Epic Rap Battles of Linguistics!

Bet you thought you’d never see that title. Still, there it is in black and white.

You’re welcome.

So, all you avowed word-nerds will certainly love this. But have you ever studied English as a foreign language? Maybe you’re an anglophile (mmm … scones). Or maybe you just have a hankerin’ for a rap battle, ANY rap battle.

Then you’ll dig this video.

As a part of their “What’s Your English” theme at the Macmillan Dictionary website, they apparently:

… asked Baba Brinkman (a Canuck) and Professor Elemental (a Brit) to produce a satirical rap-battle on the theme of stereotyped Canadian English versus stereotyped British English. The result was this ‘What’s your English?‘ video …

There you have it.

Also, I have to admit I stole my blog title from one of the best things on YouTube. It’s this guy, Nice Peter, who does videos called Epic Rap Battles of History. They’re probably not safe for work or children … and that’s exactly why they’re awesome-possum.

“Bimbo” Lost in Translation?

Hennes the billy goat loves 1. FC Köln!

So, I like soccer. When I lived in Germany, I lived near Cologne, and naturally my Bundesliga team was the local 1. FC Köln. Even now, I’m still a fan of die Geißböcke, though games are hard to catch on TV.

(Left is Hennes, their mascot. As if you needed another reason to love Cologne.)

Here in the States, though, soccer is much less prominent, but despite that, I recently got a local team of my own to cheer for. And that, dear friends is Philadelphia Union.

The Alot and the Close-Talker Solution

According to Allie Brosh at Hyperbole and a Half, the appropriate action to take when confronted with a close talker is:

This image alone made me laugh so hard I thought I’d ruptured a lung. Wheezing and hacking. Tears. Literally.

What’s this have to do with the usual word-nerdery on this blog? Well, this is from a post entitled “The Awkward Situation Survival Guide.” And one of those situations is encounters with close talkers. And talking (close or otherwise) is linguistic. Or something.

Whatever. It’s funny and I couldn’t keep it to myself. But even better news is that I browsed through more posts and found one that actually (no really, I mean it) has to do with grammar and apostrophobes!

Here it is: The Alot is Better Than You at Everything.

Thank you, Stacey, for alerting me to this blog, and thank you, Ms. Brosh for teaching me how to act in public.

Image: Allie Brosh

Thesis Snow Aye Twos Tart Able Log

Back in college, we used to play an amazing game at parties. This game was Mad Gab. And it can be hilarious and frustrating … especially after a few drinks.

For those of you unfamiliar with this little orange box of mind-gnarling cards, Mad Gab is a game for at least two players, usually more, broken into teams. You flash a card, and one team reads the words on it aloud and tries to guess what it says.

The trick is that each card has a bunch of recognizable words already on it, but when they’re spoken together, they’ll form another word or phrase that isn’t immediately clear. For example, a card might read:

Eighty Fin Sat Earn He

or

Bed Chirp Autumn Doll Her

(Go ahead. Read them aloud. They don’t work subvocally.)

Video: A Backwards Fairy Tale

Here’s more proof that language can be fun.

Nick Hughes sent this video my way in the comments of the post on spoonerisms, but I thought it was good enough to make sure everyone got to see it.

Enjoy.

A Picture Worth 500 Words

As writers at the keyboard all day, it's important to support our plams.

I recently found crates of this item for sale at a local flea market.

I know InDesign does have spell-check, so maybe they just missed my earlier post on the one-button fix for better writing.