Category Archives: Humor

My Favorite German Words

I am currently taking a German language class and one of my assignments this week was to discuss a few of my favorite German words. This was a difficult assignment, not because I couldn’t find German words that I like but because there are too many.

There seem to be more compound words in German than in English and many of these words are descriptive in ways that are both funny and true. They also tend to be more accurate than their English counterparts. In addition, these words are easier to learn because they are essentially two easy words put together to form a more specific word, so if you know the two easy words you can easily understand the compound word.

For example, one word I find amusing is “Handshuhe” (all German nouns are capitalized). This word literally means “hand shoes” or in English you would call them gloves. I think someone learning German can understand “Handschuhe” easier than an English learner could understand, or remember, “gloves.”

A word that I really like is “Warteschlange.” This word not only sounds good but it has a cool meaning: “wait snake.” It technically means “queue.” It would be like the line at the post office or an amusement park that twists around like a snake.

Another great word is “Scheinwerfer.” This word literally means “light thrower” which is a much cooler word than “headlight.”

Then there is “Stinktier” or “stink animal,” which is much more descriptive than “skunk.”

Faltier” or “lazy animal,” is a sloth. A “Staubsauger,” or “dust sucker,” is a vacuum. A “Stachelschwein,” or “spike pig,” is a porcupine. “Fledermaus” is a “flutter mouse” or bat. Another of my favorites is “Flugzeug,” which means something like “fly thing,” which, of course, is an airplane. There is also “Schildkröte, or “shield toad,” which is a toad with a shield, otherwise known as a turtle. There are many more similar words but I think you get the idea.

Finally, a word that I found to be quite amusing is more of an idiom than a description. “Schattenparker” literally means “shadow parker” and is a word that my teacher never heard before. It essentially refers to a man who is not very manly. The reason behind it is that a man who takes a shady parking spot rather than leave it for someone who needs it more is not behaving manly.

Of course, German does not have a monopoly on funny compound words. English has a few good ones too. “Aftermath,” for example, is a weird word. Perhaps it is the destruction that takes place after one does math. I don’t know. “Bulldozer” is probably my favorite English word but I have no idea why it is called that.

What do you think? Do you know any words, either in English or another language, that you really like or that are funny in their literal meaning or just funny in the way they sound?

My Least Favorite Season

My Least Favorite Season is here and it is not winter. No, it is much, much worse. It is election season.

bs on tvThe main problem is that our Congressman, Bill Young, had to up and die so now we have to have a “special” election. There are two main candidates going after his seat, Republican David Jolly and Democrat Alex Sink. The only reason I know their names is because I can’t turn on the television, watch a Youtube video, or listen to Pandora without hearing about how one or the other is the lovechild of Satan and if elected will destroy the Earth.

This happens every time there is a major election. Character assassination is a big part of politics and this election is no different. What amazes me is why this still works. Are people that stupid and gullible and believe what one candidate says about another?

Okay, don’t answer that. I know some people can be pretty stupid. Some people can be amazingly stupid, and it seems like these people are everywhere, but I think the reality is most people have, at least, some common sense.  You just hear about the stupid ones because what they do is so noteworthy. This is why I am amazed that there are enough people who fall for these negative ad campaigns to make them financially viable. They also seem to target seniors like they think they are the most gullible people on earth. They don’t seem to realize that most seniors are pretty sharp and the ones with dementia are probably not going to remember where the polling place is.

I think out of the hundreds, perhaps thousands, of commercials I saw about David Jolly and Alex Sink, only one was not negative, but that one gets very little air time. To be fair, some do not come from the candidates but other organizations like the Republican and Democrat Parties. This just means that entire committees got together and decided that it would be better to drag the opponent through the mud that point out any good qualities of their candidate.

How is it even legal to lie about people on television. If I were to even write a post and claim that  a non-politician like Bill Gates was having a secret love affair with Kim Jong-Il I would be sued (by the way Bill, I just made that up). That means that this practice is either legal or nobody wants to sue for fear of losing a system that has worked so well for centuries.

Personally, I am tired of it. I cannot turn on my television, computer, or radio without being exposed to so much negativity. I can’t wait until this election is over when I can get all the negativity I need just by watching the news in the morning.

As far as the election goes, I don’t plan on voting, and if I do, it won’t be for David Jolly or Alex Sink. I think promoting smear campaigns against others is a sign of bad character. If I do vote it will be for someone who hasn’t forced a negative agenda on me. Good luck Lucas Overby. You have my vote (in spirit) as long as I don’t have to listen to any of your commercials.

My Smoothie Fiasco

When I was I child I decided the two worst foods in the world were spinach and coconut. This, of course, was before I discovered lentils. I pretty much avoided those two foods until after I met Rose. She made a spinach pie, which I ate out of out of courtesy at first, but then realized that it was quite good. I then discovered that raw spinach was good too and not the horrible toxin that I remember from childhood. Now I will actually order a spinach salad in a restaurant because it is the best salad on the menu.

I think my dislike for spinach goes back to when I was little and my grandmother gave us a bowl of cooked spinach, probably from a can, and told us we had to finish it before we could leave the table. I must have been at the table for an hour before I finally forced it down. I then got up and puked. I think the trauma made me more sick than the spinach. It’s funny how events from childhood can affect us long into adulthood.

Coconut was another story. I didn’t have any trauma connected to coconut, I just didn’t like it. I was well into my forties before I discovered that coconut did not actually taste bad, I just didn’t like the texture. It is like chewing on ground cockroaches.

Ladybug

For those of you grossed out by that statement, let me rephrase it. It is like chewing on ground ladybugs. They are much cuter unless you see them close up.

Ninja BlenderThere is a point to all this, so here we go. Recently Rose and I bought a Ninja Blender. We wanted something better than our old blender for making fruit smoothies and other healthy drinks. This one has 1100 watts and blends much quicker and quieter than I am used to. The first time I used it I was afraid a vortex was going to open up in my kitchen and my brand new blender would be sucked into another dimension. Fortunately that didn’t happen.

Naturally, I looked through the big book of recipes that came with the blender but I could find nothing that I would want to make. Most of the recipes involved opening a can of something or putting perfectly good fruit in the microwave. I’m glad I didn’t pay extra for the book.

I ended up looking on YouTube for some smoothie ideas. I find YouTube to be a great source when you need to learn something and I found plenty of videos on how to make various kinds of smoothies. I saw a few recipes that used coconut and I learned that the fresh, raw, coconut water is very healthy for you. I also knew Rose liked coconut  and I believed that if I could blend it up well enough with other fruits then I could drink it with no problem, as long as I didn’t have to chew it.

The next day I bought a coconut on my way home from work and the following morning I got started on my experimental smoothie. I had watched some videos on the proper way to open a coconut, which all happened to be different, and I thought I was ready. I was wrong.

It seemed so easy. A couple wacks with the back of a meat cleaver and BAM! Of course that didn’t work. The only thing I accomlished was to get Rose yelling at me that it was too early and I was going to wake the neighbors. It didn’t matter that the neighbors moved out days before. So now I had a coconut AND Rose to contend with. How do you quietly pound  the crap out of a coconut? Hmmm…

I decided that I needed to open it fast and to hell with the noise so I got a hammer and screwdriver and pounded until it opened. Even then it took several hits and more yells from upstairs. After it finally opened and I put the water in the blender and then had the delema of breaking the two halves ito smaller pieses, again without making noise.

Once I finally broke the halves into smaller pieses, I then pried the “meat” out of the shell. Unfortunately there is a skin that needs to be removed as well so I had to scrape it off with a potato peeler. When I was finally done I put the pieces in the blender with bananas and other fruit and blended. It came out pretty thick so I added some more almond milk and blended again, this time leaving it on high for a consideable amount of time. I wanted to make sure the coconut was blended smooth.

Finally. After almost forty five minutes I was ready to taste my creation. I poured it in a glass, took a drink and…Yuck! It was like drinking a cat litter smoothie. I had to dump the whole thing down the drain and to top it off, I had to hurry up so I wouldn’t be late for work because I wasted so much time.

I don’t get it. How is it that so many people put coconut in their smoothies? Is it just me that is bothered by it or did I do something wrong? If anyone knows how to make this drink so it is actually drinkable plese let me know. In the meantime, coconut is back on my most hated food list.

13 Things Never To Do

A while ago I posted about things that I don’t understand. Now I want to mention some things that I do understand. Specifically, things I have learned never to do. Some of these I learned by doing, others I learned by seeing others do them.

  1. Never assume your wife or girlfriend is telling the truth when she says, “I don’t want you to buy me anything.”
  2. Never try to pet a goose…Ouch!
  3. Never eat dinner while watching Bones.
  4. Never hit an empty spray paint can with an axe. (I didn’t do this one)
  5. Never give treats with artificial coloring to a pet who is prone to vomiting on the carpet.
  6. Never eat White Castle hamburgers if you have a long drive ahead of you.
  7. Never shake a ketchup bottle without first checking if the cap is tight.
  8. Never put Pop Tarts in a toaster with a broken timer. (I think rocket fuel is the main ingredient).
  9. Never drink from a garden hose without letting it run first…yuck!
  10. Never put up a ladder and climb to the roof without first checking for a bees’ nest. Talk about a double whammy.
  11. Never use a skim board if you are overweight and over 40.
  12. Never jump into a pool at night without first checking the depth.
  13. And finally, never talk politics unless you are “preaching to the choir.”

Of course, there are plenty of other things but I have to stop somewhere. Leave a reply if you would like to add to the list.