Proverbs, aphorisms, quotations (English) | by Linux fortune |
Absent, adj.: Exposed to the attacks of friends and acquaintances; defamed; slandered. | |
Alone, adj.: In bad company. -- Ambrose Bierce, "The Devil's Dictionary" | |
Ambidextrous, adj.: Able to pick with equal skill a right-hand pocket or a left. -- Ambrose Bierce, "The Devil's Dictionary" | |
aquadextrous, adj.: Possessing the ability to turn the bathtub faucet on and off with your toes. -- Rich Hall, "Sniglets" | |
Bagbiter: 1. n.; Equipment or program that fails, usually intermittently. 2. adj.: Failing hardware or software. "This bagbiting system won't let me get out of spacewar." Usage: verges on obscenity. Grammatically separable; one may speak of "biting the bag". Synonyms: LOSER, LOSING, CRETINOUS, BLETCHEROUS, BARFUCIOUS, CHOMPER, CHOMPING. | |
Binary, adj.: Possessing the ability to have friends of both sexes. | |
Bipolar, adj.: Refers to someone who has homes in Nome, Alaska, and Buffalo, New York. | |
brain-damaged, generalization of "Honeywell Brain Damage" (HBD), a theoretical disease invented to explain certain utter cretinisms in Multics, adj: Obviously wrong; cretinous; demented. There is an implication that the person responsible must have suffered brain damage, because he/she should have known better. Calling something brain-damaged is bad; it also implies it is unusable. | |
Canonical, adj.: The usual or standard state or manner of something. A true story: One Bob Sjoberg, new at the MIT AI Lab, expressed some annoyance at the use of jargon. Over his loud objections, we made a point of using jargon as much as possible in his presence, and eventually it began to sink in. Finally, in one conversation, he used the word "canonical" in jargon-like fashion without thinking. Steele: "Aha! We've finally got you talking jargon too!" Stallman: "What did he say?" Steele: "He just used `canonical' in the canonical way." | |
Cold, adj.: When the politicians walk around with their hands in their own pockets. | |
Distinctive, adj.: A different color or shape than our competitors. | |
Famous, adj.: Conspicuously miserable. -- Ambrose Bierce, "The Devil's Dictionary" | |
hard, adj.: The quality of your own data; also how it is to believe those of other people. | |
heavy, adj.: Seduced by the chocolate side of the force. | |
Honorable, adj.: Afflicted with an impediment in one's reach. In legislative bodies, it is customary to mention all members as honorable; as, "the honorable gentleman is a scurvy cur." -- Ambrose Bierce, "The Devil's Dictionary" | |
Impartial, adj.: Unable to perceive any promise of personal advantage from espousing either side of a controversy or adopting either of two conflicting opinions. -- Ambrose Bierce, "The Devil's Dictionary" | |
intoxicated, adj.: When you feel sophisticated without being able to pronounce it. | |
italic, adj: Slanted to the right to emphasize key phrases. Unique to Western alphabets; in Eastern languages, the same phrases are often slanted to the left. | |
Machine-Independent, adj.: Does not run on any existing machine. | |
Mad, adj.: Affected with a high degree of intellectual independence ... -- Ambrose Bierce, "The Devil's Dictionary" | |
Magnocartic, adj.: Any automobile that, when left unattended, attracts shopping carts. -- Sniglets, "Rich Hall & Friends" | |
manic-depressive, adj.: Easy glum, easy glow. | |
mittsquinter, adj.: A ballplayer who looks into his glove after missing the ball, as if, somehow, the cause of the error lies there. -- "Sniglets", Rich Hall & Friends | |
modem, adj.: Up-to-date, new-fangled, as in "Thoroughly Modem Millie." An unfortunate byproduct of kerning. [That's sic!] | |
new, adj.: Different color from previous model. | |
omnibiblious, adj.: Indifferent to type of drink. Ex: "Oh, you can get me anything. I'm omnibiblious." | |
On-line, adj.: The idea that a human being should always be accessible to a computer. | |
Portable, adj.: Survives system reboot. | |
Positive, adj.: Mistaken at the top of one's voice. -- Ambrose Bierce, "The Devil's Dictionary" | |
Real Time, adj.: Here and now, as opposed to fake time, which only occurs there and then. | |
Reputation, adj.: What others are not thinking about you. | |
revolutionary, adj.: Repackaged. | |
Robustness, adj.: Never having to say you're sorry. | |
rugged, adj.: Too heavy to lift. | |
system-independent, adj.: Works equally poorly on all systems. | |
transparent, adj.: Being or pertaining to an existing, nontangible object. "It's there, but you can't see it" -- IBM System/360 announcement, 1964. virtual, adj.: Being or pertaining to a tangible, nonexistent object. "I can see it, but it's not there." -- Lady Macbeth. | |
Truthful, adj.: Dumb and illiterate. -- Ambrose Bierce, "The Devil's Dictionary" | |
Vanilla, adj.: Ordinary flavor, standard. See FLAVOR. When used of food, very often does not mean that the food is flavored with vanilla extract! For example, "vanilla-flavored won ton soup" (or simply "vanilla won ton soup") means ordinary won ton soup, as opposed to hot and sour won ton soup. | |
well-adjusted, adj.: The ability to play bridge or golf as if they were games. |