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Your Proofness: Mahim Maher Master Storyteller: Ameer Hamza Knowledge Navigator: Dilaira Mondegarian Creativity Analysts: Amna Iqbal, Essa Malik, Jamal Khurshid, Maha Haider, Samra Aamir, Kiran Shahid, Faizan Dawood, Umar Waqas
What’s a bumbershoot? PAGE 2
Weird Words Make an origami goldfish! PAGE 4
What a Lava-ly view! PAGE 5
Ever wonder what the ‘ZIP’ in ZIP Code means? PAGE 6
THE EXPRESS TRIBUNE, MARCH 31, 2013
Hi Light
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Weird Words Do you have a bumbershoot or a finnimbrun? Can’t reach your acnestis? Do your friends often get into a batrachomyomachy? Are you macrosmatic? If you’re confused how to answer any — or all — of these questions, never fear! With our handy dandy list of weird words, you’ll soon be a pettifogger! But remember, no one likes a bloviater! Do you have a favourite weird word? Send us an email at hifive@tribune.com.pk
Argle - bargle: a loud row or quarrel.
Absquatulate: to leave or abscond with something.
Anencephalous: lacking a brain.
Acnestis: the point of the back that lies between the shoulders and the lower back, which cannot be reached to be scratched.
Batrachomyomachy: making a mountain out of a molehill.
Bumbershoot: an umbrella.
Collywobbles: stomach pain or queasiness.
Doodle sack: old English word for bagpipe.
It’s going to rain today, so don’t forget your bumbershoot.
Bibble: to drink often; to eat and/or drink noisily.
Bloviate: to speak pompously or brag.
Borborygma: rumbling of the stomach.
Brontide: The low rumbling of distant thunder.
Crapulence: discomfort from eating or drinking too much.
Dudgeon: a bad mood, a huff.
THE EXPRESS TRIBUNE, MARCH 31, 2013
Hi Light
Eructationa: burp, belch.
Fatuousunconsciously: foolish.
Logorrhea: loquaciousness, talkativeness. Gobemouche: a highly gullible person.
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Godwottery: nonsense, balderdash.
Panjandrum: someone who thinks himself high and mighty.
Gongoozle: to stare at.
Pettifogger: a person who tries to befuddle others with his speech.
Hobbledehoy: an awkward or ill-mannered young boy. Selcouth: unfamiliar, rare, strange, marvelous, wonderful. For example: the list universe is such a selcouth website!
Finnimbrun: a trinket or knick-knack.
Snollygoster: a person who can’t be trusted.
Macrosmatic: having a good sense of smell.
Vomitory: an exit or outlet.
Nudiustertian: the day before yesterday.
Wabbit: exhausted, tired, worn out.
Flibbertigibbet: nonsense, balderdash. Jentacular: pertaining to breakfast. Floccinaucinihilipilification: the act or habit of describing something as unimportant, of having no value or being worthless.
Jobbernowl: a stupid fellow, a blockhead.
Oxter: outdated word meaning “armpit”.
Xertz: to gulp down quickly and greedily.
THE EXPRESS TRIBUNE, MARCH 31, 2013
4 Make an Origami Goldfish Fish are simply beautiful and an important part in the Circle of Life around us. This week, ToffeeTV.com’s Ayesha Mehmood shows you how to make an Origami Goldfish! All you need is a square piece of paper, a pair of scissors and a marker!
: d e d e e n s ie l p p u S
Instructions:
• Sheet of colourful card paper • Scissor
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Take a square sheet of paper, fold it in half (sideways) to make a crease, and unfold it again. 2. Next, fold the paper in half, downward. 3. Then, fold both the side corners inwards to meet at the centre crease. 4. Hold the bottom corner, and fold it upward. Repeat this for both the triangle shapes. 5. Hold the lower-most point of the triangle (the vertex) and fold it outward. 6. Take the upper layer of the bottom half of the fish, and fold it upwards. Be sure and crease the base a few centimetres below what you have already made. 7. Taking the same triangle that you have just made, fold it further upwards. 8. Using a scissor, cut across both the layers, leaving only a small joined piece towards the top. This will be the tail. Fold the tail into the fish face. 9. The fish is “flat on its back” right now. Pick it up, and collapse the fish so it becomes a “flat square”. 10. Rotate the fish and unfold the bottom part again. This will make the tail. Your fish is almost complete. 11. Now just draw the eyes with a marker, and your pet goldfish is complete!
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THE EXPRESS TRIBUNE, MARCH 31, 2013
World wide weird
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Get your weekly dose of the unusual and funny from across the globe!
Bite Size Celebs A Kentucky man has carved out a unique niche for his business by turning peanut shells into mini statues of celebrities and other people. Steve Casino says his project started with a statue of The Ramones singer Joey Ramone and he has since created tiny statues of Elton John, Sean Connery as James Bond, Gomez and Morticia Addams, Andy Warhol and several other celebrities using peanut shells for the bodies and craft supplies, including bamboo skewers, wood filler and embroidery floss, for limbs and other details. “Mostly, these are people that I like but I’m doing them for hire now so I’m creating complete strangers,” Casino said. Casino said his customers on www.stevecasino.com include Nine Inch Nails front man Trent Reznor, who requested his own likeness as well as statues of his wife and two children. Casino said he hopes to display his celebrities, which will soon add Freddy Mercury and Pee Wee Herman to their ranks, at a gallery in the future. SOURCE: UPI.COM
Squib Squid In the shallow waters just off the coast of the Guangdong province in China, a fisherman caught a bloated looking squid and took it to the fish market in Jiaoling County. Only after the fish was slaughtered at the market, was it revealed that there was in fact a live-bomb inside the fish that could detonate at any moment if handled improperly, according to the local news. “This sort of squid lives close to the shore and normally makes a meal of small fish and prawns,” Huang, the man who made the discovery, told the newspaper. “Perhaps he thought the bomb was his favourite food and gulped it down. He certainly had a big belly when he was caught,” he added. The bomb weighed roughly three pounds and was shaped like an eggplant. Local police suggested that the rusted bomb may have been dropped by a fighter jet, but the age of the bomb was unknown. After Huang called Chinese authorities about the bomb’s discovery, it was promptly taken away and police performed a controlled explosion. SOURCE: HUFFINGTONPOST.COM
Backstabbed! Canadian Billy McNeely spent three years scratching an itch on his back — only to be told it was a KNIFE. The three-inch blade was found in a lump that he had had since he was stabbed five times in a fight. Doctors stitched him up but never took X-Rays, he said. Billy, from Canada, said: “I’ve done some jail time in the past.”The guards rub over you with a metal wand detector, and every time it hit my back it went off.” The 32-year-old finally decided to get it looked at after he scratched his back and his fingernail caught on something. Girlfriend Stephanie Sayine told the local news: “I told Billy ‘There’s a knife sticking out of your back’. I was scared. I was ready to pull it out with tweezers.” SOURCE: MIRROR.CO.UK
What a Lava-ly view! Most of us like to go somewhere warm for our holidays — but balancing on the brink of an erupting volcano could result in far more than mere sunburn. This incredible picture shows the moment one tourist edged towards a torrent of spewing lava, risking life and limb for a holiday snap. Photographer Denis Budkov caught the incident at the Plosky Tolbachik volcano in the far east of Russia. From a safe distance, of course. SOURCE: MIRROR.CO.UK
Hey! Be Car-ful! A Southern California man’s car ended up on his neighbour’s roof in an unusual accident. Local police Sgt. Sean Riley said that the driver lost control of the car on a driveway in an area where homes are arrayed on a steep hillside. The vehicle ended up on the roof of the next house down the hill. Riley says the driver reported he had a mechanical failure. The driver, his wife and the resident of the neighbouring home were unharmed. A crane was brought in to lift the car from the roof, which had minor damage. SOURCE: HUFFINGTONPOST.COM
Sweet dreams The world’s first “hotel” made entirely from cake is to welcome guests for one night only with room service in the form of vanilla sponge cushions and a handstitched meringue rug. The hotel within a hotel in Soho, central London, is the creation of more than 14 artists who spent 2,000 hours baking and 900 hours decorating with more than 600 kilos of sugar. Guests will be encouraged to eat their way through windows and walls clad with 2,000 macaroons, a rug made from 1,081 meringues hand-stitched together, 20 kilos of marshmallow garlands, windowsills built entirely from fudge and a bath filled with caramel-coated popcorn. The bedside table even features edible books. Built to promote a new range from Tate & Lyle Sugars, the hotel includes edible art across three floors and eight rooms. Eight tasting rooms include a Mediterranean-inspired bedroom with 10 metres of edible bunting, a Pirates of the Caribbean room with a treasure chest full of edible pearls, ginger spiced doubloons and cutlasses, a British-inspired golden syrup sugar room and a South Pacific room with a two metre-high Easter Island statue made entirely from chocolate mud cake. SOURCE: MIRROR.CO.UK
Back from the depths This eerie real-life Atlantis has reappeared from under flood waters after spending 25 years submerged. Some 1,500 residents barely had time to grab their belongings when the spa resort of Villa Epecuen was swamped after a lagoon burst its banks in 1985. By 1993 the town, in eastern Argentina, which drew 20,000 visitors a year, lay hidden beneath 10 metres of water. But now, as the salty lagoon water recedes, spooky silvery ruins have re-emerged. Only one man Pablo Novak, 81, returned to the town, spending his days cycling around the ruins. He said: “I am OK here. I am just alone. I read the newspaper. And I always think of the town’s golden days of the 60s and 70s.” One former resident, Norma Berg, 48, said: “I had a bunch of cats and dogs, and they ran away a couple days before the flood and I never saw them again. I think my pets could feel that the water was coming.” Stark reminders of daily life remain from the car engines left in the streets to the rusty beds protruding from the water. The town had 280 businesses, including lodges, guesthouses, hotels and businesses, centred around the tourist trade. Legend holds that the lake was formed by the tears of a great Chief crying for the pain of his beloved. It is said that Epecuen — or ‘eternal spring’ — can cure depression, rheumatism, skin diseases, anaemia, even treat diabetes. More visitors have come to the town recently in an attempt to salvage materials to recycle from the ruins. SOURCE: MIRROR.CO.UK
THE EXPRESS TRIBUNE, MARCH 31, 2013
Did you know?
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s n i g i r O d r o W Why Meeting Notes are Called Minutes The ‘minutes’ here have nothing to do with time, but rather ‘small’, as in ‘minute’ (my-newt). ‘Minutes’ in this sense first popped up in the early 18th century, possibly directly from the Latin ‘minute scripture“, meaning ‘small notes‘ or just ‘minute’, meaning ‘small’ or possibly via the 16th century ‘minute’ definition of ‘rough draft’ from the preceding Latin. Whatever the case, ‘minutes’ as in “meeting notes’ is referencing this sense of condensing something down (small) as in the ‘my-newt‘ (minute) pronunciation, not as in ‘seconds, minutes, hours‘.
How to say 'Toilet signs' in different languages! Afrikaans Albanian Danish Dutch Estonian Finnish French German Icelandic Indonesian Italian Japanese Malay Maltese Norwegian Polish Portuguese Spanish Swahili Swedish Turkish
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Here Burra Herrer Heren Meestele Miehet Hommes Herren Karlar Pria Signori Otoko Lelaki Rgiel Menn Panowie Homens Hombres Wanaume Herrar Erkekler
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Damen Gra Damer Vrouwen Naistele Naiset Femmes Damen Konur Wanita Signore Onna Perempuan Nisa Kvinner Panie Senhoras Señoras Wanawake Damer Bayanlar
Cool facts The ZIP in “ZIP code” means Zoning Improvement Plan. Every person, including identical twins, has a unique eye and tongue print along with their finger print. 315 entries in Webster’s 1996 dictionary were misspelled. Playing cards were issued to British pilots in WWII. If captured, they could be soaked in water and unfolded to reveal a map for escape. Orcas (killer whales) kill sharks by torpedoing up into the shark’s stomach from underneath, causing the shark to explode. Dr. Seuss pronounced his name “soyce”. The Three Wise Monkeys have names: Mizaru (See no evil), Mikazaru (Hear no evil), and Mazaru (Speak no evil). Because metal was scarce, the Oscars given out during World War II were made of wood.
THE EXPRESS TRIBUNE, MARCH 31, 2013
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Fun & games
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THE EXPRESS TRIBUNE, MARCH 31, 2013
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