Things you were shockingly old when you learned

Message Bookmarked
Bookmark Removed
Not all messages are displayed: show all messages (12093 of them)

xxpost I think that's a thing where laypeople just think of rocker switches as switches, whereas electricians deal with a variety of switches and don't consider how weird it sounds to laypeople when they refer them as rockers.

You Can't Have the Woogie Without a Little Boogie (Old Lunch), Wednesday, 28 April 2021 00:31 (three years ago) link

you frown with your butt

Filibuster Poindexter (Neanderthal), Wednesday, 28 April 2021 00:35 (three years ago) link

Metro / boulot / dodo

(Commute/work/sleep)

Ezra Kleina Nachtmusik (Ye Mad Puffin), Wednesday, 28 April 2021 00:57 (three years ago) link

xp - the "rockers" for switches thing I've noticed in several industries, where they refuse to adopt the lay term. Like how computer manufacturers until recently insisted on calling portable computers "notebooks", even though everyone calls them "laptops". I hear telecom industry people speak of a "wireline"; to everyone else it's a landline.

Curious about the "metro" for subway thing though. I've from the Washington DC area where the local subway is usually called the "metro" too (parts of it literally aren't a subway as it pops aboveground in the suburbs), but I've always considered "metro" the name of *this* subway, not any subway. Just like BART is the San Francisco subway or "the tube" is the London subway or the Boston subway is sometimes "the T". I almost always call the DC subway "the metro" but would never call the London or NYC subway that.

European Stupor League (Lee626), Wednesday, 28 April 2021 01:26 (three years ago) link

In French, it's always 'métro', which is why even anglophone Montrealers call it that in English.

Beyond that, however, London's Metropolitan Railway inaugurated the history of rapid transit in 1863 so it's likely that the abbreviated version stuck even in parts of North America.

pomenitul, Wednesday, 28 April 2021 01:36 (three years ago) link

Bit of whiplash in the last minute as I went from realizing, on seeing the abbreviation FKA elsewhere, that the FKA in FKA Twigs stood for 'formerly known as', to discovering that in fact, despite her being known as just Twigs for a time, the FKA doesn't stand for 'formerly known as', according to her anyway, and is just "a selection of letters that sounded quite kind of masculine and strong".

Alba, Friday, 30 April 2021 02:29 (three years ago) link

i do not believe that at all

mookieproof, Friday, 30 April 2021 03:47 (three years ago) link

does that mean my pronunciation of "fucker Twigs" is correct after all?

assert (MatthewK), Friday, 30 April 2021 04:24 (three years ago) link

Of course, somebody in R.E.M. once claimed that the name didn't stand for anything, they just liked the dots.

Hideous Lump, Friday, 30 April 2021 04:28 (three years ago) link

Boss likes dots

Filibuster Poindexter (Neanderthal), Friday, 30 April 2021 04:42 (three years ago) link

dots man gets paid?

mookieproof, Friday, 30 April 2021 04:43 (three years ago) link

Irmin Schmidt used to tell people CAN stood for Communism Anarchism Nihilism.

Authoritarian Steaks (Tom D.), Friday, 30 April 2021 07:54 (three years ago) link

Political Unrest Stabilize Society, YES

Filibuster Poindexter (Neanderthal), Friday, 30 April 2021 12:32 (three years ago) link

KMFDM really means what I think it means and nobody will ever convince me otherwise.

pplains, Friday, 30 April 2021 12:46 (three years ago) link

That the first word in King Kong is the royal title and the name of the ape is simply Kong. I guess it's understandable that it wasn't translated into Norwegian, as "kong Kong" might look a bit silly.

anatol_merklich, Friday, 30 April 2021 13:49 (three years ago) link

In clearly specious name origin claims, there was also “ In an early promotional interview, Vedder said that the name "Pearl Jam" was a reference to his great-grandmother Pearl, who was married to a Native American and had a special recipe for peyote-laced jam.”

Kim, Friday, 30 April 2021 14:04 (three years ago) link

There's a whole lot of speculation about that name, another origin (from Jeff Ament) gives Neil Young credit for the "Jam" part:

Neil Young, of course, would go on to be one of Pearl Jam’s biggest mentors.

And on this one night in 1991, the three band members watched in amazement as Young stretched a few key songs on and on for hours. “He played, like, nine songs over three hours. Every song was like a fifteen- or twenty-minute jam," Ament told Rolling Stone in 2006. "So that's how 'jam' got added on.”

Ament soon turned to his longtime bandmate Gossard and simply said, “What about Pearl Jam?”

soaring skrrrtpeggios (jon /via/ chi 2.0), Friday, 30 April 2021 14:10 (three years ago) link

it's cum

Filibuster Poindexter (Neanderthal), Friday, 30 April 2021 14:10 (three years ago) link

Thin white rope was already taken.
As was 10cc.

Stevolende, Friday, 30 April 2021 15:45 (three years ago) link

Lovin spoonful too.

Stevolende, Friday, 30 April 2021 15:46 (three years ago) link

God, rock is awful

Alba, Friday, 30 April 2021 15:46 (three years ago) link

Do we need a 'bands whose names are probably references to semen' thread? I think we almost certainly do.

You Can't Have the Woogie Without a Little Boogie (Old Lunch), Friday, 30 April 2021 16:09 (three years ago) link

the jizz is on mary chain

A viking of frowns, (Camaraderie at Arms Length), Friday, 30 April 2021 16:11 (three years ago) link

Threads you were shockingly old when you clicked Remove Bookmark

Bobo Honk, real name, no gimmicks (Doctor Casino), Friday, 30 April 2021 16:14 (three years ago) link

jesus, had never made that connection with 10cc or lovin spoonful, ick

Draymond is "Mr Dumpy" (forksclovetofu), Friday, 30 April 2021 17:39 (three years ago) link

Cream was actually named after Jack Bruce's family's dairy farm iirc

Frumious Cumberbatch (Ye Mad Puffin), Friday, 30 April 2021 17:49 (three years ago) link

what do u think the "Wall Street Shuffle" alluded to

Filibuster Poindexter (Neanderthal), Friday, 30 April 2021 17:49 (three years ago) link

i was so naive

Draymond is "Mr Dumpy" (forksclovetofu), Friday, 30 April 2021 17:58 (three years ago) link

RUSH = running under satan's house

Or so I was told on the school playground

Andy the Grasshopper, Friday, 30 April 2021 18:03 (three years ago) link

weirdly I knew that about 10cc without having much of a clue what they even sound like

rob, Friday, 30 April 2021 18:09 (three years ago) link

wait till you hear their reggae track

Long Tall Arsetee & the Shaker Intros (breastcrawl), Friday, 30 April 2021 18:18 (three years ago) link

The song "Coffee Blues" is a tribute to Maxwell House Coffee, which Hurt describes, "rapping" in the beginning of the song, as being two or three times any other brand, ergo, he only needs one spoonful to make him feel all right, what he describes as "my lovin' spoonful" in the song. The song is part of a group of songs with a long history in recorded blues that generally use the term "a spoonful" to suggest sex, and in some cases use of a drug such as cocaine.[36] The term "lovin' spoonful" has been conjectured as referring to the amount of ejaculate released by a human male during a typical orgasm.

... Mississippi John that is, not William or, er, John.

Authoritarian Steaks (Tom D.), Friday, 30 April 2021 18:25 (three years ago) link

xp
actually I looked them up after posting that and naturally I know a bunch of their songs, including Dreadlock Holiday ¯\_(ツ)_/¯

rob, Friday, 30 April 2021 18:26 (three years ago) link

I just learned that Cardi B.'s real name is apparently Belcalis, but she often went by the nickname "Bacardi." Bacardi, B. Cardi, Cardi. B.

(Coincidence or no, her sister's actual name is Hennessy.)

Josh in Chicago, Friday, 30 April 2021 18:27 (three years ago) link

I'm sure this is the kind of thing everybody on this board knows this already but I only learned today that the Ramones did not come up with "Second verse, same as the first"

silverfish, Friday, 30 April 2021 18:58 (three years ago) link

pretty sure that was the violent femmes

Josh in Chicago, Friday, 30 April 2021 19:00 (three years ago) link

boy scouts iirc

Draymond is "Mr Dumpy" (forksclovetofu), Friday, 30 April 2021 19:01 (three years ago) link

It was Herman's Hermits! I didn't know that until I googled it right now.

Authoritarian Steaks (Tom D.), Friday, 30 April 2021 19:03 (three years ago) link

Or to be more accurate it was Fred Murray and R.P. Weston, who wrote the song in question in 1910!

Authoritarian Steaks (Tom D.), Friday, 30 April 2021 19:04 (three years ago) link

Yesterday I learned that ILX comment boxes--like the one I'm typing in now--can be enlarged or minimized using a tiny little doodad in the bottom right corner. Very exciting.

clemenza, Friday, 30 April 2021 19:06 (three years ago) link

Whoa! When did that happen?

peace, man, Friday, 30 April 2021 19:44 (three years ago) link

I had never noticed that!

soaring skrrrtpeggios (jon /via/ chi 2.0), Friday, 30 April 2021 19:46 (three years ago) link

Members of 10cc disagree about the origin of the band's name. I will note that early singles written by them include "When He Comes" and "Come on Plane".

European Stupor League (Lee626), Friday, 30 April 2021 19:47 (three years ago) link

(with each other I meant, not with us)

European Stupor League (Lee626), Friday, 30 April 2021 19:50 (three years ago) link

Pixel = picture element. Probably everybody other than me knew that.

irked at the fact I know who Jordan Rudess is (Matt #2), Friday, 30 April 2021 19:58 (three years ago) link

I went to school for graphic design and I did not know that.

It probably wasn't the best school for graphic design, though, tbrr.

You Can't Have the Woogie Without a Little Boogie (Old Lunch), Friday, 30 April 2021 20:00 (three years ago) link

I didn't know that

Mr. Cacciatore (Moodles), Friday, 30 April 2021 20:53 (three years ago) link

Yesterday I learned that ILX comment boxes--like the one I'm typing in now--can be enlarged or minimized using a tiny little doodad in the bottom right corner. Very exciting.

Isn't that more of a browser function kind of thing?

joni mitchell jarre (anagram), Saturday, 1 May 2021 13:27 (three years ago) link

Loved the song for 35 years, but only just discovered that in ‘West End Girls’, when Tennant sings ‘ Call the police, there's a mad man around, Running down underground to a dive bar, In a West End town’ he’s actually referring to a bar called The Dive Bar in Gerrard Street, Soho.

Dan Worsley, Saturday, 1 May 2021 15:26 (three years ago) link


You must be logged in to post. Please either login here, or if you are not registered, you may register here.