Abandoned prison restroom with long trough-style urinal off a low-traffic area, as described in John Cheever's 1977 novel FALCONER. To quote the author, this is where the inmates went after dinner "to fuck themselves." Themselves but not each other -- there were unwritten rules. Looking at other penises was okay, but not into another man's eyes. Touching another man was not allowed, except for the shoulder. A grim place, not gay by any definition, and certainly not the fantasy one-for-all tearoom scenes depicted in gay porn videos.
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Since The Valley in Cheever's award-winning novel Falconer was located on an upper floor, the origin of its name was obscure. Perhaps the name was coined to reference the trench- or trough-shaped nature of the elderly urinal itself.
-- "Where's Harry?"
-- "He went to The Valley after dinner."
-- 'When do you think he'll be back in our wing?"
-- "As late as possible, if I know Harry."
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-- "Where's Harry?"
-- "He went to The Valley after dinner."
-- 'When do you think he'll be back in our wing?"
-- "As late as possible, if I know Harry."
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by al-in-chgo February 25, 2010
Get the The Valley mug.A sudden but violent outburst of a person shouting, screaming recriminations and (possibly) wailing, generally short-lived but shocking.
"Hissy fit" used to describe an adult tantrum but now has become an equal opportunity description, young or old, male or female. What they all have in common is no matter how severe the (alleged) offense, there is always some wounded pride involved, and usually an audience of bystanders along with the culprit who allegedly triggered the hissy.
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"Hissy fit" used to describe an adult tantrum but now has become an equal opportunity description, young or old, male or female. What they all have in common is no matter how severe the (alleged) offense, there is always some wounded pride involved, and usually an audience of bystanders along with the culprit who allegedly triggered the hissy.
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-- "When I told Sarah she couldn't have the doll, she broke down and pitched a major hissy fit. Right there in the toy department at Target!"
--"So when Joe got fired, all he did was throw a hissy fit out in the hall? Terrible. REAL men used to slug each other."
--"She freaked! She had a hissy! She thinks you're the cat's meow." 'Farmer Ted' (Anthony Michael Hall) in movie SIXTEEN CANDLES (1984), describing the Molly Ringwald character's sudden infatuation with a boy two years her senior.
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--"So when Joe got fired, all he did was throw a hissy fit out in the hall? Terrible. REAL men used to slug each other."
--"She freaked! She had a hissy! She thinks you're the cat's meow." 'Farmer Ted' (Anthony Michael Hall) in movie SIXTEEN CANDLES (1984), describing the Molly Ringwald character's sudden infatuation with a boy two years her senior.
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by al-in-chgo February 25, 2010
Get the hissy fit mug.Typesetter's name for a "regular" (pre-computer-era) slash mark (/) that associates related terms. On computer QWERTY keyboards, commonly found to the right of the key for a period. The virgule key + shift indicates a question mark.
by al-in-chgo March 03, 2010
Get the virgule mug.Judgment City is that part of town where all the buildings are of medium height, usually located near expressways, and built between the early Sixties and the mid-Eighties. Its style is some variation on International Style as exemplified by the almost inevitable flat roofs with HVAC equipment forming a "sore thumb" addendum to the roof lines. Judgment City gets its name from the sterile corporate complex that is the setting for most of the plot of Albert Brooks' satiric comedy DEFENDING YOUR LIFE.
Beige is the predominant theme of Judgment City -- beige for the cast-concrete slabs that form some buildings, most bridges, and practically all covered parking structures attached to those buildings that no longer are surrounded by enormous asphalt parking lots. Beige also shows up in more overtly pseudo-sophisticated building techniques like pebbled walls (usually more concrete but with a deliberate random design), or the vertical walls with pretend fluting that are made of a whiter shade of concrete.
Judgment City areas generally push retail and housing to its edges because in these neo-downtowns, rents are too expensive to support low-rise concerns.
If, however, you come across a newer area that is not flat-roofed and beige, but equally corporate with such building features as monopitch or steepled roofs, ziggurat-edged walls and exposed structural elements like gray PPG plate glass or red girders, you've gone beyond Modern into Post-Modern: Legoland. (See "Legoland".)
Beige is the predominant theme of Judgment City -- beige for the cast-concrete slabs that form some buildings, most bridges, and practically all covered parking structures attached to those buildings that no longer are surrounded by enormous asphalt parking lots. Beige also shows up in more overtly pseudo-sophisticated building techniques like pebbled walls (usually more concrete but with a deliberate random design), or the vertical walls with pretend fluting that are made of a whiter shade of concrete.
Judgment City areas generally push retail and housing to its edges because in these neo-downtowns, rents are too expensive to support low-rise concerns.
If, however, you come across a newer area that is not flat-roofed and beige, but equally corporate with such building features as monopitch or steepled roofs, ziggurat-edged walls and exposed structural elements like gray PPG plate glass or red girders, you've gone beyond Modern into Post-Modern: Legoland. (See "Legoland".)
-- Recall that in Albert Brooks' movie DEFENDING YOUR LIFE, the newer retail outlets in Judgment City, like nail salons or frozen-yogurt shops, were going up on the edge of town.
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by al-in-chgo June 19, 2011
Get the Judgment City mug.A person who loves knees, or who has a fetish for human knees.
From the Greek GONATOs + PHILE, "Knee" and "Lover of."
Not to be confused with "gonad."
From the Greek GONATOs + PHILE, "Knee" and "Lover of."
Not to be confused with "gonad."
by al-in-chgo November 12, 2015
Get the Gonatophile mug.1. The penis itself.
2. Specifically, an erect penis.
3. A representation of a phallus, often exaggerated, in art or myth.
4. A non-literal representation of phallic shape, intent or function.
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2. Specifically, an erect penis.
3. A representation of a phallus, often exaggerated, in art or myth.
4. A non-literal representation of phallic shape, intent or function.
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1. It's a little pompous to refer to one's penis as a phallus, but it is lexically correct.
2. A penis is for urination; when it becomes erect it is a phallus, serving sexual or reproductive purposes.
3. Two representations of phallus:
a. For example, a primitive sculpture that shows a grotesquely large penis is using the organ as a phallus to indicate fertility, or to represent masculine potency in general.
b. Similarly, the exaggerated genitalia in the work of gay artists such as Tom of Finland emphasize the erotic quality of the phallus, sometimes called hyper-masculinity.
4. A penis, phallus or idea of potency symbolized in an object. The most commonly used term, derived from Freudian psychoanalysis, is called a phallic symbol. One example of this is the very last shot of Hitchcock's 1959 thriller NORTH BY NORTHWEST, which wittily shows a passenger train plunging into a tunnel. Because of the prior plot, the audience knows very well that a train has erotic potential, so the last shot indicates sexual intercourse.
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2. A penis is for urination; when it becomes erect it is a phallus, serving sexual or reproductive purposes.
3. Two representations of phallus:
a. For example, a primitive sculpture that shows a grotesquely large penis is using the organ as a phallus to indicate fertility, or to represent masculine potency in general.
b. Similarly, the exaggerated genitalia in the work of gay artists such as Tom of Finland emphasize the erotic quality of the phallus, sometimes called hyper-masculinity.
4. A penis, phallus or idea of potency symbolized in an object. The most commonly used term, derived from Freudian psychoanalysis, is called a phallic symbol. One example of this is the very last shot of Hitchcock's 1959 thriller NORTH BY NORTHWEST, which wittily shows a passenger train plunging into a tunnel. Because of the prior plot, the audience knows very well that a train has erotic potential, so the last shot indicates sexual intercourse.
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by al-in-chgo March 14, 2010
Get the phallus mug.Short for "tattoo sleeve": A tattoo that covers all or most of a person's forearm, as though it were the sleeve of a shirt.
by al-in-chgo August 13, 2012
Get the tat sleeve mug.