On the semiotics of Ghostbusters

Okay, I know it's a corporate advert, but I still liked it. They play it at the Prince Charles all the time and it still gets a snicker from the audience.

Think before you Facebook

Tom Beech, 20, an employee of UK retailer Argos, was sacked for gross misconduct when his employers discovered he'd set up a Facebook page titled "I Work At Argos And Can't Wait To Leave Because It's Shit". Beech was quoted as saying:

I'm stunned they've fired me for this. I had a really bad day and was feeling overworked and underpaid.

- Guardian, 11 August 2007

Great, as long as you don't like movies

Broadcaster Sky NZ has started up a Sky Movies Greats channel... with a discerning playlist that includes Coyote Ugly, Flashdance  and Scary Movie 2.  So, no Battleship Potempkin, then?

Frogs' legs

I once went out walking in the Languedoc with a retired army general who always wore long trousers, even in the blistering heat. When I asked him why he did not wear shorts he looked at me sadly and said "there's already enough suffering in the world".

 

- John Laurenson, BBC News, 4 August 2007

This man was born in 1917

And he's third in line for the US presidency. Senator Robert Byrd (D-WV) sure does like the word 'barbaric', or maybe repetition was just way more popular back in the days before the talkies came along.



[Courtesy of Ruth]

How to speak Lawyer

'Section 13 abolished the common law offences of champerty and barratry, challenging to fight, eavesdropping or being "a common scold or a common night walker." It also repealed the offence of praemunire, which had survived on the statute books since 1392. It preserves the common law offence of embracery'

 

- Wikipedia, on the (UK) Criminal Law Act 1967

Just one little word too many

Jola, 21, au pair

'In Belsize Park, I loved the summer house.  The father was very handsome.  The mother was pretty because she'd had a little plastic surgery.  At first, she liked me but we had an argument.  She called down the stairs, "Jola, the children are calling!".  I said, "I think they are calling you".  She said, "And I expect you to go to them".  I said, "Your husband is telling me about Hong Kong.  Two minutes, please".  Then she said, "You impertinent slut".  Then upstairs, she let me hear her say she had wanted a gay man as the au pair.  I said, "And what if the gay man was also attracted to your husband?".  I should not have said "also"'.

- Metro.co.uk, 2 August 2007