mighty forces

Fun with pronunciation

From online photo guru Ken Rockwell:

Can you see it? Can you see the black pip just on the right side of the point-spread of the bright dot? The dot is the evening star and planet Uranus, pronounced “your anus.” (Some humorless science teachers tired of hearing the joke about the starship Enterprise being like toilet paper because it flew around Uranus looking for Klingons, and these dull sorts now try to teach kids to mispronounce Uranus as “urine us,” which is still pretty funny.)

Yes, it is still pretty funny.

Maybe I should move to the U.K.

When I place an order with Amazon.com, I get an e-mail with this subject line:

Your Amazon.com order has shipped

Yesterday, as an experiment, I ordered a book from Amazon.co.uk that’s not available in the States. And the e-mail subject line was:

Your Amazon.co.uk order has dispatched

That sounds so much friendlier, don’t you think?

Words mean things

The best grocery store in town, the Sentry at Hilldale, has changed its name to Metcalfe’s. To go along with this change, they have a giant new 3-D sign at the entrance, which also includes their new slogan:

Uniquely different

This is stupid on so many levels, I don’t know where to begin. So I’ll just leave it there.

For the last time, god willing

ITS is a possessive pronoun.

The cat batted the fish tank with its paw.

IT’S is a contraction of “it is” or “it has.”

It’s been a long time since my cat was eaten by those piranha.