in his/her rectum’.

On the slang term keister, from NOAD2, two senses:

1 a person’s buttocks.  2 dated   a suitcase, bag, or box for carrying possessions or merchandise. ORIGIN late 19th cent. (in the sense ‘suitcase, bag’): of unknown origin.

Very cautious. The Online Etymological Dictionary, assembled by a lexicographically enthusiastic amateur, is willing to speculate, though carefully:

“buttocks,” 1931, perhaps transferred from underworld meaning “safe, strongbox” (1914), earlier “a burglar’s toolkit that can be locked” (1881); probably from British dialect kist (northern form of chest) or its German cognate Kiste “chest, box.” The connection may be via pickpocket slang sense of “rear trouser pocket” (1930s).

(As for Ziegler, his cartoons have appeared on this blog four times before, with discussion of the cartoonist here.)

On Facebook yesterday, Chris Waigl posted the beginning of this story from the (UK) Independent, dated today:

James May calls Jeremy Clarkson a ‘k**b’ after Top Gear star suspended by BBC

Top Gear presenter James May has defended his co-presenter Jeremy Clarkson following his suspension, by calling his colleague “a k**b” but saying he “quite likes him.”

It took Chris a minute or so to figure out that the asterisked word was knob — British slang for ‘penis’, also usable (like dick and prick) as an insult. She noted that “asterisks of coyness” were kind of counterproductive if you spend ages pondering what the word might be, adding that “p***k would be functionally equivalent to k**b, but takes almost as long to decipher.” She went on:

One thing I noted occasionally glancing at the red-top press in the UK — mostly in the form of Metro or other free crap, was how much more common the asterisking was there, while the style guides of the Guardian, for example, discourage it. The above is from the Indy, but I can’t discern if it wasn’t actually an external ad. Anyhow, one thing the red-tops DON’T discourage is using the offending words in the first place, so [many] more articles contain them — asterisked out — than would in the Guardian. And for the long ones, I frequently had to stop and count asterisks trying to figure out if “bastard” or “bonehead” (yeah, they’d asterisk out nursery-school level insults) would fit.

Another Briticism: red-top press, referring to a kind of tabloid; more on this below. But first a note on asterisking in the tabloid press. As Chris suggests, there’s so much asterisking because the tabloids are using “offensive” vocabulary so extensively, flaunting their “naughtiness” in a way that serious publications like the Guardian never would.

Now on the tabloids, from Wikipedia:

Tabloid journalism is a style of journalism that tends to emphasize topics such as sensational crime stories, astrology, gossip columns about the personal lives of celebrities and sports stars, and junk food news. Such journalism is commonly associated with tabloid sized newspapers like the National Enquirer, Globe, or The Sun and the former News of the World. Not all newspapers associated with such journalism are in tabloid size; for example, the format of Apple Daily is broadsheet, while the style is tabloid. The terms tabloids, supermarket tabloids, gutter press and rag refer to the journalistic approach of such newspapers rather than their size.

… Collectively called the “tabloid press”, tabloid newspapers in Britain tend to be simply and sensationally written, and to give more prominence than broadsheets to celebrities, sports, crime stories and even hoaxes; they also less subtly take a political position (either left-wing or right-wing) on news stories, ridiculing politicians, demanding resignations and predicting election results. The term “red tops” refers to tabloids with red nameplates, such as The Sun, the Daily Star, the Daily Mirror, the Daily Record and the Daily Sport, and distinguishes them from the Daily Express and Daily Mail. Red top newspapers are usually simpler in writing style, dominated by pictures, and directed at the more sensational end of the market.

Annals of remarkable birds (like the hoatzin, here): an image passed on to me by Chris Hansen:

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Two blue-footed boobies. Yes, that’s their real color. But why boobies?

About the birds, from Wikipedia:

The blue-footed booby (Sula nebouxii) is a marine bird in the family Sulidae, which includes ten species of long-winged seabirds. Blue-footed boobies belong to the genus Sula, which comprises six species of boobies. It is easily recognizable by its distinctive bright blue feet, which is a sexually selected trait. Males display their feet in an elaborate mating ritual by lifting their feet up and down while strutting before the female.

… The natural breeding habitats of the blue-footed booby are the tropical and subtropical islands of the Pacific Ocean. It can be found from the Gulf of California down along the western coasts of Central and South America down to Peru. Approximately one half of all breeding pairs nest on the Galápagos Islands.

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NOAD2 gives two senses for booby: ‘a stupid or childish person’ and the bird (above), with

ORIGIN early 17th cent.: probably from Spanish bobo (in both senses), from Latin balbus ‘stammering’

The tentative etymology treats the two senses as one historically, seeing the bird and an oaf or fool as deeply similar. Then from the first sense, we get the compounds booby trap and booby hatch. From NOAD2:

booby trap: a thing designed to catch the unwary, in particular:

- an apparently harmless object containing a concealed explosive device designed to kill or injure anyone who touches it: miles of mines, booby traps, and underground fortifications
– a trap intended as a practical joke, such as an object placed on top of a door ajar ready to fall on the next person to pass through

booby hatch: (N. Amer. informal) a psychiatric hospital

And from boob, the slang compound boob tube ‘television set’, attested in the OED from 1966.

Also, from this item the first sense of booby, we get shortened boob ‘stupid fellow, clown'; the datings in the OED make it clear that that this boob is a shortening of booby, rather than the reverse.

There are more loose ends. First, there’s another sense ‘jail, jail cell’ for both boob and booby, though the historical sequence is unclear.

Then there’s a slang ‘breast’ sense for both boob and booby (both most often attested in the plural); the first is attested in the OED in 1949, the second in 1934. OED has booby as the clearly older item, a variant of the now-obsolete or dialectal slang bubby (first attested in 1690), which the OED says is comparable to German bübbi ‘teat’.

There’s a lot of supposition in these stories.

From the April 18th Economist, in the article “Putin’s targeted strike: The meaning of Russia’s weapons sale to Iran”:

In July 2013 Russia remained silent when an Israeli air strike destroyed anti-ship cruise missiles that it had recently supplied to Syria and were on their way to Hizbullah. And Israel kept shtum last October when Syrian rebels released footage of the involvement of Russian intelligence officers at a Syrian military listening post on the Golan Heights that had been overrun.

Israel kept shtum. With the adjective shtum ‘silent, mute’ — an item that, apparently, few Americans know, unless they have some experience of British English. (The Economist is a British publication.) On the British side, the item is ordinary slang, commonly used in the collocation keep shtum (and in some other contexts). It seems to be derived from Yiddish, though I believe that very few British speakers appreciate that; for them, it’s just slang. So there’s something of a puzzle as to how it became naturalized in BrE but not AmE.

Solving that puzzle would require an extensive knowledge of the relevant texts and their cultural contexts, over time, something I unfortunately don’t have. But it’s a nice project for someone who’s better at such research than I am.

Ok, so far, keep shtum. Then here’s shtum on its own, in a Monty Python routine, “The Piranha Brothers, Part 2″:

In this, we have a pimp answering the phone (and trying to conceal what’s going on from a reporter interviewing him about the Piranhas:

“Oh no, not now…shtum, shtum…right. Yes, we’ll have the ‘watch’ ready for you at midnight. The watch. The Chinese watch.“

The lexicographers. From NOAD2 on shtum (also schtum), marked as informal (but not British):

adjective   silent; non-communicative: he kept shtum about the fact that he was sent down for fraud. [note BrE sent down]

verb [no obj.]   be or become quiet and non-communicative: you start to say something and then just when it’s getting interesting you shtum up.

ORIGIN 1950s: Yiddish, from German stumm [‘silent, mute’].

OED2 is not as current as NOAD2, but it has some additional information. First, more attested alternative spellings, beyond shtum and schtum: shtoom, schtoom, shtumm, stumm. Then, more citations. In summary:

A. adj. Silent, speechless, dumb. Esp. in phr. to keep (or stay) shtoom . Occas. also as n. [first cite 1968]

B. v. intr. To be quiet, to shut up. Also trans.: cf. shut it [first cite 1958]

(It has the Yiddish etymology and marks the entry as slang, but (again) not as British.)

In response to possible Russian submarine intrusions in Swedish waters, a playful Distractify posting “Sweden’s New Defense Strategy Against Russian Submarines Is A Gay Dancing Sailor” by Myka Fox. A neon hunk:

“Light in the loafers, heavy in the briefs” says the posting.

Heavy in the briefs — a big package — is clear in the photo. What about light in the loafers?

Here’s O’Conner & Kellerman’s Grammarphobia Blog on the idiom (on 3/12/08):

Q: Growing up in the ‘50s, I recall hearing “light in the loafers” as a term of derision for gay men. An Internet search turned up several possible explanations, all plausible, none definitive. Have you ever wrestled with “light in the loafers”?

A: Like many expressions, “light in the loafers” is a bit slippery to wrestle with, but here goes.

Cassell’s Dictionary of Slang (2d ed.) has only a brief entry, describing the expression as ‘50s American slang and adding that “the image is the stereotyped effeminate male, tripping along.” [the reference is to a mincing gait]

The Random House Historical Dictionary of American Slang, which defines it as effeminate or homosexual, lists a series of references for the expression dating from 1967 to 1996.

However, the first Random House citation, which comes from the Dictionary of American Slang (1967) by Harold Wentworth and Stuart Berg Flexner, describes the expression as “fairly common” since around 1955.

The expression, by the way, hasn’t been used only to mock gay men. It’s also been used as a euphemism by gay men themselves, as in this 1989 reference from the ABC-TV movie Rock Hudson: “We’d say, ‘Is he musical?’ Never gay…. Sometimes ‘Light in the loafers.’”

Both the Cassell’s and Random House entries include what they describe as a similar expression for a gay or effeminate man: “light on his (or “her”) feet.” But I’ve never heard this phrase used in any other way than to describe someone who’s graceful.

If you’ve googled “light in the loafers,” you know that it’s still being used today. The most recent Random House citation is from the Feb. 7, 1996, issue of New York Press, an alternative weekly: “The garment business is popularized by citizens who are ‘light in the loafers.’”

So the nightmare for Putin and his minions is a horse-hung swishy faggot.

This morning’s Bizarro:

A play on cat: ‘feline’ or ‘jazz musician’. With the former opposed to dog ‘canine’ in the idiomatic prairie dog.

As I noted in a posting on prairie dog, those creatures are not dogs, but they are so-called because they resemble dogs in having a bark-like warning call. In the cartoon, we see two figures that are indeed cats (on the prairie), but in the slang sense rather that the literal sense.

Green’s Dictionary of Slang has two relevant senses of cat, both marked as orig. US black: ‘a person’, with the first cite in 1886; and “in orig. jazz-orientated uses” ‘a jazz musician’, with the first cite from Cab Calloway in 1944. The sense developments aren’t entirely clear.

(If you’re puzzled by the odd symbols in the cartoon — Don Piraro says there are 2 [no — make that 3] in this strip — see this Page.)

From Steve Anderson a few days ago, this cute story (by Seth Rosenthal on June 20th) from the world of basketball, on player Boogie Cousins:

Hero child nutmegs DeMarcus Cousins, then scores in his face

This is Boogie’s “DeMarcus Cousins Elite Skills Camp,” and it’s the typical session in which campers get to attempt scoring on the 7′ basketball man. Cousins obviously isn’t trying very hard to start the exchange, but then the kid successfully puts the ball through his legs and Cousins spins around with what looks to me like a genuine effort to block the reverse finish … but it’s got juuuust the right arc to soar over his fingers and drop in! And the crowd goes wild!

Video in the story. Still shot of the aftermath:

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Ah, the verb nutmeg.

There’s a Wikipedia page, with some speculation about the origin of the term:

A nutmeg (or tunnel, sometimes just meg in British English slang) is a technique used in association football, field hockey or basketball, in which a player kicks, rolls or throws the ball between an opponent’s legs (feet). This can be done in order to pass to another player, to shoot on goal, or to carry on and retrieve it.

Nutmeg is the British English name for this technique.

… Kicking the ball through an opponents legs in order to get past them is a dribbling skill commonly used among football players, with some of the most notable exponents in the modern game including Ronaldo, Ronaldinho, Lionel Messi, Cristiano Ronaldo and Luis Suárez. Suárez became so skilled at nutmegging opponents it led to the saying: “Suárez could nutmeg a mermaid.”

… The origins of the word are a point of debate. An early use is in the novel A bad lot by Brian Glanville (1977). According to Alex Leith’s book Over the Moon, Brian – The Language of Football, “nuts refers to the testicles of the player through whose legs the ball has been passed and nutmeg is just a development from this”. The use of the word nutmeg to mean leg in Cockney rhyming slang has also been put forward as an explanation.

Another theory was postulated by Peter Seddon in his book Football Talk – The Language And Folklore Of The World’s Greatest Game. The word arose because of a sharp practice used in nutmeg exports between America and England. “Nutmegs were such a valuable commodity that unscrupulous exporters were to pull a fast one by mixing a helping of wooden replicas into the sacks being shipped to England,” writes Seddon. “Being nutmegged soon came to imply stupidity on the part of the duped victim and cleverness on the part of the trickster.” It soon caught on in football, implying that the player whose legs the ball had been played through had been tricked, or, nutmegged.

Checking out Green’s Dictionary of Slang, we discover that nutmegs is a venerable slang term for the testicles (attested first in Broadside Ballads of 1684-9), indeed that it predates nuts in this sense. Though nutmegs in this sense has almost entirely passed out of general use, in favor of nuts or balls (or the more refined testicles), it seems to have been preserved on the football pitch (and then in other athletic arenas) in Britain (and then elsewhere). (Somewhat surprisingly, eggs in this sense has never really caught on in English, nor has oeufs in French; compare huevos in Spanish.) From Green’s:

1999 Roger’s Profanisaurus 3 in Viz 98 Oct. 21: nutmegs n. Balls that hang between a footballer’s legs.

You can appreciate how appropriate nutmegs is for this use from this photo:

  (#2)

(More on the spice in a little while.)

The sporting use of nutmeg(s) makes it available for a verbing of a rather complex sort. But verbings frequently stand in a complex relationship to their noun sources: in their classic study “When nouns surface as verbs” (Language 55,767-811, 1979), Eve and Herb Clark observe that there is a relatively small set of frequent N > V semantic relationships, but that idiosyncratic and highly contextualized relationships also occur. As a result, if you insist on formulating an account that covers all the examples, the best you can do is something like: the denotation of the V has something to do with the denotation of the N.

In the soccer (and other sporting) examples, to nutmeg a player is to shoot the ball under his nutmegs, that is, in between his legs. (No doubt many people who use the term have no appreciation of its origin; for them, it’s just what you say.)

Bonus: nutmeg, the spice. From Wikipedia:

Nutmeg … is one of the two spices – the other being mace – derived from several species of tree in the genus Myristica. The most important commercial species is Myristica fragrans, an evergreen tree indigenous to the Banda Islands in the Moluccas (or Spice Islands) of Indonesia.

Nutmeg is the seed of the tree, roughly egg-shaped and about 20 to 30 mm (0.8 to 1.2 in) long and 15 to 18 mm (0.6 to 0.7 in) wide, and weighing between 5 and 10 g (0.2 and 0.4 oz) dried, while mace is the dried “lacy” reddish covering or aril of the seed.

… Nutmeg and mace have similar sensory qualities, with nutmeg having a slightly sweeter and mace a more delicate flavour. Mace is often preferred in light dishes for the bright orange, saffron-like hue it imparts. Nutmeg is used for flavouring many dishes, usually in ground or grated form, and is best grated fresh in a nutmeg grater.

The origin of the name, from NOAD2:

late Middle English notemuge, partial translation of Old French nois muguede, based on Latin nux ‘nut’ + late Latin muscus ‘musk.’

First, a little more on sexual tube steak. Then a couple images of accidental penises.

Tube steak. First to reminisce. From a 8/28/12 posting on “Gidget and her friends”:

[Tubesteak Tracy:] a reference to tubesteak ‘hot dog’ (as a nickname for [surfer Terry] Tracy). On this last, there’s a complex set of senses of hot dog involved here, most going back to the late 19th century: the sausage; the slang interjection ‘expressing delight or strong approval’ (OED3); and the slang (originally and chiefly U.S.) for:

A flashy, ostentatiously successful person; a show-off. In later use also: a person proficient at a sport, etc.; esp. one who gives a flamboyant display of his or her skill. (OED3)

(a sense that became especially prominent in skiing and surfing). Later — OED3 has it first in 1963 — came the specifically surfing use for ‘a large surfboard, somewhat smaller than a ‘gun’ ‘. The name Tubesteak picks up some of these associations. It might also have associations to the phallic slang tube steak, which I discussed here as a possibly unfortunate name for a hot-dog stand, noting:

Here the problem is yet another metaphorical extension of a word referring to a hot dog to use in reference to the penis; see the wiener discussion here.

Now on Urban Dictionary, an extension of simple phallic tube steak:

Army lingo for the male sexual organ; the penis. Typically used in the phrase “tube steak & white gravy,” a reference to an ejaulating penis, inserted into one of the drill/platoon/top sergeants’ numerous gay slurs directed at subordinates. (by Tummy AuGratin 2/28/06)

Accidental phallicity. Two photos that appeared during my recent search on tube steak: a penis of pork, and one that can grill food.

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As you can see from the label, this is a whole pork tenderloin in a supermarket (posted on Pinterest by someone who found it on mandatory.com).

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(Well, I’ll.) Guy was just striding along, when Penis Cook popped out of his fly and started grilling away.

(On the language of sex — but with a fair amount of sex, so this posting might not be to everyone’s taste.)

“Happy Ending” was the header on this e-mail from the Daily Jocks people yesterday, announcing the last hours of their big sale; the caption below is mine.

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He got him off, then he
Kissed him off.

From Wikipedia on massage parlors:

A massage parlor (American English) or massage parlour (British English) is the term commonly used as a euphemism for a brothel, an establishment that is actually a front for prostitution.

… the massages at certain massage parlors may have a “happy ending”, meaning that the massage ends with the client receiving a sexual release [usually by a handjob, sometimes by a blowjob]. In addition to a “happy ending” service, given the restrictions imposed upon most striptease venues, some erotic massage venues now also offer a service where the client can masturbate him or herself while watching an artist perform a striptease.

This sexual (but semi-euphemistic) and very context-specific sense of happy ending (referring to the ending of a massage session that provides happiness by giving the customer sexual release) competes with a more literal (and more general) sense of the expression (referring to the ending of an event or a story that is fortunate, usually by providing happiness to the participants — they lived happily ever after, as the saying goes); even this sense is not fully literal, however, since literal happy is predicated of people, but is here transferred to an event in which people become happy.

The two senses can sit poorly together, as here:

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(Another Friendly’s sign offers a free Happy Ending “with any chicken choices”. Cue the gay slang detector: one boy to go, with a handjob.)

From an Adweek piece of 7/12/05 by Tim Nudd, “Is Friendly’s being overly friendly?”:

The phrase “happy ending” has been gaining currency for some time as a way to refer to a massage that offers, shall we say, an extra component of release. There’s even a new movie called Happy Endings, which is being advertised with a shot of what looks like a woman’s bare back and a towel covering her butt. (A man’s butt would make more sense, probably, but a woman’s may be better for ticket sales.)

(#3)

So it’s somewhat curious that Friendly’s is still touting its “Happy Ending” sundae, a product that is prompting the expected insinuations about the family restaurant chain’s commitment to customer service… To get their side of the story, we called Friendly’s. They told us they weren’t aware of the connotation and had no plans to change the name.

Apparently, Friendly’s (a restaurant chain in the eastern U.S. specializing in ice cream) has used the registered name “Happy Ending” for a number of sundaes on its menu, the idea being that a sundae provides a happy ending to a meal.

The 2005 movie Happy Endings advertised itself (as in #3) in a clearly sexual fashion, and indeed the three stories it weaves together all have prominent lesbian or gay themes. But the 2011-13 tv series with that name seems to have been just about relationships, as were the 2014 romantic comedy film Happy Ending and the 1969 film The Happy Ending.

Passed on by Chris Hansen on Facebook, this story of 6/23 from thelocal.no (“Norway’s news in English”), “Is this the worst summer job ever?”:

A nineteen-year-old in Norway has been hired by a sexual health charity to play a giant penis who surprises passers-by by spraying them with golden confetti.

“I thought it was hilarious. If I can do a good thing for others, just by being a dick, there is nothing better,” Philip van Eck, the man inside the penis costume, told Norway’s Tønsberg Blad newspaper.

It’s all about STDs.

The tagline for this story in Nowegian Bokmål is:

(1) Tiss kan overraske.

which is interestingly ambiguous.

Background: Norwegian has three grammatical genders (masc neut fem) and two (related) lexical items tiss:

tiss neut (mass noun: definite singular tisset) ‘pee’ (clearly onomatopoetic)

tiss masc (count noun: definite singular tissen, indefinite plural tisser, definite plural tissene) ‘pee-pee, willy’ (childish term for the penis)

So: (1) is either ‘pee can surprise you’ or ‘a willy can surprise you’.

Today’s Calvin and Hobbes:

As on other occasions, Calvin asks his father an information question and gets a less than useful response. In this case, the meaning of the old college try is clear, but its history is not quite so clear.

Merriam-Webster Online gives the brief definition ‘a zealous all-out effort’ for the old college try in the slang idiom give it the old college try, which might have satisfied Calvin (assuming that he understands zealous). Green’s Dictionary of Slang suggests a rationale for the idiom and gets it back to 1918; the entry, with the first three cites:

college try (n.) [the myth of ‘college spirit’] (US) a plucky effort, esp. against heavy odds; usu. in phr. (let’s) give it the old college try.

1918 Elyria (OH) Eve. Telegram. 19 Oct. 4/4: [headline] The Old College Try.

1939 W. Winchell ‘On Broadway’ 3 Oct. [synd. col.] The best they could give Rudy [Vallee] was cheers for a college try.

1946 Mezzrow & Wolfe Really the Blues 199: They figured to clean up some money fast with this good old college try.

(I’ve included the Mezzrow & Wolfe quote because, by happy accident, Mezz Mezzrow figures prominently in another posting I’m working on, on white people assuming black identities.)

More detail on that 1918 cite: the full headline was

“The Old College Try.”
By BILLY SUNDAY
(Famous Evangelist)

which suggests that the old college try was already a familiar formula to Sunday. A Stack Exchange discussion supplies further detail:

Actually, the evangelist puts the expression on the lips of the great Giants manager John McGraw who after watching an rookie outfielder just out of college miss a heroic catch which resulted in a homer. While the “sapient birds of the Giants gave the kid the cackle” McGraw is quoted as saying, “That’s the eye, young fellow. The old college try.”

So maybe it was an invention of McGraw’s.

This morning’s Mother Goose and Grimm turns on a simple, silly ambiguity, but then the story gets more complicated:

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First pass: hooters (1) ‘creatures that hoot, i.e., owls’ (straightforward derivational morphology, but specialized semantically) vs. Hooters, the restaurant chain fixated on hooters (2) N. Amer. vulgar slang for ‘a woman’s breasts’ (NOAD2).

Then there’s another sense, on which a Bizarro cartoon (posted here as #3 on 5/2/14) turns: hooters (3) informal ‘noses, esp. big noses’ vs. Hooters.

And at least one other important sense: hooter (4) esp. Brit. ‘an automobile horn’ —  that is, a thing that hoots (more straightforward derivational morphology).

But what about senses (3) and (2)?

Second pass: the restaurants. From Wikipedia:

Hooters, Inc. is the trade name of two privately held American restaurant chains: Hooters of America, Incorporated, based in Atlanta, Georgia, and Hooters, Incorporated, based in Clearwater, Florida. The Hooters name is a double entendre referring to both its owl logo, a bird known for its “hooting” calls as well as an American slang term for human breasts originally coined by comedian Steve Martin on the hit comedy series Saturday Night Live.Hooters is a restaurant whose waiting staff are primarily attractive young women, usually referred to simply as “Hooter Girls”, whose revealing outfits and sex appeal are played up and are a primary component of the company’s image.

I’ll get back to Steve Martin soon.

Here are some Hooter(s) girls on the job:

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The owl on these shirts is a new logo; it replaced the original l(and to my eye, more satisfactory) logo in 2013:

(#3)

Background on Steve Martin, from Wikipedia:

Stephen Glenn “Steve” Martin (born August 14, 1945) is an American comedian, actor, musician, writer, producer, and singer.

Martin came to public notice as a writer for the Smothers Brothers Comedy Hour, and later became a frequent guest on The Tonight Show. In the 1970s, Martin performed his offbeat, absurdist comedy routines before packed houses on national tours. Since the 1980s, having branched away from stand-up comedy, Martin has become a successful actor, as well as an author, playwright, pianist and banjo player,

… Martin appeared on 27 Saturday Night Live shows and he guest-hosted 15 times, … On the show, Martin popularized the air quotes gesture, which uses four fingers to make double quote marks in the air.

… On his comedy albums, Martin’s stand-up is self-referential and sometimes self-mocking. It mixes philosophical riffs with sudden spurts of “happy feet”, banjo playing with balloon depictions of concepts like venereal disease, and the controversial kitten juggling (he is a master juggler). His style is off-kilter and ironic, and sometimes pokes fun at stand-up comedy traditions

Now the hooters story, from the askmen site:

On May 17, 1980, three years before Hooters opened its doors, Steve Martin hosted Saturday Night Live and in his monologue he unknowingly provided the future restaurant with its name, saying, “I believe it’s derogatory to refer to a woman’s breasts as ‘boobs,’ ‘jugs,’ ‘winnebagos’ or ‘golden bozos’ — you should only refer to them as ‘hooters.’”

Martin’s next line was, “And I believe you should put a woman on a pedestal — high enough so you can look up her dress,” possibly providing the founders with the motivation needed to launch a restaurant in such a competitive industry.

Martin’s monologue is consistent with this sense of hooters being already current, so that Martin was recommending one variant rather than inventing one. However, Green’s Dictionary of Slang has its first mammary citation only in 1979 (in Geoffrey Wolff’s excellent memoir The Duke of Deception), so that if Martin didn’t actually invent the usage, he was certainly the vector for its spread.

But what would be the motivation for its invention? Well, noses are not only phallic symbols, but big ones are also mammary symbols, and that would get us from noses to breasts by a metaphorical transfer..

Working our way back, hooter ‘nose’ could conceivably be a specialization of hooter ‘thing that hoots’ (as in snorting or blowing one’s nose), but Green’s takes it to be metaphorical, “from its supposed resemblance to an old-fashioned automobile hooter” [i.e. horn] (with a first cite in 1959),

So it all starts with things or creatures that hoot and works its way out from there.

Oh yes, to be a hoot (said of a person, thing, or situation) ‘to be amusing or entertaining’ pretty clearly comes from hooting in pleasure or entertainment at some source.

From Ned Deily on Facebook, a photo of the Sneaky, Snacky Squirrel Game for small children, which invited jokey comments playing on nuts ‘testicles’. And from there to other expressions for the testicles: play ball!

The Squirrel Game, by Educational Insights:

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Grab those nuts! And squeeze them. From the makers:

Your forest friends are hungry in The Sneaky Snacky Squirrel Game and they need your help! Spin the spinner, squeeze the matching colored acorn with your Squirrel Squeezers, and place it into your log. Be the first to fill your log with delicious acorns and you win! You could also spin pick an acorn, steal an acorn, or lose an acorn, so be strategic, little squirrel! The Set Includes: one set of Squirrel Squeezers, 20 colored acorns, four logs, one game spinner, and game board which doubles as packaging! Develops matching, sorting, strategic thinking, hand eye coordination, fine motor skills, and pre handwriting skill. Grades Pre-K and up.

There are more squirrel-and-nut games. For instance, the Defend Your Nuts action game, described here as follows:

Everyone knows that squirrels are super cool… until you mess with their nuts. Take heed, scary bees and skeletons! This squirrel IS NOT joking around. Stop being so squirrelly and get to defending! [a tower defense game, for all ages, launched 9/23/11]

There’s a successor, Defend Your Nuts 2:

You want my nuts? Just try and get them! Mr. Squirrel is no stranger to nut danger, and he is ready to pop any creeps who make a move for his nuts. Fierce mice join your battle as you upgrade your weapons and nut defenses. Unfortunately, the creeps get faster and badder, too. Lock and Load, Little Nutjobs! [a tower defense game, for all ages, launched 12/21/12]

Then there’s a card game Nuts (aka 2-handed solitaire or team solitaire), played with an ordinary deck of cards (described here) and surely getting its name from a secondary use of nuts, presumably the exclamation.

And still another card game, Nuts!, which is played with a special deck and incorporates the squirrel/acorn image:

(#2)

Digression. Googling on nuts and game together pulls up a number of sites about playing with your balls and still others offering advice on how to play with a guy’s balls. Apparently, Google counts nuts and balls as equivalents.

Well, as slang synonyms for testicles, they pretty much are, though in secondary uses they diverge. More on this below.

Slang for testicles. People are tremendously inventive in coining expressions for the testicles (as for the penis, the breasts, etc.), but the collection of testicular slang expressions that are widely known and used isn’t very large. For modern English, nuts and balls — both metaphorical — lead the pack; they are, in effect, “standard slang”, the everyday words for this purpose. But other words referring to spherical or ovoid objects of roughly the right size will serve as the basis for a metaphor, and stones and rocks are reasonably common in this use (and also in extended uses, as in have stones, have the stones (to) VP, parallel to have balls, have the balls (to) VP ‘have courage, guts’; and in get one’s rocks off ‘ejaculate’).

Another apparent metaphor is found in the specifically British slang goolies, which the Oxford Dictionaries site dates to the 1930s and takes to be of Indian origin, citing Hindi golī ‘bullet’.

Still another English metaphor has largely fallen out of use; see my discussion in a 6/25/15 posting:

Checking out Green’s Dictionary of Slang, we discover that nutmegs is a venerable slang term for the testicles (attested first in Broadside Ballads of 1684-9), indeed that it predates nuts in this sense. Though nutmegs in this sense has almost entirely passed out of general use, in favor of nuts or balls (or the more refined testicles), it seems to have been preserved on the football pitch (and then in other athletic arenas) in Britain (and then elsewhere). (Somewhat surprisingly, eggs in this sense has never really caught on in English, nor has oeufs in French; compare huevos in Spanish.)

Digression on French and Spanish. The “standard slang” expressions in these languages — like nuts and balls, vernacular but not especially vulgar — are both traceable back to Latin cōleus ‘bag, sac, sack, pouch’: French couilles, Spanish cojones as alternatives to more anatomical testicules, testiculos. The sense development is figurative, but metonymical rather than metaphorical, turning on contiguity (of the scrotum to the testicles) rather than similarity.

Note: cojones has been borrowed into American English slang.

Back to English. One more metaphor, the euphemistic family jewels. And a specialization of an anatomical term for ordinary-language purposes:

gonads  an organ that produces gametes; a testis or ovary. ORIGIN late 19th cent.: from modern Latin gonades, plural of gonas, from Greek gonē ‘generation, seed.’ (NOAD2)

What’s remarkable here is that gonads is now taken to be vulgar slang, perhaps less so in its American clipped version nads.

Two more alternatives that are chiefly or entirely British: bollocks / ballocks (mid-18th century variants of balls, especially favored in various secondary uses of balls) and the rhyming slang cobblers (from the shoemaking expression cobbler’s awls, impressed into service to convey balls).

Bonus. Searching on synonyms for testicles also leads us to testicles as food, where euphemisms are the order of the day. From Wikipedia:

The testicles of calves, lambs, roosters, turkeys, and other animals are eaten in many parts of the world, under a wide variety of euphemistic culinary names. Testicles are a by-product of the castration of young animals raised for meat, so they were probably a late-spring seasonal specialty, though nowadays they are generally frozen and available year-round.

Testicles are cooked in a variety of ways: sautéed and sauced, fricasseed, deep-fried with breading or batter, in pies, poached, roasted, and so on. Before cooking, they are generally scalded, skinned, and soaked in cold water.

Testicles are known by a wide variety of euphemisms, including ‘stones’, ‘mountain oysters’, ‘prairie oysters’, and so on. Lamb testicles in particular are often called ‘lamb fries’ or simply fries (though that may also refer to other organ meats).

On the Comics Kingdom blog on Tuesday the 8th: “Tuesdays Top Ten Comics on Grammar and Wordplay” (with grammar, as usual, understood broadly). CK distributes strips from King Features; it’s one of my regular sources of cartoons for this blog. The strips here are all from 2014-15.

Commas. A Bizarro from 7/12/15:

(#1)

Note asyndetic coordination (without and, using just commas), very common in headlines and the like, and the ambiguity of joined.

(If you’re puzzled by the odd symbols in the cartoon — Don Piraro says there are 8 in this strip — see this Page.)

A Mother Goose and Grimm from 1/13/14:

(#2)

Something of a meme: close syntactic construction, with no comma, versus a comma settting off a vocative.

A Bizarro from 2/17/15, involving the vocative comma and also correction:

(#3)

Correction of the non-standard adverb good for well (but without correction of degree real to really). Plus the vocative comma. And ambiguity of well (adverb vs. noun) and of the verb call. And a little joke on good grammar vs. well grammar. A lot — maybe too much — going on in only two panels.

(Just 1 symbol in the cartoon.)

Then just correction, in this Dustin of 1/8/15:

(#4)

Briefly on the strip, from Wikipedia:

Dustin is a daily comic strip created by Steve Kelley, editorial cartoonist for the New Orleans Times-Picayune, and Jeff Parker, who holds the same position for Florida Today. It …  started running on January 4, 2010… Focusing on the present boomerang generation and post-2008 recession period, it also deals with varying topics from everyday life and social commentary.

On to lexical semantics, in the Retail of 6/28/14, on literally (another recurrent subject in the comics):

(#5)

(On the usage literature about literally, with links to Language Log discussions, see my posting of 2/25/11.)

About the strip, from Wikipedia:

Retail is a syndicated comic strip … authored and illustrated by Norm Feuti. It made its newspaper debut on January 1, 2006, and then gained quickly in popularity following articles in The New York Times and TIME Magazine. [It’s set in a depatment store.]

On mechanics (spelling and punctuation), teens, and texting: the Pajama Diaries of 1/31/15:

(#6)

About the strip, from Wikipedia:

The Pajama Diaries is a syndicated comic strip created in 2006 by Terri Libenson, an artist who has also done work for American Greetings. It is narrated by Jill Kaplan, a wife of a loving husband and working mom of two young girls in a Jewish family somewhere in Ohio done in real-time fashion, where the characters age with the progressive years of the series and deals with varying topics from the everyday silliness and dramas of life to social commentary.

And on non-standard English (and slang), the Curtis of 2/11/14:

(#7)

Curtis is a nationally syndicated comic strip written and illustrated by Ray Billingsley. It began on October 3, 1988, and is syndicated by King Features.

The strip mostly involves the title character, Curtis, getting in trouble at home and school, trying in many attempts to make his father, Greg, quit smoking …, trying to win the heart of aspiring diva singer Michelle and stuffing his face.

Next a Rhymes with Orange (of 8/15/15) on the names of punctuation:

(#8)

(“Rocky Raccoon”: Her name was Magill and she called herself Lil / But everyone knew her as Nancy)

Her name is Ellipsis and she calls herself Sis / But everyone knows her as Dot Dot Dot.

And the word play. The Bizarro of 12/30/14, on peace vs. peace in Zombieland:

(#9)

(Just 1 symbol in the cartoon.)

Finally, app and happy, from the Six Chix of 12/4/14:

(#10)

On the strip, from Wikipedia:

Six Chix is a collaborative comic strip … [that] debuted in January 2000. The series is drawn by six female cartoonists who rotate the drawing duties through the week based on a fixed schedule [#10 was done by Anne Gibbons.]

(It’s going to be penis penis penis in this posting. But fairly decorously, and with some discussion of names, plants, and medicine.)

Every so often there’s an outbreak of ExtenZe commercials on late-night cable television. Well, the same commercial, over and over again. The current ad features former Dallas Cowboys head coach Jimmy Johnson, who became the official spokesman for ExtenZe in 2010:

Here’s comic Jim Gaffigan riffing on this commercial:

Note Gaffigan’s playing on Jimmy Johnson‘s name as a possible factor in his choice as spokesman; Gaffigan mentions (former Chicago Bears linebacker) Dick Butkus as an alternative. I suppose it’s too bad that actor Peter O’Toole is no longer available. (In a while I’ll consider Willy / Willie candidates.)

But first some ExtenZe background.

From Wikipedia:

ExtenZe is a herbal nutritional supplement claiming to promote “natural male enhancement”, a euphemism for penis enlargement. Additionally, television commercials and advertisements claim an “improved” or “arousing” sexual experience [longer, stronger, harder erections]. Websites selling the product make several more detailed claims, including acquiring a “larger penis”. Their enlarging effects are described as “temporary” which will only provide you a “chubby one” while under the use of Extenze. Early infomercials featured a studio audience and porn star Ron Jeremy.

(#1)

(Earlier mention of the product on this blog in section 3 of a 9/14/11 posting.)

(ambesium labidrol is an invented name for ExtenZe.)

A fair number of websites claim to be providing “reviews” of ExtenZe and its efficacy, but these are just disguised ads for the product.

The world of male enhancement. A very crowded world it is. It comes in two parts: supplements that you take internally, like ExtenZe or its competitor Rock Hard Weekend;

(#2)

and massage oils for the penis, usually from Chinese or Indian sources:

(#3)

(#4)

Penis slang names. A digression now on the topic of names that are slang terms for the penis. Gaffigan went though Johnson and Dick, and I added Peter and O’Toole. Then there’s Willy / Willie. Plenty of candidates here, though I think my favorite is singer-songwriter Willie Nelson.

Also plenty of playing with the names Willy / Willie, with the phallic associations. Here are three from a very crowded field: a rainbow willy warmer (knitted), from the firm MenKind:

(#5)

and two plays on Where’s Wally (British) / Waldo (North American)? One, the image “Where’s wally willy” by Rennis05 on DeviantArt:

(#6)

And, two, the book “Where’s Willy?” by Wings Illustration (2010). From the publisher’s blurb on Amazon UK:

Where s Willy? is a great fun book for the sausage-chaser in your life! The concept is slightly rude of course, but this book is not filled with huge, graphic images, the material is handled in a delicate manner and is great for a giggle! With three star characters throughout who bear an uncanny resemblance to Tiger Woods, Bill Clinton and Michael Douglas the Search for little Willies around the world begins!

(#7)

(All very British. Spotted Dick is the name of a traditional British suet pudding, briefly considered on this blog in a posting of 9/9/09).

The ingredients of ExtenZe. On a “How Does Extenze Work?” site, the company explains that the ingredients come in four parts: three “Support formulas” — male prohormones, bio-enhancement, and sexual response enhancement — plus zinc and folic acid. I’ll run fairly quickly through two of these parts, saving the Bio-Enhancement Support and Sexual Response formulas for extended discussion. From the compay site:

(4) There are two … ingredients in Extenze which are not part of the 3 Support formulas: Zinc and folic acid. Both of these ingredients are essential to your overall health and have many functions in the body. For the male sexual system, they are very important for sex hormone production. Studies show that deficiencies in zinc or folic acid can lead to infertility. By taking these supplements as part of Extenze, you can get an impressive boost in your male vitality. Ejaculations become more voluminous.

(1) Extenze Male Prohormone Support: There are two ingredients which make up this part of the Extenze formula: DHEA and Pregnenolone. Both ingredients are chemicals which naturally occur in the body. Their jobs include regulating sexual hormones. By taking Extenze, you can get a boost in your testosterone levels.

The supplement also contains γ-aminobutyric acid (GABA) (a neurotransmitter, marketed as a supplement for its purported calming effect) and L-arginine hydrochloride (a natural amino acid).

(2) Extenze Bio-Enhancement Support: As men age, their blood circulation becomes weaker. This is harmful to your entire body, including your erectile function. Without enough blood flowing to the penis, penile cells can become weak and incapable of holding enough blood for a large erection. Poor blood flow can also result in smaller, soft erections. Extenze makes sure that men are getting the best quality, largest erections possible with the Bio-Enhancement Support formula. This formula contains circulation boosters like black pepper and ginger.

Not only black pepper (Piper nigrum), but also the closely related long pepper (Piper longum), both as ground-up seeds in ExtenZe. These two plants have three things in common: they are spicy, “hot”, which goes along with their circulatory effects; they have notably phallic seed clusters; and they are elements in several traditions of herbal medicine, probably because of the first two commonalities.

On the phallicity of the long pepper:

The fruit of the pepper consists of many minuscule fruits — each about the size of a poppy seed — embedded in the surface of a flower spike that closely resembles a hazel tree catkin.

Examples:

(#8)

Black pepper flower spikes are less showily phallic.

In any case, it’s quite likely that these pepper seeds play a role in some herbalist traditions in part because of the phallic nature of the spikes — as instances of folk beliefs that the utility of a plant can be gauged from the appearance of its parts (walnuts are “brain food” because their nutmeats resemble brains). In the West, such beliefs were incorporated in medical practice in the doctrine of signatures —

The doctrine of signatures, dating from the time of Dioscurides and Galen, states that herbs that resemble various parts of the body can be used by herbalists to treat ailments of those parts of the body. A theological justification for this, as stated by botanists like William Coles, was that God would have wanted to show men what plants would be useful for.

but similar beliefs guided other ancient traditions, in paricular those of China and India.The two types of Piper seeds have two things going for them as elements of folk-medical practice: via their circulatory-stimulant, and therefore potentially pro-erectile, properties and via the appearance of their flower spikes.

But folk-medical traditions are somewhat arbitrary, even whimsical, with respect to which particular plants are singled out as medically useful. Piper seeds get in, and so does ginger (Zingiber officinale), in part because of its hotness, in part because of the phallic appearance of ginger root:

(#9)

Given what I just said, you’d expect chili peppers (in the genus Capsicum) to be in the folk-medical tradition and also in the formulation of ExtenZe: they are (mostly) hot, and their fruits are significantly phallic, but they haven’t made it into folk-medical practice (except for topical applications of pepper oil), and there’s no Capsicum in ExtenZe.

It looks like ExtenZe follows folk-medical traditions very closely; the ingredients in the Sexual Response formula for the stuff is a compendium of herbs said in one tradition or another to be aphrodisiac (increasing desire) or pro-erectile (strengthening and lengthening erection) or tonic (boosting energy) or anti-aging.

From the site:

(3) Extenze Sexual Response Enhancement Support: The Sexual Response formula of Extenze contains an impressive 18 ingredients including some notorious ones for sexual enhancement, like horny goat weed, Yohimbe, and damiana leaf. These ingredients, most of which are natural herbs, will make your sex drive go through the roof. There are several ways that this is accomplished. Firstly, the ingredients support healthy hormone levels so you can become sexually stimulated. Secondly, the formula supports nerve function so your brain can trigger a sexual response throughout your body. Finally, the ingredients ensure that your penile cell membranes are healthy.

One ingredient on this list is not from a plant. That’s deer velvet antler, the young, not yet calcified, antler of a deer after the annual shedding. The antler is cut off, dried, and powdered. It’s a drug in traditional Chinese medicine. Indexing youth and masculinity, and obviously phallic.

Then there’s the leaf of the horny goat weed, in the genus Epimedium. From Wikipedia:

Epimedium, also known as barrenwort, bishop’s hat, fairy wings, horny goat weed, rowdy lamb herb, randy beef grass or yin yang huo … The plant contains [small quantities of] icariin, which is a PDE5 inhibitor like sildenafil, the active ingredient of Viagra. It is therefore used as an aphrodisiac and a treatment for erectile dysfunction.

The amount of icariin in an ExtenZe capsule must be truly tiny, nowhere near the amount that browsing animals (like goats, lambs, or cattle) can ingest by chomping down a bushel or more of leaves of the plant, which then has been observed to make the animals horny, rowdy, or randy. In any case, this plant gets into the formula via an empirical observation, with no involvement of phallic plant parts that I can see.

Something similar may be true of the extract of yohimbe bark in ExtenZe. From Wikipedia:

an indole alkaloid derived from the bark of the Pausinystalia johimbe tree in Central Africa[,] ,,,yohimbine has been studied as a potential treatment for erectile dysfunction but there is insufficient evidence to rate its effectiveness. Extracts from yohimbe containing yohimbine have been used in traditional medicine in West Africa as an aphrodisiac and have been marketed as dietary supplements.

And possibly of the Cnidium monnieri (Monnier’s snowparsley) seed in the formula. From Wikipedia:

A pro-erectile herb from Traditional Chinese Medicine, Cnidium monnieri and its main bioactive known as osthole appear to have mechanisms similar to Viagra in penile tissue and the hippocampus; the influence of cnidium monnieri on testosterone and cognition remains unexplored.

And possibly of some other ingredients:

• damiana (Turnera diffusa) leaf. From the WebMD site:

Damiana is a wild shrub that grows in Mexico, Central America, and the West Indies. The leaf and stem are used to make medicine. Historically, it was used mostly to increase sexual desire (as an aphrodisiac).

• stinging nettle (Urtica dioica) root, a traditional medicinal herb in Austria and in Anglo-Saxon England
• licorice extract. From Wikipedia:

the root of Glycyrrhiza glabra is used in traditional Chinese and Indian medicine; glycyrrizin has medicinal properties, but must be taken in moderation

• Astragalus root. From Wikipedia:

Extracts of Astragalus propinquus … are marketed as life-prolonging extracts for human use. A proprietary extract of the dried root of A. membranaceus … [has been] associated with … [an] age-reversal effect in the immune system

But then we get to ingredients where the appearance of plant parts probably figures in their herbal medicine use:

• aerial parts of Xanthroparmelia scabrosa, a lichen with fleshy protuberances. From WebMD:

Xanthoparmelia is used to treat sexual dysfunction, especially erectile dysfunction (ED), as well as to increase sexual desire (as an aphrodisiac).

• Ho Shou Wu extract, from the often anthropomorphic roots of

Fallopia [syn. Polygonum] multiflora (tuber fleeceflower or Chinese knotweed; Chinese: hé shǒu wū … Fallopia multiflora is used in traditional Chinese medicine, which regards it as having anti-aging properties (Wikipedia link)

• Tribulus terrestris extract, from a widespread invasive plant with many common names (goathead, bindii, bullhead, burra gokharu, caltrop, cat’s head, devil’s eyelashes, devil’s thorn, devil’s weed, puncture vine, puncturevine, tackweed), used in both Chinese and Indian traditional medicine. Its

spiky nutlets strikingly resemble goats’ or bulls’ heads… [The] extract is claimed to increase the body’s natural testosterone levels and thereby improve male sexual performance and help build muscle.

Then some ingredients where appearance almost surely plays a part:

• Korean ginseng extract, from the phallic roots of plants in the genus Panax, esp. P. ginseng. From Wikipedia:

Folk medicine attributes various benefits to oral use of American ginseng and Asian ginseng (P. ginseng) roots, including roles as an aphrodisiac or stimulant treatment

• Eleutherococcus extract from phallic roots. From Wikipedia:

Perhaps the best known [species] in the West is … E. senticosus, used as herbal medicine, and commonly known by such English names as Eleuthero or Siberian ginseng. In traditional Chinese medicine, this is administered to increase energy, thus traditionally recognized to have attributes akin to true ginseng (Panax).

• Muira Puama extract (from the stems of Ptychopetalum, a plant with notably testicular roots). From Wikipedia:

Ptychopetalum is a genus of two species of flowering plants in the family Olacaceae, native to the Amazon rainforest. The indigenous name for the genus is Muira Puama, “potency wood”.

A continuing series on this blog, with at least 9 postings before this under the heading  “The news for penises” (plus a great many other penis postings not under that heading). Four items that have come to me in the past few days: an ad for gay porn with some phonological play in it;  horse penises in Kyrgyzstan; beef whistle as a slang term for the penis; and the celebrated candiru fish of the Amazon.

The gay porn ad. From a site that aggregates porn (straight and gay) into packages for sale, this ad I got yesterday:

It’s all about dreamy guys with big thick sticks who like to play hardcore games.

(#1)

The image plays with assonance in /ɪ/ (in thick and big), and the lead-in combines that with a rhyme of thick and stick. And note the use of stick as a (metaphorical) slang term for the penis.

The ad inspired me to this burlesque of Edward Lear’s “The Jumblies” (“Far and few, far and few, are the lands where the Jumblies live”):

Thick and big, thick and big,
Are the dicks where the Yaoi live
They love other boys, they all act like pigs,
And they know how to take and to give.

yaoi (roughly, ‘boys’ love’) is a genre of Japanese manga (comics) depicting romantic and sexual relationships between young men. (I will soon post some examples, including material from the manga story Himitsu no Yoasobi (titled Secret Night Play in English)  — which is relevant here because the sending address for the ad above was yoasobi.com).

The unfortunate horse penis joke. From a number of different British sources yesterday, a breaking story about a joke gone bad. From BBC News Scotand, under the headline “Horse penis joke Scot to be deported”:

A Scottish mine worker who compared Kyrgyzstan’s national dish to a horse’s genitalia on Facebook is to be deported from the country.

Michael McFeat, from Abernethy, was said to have been held after posting a picture of Kyrgyz co-workers queuing for a “chuchuk” horsemeat sausage.

In his Facebook post on 31 December, Mr McFeat posted a picture of colleagues at the Kumtor gold mine enjoying what he described as a “fantastic Hogmanay feast”.

The post added: “The Kyrgyz people queuing out of the door for there special delicacy the horses penis!!!”

Radio Azattik said that Mr McFeat’s post had “caused a lot of discontent and resentment on the part of local staff”, who demanded respect for the traditions of the people of Kyrgyzstan, as well as an apology from the mine’s management company.

He later deleted the original post and replaced it with an apology on 2 January, which said he had not intended to offend anyone.

(A side note on the compound horse penis joke Scot in the headline, which has a distinctly British form to it, thanks to its last word. The compound horse penis joke ‘a joke about ‘the penis of a horse’ is entirely ordinary, composed of parts standing in a small set of semantic relationships to one another. But adding Scot takes things out of the ordinary realm; to interpret it, the reader needs to know the story about how some Scot is related to a horse penis joke. Length isn’t the issue; Geoff Pullum posted some years ago on Language Log about the two-word compound canoe wife, which is opaque in a similar way.)

McFeat ran up against a significant fact about the historical culture of Kyrgyzstan, namely that it’s distinctly horse-centered, and Kyrgyz people are probably not going to take lightly the imputation that they eat the penises of their beloved horses.

Two side notes, one on (literal) penis-eating, one on traditional Kyrgyz culture.

First, in a posting of 10/25/15, I had a section on penis food, referring to penises as food (not food resembling penises), in which I quoted an article on edible penises from 10 different animals — not, however, including the horse.

Second, the traditional culture of Kyrgyzstan (and much of central and northeast Asia) is that of nomadic horsemen, living sometimes in yurts but mostly on the move; engaging in horse-based competitions, including horse wrestling (wrestling on horseback), as here:

(#2)

and using the horse as a source of food (horsemeat in a number of forms, including in sausages, and fermented mare’s milk). The culture goes back over a millennium. Note that Genghis Khan (c. 1162 – 1227) came to power by uniting many of the nomadic tribes of Northeast Asia and forging them into the Mongol Empire. All was not war; from Wikipedia:

Beyond his military accomplishments, Genghis Khan also advanced the Mongol Empire in other ways. He decreed the adoption of the Uyghur script as the Mongol Empire’s writing system. He also practiced meritocracy and encouraged religious tolerance in the Mongol Empire while unifying the nomadic tribes of Northeast Asia. Present-day Mongolians regard him as the founding father of Mongolia.

beef whistle. I stumbled on this slang term for penis yesterday, and then found meat whistle as well. Beef on its own as slang for penis goes back to Shakespeare, meat on its own has a long history too (and is very frequent in the rhyming idiom beat one’s meat ‘masturbate’), and steak in this sense is also attested. Now, beef occurs as the first N in some slang terms for penis where the second, head, N carries the main burden of referring to the penis via a metaphor, while beef (or another meaty N) contributes a component of fleshiness to the meaning; from Green’s Dictionary of Slang: beef tube, beef bayonet, beef torpedo. Beef whistle is presumably another item in this set.

Oddly, though whistle on its own would be a natural slang term for the penis, or rather for the whole male genital package, it seems to be rarely used this way. On its naturalness for this metaphorical purpose, just look at this typical whistle:

(#3)

Phallic projection, rounded base, even a urinary meatus (aka piss slit).

Where whistle does occur with some frequency as a reference to the penis is in the slang idiom blow (s.o.’s) whistle ‘fellate (someone)’,  where the blow of blowing a whistle and the sexual blow of blow (s.o.) ‘fellate (someone)’ combine. Consider Flo Rida’s 2012 song “Whistle”, which can be viewed here. Some lyrics:

Can you blow my whistle baby, whistle baby
Let me know
Girl I’m gonna show you how to do it
And we start real slow
You just put your lips together
And you come real close
Can you blow my whistle baby, whistle baby
Here we go

Just put your lips together and blow.

The candiru. A photo of the fish:

(#4)

I considered this creature (Vandellia cirrhosa) in a 8/5/12 posting “Snakes, worms, fish, clams, slugs”, where I looked at it as a penis fish (a fish that is said to work its way into the penis — that is, into the urethra — not a fish that looks like a penis) and noted the Wikipedia article treating such reports as dubious.

Now Chris Hansen has passed on to me a BBC Earth piece from yesterday, “Would the candiru fish really eat your genitals?” by Josh Gabbatiss, beginning:

The story is that the fish swims up a stream of urine into a man’s penis, then eats it from the inside. But is there any truth to it?

Gabbatiss considers the matter at some length; the short answer is No. If you’re venturing into the Amazon, the fish to worry about is the piranha, not the candiru.

From Michael Carden on Facebook recently, this comic strip panel from Marvel, showing an exchange between Iron Man (whose nickname is Shellhead) and Captain America:

(#1)

Carden commented:

Marvel has been around long enough that at one time “solid dick” was slang for “straight talk”.

(a story repeated with amazement and mirth on any number of blogs). I was somewhat concerned about the poor quality of the image, but much more concerned that I could find no reference to non-sexual solid dick (or anything like it) in a reputable source on slang.

Then came a small flood of debunking.

From these debunkers I choose dorkly, in a posting “3 viral geek rumors that were total bullshit” (because he does a nice follow-up to his debunking). dorkly writes, of his second example:

The Reality: Nooooooooooooooooooooooooope. The magic of poorly-done photoshop strikes again, this time to imply Iron Man is going to sexually assault Captain America, when in fact he’s only going to assault him with solid advice:

(#2)

In recompense for eliminating one piece of fabricated slang, dorkly offers us the Joker (from Batman) on some genuine (and still current) slang:

(#3)

From NOAD2 on the noun boner:

1 N. Amer. informal    a stupid mistake.

2 N. Amer. vulgar slang    an erection of the penis.

The newspaper laughs at his stupid mistakes, so the Joker plots to screw Gotham City. Never mock a supervillain’s penis, especially when he has a hard-on.

Yesterday’s Rhymes With Orange:

The nouns butt and booty overlap in their uses, and so do the verbs dial and call, and so do the related nouns dial and call. However… the compound nouns butt dial and booty call (also the related verbs butt dial and booty call) are both slang idioms, and they aren’t at all interchageable.

I’ll start with the verbs to dial and to call. These are near-synonyms for to telephone, though dial more strongly suggests that a dial phone is used for the telephoning, while call carries no connotation as to the type of phone used; and dial is also less syntactically versatile than call, since call can be used with direct objects that denote either a phone number (Call 555-1212 for help) or a person or organization (Call me / my department for help), while dial is rarely used in the second way (??Dial me / my department for help); in fact, NOAD2 countenances only the first use for dial. But things are more complex than that in the world of mobile/cell phones, where the recent idiom to butt dial or to pocket dial refers to the accidental dialing of a number by a such a phone in a pocket (or handbag) — in which case, these idiomatic uses of dial can have direct objects of either type (Ohmygod, you butt-dialed 555-1212 / me / my department!).

The current use of to butt dial doesn’t actually require that the phone be in a rear pocket (where dialing can be triggered by contact with a person’s butt, that is, buttocks); it’s been extended to accidental dialing in any pocket (or in a handbag).

Another comment on butt in to butt dial: butt here is a shortening of buttock ‘either of the two round fleshy parts that form the lower rear area of a human trunk’ (NOAD2), but (like its near-synonym ass) the noun butt can also refer to the central anatomical feature of the buttocks, the rectum or its external opening the anus (as in take it up the butt and similar expressions). This ambiguity is not relevant in to butt dial, though it is in other contexts.

So far this has been about the verb to butt dial, but the cartoon uses the nouning a butt dial. Nouning of the verb dial is certainly possible — Here’s the number; give it a dial — but it is rare enough that NOAD2 doesn’t list a ‘phone call’ sense for the noun dial. However, once again things are different in the world of mobile/cell phones, where the nouning a butt dial is very common indeed. From just one Gizmodo piece (7/23/15 by Kalia Hale-Stern), we have the title:

Have You Ever Had a Disastrous Butt-Dial?

two captions for images:

caption [man speaking]: I listen to the first 30 seconds of an accidental butt dial like I’m in a FBI Surveillance Van

caption [cat speaking]: begrudgingly answer phone call from a friend / relieved to find out it’s just a butt dial

and the text:

I have to admit that as the recipient of butt-dials, I’ve stayed on the line for longer than I probably should have out of curiosity.

Now to booty and booty call. First, set aside the piratical noun booty and a metaphorical extension of it (from NOAD2: ‘valuable stolen goods, especially those seized in war’, (informal) ‘something gained or won’). That brings us to a noun booty (also spelled boody) that originated in AAVE, with multiple historical associations with both body and butt. Green’s Dictionary of Slang gives two senses (front and rear) of this booty:

the vagina, hence by metonymy, a woman, esp. as a sex-object and generic, for sex (whether with a man or a woman): first cite c1908 [on the metonymy for ‘woman’, compare similar uses of cunt, snatch, piece of ass, etc.; on the generic use for ‘sex, sexual relations’, compare the usage in I need some ass / dick / etc.]

the buttocks, the rectum: first cite 1926

The word in these senses was confined to black usage for some time, but (as is the case with many pieces of black slang) eventually percolated into wider use, and eventually was used by some people who probably didn’t see any association with race.

For booty call, Green again has two senses:

late-night rendezvous [for sex]: first cite 1994

a person used for casual sex [as in Kim is my booty call]: first cite 1995

(Again, these items were at first specifically AAVE, but spread fairly quickly into wider usage.)

In the case of the compound noun butt dial, the head noun dial is clearly the telephonic noun, but for the compound noun booty call the head noun call pretty clearly is not the telephonic noun (though booty calls can of course be set up by phone or some other means of communication). Still, it’s not clear which of a number of (related) uses of the noun call is the one in booty call; it’s not even clear that it makes sense to ask this question. It’s entirely possible that the first users of booty call saw two or more uses in play at once; ordinary speakers do not, after all, think in terms of dictionary entries and subentries and might well think of items and their meanings much more loosely and fluidly than lexicographers do.

In any case, here’s some of NOAD2’s entry for the noun call, which has lists two senses, the first with quite a number of specialized subsenses, five of them given here:

[1] a cry made as a summons or to attract someone’s attention: in response to the call, a figure appeared.
[1a] the characteristic cry of a bird or other animal.
[1b] [with modifier] a series of notes sounded on a brass instrument as a signal to do something: a bugle call to rise at 5:30.
[1c] a telephone communication or conversation: I’ll give you a call at around five.
[1d] (a call for) an appeal or demand for: the call for action was welcomed.
[1e] a summons: a messenger arrived bringing news of his call to the throne.
[2] a brief visit: we paid a call on Howard.
[2a] a visit or journey made in response to an emergency appeal for help: the doctor was out on a call.
ORIGIN late Old English ceallian, from Old Norse kalla ‘summon loudly.’

Early users of booty call might well have seen such a rendezvous as combining a summons and a visit. In any event, the compound quickly became conventionalized, an idiom whose users would not ordinarily reflect on the meanings of its parts.

Finally, the noun booty call has been verbed, giving us a transitive verb to booty-call, glossable as ‘have a (sexual) rendezvous with’ which can be used by a man or a woman. On Twitter, some tweets with this usage: first, an 5/21/14 exchange between a woman and a man in which the man offers to booty-call the woman:

Jackie O (@JackieOProblems): Ugh I don’t even get booty call texts anymore. WTF is wrong with me??

sir trap wigglin (@bigdc417): i’ll booty call you, text or phone call ;)

and then a 1/11/13 vow from a woman to booty-call a man:

Christianna (@MissDoulou): i’ll booty call him 2nite after the concert, that way he can see his favorite band and his favorite vagina all in 1night

This usage brings us back to the cartoon, where the daughter says to the mother:

You didn’t booty call the gerontologist.

(instead, she butt dialed the gerontologist — not the same thing at all).

Or: Australia Australia Australia!

From Daily Jocks on the 25th, this example of their own AUS line (with my caption appended):

(#1)

A triple threat: proudly
Australian, proudly
Working class, proudly
Queer – “I like to get
Down under with
Me mates”

The company’s ad copy:

Say G’day to our newest underwear collection, designed downunder (for your downunder). Featuring a soft waistband with bold AUS logo and printed Australian flag, the cotton/spandex blend will keep you feeling comfortable.

To come: more on the underwear and the body of the model in #1. Then to Monty Python’s “Bruces” sketch, notes on Bruce as a particularly Australian name (and, in the U.S., as a particularly gay name), with a digression on the wattle, and then to Australian comedian and actor Barry Humphries, Dame Edna Everage, and Aussie bloke Barry McKenzie.

The underwear. #1 has DJ’s AUS underwear in a trunk (with fly). It also comes as a low-rise brief (flyless, more serious pouch):

(#2)

The AUSwear is in the blue and white of the Australian flag, but without the Union Jack or the representaion of the Southern Cross constellation:

(#3)

The model. The model in #1 has a really fine model’s body: swimmer-type build, really fit, but not ostentatiously developed. Lightly furred, neither notably hairy nor notably smooth. A very good-looking body, also “natural” — a body men can admire and identify with, or (if that’s what works for you) desire. No doubt he’s good for business.

As for the actual man, I doubt that his name is Bruce, and I have no idea whether he is Australian, working class, or queer.

Bruces. From Wikipedia:

The Bruces sketch is a sketch from the television show Monty Python’s Flying Circus, and appears in episode 22, “How to Recognise Different Parts of the Body” [aired 11/24/70]. It involves a group of stereotypical lounging Australians who are revealed to be the Philosophy Department at the fictitious University of Woolamaloo (a misspelling of the Sydney suburb of Woolloomooloo; this is how the suburb is actually pronounced with an Australian accent), and all named Bruce, with a common fondness for beer and a hatred of “poofters” (a derogatory Australian slang word for a homosexual). Terry Jones plays a “pommie” [British] professor, Michael Baldwin, joining the department and meeting his colleagues for the first time.

… Eric Idle co-wrote the sketch with Cleese and said he based it on his Australian friends from the 1960s “who always seemed to be called Bruce”.

You can watch the whole sketch here. It’s laced with stereotypical Aussie slang and stereotypical Aussie admiration for working-class values and behavior (and disdain for their stereotypical British counterparts). The full transcript, so you can appreciate the details:

Voice Over: Number eight. The kneecap

Pull back to reveal the knee belongs to First Bruce, an Australian in full Australian outback gear. We briefly hear a record of ‘Waltzing Mathilda’. He is sitting in a very hot, slightly dusty room with low wicker chairs, a table in the middle, big centre fan, and old fridge

Second Bruce [Graham Chapman]: Goodday, Bruce!

First Bruce [Eric Idle]: Oh, Hello Bruce!

Third Bruce [Michael Palin]: How are yer Bruce?

First Bruce: Bit crook, Bruce.

Second Bruce: Where’s Bruce?

First Bruce: He’s not here, Bruce.

Third Bruce: Blimey, s’hot in here, Bruce.

First Bruce: S’hot enough to boil a monkey’s bum!

Second Bruce: That’s a strange expression, Bruce.

First Bruce: Well Bruce, I heard the Prime Minister use it. S’hot enough to boil a monkey’s bum in ‘ere, your Majesty,’ he said and she smiled quietly to herself.

Third Bruce: She’s a good Sheila, Bruce and not at all stuck up.

Second Bruce: Ah, here comes the Bossfella now! – how are you, Bruce?

Enter fourth Bruce with English person, Michael

Fourth Bruce [John Cleese]: Goodday, Bruce, Hello Bruce, how are you, Bruce? Gentlemen, I’d like to introduce a chap from pommie land… who’ll be joining us this year here in the Philosophy Department of the University of Woolamaloo.

All: Goodday.

Fourth Bruce: Michael Baldwin – this is Bruce. Michael Baldwin – this is Bruce. Michael Baldwin – this is Bruce.

First Bruce: Is your name not Bruce, then?

Michael [Terry Jones]: No, it’s Michael.

Second Bruce: That’s going to cause a little confusion.

Third Bruce: Mind if we call you ‘Bruce’ to keep it clear?

Fourth Bruce: Well, Gentlemen, I think we’d better start the meeting. Before we start, though, I’ll ask the padre for a prayer.

First Bruce snaps a plastic dog-collar round his neck. They all lower their heads.

First Bruce: Oh Lord, we beseech thee, have mercy on our faculty, Amen!!

All: Amen!

Fourth Bruce: Crack the tubes, right! (Third Bruce starts opening beer cans) Er, Bruce, I now call upon you to welcome Mr. Baldwin to the Philosophy Department.

Second Bruce: I’d like to welcome the pommy bastard to God’s own earth, and I’d like to remind him that we don’t like stuck-up sticky-beaks here.

All: Hear, hear! Well spoken, Bruce!

Fourth Bruce: Now, Bruce teaches classical philosophy, Bruce teaches Haegelian philosophy, and Bruce here teaches logical positivism, and is also in charge of the sheepdip.

Third Bruce: What’s does new Bruce teach?

Fourth Bruce: New Bruce will be teaching political science – Machiavelli, Bentham, Locke, Hobbes, Sutcliffe, Bradman, Lindwall, Miller, Hassett, and Benet.

Second Bruce: Those are cricketers, Bruce!

Fourth Bruce: Oh, spit!

Third Bruce: Howls of derisive laughter, Bruce!

Fourth Bruce: In addition, as he’s going to be teaching politics, I’ve told him he’s welcome to teach any of the great socialist thinkers, provided he makes it clear that they were wrong.

They all stand up.

All: Australia, Australia, Australia, Australia, we love you. Amen!

They sit down.

Fourth Bruce: Any questions?

Second Bruce: New Bruce – are you a pooftah?

Fourth Bruce: Are you a pooftah?

Michael: No!

Fourth Bruce: No right, well gentlemen, I’ll just remind you of the faculty rules: Rule one – no pooftahs. Rule two, no member of the faculty is to maltreat the Abbos in any way whatsoever – if there’s anybody watching. Rule three – no pooftahs. Rule four – I don’t want to catch anyone not drinking in their room after lights out. Rule five – no pooftahs. Rule six – there is no rule six! Rule seven – no pooftahs. That concludes the reading of the rules, Bruce.

First Bruce: This here’s the wattle – the emblem of our land. You can stick it in a bottle or you can hold it in your hand.

All: Amen!

Fourth Bruce: Gentlemen, at six o’clock I want every man-Bruce of you in the Sydney Harbour Bridge room to take a glass of sherry with the flying philosopher, Bruce, and I call upon you, padre, to close the meeting with a prayer.

First Bruce: Oh Lord, we beseech thee etc. etc. etc., Amen.

All: Amen!

First Bruce: Right, let’s get some Sheilas.

An Aborigine servant bursts in with an enormous tray full of enormous steaks.

Fourth Bruce: OK.

Second Bruce: Ah, elevenses.

Third Bruce: This should tide us over ’til lunchtime.

Second Bruce: Reckon so, Bruce.

First Bruce: Sydney Nolan! What’s that! (points)

Cut to dramatic close-up of Fourth Bruce’s ear. Hold close-up. The superimposed arrow pointing to the ear.

Voice Over: Number nine. The ear.

A still:

(#4)

The sketch was varied in a number of ways in performances and in the version that was recorded on the 1973 album Matching Tie and Handkerchief, where the sketch concluded with the whole cast singing “The Philosopher’s Song”, which is all about drinking:

Immanuel Kant was a real piss-ant who was very rarely stable.
Heidegger, Heidegger was a boozy beggar who could think you under the table.
David Hume could out-consume Wilhelm Friedrich Hegel.
And Wittgenstein was a beery swine who was just as sloshed as Schlegel.
There’s nothing Nieitzsche couldn’t teach ‘ya ’bout the raising of the wrist.
Socrates, himself, was permanently pissed.
John Stewart Mill, of his own free will, after half a pint of shandy was particularly ill.
Plato, they say, could stick it away, half a crate of whiskey every day!
Aristotle, Aristotle was a bugger for the bottle,
And Hobbes was fond of his Dram.
And Rene Descartes was a drunken fart: ‘I drink, therefore I am.’
Yes, Socrates himself is particularly missed;
A lovely little thinker, but a bugger when he’s pissed.

The name Bruce. Now from the site Waltzing More Than Matilda ~ Names with an Australian Bias of Democratic Temper, from 9/17/14, Famous Name: Bruce:

When the name Acacia was featured for Wattle Day, I mentioned that Monty Python made gentle fun of our national flower with their Bruces Sketch, where all the philosophy faculty at the (fictional) University of Woolloomooloo are named Bruce. This seems to be the origin of the notion that Bruce is a particularly Australian name.

(#5)

Acacia podalyrifolia, Queensland silver wattle

Barry Humphries has said that the inspiration for the Bruces Sketch was his Barry Mackenzie character, who began life as a comic strip in Private Eye. Barry Humphries’ television series, The Barry Humphries Scandals, was a precursor to Monty Python, and Eric Idle has cited Humphries as one of his comedy influences.

It’s rumoured, not implausibly, that Humphries himself suggested the name Bruce as an Australian signifier, either directly or indirectly. The name Bruce peaked in Australia in the 1930s, and in Britain slightly later, in the 1940s. Even at its height in the UK, it was only around the bottom of the Top 100, so it wasn’t nearly as common there.

Humphries was born in 1934, so had peers called Bruce. The most obvious example is Australian director Bruce Beresford (born 1940), who directed the Barry Mackenzie films. Like Barry Humphries, Bruce went to England in search of career opportunities, but was unable to break into the British film industry, and found success at home, with movies like Breaker Morant and Puberty Blues, and in North America with Driving Miss Daisy, and Black Robe.

The connection between Barry and Bruce continued when Humphries took the role of a great white shark named Bruce in the animated film, Finding Nemo. The American film-makers named Bruce, primarily not as an Australian reference, but after the shark in Jaws, whose models were all called Bruce after Steven Spielberg’s lawyer. Bruce the Shark does have an Australian accent though, and uses ockerisms like “Good on ya, mate!”.

From the United States, the name Bruce gained a different stereotype, being associated with homosexuality. The reasons are unclear, but one of the most popular theories is that it’s connected to the campy Batman television shows of the 1960s, as Batman’s real name is Bruce Wayne. Another is that it is from the 1960s parody song Big Bruce, where Bruce is a camp hairdresser.

Apart from these reasons, it does seem that the “tough guy” names of one generation are often seen as effeminate, dorky, or otherwise laughable by the next. Something to think about should you be considering one of today’s rugged baby names, such as Axel, Blade, Diesel, or Rowdy.

Barry Humphries. From Wikipedia:

John Barry Humphries … (born 17 February 1934) is an Australian comedian, actor, satirist, artist, and author. Humphries is best known for writing and playing his on-stage and television alter egos Dame Edna Everage and Sir Les Patterson. He is also a film producer and script writer, a star of London’s West End musical theatre, an award-winning writer and an accomplished landscape painter. For his delivery of dadaist and absurdist humour to millions, biographer Anne Pender described Humphries in 2010 as not only “the most significant theatrical figure of our time … [but] the most significant comedian to emerge since Charlie Chaplin”.

Humphries’ characters have brought him international renown, and he has appeared in numerous films, stage productions and television shows. Originally conceived as a dowdy Moonee Ponds housewife who caricatured Australian suburban complacency and insularity, Edna has evolved over four decades to become a satire of stardom, the gaudily dressed, acid-tongued, egomaniacal, internationally feted Housewife Gigastar, Dame Edna Everage.

(#6)

Humphries’ other major satirical character creation was the archetypal Australian bloke Barry McKenzie, who originated as the hero of a comic strip about Australians in London (with drawings by Nicholas Garland) which was first published in Private Eye magazine. The stories about “Bazza” (Humphries’ nickname, an Australian term of endearment for the name Barry) gave wide circulation to Australian slang, particularly jokes about drinking and its consequences (much of which was invented by Humphries), and the character went on to feature in two Australian films, in which he was portrayed by Barry Crocker.

Humphries’ other satirical characters include the “priapic and inebriated cultural attaché” Sir Les Patterson, who has “continued to bring worldwide discredit upon Australian arts and culture, while contributing as much to the Australian vernacular as he has borrowed from it”, gentle, grandfatherly “returned gentleman” Sandy Stone, iconoclastic 1960s underground film-maker Martin Agrippa, Paddington socialist academic Neil Singleton, sleazy trade union official Lance Boyle, high-pressure art salesman Morrie O’Connor and failed tycoon Owen Steele.

Barry McKenzie. From Wikipedia:

Barry McKenzie (full name: Barrington Bradman Bing McKenzie) is a fictional character created by the Australian comedian Barry Humphries (but suggested by Peter Cook) for a comic strip, written by Humphries and drawn by New Zealand artist Nicholas Garland in 1964, in the British satirical magazine Private Eye.

(#7)

The Private Eye comic strips were compiled into a book, The Wonderful World of Barry McKenzie, in which McKenzie travels to Britain to claim an inheritance. The book was published in London, but was banned in Australia with the Minister for Customs and Excise stating that it “relied on indecency for its humour”.

Two films followed.

The character was a parody of the boorish Australian overseas, particularly those residing in Britain – ignorant, loud, crude, drunk and punchy – although McKenzie also proved popular with Australians because he embodied some of their positive characteristics: he was friendly, forthright and straightforward with his British hosts, who themselves were often portrayed as stereotypes of pompous, arrogant, devious colonialists. McKenzie frequently employs euphemisms for bodily functions or sexual allusions, one of the most well-known being “technicolour yawn” (vomiting). The [1972] film popularised several Australian euphemisms and slang terms which are still used today in the Australian vernacular (such as “point Percy at the porcelain”, “sink the sausage” and “flash the nasty”). Some of the sayings were invented by Humphries, while other terms were borrowed from existing Australian slang such as “chunder” [vomit] and “up shit creek” (adopted by the Australian poetry magazine Shit Creek Review).

For a later posting, on Aussie masculinity (and class): aussieBum underwear, Shearing the Ram by Tom Roberts, and Slim Dusty.

(Some genuine language stuff in here, but in the context of serious man-man sex described in very plain language, so not for kids or the sexually modest.)

On the 25th, this ad (from a gay porn aggregation service using the name Genuine Lust), under the heading “Crossed Swords”, referring both to weapons and to penises:

(#1)

This is serious role reversal, on (at least) three fronts: class, status, and race/ethnicity. Meanwhile, the text (in the dialogue above, and in some ad copy) is both bizarre and rife with errors (of various kinds) in English. The ad copy:

Beautiful themed movies with only the best actors shot with the best cameras the humanity ever known. Watch these sirs.

The sexual action. What’s concealed by the “Watch NOW” inset is clearly man A (on the left) positioned with his hard dick at man B’s asshole, about to plunge into it.

This is (about to be) fucking in the “missionary position”, face to face. If you’re about to be fucked in this position, you’ll want to spread your legs, to make it easier for him to enter you. If you’re a guy about to be fucked in this position, you’ll need to get your legs up, to make your asshole available for your fucker. There are quite a few ways to manage this (three illustrated in #6-8 in an AZBlogX posting of 7/6/15 about ways to offer your body for fucking); in #1, A is holding one of B’s legs up by the ankle, while B is apparently resting the other raised leg on a piece of furniture. (Note the Turkish furnishings.)

In most of these missionary positions, the fuckhole has his legs splayed out like a frog on a dissection mat —

(#2)

(This is a plastic frog; no animals were harmed in the preparation of this posting.) So I’ve sometimes called taking this position “frogging up” (to get fucked).

The social situation. A is framed as a soldier (specifically, a Turkish soldier), B as a British ranking officer. A’s status (and likely social class, as working class) you can judge from his uniform (or what’s left of it) and from his use of the Turkish respectful address term effendi to B; and his nationality can be judged from his appearance and from effendi. For his part, B has no uniform (or any other clothing) for us to judge him by — however did they get this far into the encounter without its being clear that A was going to fuck B and that B was willing, even anxious, to be fucked? — but he uses the posh British address term dear sir to A; and of course B is clearly a white guy.

So A is lower than B in class, status, and race/ethnicity/nationality. In Gayland, the fantasy world of gay porn, that, of course, makes A more masculine, and hence more desirable as a partner (especially a dominant one) in sex. Lower fucking higher is then a delicious role reversal, for both partners, on three fronts at once.

Not just in Gayland, but to some extent in the real world, where (as I have noted) some middle-class (or higher) men seek out encounters with working-class partners (especially dominant ones) and some white men seek out encounters with black or latino partners (especially dominant ones).

The pragmatics of the encounter. In real-life role-reversal situations, we expect the lower (but dominant) partner to talk bluntly, or harshly, or even derogatorily, to the higher (but submissive) man: a lower dom is configured as a stud, a real man, the higher sub as a queer, a fag(got), etc., and this sort of dirty talk is likely to be part of the attraction in such encounters. But men differ in their linguistic tastes in these matters. Some subs, in particular, might not tolerate the humiliation and insult in high-end dirty talk, but others might welcome, or even invite, it. In real life, it’s not uncommon for the two men in a sexual encounter to negotiate on language as well as on sexual acts, but in role-reversal situations the dominant partner is usually allowed considerable latitude in setting the terms, both linguistic and carnal, of the encounter.

So the language in #1 is distinctly odd. Man A uses the respectful address term effendi, asks for permission to fuck B, uses the less powerful (though still somewhat vulgar) verb bang (where surely the expected verb would be fuck), uses please, and even frames the request as a question. Despite the fact that he’s about to screw B’s ass like a jack-hammer (and at this point in the encounter, there’s little B could do to stop him, since A is firmly in control of B’s body), he is massively, laughably, polite.

B is equally polite in return, not so surprising in a submissive bottom, but instead of recognizing A as the superior man (in several senses), B treats him as a social equal, through the use of the British address term dear sir. In real life, at this point B would be crying out something like “Oh god, fuck me, fuck me, please fuck me!”, not coolly giving permission. (In my racy earlier years, back in the Pleistocene, I witnessed several such encounters, merely heard quite a few more, and enthusiastically participated in a number of them, so I know whereof I speak. I never heard, much less uttered, something like the measured “I am all yours!” — B isn’t responsible, of course, for the misspelling yourse.)

A note on effendi in modern English. NOAD2 gives two senses for effendi, one as a referential term, one as a term of address:

[referential term] (pl. effendis) a man of high education or social standing in an eastern Mediterranean or Arab country

[address term] historical   a title of respect or courtesy in Turkey

What we see in #1 is the address term; #1 is clearly from a gay historical fantasy set in Ottoman Turkey in World War I or earlier. Apparently, in this fantasy world, guys talk in an archaic variety of English, in a very polite register, even when they’re fucking like minks.

The origin of effendi has its own interest. From NOAD2:

early 17th cent.: from Turkish efendi, from modern Greek aphentēs, from Greek authentēs ‘lord, master’

Compare the NOAD2 origin for the adjective authentic, which goes back to a Greek adjective related to the noun authentēs:

late Middle English: via Old French from late Latin authenticus, from Greek authentikos ‘principal, genuine’

So from a noun meaning ‘lord, master’, an adjective meaning ‘chief, main, principal’, which then develops the sense ‘real, genuine’.