What is the funniest phrase that you've seen online and adopted for your own vocabulary? Where did you read it? Were your friends shocked when you started using it? What's the definition (even if it seems obvious, it might make someone's day to find out exactly what that phrase meant without embarrassing themselves to ask.) ;)

-- Anonymous, August 22, 2000

Answers

Hmm...I talk to a lot of "colorful" people online, so I got a million weird phrases from them...my personal favorites..."Bitch on fire" as in when i stubbed my toe it hurt like a bitch on fire! Just the other day a friend of mine told me he'd be right back, he had to piss "like a race horse" I LOVE that! Its just so crass and all, I can't wait for a place I can use that appropriately! And of course there's the endless list of insults...ratbastard, smackdoll, siznitch, and my personal favorites...slut zipper, whore buckle, prostitute snap, lady of the night drawstring...none of those really have a definition, but they're fun to say :)

-- Anonymous, August 22, 2000

slut zipper and whore buckle: what fun! I'm having trouble coming up with any words or phrases that I'd use online but not in normal conversation. I tend to shy away from using expressions such as "lol" and "rofl" and whathaveyou. Not sure why I do. [whispered: those mean "laughing out loud" and "rolling on the floor laughing"]

-- Anonymous, August 22, 2000

Courtesy of Mediarama, Hissyfit, and the Chixes, I've incorporated: blah blah blah fishcakes, tastes/smells like ass, snarf, squick, poo, and scores of other things that I'll think of as soon as I send this post....

-- Anonymous, August 23, 2000

My best friend Karri, who I know from 'real life,' calls me 'whoretits' and 'bitchbrain' in emails. So I guess it's an online thing.

-- Anonymous, August 23, 2000

"I hate ______ with the passion of a thousand boiling suns." I think it's Hissyfit-related somehow. I usually use it to describe things that I don't literally hate, but that annoy me to no end. Usually things on television.

-- Anonymous, August 23, 2000

The phrase I just saw Klee use in another thread, she said Dave Ghrol (sp?) can eat crackers in her bed anytime. I LOVE that!

-- Anonymous, August 23, 2000

I have a couple of insulting names to call people that I could always use in email with my old boss and make her damn near pee her pants every time. One is "shit-hook" and the other is "fuck-stick". Don't ask me why, but those always got her. I can't really think of anything I've seen online and adopted in my own vocabulary. I do use BTW in emails nowadays, and I first saw that in chat rooms (By The Way).

-- Anonymous, August 23, 2000

I think I picked up "blah blah blah fishcakes" from Hissyfit, my friends have NO idea what it means. I never typed "prolly" until I got into my "Survivor" chat group, nor any other Surivor related phrases like "FNF" or "Big, cute hat" which I cannot explain here.

-- Anonymous, August 24, 2000

I said that about Dave Grohl??! Wow, totally don't remember.
I find myself saying "bee ar bee" (ie, BRB, ie be right back) when I leave the office to take my break. "Blah blah blah (insert noun of choice here)cakes", courtesy of Dwanollah. Love that one. "Seeyabye", an ancient relic from my first forays into newsgroups, c.1990. There are a few words I can't share because they are specific to certain friends of mine-- so they're, like, secret words. *snicker*

I just reread the Lisa D's Original question, and I'm not answering it right! Funny phrases? "(----) sucks ass." I don't know. And I stole that one from South Park, not online. Bah.

-- Anonymous, August 24, 2000

I must step in here and give props to the true originator of "blah blah blah fishcakes", Sarah Bunting of Tomato Nation Fame.

-- Anonymous, August 25, 2000

yeah you are, Klee!

-- Anonymous, August 25, 2000

Correct, Erika... although Sarah credits a friend's sister with actually ORIGINATING it. Whoever it is shoulda trademarked it, that's for sure. I'm waiting for the day I hear a radio or tv announcer say it. It's kinda like with Adam Carolla and Jimmy Kimmel's "jackhole" thing....

-- Anonymous, August 25, 2000

Oops! I'm sorry, it was KELI that said that...my mistake ;)

-- Anonymous, August 25, 2000

Wow. Didn't know about the blah blah blah fishcakes thing. But some of my friends call me "blah blah" for my frequent use of those first three words. I hope they don't start working in the "fishcakes" part when addressing me. Let's keep that from them, k? :-)

-- Anonymous, August 25, 2000

I always think of Iggy Pop when I read "blah blah blah"...and it isn't always a good thing that I do...but then I see "[fish]cakes" and think of Dwan./the Chix/klee and, by extension, Tomato Nation.

I, too, say "bee ar bee" out loud. I use "squick" (original definition too gross to post, current definition just means 'anything that makes you shudder violently'), "troll" (as in someone looking to cause trouble or get attention--sometimes referred to in the acronym YHBT--'you have been trolled'.), "ping" (as in calling or e-mailing in hopes of finding out if someone's actually alive), "grok" (predates my Internet forays but was used a lot so started using it again), and I understand "fnord", "^H", "ptang", "frink", "furrfu", "Kibo", "Spot", "Xibo", "rumorf", "porch fart", "luser", "finger", "foaf" and other quaint Internetisms and abbreviations (many specific to small newsgroups).

"Fnord" has to be experienced, it's an in-joke and now loosely tied in with Illuminati books.
"^H" is used like a cross-through. In old editors like .vi, you'd have to hit a control character to erase. So if I said "Pauly Shore is a genius^H^H^H^H^H^Hidiot" you'd hopefully get the joke.
"Ptang" and "frink" are in-jokes. They're the noises lemurs make. "Furrfu" is "Sheesh" in rot-13, an archaic way to 'spoiler' information. Joel Furr is lemur- obsessed.
"Kibo", "Xibo" and "Spot" are in-jokes about a set of characters created by James Parry who used to astound and mystify newbies by grepping for mentions of "Kibo" and then showing up randomly in any newsgroup. (Once upon a time, there were only a few hundred newsgroups to choose from.) Spot is always Not Allowed.
A "rumorf" is a geek who only wants to talk to girls. It's the first question out of their fingers: R U a M or F, are you a guy or a girl. Losers.
A "porch fart" (a.k.a. an "old hat") is a member of a small group of people who want to *discuss* music (as opposed to saying "X roolz" or "Y sux"). I.e., they sit on the porch like old farts and have a real conversation while the kiddies play in the yard and compare tattoos. "Death to all that appose! [sic]"
"Finger" just sounds dirty. Back in the dark ages, you could make a .finger file and people could read what you put there. You also could make .plan files and .project files. Sort of like .sig files.
A "foaf" is a friend of a friend, and a foaf is the person who always has urban legends happen to them. It's always a friend of a friend who had their kidneys stolen in a New York fleapit hotel, or got served ratburgers at the McD's, or was groped by one of the Three Little Pigs (the costumes have immovable arms). snopes.com is a font of amusement if you like urban legends.

HTH. (hope this helps) HAND. (have a nice day)

-- Anonymous, August 30, 2000

Milla, you're back! I was waiting for the vault of knowledge to open up *G*

-- Anonymous, August 30, 2000

Aw. You're so sweet when you call me a geek. *grin* (I'll celebrate ten years online next year. Fifteen if you count dabbling with BBSes back in the REALLY dark ages. I be fookin' OLD.)

-- Anonymous, August 30, 2000

Not THAT old! Thanks for all the reminders, I had almost forgotten rot-13! (That reminds me, I've been known to use a verbal shorthand of "pound-include-standard-disclaimer", which C programmers should get. And I'm also guilty of making references to X Windows, such as "think about it and then shoot me the display". God, what a geek.)

In June, I celebrated 10 years online. I was telnetting to MUDs in June 1990 and that's the first time the word "comestible" entered my vocabulary (much to my chagrin, as it appears to be a dead giveaway for anyone who's ever spent any time in a MUD). Hey, the Internet was new to me, I didn't know what a waste of time it would be. :-)

I used to joke with my old boss that she should cross-stitch a "~ Sweet ~" or "There's no place like ~" design to hang on her wall. Inside Unix users joke, sorry.

We also use "ping" around my office all the time. Once, we started thinking of what costumes we could wear if we were going to a party in which you had to dress up as your favorite Unix command. She quickly came up with "cat", then added "ping", in which you would glue ping-pong balls all over a leotard. I suggested "grep" or "finger", both of which could be construed as risque, to suitably warped brains, and the costume would be a trenchcoat and nothing else and two grasping, sweaty hands. :-)

-- Anonymous, August 30, 2000

Hey Paul, do you find yourself calling !s "bang"s? THAT is a dead giveaway.

BTW, bwa ha on the ~ sweet ~ thing. *snicker*

P.S. What's in your .plan file?

-- Anonymous, September 01, 2000

(P.P.S. You could go as "man" and not have to dress up at all! Heh! I slay me.)

-- Anonymous, September 01, 2000

Oh yeah! I use "bang". As in "That is so bang cool", which of course means "How lame".

Oh, and we even pronounce it "tilde sweet tilde". Or "There's no place like tilde."

I have actually caught myself, when frustrated by leafing through pages of paper documentation, wondering why I don't just use grep... DOH!

Ha! "Man"! Perfect!

Do you ever call your favorite built in text editor "six" instead of it's real two-letter name?

geek geek geek geek geek geek geek geek geek geek geek geek geek

-- Anonymous, September 01, 2000

Me and .vi aren't that close anymore. :) I always liked .pine better....

-- Anonymous, September 07, 2000