Tag: fun

Think you can think laterally: think again!

Remember Dingbats, that board game with the cards with the phrases on them, expressed through cleverly laid-out words and pictures (a bit like Catch Phrase, that old TV show [is that still running]). Well, anyway, it involves pictures a bit like this:

The picture shows the word “somewhere” mysteriously suspended over a sylised rainbow. So what’s the phrase: “Rainbow under somewhere?” Not quite… it’s obviously “somewhere over the rainbow.”

So I’ve set up a challenge: 14 puzzles to challenge your lateral thinking. You’re against the clock, and you sacrifice 30 seconds for every wrong answer or passed question, so you’ve got to judge the challenge to suit you. I’ll publish the answers – and the high scorers – here in a day or two.

Go try Dan’s Dingbats Challenge I

Enjoy.

This is absolutely fantastic. Take a look.

Courtesy of Private Eye, here’s a quick summary of the main points from the three big players’ manifestoes:

Labour
We’re not Conservative.

Conservative
We’re not Labour.

Liberal Democrats
We’re not Labour or Conservative.

Seen this eBay auction?

Would you know it: there’s an “opposite number” to the Dewey Decimal System (introduction to the system [PDF]) – which for the most part of a centurey has been used to categorise books according to their topic and content – for categorising folk tales: the Aarne-Thompson Classification System.

It’s horrendously difficult to find information on it online – most of the resources are in German (Germany, apparently, being big fans of both fairy tales and classifying things) – particularly information about the system itself (rather than about given tales classified by it), but here’s what I’ve managed to glean – it consists of about 2500 categories, subcategories, and themes, broadly broken down in a pretty random way. An entire story can be defined by it’s key themes as a series of numbers, for example:

Little Red Riding Hood is a “The Glutton”-class tale in which an animal disguises itself as a human with the intention of killing a child (I. K2011) . It carries a “what makes your ears so big” theme (Z18.1), and a non-fatal swallowing by a person by an animal (F911.3) which leads to their eventual rescue from the animal’s belly (F913). In some variations of the story, the wolf is then sewn up again – having been filled with stones – such that he eventually drowns (Q426).

Here’s another you might be familiar with:

Rapunzel (“the Maiden in the Tower”) is a tale of type 310 (“Magic Tales”), with four key themes: (a) a man promises his unborn daughter to a witch in order to save himself from death (S222), leading to a girl in the service of a witch (G204), (b) the girl is imprisoned in a tower (R41.2) [also, potentially – T381 (“Imprisoned virgin to prevent knowledge of men (marriage, impregnation)”)], and “lets down her hair” to allow the captor to climb (F848.1); a desirable suitor (prince or king) follows this technique and becomes her lover (L162), (c) the witch discovers what the girl has done, cuts off her hair, and abandons her in the desert (S144 – abandonment in desert); the prince comes, saves himself from the witch, but in doing so is blinded (S165), (d) finally, the couple are reunited, and the woman’s tears restore sight to the blinded man (F952.1).

I find this system a little bit scary and overwhelming. As Andy R said to me, “Perhaps Aarne and Thompson should have spent their time… I don’t know… finding a cure for cancer or something.” They’ve certainly spent a lot of time developing this very deep, very complex system for classifying fairy tales.

There’s a good-looking – but expensive – book, “A Guide to Folk Tales in the English Language: Based on the Aarne-Thompson Classification System” by D. L. Ashliman, which, according to Voyager, can be found in the academic library at UWA. I’ve asked Paul to pick up a copy (Paul: it’s published by Greenwood Press in 1987 and can be found on the Arts and Humanities floor (Level F) of the Hugh Owen library – classmark Z5983.F17.A8). Could be interesting.

Anyway; sorry if that bored you. Here’s more information:

• An Aarne-Thompson analysis
• Another Aarne-Thompson analysis
• List of Aarne-Thompson types
• More Aarne-Thompson types

Is this actor real? Seymore Butts (say it out loud) is listed on the IMDb, director of such films as Anal Surprise Party, Female Ejaculation Review, and Tongue In Cheeks, as well as over 60 other films. Also performed in 50 films… most of which don’t have an IMDb score…

…so it’s an anonymous pornstar with a thing for doing it up the arse, big deal. But here’s the interesting thing: he was most recently in a film called Slaughter Party, which also starred… Lloyd Kaufman.

The world is a funny place.

In related news, you can read the full story of Will Keenan‘s appearance on the Troma Night bulletin board, including a video we sent back to him and Lloyd, thanking them, on a special thread we set up. Have fun!

You won’t find these from Crayola…

Thanks to Matt for the idea for this one – on the RockMonkey wiki, it’s now possible to play Scissors, Stone, Paper! For some reason, I keep losing, but it’s supposed to play fair! See for yourself.

The Revenge Of Zanatoth is a new WikiGame on the RockMonkey wiki. And for those of you who remember me publicising TromaNightAdventure, my first adventure-based WikiGame… well: The Revenge Of Zanatoth kicks it’s arse. It’s a wonderful little (heh) WikiGame that sends you on a quest to save Peter Hain from Zanatoth. During your travels, you’ll imitate oral sex in a gay bar, try to knit with goat’s wool, swap random items for all kinds of crap (hmm… very “Union Roof Scene” from TromaNightAdventure, there…) with Paul, buy beer from pet shop owners, eat fig rolls… the list goes on.

It’s an epic quest from the fevered imagination of Andy R. Go play it (you’ll need a [free] RockMonkey account – register here).

Promised various people I’d put these online, for their… enjoyment:

• VegPorn – Porn For Vegetarians, By Vegetarians – all their models are vegan, and they also sell “cruelty-free” toys and stuff. Weird.
• Overheard In The Office and Overheard In The Office and Overheard In New York – especially for Strokey Adam

Have a great weekend.

1. Have a spare pair of underpants ready. Do not be eating anything.
2. Be sure that you are not under the influence of any hallucinogens. Put that pint down, too.
3. Take a deep breath. Remind yourself that you are in a safe place, and you can turn off your computer at any time.
4. Watch this 80’s Estonian TV ad (about 5.3MB). I think it’s supposed to be shot from the perspective of a chicken on a bad LSD trip.