User:NorwegianBlue/refdesk/fun

Sarcophagus confiscated

• Did you know that the sarcophagus of King Gustav I of Sweden and his consorts at Uppsala Cathedral (pictured) had once been confiscated by authorities in Antwerp because the Flemish sculptor Willem Boy was in debt? from "Did you know?"

Bless your (his/her etc.) cotton socks

Where does this expression orginate? Does it have a historical background?84.136.158.195 (talk) 20:57, 23 June 2008 (UTC)frau

One theory is that it's to do with the missionary George Cotton, Anglican Bishop of Calcutta in the late 1850s and early 1860s, who sent home appeals for clothing for local children, stressing the need for warm socks, which he thought were the key to health. So women knitted lots of little woolly socks and sent them off, and on arrival in Calcutta Bishop Cotton literally blessed everything he received. Cotton's socks, cotton socks? It's possible, at least. Xn4 22:40, 23 June 2008 (UTC)

In the Gospel of Matthew, the Sermon on the Mount (chapters 5 - 7) the scribe records the qualities of heavenly residents, as seen by the orator. The tenth beatitude says "Blessed are ye that weareth garments of woven shibboleth to shroud thine metatarsal phalanges".

Biblical scholars have puzzled on this cryptic parabola and the semantics in Koine Greek and ancient Hebrew. The noted Sephardic Rabbinical scholar Timus Tinnittus has proposed the translation of "Tiptoe thru the tulips", eschwing all references to cotton socks... --Cookatoo.ergo.ZooM (talk) 23:21, 23 June 2008 (UTC)

You're in fine form, Cookatoo.ergo.ZooM! Have you been at the dandelion wine again? Xn4 23:39, 23 June 2008 (UTC)

And let it be known (to both of you): "Lol". Fribbler (talk) 23:42, 23 June 2008 (UTC)

The simplest explanation is that it is what you say to a child, wearer of (little cotton) socks rather than (longer woollen or silk) stockings. The expression is thus rather dated since adults also wear socks these days. It is said when the child has said something endearingly naive. "Ah, bless!" is an alternative. Itsmejudith (talk) 20:45, 24 June 2008 (UTC)

I wear cotton socks. Is that why people don't respect my hypothetical gray hairs? —Tamfang (talk) 04:40, 27 June 2008 (UTC)

Of course metatarsal phalanges makes as much sense as nasal chin. —Tamfang (talk) 04:40, 27 June 2008 (UTC)

Sunburn

I hope you had a big farm in the sunburn! —Preceding unsigned comment added by 98.213.141.241 (talk) 20:06, 8 September 2008 (UTC)

I had a dream with this quote. What does it mean? —Preceding unsigned comment added by 98.213.141.241 (talk) 20:10, 8 September 2008 (UTC)

Probably nothing. - Lambajan 20:14, 8 September 2008 (UTC)

Colorless green ideas sleep furiously ? SteveBaker (talk) 01:30, 9 September 2008 (UTC)

Nice one Steve - Noam Chomsky! On the other hand buffalo buffalo buffalo buffalo buffalo buffalo buffalo. Franamax (talk) 15:56, 9 September 2008 (UTC)

Hmmm - you messed up the capitalisation of that sentence...see this: ====>

SteveBaker (talk) 17:26, 9 September 2008 (UTC)

Time flies like an arrow; fruit flies like a banana. Saintrain (talk) 21:16, 9 September 2008 (UTC)

...and Green flies like a lettuce. SteveBaker (talk) 17:14, 10 September 2008 (UTC)

Seen painted on the outside of a college building: "Do not if the when go to, but only as it very since." Edison (talk) 16:26, 10 September 2008 (UTC)

What's the difference between a chicken? The answer is as enigmatic as the question: "One of its legs is both the same". -- JackofOz (talk) 20:57, 10 September 2008 (UTC)

Well, if we're starting on the corny jokes, then I must ask: "What's green, sits in a cage and sings?"

→ A red herring.

(Not that I'm passing judgement on the quality of the answers here, of course.) Gwinva (talk) 21:13, 10 September 2008 (UTC)

I feel more like I do now than I did before I read this thread. Edison (talk) 04:37, 11 September 2008 (UTC)

"Grammatically correct"

My friend just told me that it is incorrect to call something, like a sentence or a phrase, etc. "grammatically correct". He said that those things would only be "grammatical". I disagreed with him, because sentences can either be grammatically correct or grammatically incorrect. Has anyone ever heard of this, and if so, can you explain to me to what he was referring? —Preceding unsigned comment added by 69.16.88.147 (talk) 19:34, 20 September 2008 (UTC)

So he's saying that it's grammatically incorrect to refer to something as "grammatically incorrect"? :)

Seriously, what he's probably on about is that there are 2 ways to think about grammar:

Prescriptive grammar is about establishing rules that others are judged by. A particular sentence is either correct or incorrect, according to the rules. That's usually the kind of grammar we're taught at school; which is fair enough, because kids have to understand the basic structures and conventions before they can go off creating their own linguistic world. Hence, our first training in grammar is the "right/wrong" paradigm, and it can be tempting to believe this is the only correct approach to grammar (assuming one has ever heard of any other approach; if not, then it would be seen as the only approach to grammar).

Then there's descriptive grammar, which is about recording the usages that people in the real world actually employ, and noting how these usages change over time. What was commonly heard 20 years may be old hat today. An expression that would have caused hearers to do a double take 20 years ago may be very common today. That is, if some utterance uses commonly used forms of expression - whether or not these would pass a test set by the people mentioned above - then it is in line with the grammar that derives from the people rather than the rule makers. From this perspective, such an utterance is neither "correct" nor "incorrect", it is simply "grammatical".

Most (probably all) grammarians are prescriptivists to a degree, and descriptivists to a degree. It sounds like he's more of a descriptivist than a prescriptivist. That's OK, we love them all unconditionally. -- JackofOz (talk) 20:17, 20 September 2008 (UTC)

"Grammatical" is defined as "correct" in the sense of the rules of grammar. As such, "grammatically correct" is a tautology. Some clause / sentence can only be "ungrammatical" but not "grammatically incorrect". Bear in mind that this also holds true to similar terms. There is no such thing as a "logical fallacy", even if we got a blue link. A fallacy (of which this post may be an example) is illogical by definition. --Cookatoo.ergo.ZooM (talk) 20:27, 20 September 2008 (UTC)

I think you're being excessively narrow in what you're allowing these adjectives and adverbs to mean. "Grammatically incorrect" doesn't mean "grammatical and yet incorrect", it means "incorrect with respect to grammar"; a sentence could be grammatically incorrect but factually correct, for example. (By your logic, the phrase "factually incorrect" would also be meaningless.) Likewise a logical fallacy is not a fallacy that is nevertheless logical, it is a fallacy with respect to logic. (In this case, though, it might well be tautologous since I don't what else a fallacy can be with respect to besides logic.) —Angr 20:44, 20 September 2008 (UTC)

Wouldn't "logical fallacy" be an oxymoron rather than a tautology? -- JackofOz (talk) 20:57, 20 September 2008 (UTC)

"Fallacy" doesn't just mean what the logicians would have it mean. DuncanHill (talk) 21:00, 20 September 2008 (UTC)

Jack, that's the point. Cookatoo says it's an oxymoron because if it's a fallacy it can't be logical. I say it's a tautology because what "logical fallacy" actually means is "fallacy with respect to logic", but there's no other kind of fallacy with respect to something other than logic; therefore "logical fallacy" means exactly the same thing as "fallacy" and as such is tautologous (like "unmarried bachelor" is). And I guess what DuncanHill is saying is that there are in fact fallacies with respect to other things than logic (and if that's the case, then "logical fallacy" isn't tautologous after all), but he didn't give any examples. —Angr 21:34, 20 September 2008 (UTC)

A fallacy may be a deceptive appearance, a deception, a prevalent but wrong notion - the word has more to it than its use in the realms of logic. DuncanHill (talk) 21:37, 20 September 2008 (UTC)

Cookatoo didn't make any reference to oxymorons (oxymora?). I was the first to use the term in this thread. -- JackofOz (talk) 22:03, 20 September 2008 (UTC)

I did not make a reference to an oxymoron, largely because I have been one or the other, and frequently both at the same time on numerous occasions. Regulars will agree to this humble statement outlining my relative qualities. Quod licet Iovi non licet bovi, as Europa pointed out postcoitally. --Cookatoo.ergo.ZooM (talk) 22:20, 20 September 2008 (UTC)

"He who likes love does not like cows"? I guess that would be the motto of the Vaccaphobia Society. -- JackofOz (talk) 09:02, 22 September 2008 (UTC)

You need to use a less ambiguous font, Jack. That's Iovi with a capital eye, not lovi with a lower-case el. "What is permitted to Jupiter is not permitted to an ox" (namely, banging Europa). —Angr 09:09, 22 September 2008 (UTC)

Oh, I knew that, silly. Apparently the dryness of my humour has attained desert-like proportions. It should correct itself soon. The meteorologists are predicting rain inside my head.  :) -- JackofOz (talk) 20:29, 22 September 2008 (UTC)

I thought Australia will be without rain for the forseeable future? Algebraist 21:14, 22 September 2008 (UTC)

Not completely true, but it's bad enough. However, fortunately, my head does not live in Australia. In fact, most of the time I'd say it's not of this world (or any other planet, for that matter). -- JackofOz (talk) 21:29, 22 September 2008 (UTC)

The Answer Man

According to an article printed in the 1940s, there were two questions that The Answer Man was unable to answer:

• How many buffalo would it take to fill Grand Canyon?
• Do birds dream?

Can these questions now be answered? Pepso2 (talk) 17:49, 26 May 2009 (UTC)

The buffalo one is a bit of a joke (and it was originally cows, not buffalo). In short, the "wrong" answer begins with "assume each cow is a perfect sphere." In other words, it makes fun of the way mathematicians tend to oversimplify real world problems. As for an answer - it is answerable if you ask a distinct question. What kind of buffalo? How big? How small? Can we purée them so they fill every crook and cranny? How do you want to declare the ends of the canyon? Do we put up a dam on each end to hold the buffalo in? Only when you precisely state the question is there an answer. Until then, it is "answerable" but no answer may be correctly given. -- kainaw™ 18:08, 26 May 2009 (UTC)

As for the cows/buffaloes, the mathematician in me says that one should suffice, given enough food and eternal life. --NorwegianBlue ^talk 18:16, 26 May 2009 (UTC)

Just want to point out that Wikipedia actually has an article on the Spherical cow. --Zerozal (talk) 19:42, 26 May 2009 (UTC)

And as for the birds, this source says they do have REM sleep, which strongly suggests that they dream. --NorwegianBlue ^talk 19:22, 26 May 2009 (UTC)

What do birds dream about? Bus stop (talk) 19:30, 26 May 2009 (UTC)

The fiords. --NorwegianBlue ^talk 19:48, 26 May 2009 (UTC)

That answer deserves immortalization at Dweller's Ref Desk thread of the week award (unless Bus Stop is your sockpuppet, so that you served as your own straight man). Deor (talk) 21:22, 26 May 2009 (UTC)

No, I'm not NorwegianBlue's sockpuppet. In all honesty -- I don't even "get" the joke. I really would genuinely appreciate it if someone would explain it to me. Bus stop (talk) 22:45, 26 May 2009 (UTC)

Dead Parrot. -- JackofOz (talk) 23:04, 26 May 2009 (UTC)

That is funny. I have seen that comedy routine once or twice, but I never took note of the reference to the "fjords." Thanks. Bus stop (talk) 23:29, 26 May 2009 (UTC)

The Edsel is dead. It has ceased to exist. Pepso2 (talk) 12:30, 27 May 2009 (UTC)

Ah, such a lack of imagination and such hamstringing by trying to be scientific.

These questions are easy to answer using language and logic, rather than science.

Q1) One. As soon as one buffalo has been placed in Grand Canyon, regardless of size, the canyon is by definition no longer empty. It has therefore been filled. It may not be filled completely, but that's a problem for the person who set an imprecise question.

Q2) Birds definitely do dream, although they may forget the content when they wake up. NB Birds generally prefer to be called "women" in these days of political correctness.

Hope that helps. --Dweller (talk) 15:43, 27 May 2009 (UTC)

Q1) One, but he would have to find a shovel he could use with his hooves? DJ Clayworth (talk) 17:37, 27 May 2009 (UTC)

Nice. --Dweller (talk) 19:28, 27 May 2009 (UTC)

British vs. U.S. Table Manners

From the Fawlty Towers article: He also criticised the US-born Terry Gilliam's table manners for not being 'British' (switching hands with his fork whilst eating).

1. What exactly does switching hands with his fork mean? Passing the fork from one hand to another?
2. Are there any other differences between British & U.S. table manners? I read both their sections in the article on table manners and didn't really notice any, but I'm an American going to England soon where I'll be in formal dining situations. I'd thought they'd be just like formal dinners in the States but apparently not, and I want to get everything right.

Thanks! Rorrima (talk) 09:55, 6 August 2010 (UTC)

When an American eats, he or she cuts a piece of meat with the knife in his right hand (if he's right-handed), then puts the knife down and put the fork in his right hand to eat the piece. When a Briton eats, he keeps the fork in his right hand and the knife in his left hand the whole time. I have no idea why this is. -- Mwalcoff (talk) 10:14, 6 August 2010 (UTC)

Almost... Brits keep the fork in the left and the knife in the right. But otherwise, I agree. I think what our article is clumsily saying is that Gilliam switched hands, which is unBritish. The text is ambiguous, as it can be read to mean the opposite of what is intended. --Dweller (talk) 10:18, 6 August 2010 (UTC)

See eating utensil etiquette#North American style. Gdr 13:12, 6 August 2010 (UTC)

You know, I've never seen anyone do that, American or Canadian. That seems like an extremely inefficient way to eat. Also, the way I remember the story, Terry Gilliam cut his food into little bite-size pieces first, then ate it all, which is something I have seen both Americans and Canadians do. Adam Bishop (talk) 13:33, 6 August 2010 (UTC)

This "British" practice is just good table manners. It is, however, difficult to eat curry and rice with this practice. When eating out with guests in Britain it would be normal to eat with fork-&-knife in this manner. In fact it would never be acceptable to form the fork into a type of shovel in the right hand. If you had rice on your dish, you would take your cue from your host or ask if you may use a spoon. MacOfJesus (talk) 15:29, 6 August 2010 (UTC)

In my experience, Europeans in general will hold the meat down with the fork in left hand, cut it with knife in right hand, and then pop it straight into their mouth from the fork in left hand; whereas American custom is to put down the knife, transfer the fork to right hand, and eat it that way. (Obviously, the opposite process if you're left-handed.) Perhaps the American custom forces you to "slow down" a bit? ←Baseball Bugs ^{What's up, Doc?} carrots→ 16:51, 6 August 2010 (UTC)

If Americans ate slower, Americans wouldn't be the most obese people of the world. I think that whole table manners section needs some sort of statistical sample citation to support the claim that this is the American way to eat. Not all Americans juggle their utensils at dinner. Comet Tuttle (talk) 16:59, 6 August 2010 (UTC)

This is a world removed from me (table manners are for those who use tables; I haven't used one in...years...) but what's the point of juggling your food in this manner? I think I'd be in danger of spraying food due to laughing if I saw someone do this...Plus, when I try to imagine it, it takes ages. Vimescarrot (talk) 17:44, 6 August 2010 (UTC)

Rather how we feel when we see Europeans keep holding their forks inverted. It's a spoon with holes in it, why use it upside down. About hand switching, some references: [1] says Emily Post calls it zig zag style, [2] calls it American style. Rmhermen (talk) 18:34, 6 August 2010 (UTC)

We were taught that cutting the meat and then going straight to the mouth without transferring was kind of uncouth or uneducated, like the way a hillbilly would eat. So it was kind of amusing the first time I saw Europeans eat that way. However, that first link at least explains where the American method probably comes from, which is was what the OP was asking. ←Baseball Bugs ^{What's up, Doc?} carrots→ 18:43, 6 August 2010 (UTC)

<humor>Your hillbillies owned forks? They must have been rich, ours ate with just a knife.</humor?> Eating with a utensil in each hand is seen as greedy, piggish, boarder house behavior. You're too busy getting your share to set your knife down - and I may need to keep hold of my knife to keep you out of my plate. Rmhermen (talk) 19:16, 6 August 2010 (UTC)

Well, as Will Rogers said, we have the world's richest poor. But that does remind of this li'l ol' poem: "I eat my peas with honey / I've done it all my life / They do taste kind of funny / But it keeps them on my knife." ←Baseball Bugs ^{What's up, Doc?} carrots→ 20:43, 6 August 2010 (UTC)

My ex-wife trotted that one out at least once a week for the 15 years we were married. We are no longer married. I'll leave you to draw your own conclusions. -- Jack of Oz ... speak! ... 22:23, 6 August 2010 (UTC)

I conclude that your grounds for divorce were, at least in part, something to do with "mental cruelty", or perhaps you just grew tired of being served corn. ←Baseball Bugs ^{What's up, Doc?} carrots→ 12:00, 8 August 2010 (UTC)

Heh. In Australia, fortunately, "couples do not need to show grounds for divorce, but instead, merely have to show that their relationship has suffered an irreconcilable breakdown." The prospect of raising the pea-honey story before a judge would have had me thinking about Plan B. Ironically, she and I remain very good friends, and have regular if not especially frequent contact, so our "relationship" is fine. But we never talk about peas, honey, or knives any more. It's safer that way. -- Jack of Oz ... speak! ... 09:44, 9 August 2010 (UTC)

The US is not even in the top five of the world's fattest countries. Everard Proudfoot (talk) 18:29, 6 August 2010 (UTC)

Did you read the article, or just the headlines? That ranking is based on percentage of the population overweight, and is titled very much by the fact that in a few very small islands in the South Pacific with tiny populations, where portliness is highly desired trait (think Samoans). So if you take those out of the running, the only countries in the top 10 are the United States and Kuwait. The US has by far the largest overweight population, with some 237 million overweight. (Kuwait has 3 million people total, by comparison.) So calling the US the "world's fattest country" is probably justified in more than a few ways, if you actually sift through the facts of it. If you compare the US to other countries with similar economies and culture (e.g. Germany, UK, France), the US is waaaaaay ahead in the rankings. --Mr.98 (talk) 23:56, 6 August 2010 (UTC)

When my mother's US penfriends (from Florida?) visited us in London, they did the cutlery juggling thing, and we couldn't help notice them staring at us eating with both utensils.

In the UK, well brought-up people always use a fork with the prongs pointing downwards and the concave side (ie the back) upwards. You can give away your social status by the way you manage your peas. They ought to be squished onto the back of the fork with the knife and transferred to the mouth without losing any. A skill that requires practice. The working classes (and I expect everybody else in the world) proudly scoop their peas up with the concave side, but this is not the done thing in polite society. Apparently, in the highest circles, even a banana should be eaten with a knife and fork at the table. As to spaghetti, the traditional British method is to chop pieces of pasta off with the knife and then squish it onto the back of the fork as above. However, one can now appear educated and cosmopolitan by using a fork and spoon after the custom of the Italians. As Indian food should really be eaten with the fingers of the right hand (a highly un-British method), just about anything goes except licking it off your knife. Alansplodge (talk) 20:17, 6 August 2010 (UTC)

Actually, my understanding was that the Italians can't believe anyone eats spaghetti in such an inefficient way. They break it up to fit into the cooking pan, and eat it with a knife and fork. Rojomoke (talk) 20:53, 6 August 2010 (UTC)

Our waiter in Venice spent some time showing the college girls in our tour group how to eat with fork and spoon so I think it is not entirely unknown. Some seem to think it is a childish method for those who can't twirl it on their plate. [3] Rmhermen (talk) 21:50, 6 August 2010 (UTC)

Two quotations might sum up the foregoing discussion:

"There are nine and sixty ways, Of constructing tribal lays, And every single one of them is right." (Kipling)

and

"When in Rome, do as the Romans do." (St Ambrose?) 87.81.230.195 (talk) 21:06, 6 August 2010 (UTC)

I have to say, the Wikipedia Ref Desks never cease to amaze me about yet another strange and arcane bit of US-UK difference; especially ones like this that seem trivial yet clearly have some kind of importance. After reading the ref desks for a few years, am I ready to visit the UK?? Pfly (talk) 08:51, 7 August 2010 (UTC)

Yes, but practice eating peas on the back of your fork first! Alansplodge (talk) 15:57, 7 August 2010 (UTC)

NB: the above is not to be taken seriously, unless you're planning to visit Buckingham Palace. Original research indicates that 99.99% of British people do not try to balance their peas on the back of their fork.  :) Ghmyrtle (talk) 18:03, 8 August 2010 (UTC)

Pfft, the Windsors are upper-class, and hence won't really care how you eat. It's the people below on the ladder you have to watch for, particularly if they don't feel socially secure. Personally, I put ketchup on my peas, and then I can easily stick them on the back of the fork: I get quite ungainly when I try to eat with the fork the other way up in my left hand. I'm not sure if that's better or worse... 82.24.248.137 (talk) 22:35, 8 August 2010 (UTC)

I believe your research is flawed Ghmyrtle, see this primary school website[4] for confirmation of my thesis; "To be very polite, peas should be crushed onto the fork - a fork with the prongs pointing down." Or this from the improbable "peas.org"[5]; "The proper way to eat them is to squash them on the back of the fork." Alansplodge (talk) 17:39, 9 August 2010 (UTC)

Perhaps I missed it in the above, but the American hand-switch goes along with pretty much eating the various components of your dish of food separately, while the British/European non-switch allows you to use your knife to assemble multiple components of your dish of food on to your fork as a microcosm so you actually taste the intended blend of flavors. Ultimately, the "no-switch" method makes your food more interesting and complex. PЄTЄRS J VЄСRUМВА ►TALK 15:16, 8 August 2010 (UTC)

I crossed the Atlantic thrice between the ages of 6 and 11, and my British parents told me that the reason Britons don't cut up their meat on their plates before eating the first bite is that the other bits would get cold and dry for no good reason. (Also there's more of a temptation to finish eating everything you've cut up; whereas you might thriftily and more safely refrigerate the uncut leftover half of a joint, with fewer exposed surfaces than a collection of slices.) —— Shakescene (talk) 18:18, 8 August 2010 (UTC)

To the OP: here's a video which demonstrates the differences quite clearly. Note the lady's demonstration of the "European" style, which assembles a variety of food in one mouthful (as Vecrumba also notes above). Gwinva (talk) 00:13, 9 August 2010 (UTC)

Egh, that "American style" thing looks terribly time consuming. Incidentally, what's with the napkins on the knees? I've seen that done a few times, and it just strikes me as patently absurd, like an adult using a bib. TomorrowTime (talk) 18:17, 9 August 2010 (UTC)

I haven’t had such a good laugh in many years. Thanks, one and all, but it is time to put you out of your misery. The truth is that the entire switching hands thing is a joke played on the monohanded by those of us capable of using each of our hands equally well. Sorry, we should have said something before it went this far, but if you could have seen the looks on your faces . . . DOR (HK) (talk) 05:59, 10 August 2010 (UTC)

A-ha! Thus the bigotry of the ambidextrous rears its ugly head! TomorrowTime (talk) 09:04, 10 August 2010 (UTC)

Athletic shoes hanging from power lines

Does anyone understand this ubiquitous phenomenon? Does it have a name? I presume there must be some purpose (although I would think not a rational one). Michael Hardy (talk) 00:09, 19 June 2011 (UTC)

I always thought it was a tribute to Wag the Dog. Gabbe (talk) 00:13, 19 June 2011 (UTC)

I'm not familiar with that film, but its article says it didn't appear until 1997, and the plural shoes appears nowhere in the article. Did you never see this happen before 1997? Michael Hardy (talk) 00:22, 19 June 2011 (UTC)

Maybe I'm showing my age (or maybe you're showing your lack thereof), but it's been around way, way longer than 1997. -- Jack of Oz ^{[your turn]} 00:21, 19 June 2011 (UTC)

Showing my age too, but way longer than 1997. I certainly can remember it being done in my teenage years (back in the 80s) and the main reason I remember was to see if you could do it, or if they weren't your shoes, because you could do it (and get away with it). The guys who were doing it weren't really big on subtexts or metaphors FlowerpotmaN·(t) 01:07, 19 June 2011 (UTC)

Snopes has a page about it. --Tango (talk) 00:19, 19 June 2011 (UTC)

The snopes page doesn't answer the question but only speculates. I would think there must be actual humans who've done this, who know something about why they did it. Michael Hardy (talk) 00:25, 19 June 2011 (UTC)

Of course, but they probably don't all have the same reason. Snopes doesn't do more than speculate because there isn't really an answer. --Tango (talk) 00:31, 19 June 2011 (UTC)

As requested, WP:OR coming: in my high school, local bullies used to do it with victims' gym shoes. In those days (Jurassic Period), we carried our gym shoes to and from school, while wearing either leather shoe or boots, depending on the weather. Our gym shoes were always white and had to be polished at least once a month for inspection, which is why we took them home one night and then brought them back the next day. We were not permitted to wear them anywhere except for gym class. They were always carried in our arms on top of our 3-ringed binder on top of our textbooks. They were easy to snatch and toss. For many kids, it was a huge loss. And, to agree with Jack of Oz, this was long before the dates given above. Bielle (talk) 00:58, 19 June 2011 (UTC)

How could you polish gym shoes ? Mine were canvas and artificial rubber, neither of which can be polished. StuRat (talk) 03:48, 19 June 2011 (UTC)

See your talk page. Bielle (talk) 04:02, 20 June 2011 (UTC)

Somehow managed to miss this when editing earlier, but we had much the same system, with maybe less emphasis on the polishing. Apart from the obvious bigger-than-the-other-guy cases, sometimesit was just guys creatively getting rid of old trainers as they were becoming a bio-hazard and/or achieving sentience or whatever. It wasn't just shoes; it was surprising what could be sent on a ballistic course to the nearest power line or telephone pole.. School-bags, clothing, the odd teenager if they were light... FlowerpotmaN·(t) 01:38, 19 June 2011 (UTC)

According to an informant, it was happening in Philadelphia in the '40s, if not earlier. In my childhood one did it with one's old sneaker's when one got new ones. μηδείς (talk) 01:47, 19 June 2011 (UTC)

In some cases, it is merely juvenile bullying/vandalism, etcetera. In some cases, a person has an old pair of shoes they won't miss, and thinks it would be cool to have them up there. In some cases, a drug dealer may mark his territory in this way. There are an infinite number of rational explanations (consistent with Pirsig's law).Greg Bard (talk) 02:27, 19 June 2011 (UTC)

The phenomenon is described, perhaps not that well but at Shoe tossing Nil Einne (talk) 02:32, 19 June 2011 (UTC)

Right, this is way off topic. — The Hand That Feeds You:Bite 16:15, 22 June 2011 (UTC)
The following discussion has been closed. Please do not modify it.
Drug dealer? Bullying? Please. I call shenanigans, Gregbard. Provide just one legal case. μηδείς (talk) 05:00, 19 June 2011 (UTC) Legal case? Give me a break. You need to get off the Wikipedia for a while and get out more. Greg Bard (talk) 06:17, 19 June 2011 (UTC) Yes, I need to stop editing wikipedia because you are angered by my pointing out that you have no reliable sources to back up your speculation. Got it. μηδείς (talk) 16:50, 19 June 2011 (UTC) Greg's comment was inappropriate, and he should retract it. ←Baseball Bugs What's up, Doc? carrots→ 01:31, 20 June 2011 (UTC) I find that hypersensitivity is very unproductive. Hardy is not asking for references. The explanations I provided are mundane, not extraordinary in any way. I was the founder of my university's Skeptics Club, and even I think this is over the top. Please get a sense of what is an is not appropriate please. No, I do not have any legal cases to back up the drug dealer or bullying explanations --only the most extremely naive, and sheltered person would be oblivious to these expalnations. Shenanigans? Um, sure I just made it up. Whatever. You're nuts. I'm sure μηδείς is a wonderful mainspace editor, and requests for sources there is par for the course. Here people are rarely ever in need of a reference despite it being the reference desk. Most people are just asking questions...you know like normal people who get out occasionally. You know people who do not necessarily treat every answer to every question as "shenanigans" unless there is some peer review that backs up, for instance, someone's theory about shoes on wires. Please get a perspective. Seriously. Taking a break from Wikipedia actually is good advise in that regard. I am sorry if anyone took offense, as that was certainly not my intention, but I can't really retract under these circumstance. I hope you can let that go. Be well, Greg Bard (talk) 03:06, 20 June 2011 (UTC) Next time one of the regulars yells at me for failing to provide sources, I'll send them your way. ←Baseball Bugs What's up, Doc? carrots→ 03:09, 20 June 2011 (UTC) There are clearly reasonable requests for sources and then there are clearly unreasonable requests for sources. We aren't robots incapable of nuance, and therefore in need of absolute rigorous bureaucracy. If I had asked for sources backing up the claim that asking for someone to "give me a break" or telling someone they to take a break is somehow offensive, well I think that would be me being a jerk quite frankly. So please do not trouble yourself by digging through Emily Post on my account, and please do not ask me to do legal research over shoes on wires --DEAL? Greg Bard (talk) 03:42, 20 June 2011 (UTC) I think the OP is a regular, otherwise I would have advised you to take this entire discussion to the talk page, as it is not appropriate to take shots at each other in front of the OP. ←Baseball Bugs What's up, Doc? carrots→ 03:45, 20 June 2011 (UTC) Hardy is more than a regular. He's so prolific, he's probably in the top one tenth of a percent of contributors.Greg Bard (talk) 04:07, 20 June 2011 (UTC) He's a hardy boy. ←Baseball Bugs What's up, Doc? carrots→ 05:53, 20 June 2011 (UTC) . Well, some people decided it would be a good place to leave their shoes out to dry, but then forgot about them.AerobicFox (talk) 07:21, 19 June 2011 (UTC) I don't want a retraction from Gregbeard. That would imply something that is not the case. And she has already refused to provide any reliable source, enough said. Being someone who has, along with my ancestors, participated in said activity, long before anyone had ever heard of "drug gang"s, I find her "contribution" laughable and her opposition of less consequence than the alarm call of a woodchuck to whom I have tossed an unwanted lettuce stem. But let's remember that there's a real person here who asked this question, and that repeating to that person crap which has less provenance than the scrawlings found on men's room walls, as if it were fact, is hardly helpful. Attributing this activity to crack dealers is the modern analog of the blood libel, or accusing negroes of being rapists, the reflex of dead white males suffering penis envy: baseless slander. In reality, the custom of heaving old shoes on a post is probably as old as that of leaving a pile of stones at a crossroads in dedication to the god Mercury, just as making stuff up is as old as Plato's forgeries of Socrates. μηδείς (talk) 03:39, 20 June 2011 (UTC) Yes, I do refuse to waste my time providing any reliable sources to back up the claim that some shoes end up on wires because of bullies and drug dealers, so I appreciate that enough has been said. I think you have gone way off the deep end with the whole "negroes of being rapists" thing. It seems to me that μηδείς seems to think I have named him as a bully or drug dealer somehow, and that is pretty ridiculous. I am sure you are (usually) a wonderful person, not a bully or drug dealer, even though you admit to participating in this shoe throwing thing. Is there some reason you believe I am female? The name is Greg, which is not a female name, so I am requesting an explanation. If this is some attempt at a insulting me (and I'm not saying it is), then that would require a retraction, and an apology to all the women out there who would rightfully be offended that you are equating naming someone as being female as an insult. Is that what you think? I hope not. Greg Bard (talk) 03:59, 20 June 2011 (UTC)

Ahem . . .Indeed. (For what it's worth, this whole sidetrack is way "over the top".) Bielle (talk) 04:22, 20 June 2011 (UTC)

According to that article the British gangs are doing it because they'd heard about it being done in America. That's hilarious, since over here that's a total urban legend.

We need to think up some new legends for british thugs to emulate! APL (talk) 06:46, 20 June 2011 (UTC)

Re: the earlier request for ref [6] includes one person who says he saw it being done as a result of bullying. As for the gang thing, I don't know if we can say it's a total urban legend in the US from the evidence I've seen so far. Sure it's clearly way overhyped and likely a lot (most?) of the instances which people attribute to gangs are false and it may not have been how the urban legend started. But there's no reason to presume American gangs (particularly the lower level or wannabe people) are any less likely to copy things they've heard gangs do. The earlier link also has someone who works with gangs who discusses the use in gangs albeit not as a territorial marker (either out of respect to someone who died or disrespect to someone who left the gang). As with others I do agree trying to proscribe one reason is silly, there are almost definitely people doing it for a lot of different reasons, often because they've heard people do it for that reason (even if that's not really true). Stories from people who've allegedly done it only really tell us about one case and that's presuming the person isn't just fibbing. Trying to determine the percentage of reasons is IMO likely to be a foolhardy exercise. Nil Einne (talk) 08:34, 20 June 2011 (UTC)

And this... — The Hand That Feeds You:Bite 16:15, 22 June 2011 (UTC)
The following discussion has been closed. Please do not modify it.
The notion that this is done out of bullying is absurd. It can take a half hour of tossing the shoes to get them up there. People who do this are patiently attempting to leave a personal mark, not wasting valuable bullying energy when they could be giving wedgies or beatdowns. And if the practice were done as part of gang territory marking it would be adduced as evidence in some sort of legal case. But the plain fact is this that while this was ubiquitous in the rural and suburban US in past decades, I can't recall having seen it more than once or twice in the past 20 years in Harlem or the Bronx. The notion that it is a gang thing is just typical stereotyping of "them negroes" no more sophisticated than blaming the Mexican drug war on that guy cutting your neighbour's lawn. μηδείς (talk) 21:17, 20 June 2011 (UTC) Talk about blaming the darkies for whatever mischief you can't explain: Sen. John McCain ignites controversy, GOPer blames some Arizona wildfires on illegal immigrants: http://www.nydailynews.com/news/politics/2011/06/21/2011-06-21_sen_john_mccain_ignites_controversy_goper_blames_some_arizona_wildfires_on_illeg.html#ixzz1Pxzvn12D Obviously, Medeis and I grew up in different places and in different eras. One person's "absurd" is another's reality. I know it was done as a bullying tactic; over 5 years, I lost 2 pairs of gym shoes to it. If you want the how-tos, it was generally 3 or 4 "bad boys" (we didn't have gangs then) who worked as a team. One would snatch the shoes, then the others would dance around him, keeping anyone brave enough to object at bay. They would then take turns tossing the shoes until one throw was successful. (You are right that it did take time.) Sometimes they would snatch a few pair and do the throwing when the rest of us were in classes. Wedgies are from a later era, and I have never heard of a "beatdown". Noogies, however, were common. Bielle (talk) 02:35, 22 June 2011 (UTC) I am happy to accept your anecdotal evidence. But it doesn't explain the commonness of the practice, or the fact that people do it with their own shoes. I have never yet seen anyone give himself a wedgie, and I have seen a few things. What a horrible, vacant, malign place you grew up in that bullies could spend so much time taunting a child with no one intervening on his behalf. μηδείς (talk) 03:01, 22 June 2011 (UTC)

Sometimes the reason is merely artistic: [7] --Tagishsimon (talk) 00:46, 24 June 2011 (UTC)

A happy medium (was Card reader the electronic device vs. card reader, a person)

I just learned that "card reader" may apparently mean a fortune teller who uses cards, a cartomancer. Is this usage common? Is it specific to British English? (it's the British edition of a Canadian show in the video) If I said "A card reader told me my fortune", would this sound funny to a native speaker of English? I'm asking because no dictionary I looked in had this meaning. Asmrulz (talk) 02:52, 14 September 2012 (UTC)

It sounds okay to these aged (i.e. pre-electronic version) Canadian ears, and the meaning is obvious enough, though "tarot card reader" is clearer. Clarityfiend (talk) 04:07, 14 September 2012 (UTC)

To older British ears (mine) it sounds unusual and ambiguous but not wrong. I don't think I have ever heard a 'tarot-card reader' called a 'card reader' but given suitable context as in your sentence above it would be easily understood and not sound funny, just a little unusual. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 86.4.183.74 (talk) 07:30, 14 September 2012 (UTC)

I hear "card reader", I think of an old IBM machine that reads punched computer cards. More recently, the term suggests a device to read an SD card. In America, the term for a tarot card reader would likely be "fortune teller". ←Baseball Bugs ^{What's up, Doc?} carrots→ 14:12, 14 September 2012 (UTC)

A cursory google search shows that card reader is a commonplace description of tarot card readers. I suspect there's a subtlety associated with card reader that's entirely absent from fortune teller. --Tagishsimon (talk) 14:47, 14 September 2012 (UTC)

A card-reader would be performing cartomancy. That is, all card-readers are fortune tellers, but not all fortune tellers are card readers. Adam Bishop (talk) 19:57, 14 September 2012 (UTC)

You don't need a crystal ball to know that. Clarityfiend (talk) 21:01, 14 September 2012 (UTC)

I've gotta find myself a new psychic. My last one had to close their business down through unforeseen circumstances. -- ♬ Jack of Oz ♬ ^{[your turn]} 00:16, 15 September 2012 (UTC)

You should have given him a good punch. Always try to strike a happy medium.... I hesitate to put my name to this but here goes:- Alansplodge (talk) 02:01, 15 September 2012 (UTC)

To these Canadian ears, "card reader" works equally well for someone performing cartomancy/tarot reading as for the electronic device and the difference would be easily understood from context. I would find "tarot card reader" somewhat redundant as tarot is primarily used for card reading; it would only sound natural if you were differentiating such a person with another who uses a regular deck or some other non-tarot deck. Matt Deres (talk) 03:44, 15 September 2012 (UTC)