“May you never live to see your wife a widow.”

While reading the novel Catherine Snow, I came across the statement “May you never live to see your wife a widow”.  I had been reading for some time that particular day, and had to re-read this phrase a few times to make sure it made no sense.  Was this statement a mistake of the author?

Nope!  In the novel the statement had been referred to as an “Irish toast”.  So I Googled it.  I learned that the fact that these statements are absurd or contradictory is what characterizes these phrases as “Irish Bulls”, perhaps there is some relation to the slang term “bullshit”.  

While Googling, I also discovered that there are tonnes of these phrases, and they are not only used in the Irish culture.  If you want to check out a bunch, here is a website:  http://therussler.tripod.com/dtps/irish_bulls.html  If you're just too lazy to click, some are listed below.  Enjoy!

More Irish Bulls:

-       “A lot of people my age are dead at present time.” – Anonymous

-       “And he proceeded to stop.” – Ken Zotigh

-       “At first, I had second thoughts.” – a west Texan

-       “I didn’t go back to sleep until we got up in the morning.” – Carole Mabrey

-       “I distinctly remember forgetting that.” – Robert K. Oglesby

-       “I hate all prejudice people.” – Robert Scott

-       “It occurred to me lately that nothing occurred to me lately.” – Ashleigh Brilliant

-       “They were laughing in my face, right behind my back” – The Russler

-       “They’re both unique in the same way.” - Anonymous

"Did you survive?"

In 75% of my classes today, this was the greeting the professors provided the students with the day after Hurricane Igor savagely swept through town: “Did you survive?”  In my opinion, it is a very dumb question to have been asked by people of such high educational status.  I think it’s quite obvious when I am sitting right in front of you that I did indeed survive the hurricane. Maybe a more appropriate question would be “Know anyone who died?” or as my roommate’s prof asked, “Anyone have any horror stories?”  Just thought I’d share that with you.

“Toss over the boat anchor, I have room for two more in my hip pocket.”*

This quote came from a documentary my Linguistics professor showed in class today.  I cannot remember the name of the person who said it, but they had a good point.  Naturally, this sentence doesn’t make sense.  However, it is grammatically correct, which deems it a proper sentence despite it having little or no meaning.

The documentary was on the subject of language and communication, and the discussion was around the idea that there are infinite combinations of words that can be put together to make infinite sentences.  Language is described as being similar to a game of chess; each piece has a limited number of spaces it can move, but these pieces together can make infinite numbers of games.  Respectively, each word has a limit within the sentence, (noun, verb, etc), but when constructed together, the amount of sentences that can be created are countless.

I do understand the comparison between language and chess, however, I don’t necessarily agree with this metaphor.  I believe that if there are a limited number of moves a chess piece can make, then those moves can be counted, hence the number (though a big one) of possible games can also be counted.  And, on an unreasonable level, so can the possible sentences in the English language.  But no one has time for that, so we’ll just leave that one at infinite. 

* I'm not sure if this is a direct quotation, but it's close. 

         P.S.  Enjoy the comic... I know you love the lame jokes just as much as I do.

"Tastes Great!"

Borrowed this shit from Google.

It's on a package of Gourmet Chocolate Chunk Cookies. I could have guessed that they tasted great, they are cookies. I don't think I've ever experienced a chocolate chunk cookie that didn't taste at least "great"...

Do marketers use this as a selling point? If so, the message was so tiny and printed off in the corner that I didn't even notice it on the package of cookies until I was already half way though. FAIL. (Maybe on my part for not being observant.)  Either way, I didn't sit down and eat half the pack feeling undecided about the flavor that I was experiencing in my mouth, then read "Tastes Great!" and BAM: euphoria - these cookies do taste great! But that's just me, maybe this little message has worked wonders for other consumers.

But thanks for clarifying that Gourmet Chocolate Chunk Cookies do indeed taste great!

Quotes McGotes

Choosing a name for a blog is never an easy decision... unless you have a title and build your blog around. Then perhaps the blog itself is the challenge. In the past I have come up with ideas, but could never get started. Finally after two and a half failed attempts to write a blog, I feel quotes are something I can actually write about.

I promise you the quotes I write about will not be those boring quotes that use old English and are written by some dead guy. I’m talking about good ol’ every day phrases said by friends or heard in movies, (even some books), that make me laugh or cause me to stop and think. Hopefully you’ll get a laugh out of some of them too!

Now back to the name of my blog, “Quotes McGotes”, perhaps some of you already understand the origin of this little mis-quote. If you don’t, I shall explain: ever watch the movie I Love You, Man? Throughout the movie Peter Klaven, the main character, is constantly saying random things in hopes to be cool, but ends up creating countless awkward situations for himself. At one point in the movie Peter attempts to arrange another “man date” with Sydney Fife, his new best friend, and says “Totally... Totes McGotes”. This quote has been popping up randomly in my head since the first time I watched the movie, so naturally it’s a favourite. As I was trying to think of a name for this blog I realized that I was able to mis-quote a favourite to make a bit of a pun. I love puns. So I present to you the blog entitled “Quotes McGotes”, I hope you all enjoy!