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Wednesday, March 04, 2015

Preface To Shut Up: Shut Up All Over The World

As I write this, there's a winter storm heading our way.  The initial estimates of a foot to a foot & a half of snow falling on Lexington overnight have been rounded down to a foot, but having just lived through the worst snowfall in seventeen years in the city, you may well imagine how exhausted everyone here feels.  Watching weather radar is a weird habit to develop.

So I am glad for the distraction, & weirded out/happy I found a website, called youswear dot com, which has an entry called How to say shut up in any language!.  I'm sure the first thing you want to do when you're in a foreign country is sharpen your rudeness skills.  Or maybe this is for online arguments?

It's not a very good list, alas.  From the first entry, which suggests that in American English we say "Voldemort's nipple" as a means of quieting someone, to the weird designation of "Firefly" as a language, the list looks like it may have been cobbled together from a drunken night of sloppily researching the Urban Dictionary.  Though I suspect I am insulting the fine contributors to that modern online marvel.

Are you going to make me use Yahoo answers?  Please don't.

At this point, you might be asking, why in the world would anyone do a radio show about such an unpleasant phrase?  No one ever wants to be told to shut up.  It's the sort of thing one says in anger or in frustration.  But I suppose I can answer that question tomorrow.

Meanwhile: Here's a profile of WRFL, where I deejay.  It's nice!

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