Dinkum's definitions
November 11, formerly observed in the United States in commemoration of the signing of the armistice ending World War I in 1918. Since 1954 it has been incorporated into the observances of Veterans Day.
-- American Heritage Dictionary, 4th Edition
-- American Heritage Dictionary, 4th Edition
EXAMPLE:
"So this book is a sidewalk strewn with junk, trash which I throw over my shoulders as I travel in time back to November eleventh, nineteen hundred and twenty-two.
"I will come to a time in my backwards trip when November eleventh, accidentally my birthday, was a sacred day called Armistice Day. When I was a boy . . . all the people of all the nations which had fought in the First World War were silent during the eleventh minute of the eleventh hour of Armistice Day, which was the eleventh day of the eleventh month.
"It was during that minute in nineteen hundred and eighteen, that millions upon millions of human beings stopped butchering one another. I have talked to old men who were on battlefields during that minute. They have told me in one way or another that the sudden silence was the voice of God. So we still have among us some men who can remember when God spoke clearly to mankind.
"Armistice Day has become Veterans' Day. Armistice Day was sacred. Veterans' Day is not.
"So I will throw Veterans' Day over my shoulder. Armistice Day I will keep. I don't want to throw away any sacred things.
"What else is sacred? Oh, "Romeo and Juliet", for instance.
"And all music is."
-- From Kurt Vonnegut's 1973 novel "Breakfast of Champions" -- Preface (page 6).
"So this book is a sidewalk strewn with junk, trash which I throw over my shoulders as I travel in time back to November eleventh, nineteen hundred and twenty-two.
"I will come to a time in my backwards trip when November eleventh, accidentally my birthday, was a sacred day called Armistice Day. When I was a boy . . . all the people of all the nations which had fought in the First World War were silent during the eleventh minute of the eleventh hour of Armistice Day, which was the eleventh day of the eleventh month.
"It was during that minute in nineteen hundred and eighteen, that millions upon millions of human beings stopped butchering one another. I have talked to old men who were on battlefields during that minute. They have told me in one way or another that the sudden silence was the voice of God. So we still have among us some men who can remember when God spoke clearly to mankind.
"Armistice Day has become Veterans' Day. Armistice Day was sacred. Veterans' Day is not.
"So I will throw Veterans' Day over my shoulder. Armistice Day I will keep. I don't want to throw away any sacred things.
"What else is sacred? Oh, "Romeo and Juliet", for instance.
"And all music is."
-- From Kurt Vonnegut's 1973 novel "Breakfast of Champions" -- Preface (page 6).
by Dinkum September 3, 2013
Get the Armistice Daymug. (1) ' n. Any of various poisonous American snakes, of genera Crotalus and Sistrurus, having a rattle at the end of its tail. ' -- Wiktionary
(2) According to Kurt Vonnegut, the rattlesnake is a creature so inimical to humankind that it makes you wonder about the vaunted benevolence of the Creator of the Universe.
(2) According to Kurt Vonnegut, the rattlesnake is a creature so inimical to humankind that it makes you wonder about the vaunted benevolence of the Creator of the Universe.
EXAMPLE:
' Dwayne mimicked her cruelly in a falsetto voice . . . He looked about as pleasant and relaxed as a coiled rattlesnake now. It was his bad chemicals, of course, which were compelling him to look like that . . .
' The Creator of the Universe had put a rattle on its {the rattlesnake's} tail. The Creator had also given it front teeth which were hypodermic syringes filled with deadly poison.
' Sometimes I wonder about the Creator of the Universe. '
-- From Kurt Vonnegut's 1973 novel "Breakfast of Champions" -- Chapter 15 (page 159 - 160).
' Dwayne mimicked her cruelly in a falsetto voice . . . He looked about as pleasant and relaxed as a coiled rattlesnake now. It was his bad chemicals, of course, which were compelling him to look like that . . .
' The Creator of the Universe had put a rattle on its {the rattlesnake's} tail. The Creator had also given it front teeth which were hypodermic syringes filled with deadly poison.
' Sometimes I wonder about the Creator of the Universe. '
-- From Kurt Vonnegut's 1973 novel "Breakfast of Champions" -- Chapter 15 (page 159 - 160).
by Dinkum August 28, 2013
Get the rattlesnakemug. (Interrogative, colloq.) African-American English for "Why", or more emphatically, "What for?"
NOTE: The expression "the right word" is the English equivalent of the French "mot juste" -- "n. The perfectly appropriate word or phrase for the situation." -- Wiktionary.
NOTE: The expression "the right word" is the English equivalent of the French "mot juste" -- "n. The perfectly appropriate word or phrase for the situation." -- Wiktionary.
EXAMPLE:
' "I guess that isn't the right word," she said. She was used to apologizing for her use of language. She had been encouraged to do a lot of that in school. Most white people in Midland City were insecure when they spoke, so they kept their sentences short and their words simple, in order to keep embarrassing mistakes to a minimum. Dwayne certainly did that. Patty certainly did that.
' This was because their English teachers would wince and cover their ears and give them flunking grades and so on whenever they failed to speak like English aristocrats before the First World War. Also: they were told that they were unworthy to speak or write their language if they couldn't love or understand incomprehensible novels and plays about people long ago and far away, such as "Ivanhoe".
' The black people would not put up with this. They went on talking English every which way. They refused to read books they couldn't understand -- on the grounds they couldn't understand them. They would ask such impudent questions as, "Whuffo I want to read no "Tale of Two Cities"? Whuffo?
-- From Kurt Vonnegut's 1973 novel "Breakfast of Champions" -- Chapter 15 (page 138).
' "I guess that isn't the right word," she said. She was used to apologizing for her use of language. She had been encouraged to do a lot of that in school. Most white people in Midland City were insecure when they spoke, so they kept their sentences short and their words simple, in order to keep embarrassing mistakes to a minimum. Dwayne certainly did that. Patty certainly did that.
' This was because their English teachers would wince and cover their ears and give them flunking grades and so on whenever they failed to speak like English aristocrats before the First World War. Also: they were told that they were unworthy to speak or write their language if they couldn't love or understand incomprehensible novels and plays about people long ago and far away, such as "Ivanhoe".
' The black people would not put up with this. They went on talking English every which way. They refused to read books they couldn't understand -- on the grounds they couldn't understand them. They would ask such impudent questions as, "Whuffo I want to read no "Tale of Two Cities"? Whuffo?
-- From Kurt Vonnegut's 1973 novel "Breakfast of Champions" -- Chapter 15 (page 138).
by Dinkum August 28, 2013
Get the Whuffo?mug. (1) According to Kurt Vonnegut, the Founding Fathers were marauding "sea pirates" (read: white Europeans), who "founded" new nations in North, Central, and South America by displacing or exterminating the indigenous inhabitants.
(2) ' The Founding Fathers of the United States of America were political leaders and statesmen who participated in the American Revolution by signing the United States Declaration of Independence, taking part in the American Revolutionary War, and establishing the United States Constitution.
' Many of the Founding Fathers owned African American slaves, and the Constitution adopted in 1787 sanctioned the system of slavery.
' Some historians define the "Founding Fathers" to mean a larger group, including not only the Signers and the Framers but also all those who, whether as politicians, jurists, statesmen, soldiers, diplomats, or ordinary citizens, took part in winning American independence and creating the United States of America.' -- Wikipedia
(2) ' The Founding Fathers of the United States of America were political leaders and statesmen who participated in the American Revolution by signing the United States Declaration of Independence, taking part in the American Revolutionary War, and establishing the United States Constitution.
' Many of the Founding Fathers owned African American slaves, and the Constitution adopted in 1787 sanctioned the system of slavery.
' Some historians define the "Founding Fathers" to mean a larger group, including not only the Signers and the Framers but also all those who, whether as politicians, jurists, statesmen, soldiers, diplomats, or ordinary citizens, took part in winning American independence and creating the United States of America.' -- Wikipedia
EXAMPLE:
' A lot of the nonsense was the innocent result of playfulness on the part of the founding fathers. But some of the nonsense was evil, since it concealed great crimes. For example, {U. S.} teachers wrote this date on blackboards again and again, and asked the children to memorize it with pride and joy:
' = 1492 =
' The teachers told the children that this was when their continent was discovered by human beings. Actually, millions of human beings were already living full and imaginative lives on the continent in 1492. That was simply the year in which sea pirates began to cheat and rob and kill them.
' Here was another piece of evil nonsense which children were taught: that the sea pirates eventually created a government which became a beacon of freedom to human beings everywhere else. There were pictures and statues of this supposed imaginary beacon for children to see. It was sort of an ice-cream cone on fire.
' Actually, the sea pirates who had the most to do with the creation of the new government owned human slaves. They used human beings for machinery.
' The sea pirates were white. The people who were already on the continent when the pirates arrived were copper-colored. When slavery was introduced onto the continent, the slaves were black.
' Color was everything. '
-- From Kurt Vonnegut's 1973 novel "Breakfast of Champions" -- Chapter 1 (page 10 - 11).
' A lot of the nonsense was the innocent result of playfulness on the part of the founding fathers. But some of the nonsense was evil, since it concealed great crimes. For example, {U. S.} teachers wrote this date on blackboards again and again, and asked the children to memorize it with pride and joy:
' = 1492 =
' The teachers told the children that this was when their continent was discovered by human beings. Actually, millions of human beings were already living full and imaginative lives on the continent in 1492. That was simply the year in which sea pirates began to cheat and rob and kill them.
' Here was another piece of evil nonsense which children were taught: that the sea pirates eventually created a government which became a beacon of freedom to human beings everywhere else. There were pictures and statues of this supposed imaginary beacon for children to see. It was sort of an ice-cream cone on fire.
' Actually, the sea pirates who had the most to do with the creation of the new government owned human slaves. They used human beings for machinery.
' The sea pirates were white. The people who were already on the continent when the pirates arrived were copper-colored. When slavery was introduced onto the continent, the slaves were black.
' Color was everything. '
-- From Kurt Vonnegut's 1973 novel "Breakfast of Champions" -- Chapter 1 (page 10 - 11).
by Dinkum August 21, 2013
Get the Founding Fathersmug. EXAMPLE:
' But now Midland City looked unfamiliar and frightening to Dwayne. "Where am I?" he said.
' He even forgot that his wife Celia had committed suicide, for instance, by eating Drano --- a mixture of sodium hydroxide and aluminum flakes, which was meant to clear drains. Celia became a small volcano, since she was composed of the same sorts of substances which commonly clogged drains. '
--- 1973. KURT VONNEGUT. "Breakfast of Champions, or, Goodbye Blue Monday." Chapter 6 (Page 65).
' But now Midland City looked unfamiliar and frightening to Dwayne. "Where am I?" he said.
' He even forgot that his wife Celia had committed suicide, for instance, by eating Drano --- a mixture of sodium hydroxide and aluminum flakes, which was meant to clear drains. Celia became a small volcano, since she was composed of the same sorts of substances which commonly clogged drains. '
--- 1973. KURT VONNEGUT. "Breakfast of Champions, or, Goodbye Blue Monday." Chapter 6 (Page 65).
by Dinkum February 15, 2014
Get the Dranomug. (1) Any doomsday catalyst; any precipitator which brings about cataclysmic, apocalyptic change -- yes, Virginia, THE END of the world, Armageddon, "that's all she wrote", APOCALYPTIC #FAIL!
(2) The Unholy Grail of overzealous scientists who in the thoughtless pursuit of "pure science" unwittingly create a doomsday device.
(3) Specifically, the fictional doomsday catalyst envisioned by Kurt Vonnegut in his novel "Cat's Cradle." Ironically, the inventor of Vonnegut's "ice-nine" never intended his creation to be used as a doomsday device; this shortsighted scientist only foresaw "ice-nine" being used for the ploddingly pedestrian purpose of making it possible for combat Marines to march over mud in much the same manner that Jesus is said to have come striding across the tempest-tossed waves of the Sea of Galilee (Matthew 14:24).
(2) The Unholy Grail of overzealous scientists who in the thoughtless pursuit of "pure science" unwittingly create a doomsday device.
(3) Specifically, the fictional doomsday catalyst envisioned by Kurt Vonnegut in his novel "Cat's Cradle." Ironically, the inventor of Vonnegut's "ice-nine" never intended his creation to be used as a doomsday device; this shortsighted scientist only foresaw "ice-nine" being used for the ploddingly pedestrian purpose of making it possible for combat Marines to march over mud in much the same manner that Jesus is said to have come striding across the tempest-tossed waves of the Sea of Galilee (Matthew 14:24).
EXAMPLES:
(1) ' "Suppose," chortled Dr. Breed, "there were many possible ways water could freeze. Suppose the ice we skate upon -- what we might call ice-one -- is only one type of ice. Suppose water always froze as ice-one because it had never had a seed to teach it how to form ice-two, ice-three, ice-four? Suppose there were one form, which we will call ice-nine -- with a melting point of 130 degrees. " '
-- "Cat's Cradle", Ch. 20
(2) ' Breed asked me to think of Marines in a swamp.
' "Their trucks are sinking in ooze."
' He winked. "But suppose one Marine had a capsule containing a seed of ice-nine, a new way for the atoms of water to stack and lock, to freeze. If that Marine threw that seed into the nearest puddle . . . ?"
' "The puddle would freeze?" I guessed.
' "And all the puddles . . .?"
' "They would freeze?"
' "You bet they would!" he cried. "And the Marines would rise from the swamp and march on!" '
-- "Cat's Cradle", Ch. 21
(3) ' "I keep thinking about that swamp" I said. "If the streams flowing through the swamp froze as ice-nine, what about the rivers and lakes the streams fed?"
' "They'd freeze."
' "And the oceans . . . ?"
' "They'd freeze, of course," Dr. Breed snapped.
' "And the springs . . . ?"
' "They'd freeze, damn it!" he cried.
' "And the rain?"
' "When it fell, it would freeze into hard little hobnails of ice-nine -- and that would be the end of the world!" '
-- "Cat's Cradle", Ch. 22
(1) ' "Suppose," chortled Dr. Breed, "there were many possible ways water could freeze. Suppose the ice we skate upon -- what we might call ice-one -- is only one type of ice. Suppose water always froze as ice-one because it had never had a seed to teach it how to form ice-two, ice-three, ice-four? Suppose there were one form, which we will call ice-nine -- with a melting point of 130 degrees. " '
-- "Cat's Cradle", Ch. 20
(2) ' Breed asked me to think of Marines in a swamp.
' "Their trucks are sinking in ooze."
' He winked. "But suppose one Marine had a capsule containing a seed of ice-nine, a new way for the atoms of water to stack and lock, to freeze. If that Marine threw that seed into the nearest puddle . . . ?"
' "The puddle would freeze?" I guessed.
' "And all the puddles . . .?"
' "They would freeze?"
' "You bet they would!" he cried. "And the Marines would rise from the swamp and march on!" '
-- "Cat's Cradle", Ch. 21
(3) ' "I keep thinking about that swamp" I said. "If the streams flowing through the swamp froze as ice-nine, what about the rivers and lakes the streams fed?"
' "They'd freeze."
' "And the oceans . . . ?"
' "They'd freeze, of course," Dr. Breed snapped.
' "And the springs . . . ?"
' "They'd freeze, damn it!" he cried.
' "And the rain?"
' "When it fell, it would freeze into hard little hobnails of ice-nine -- and that would be the end of the world!" '
-- "Cat's Cradle", Ch. 22
by Dinkum August 20, 2013
Get the Ice-ninemug. KFC (Kentucky Fried Chicken) is a fast food restaurant chain which specializes in fried chicken. The first "Kentucky Fried Chicken" franchise opened in 1952. KFC was founded by Harland Sanders. By branding himself as "Colonel Sanders", Harland Sanders became a legendary figure of American cultural history, and his image remains prominent in KFC advertising. The company is famous for the "It's finger lickin' good" slogan, which originated in the 1950s. The trademark on that slogan expired in the United States in 2006. In 2011, the "finger lickin' good" slogan was dropped in favor of "So good".
EXAMPLE:
"Here was the problem: Dwayne wanted Francine to love him for his body and soul, not for what his money could buy. He thought Francine was hinting that he should buy her a Colonel Sanders Kentucky Fried Chicken franchise, which was a scheme for selling fried chicken.
"A chicken was a flightless bird . . . The idea was to kill it and pull out all its feathers, and cut off its head and feet and scoop out its internal organs -- and then chop it into pieces and fry the pieces, and put the pieces in a waxed paper bucket with a lid on it . . ."
-- From Kurt Vonnegut's 1973 novel "Breakfast of Champions" -- Chapter 15 (page 157 - 158).
"Here was the problem: Dwayne wanted Francine to love him for his body and soul, not for what his money could buy. He thought Francine was hinting that he should buy her a Colonel Sanders Kentucky Fried Chicken franchise, which was a scheme for selling fried chicken.
"A chicken was a flightless bird . . . The idea was to kill it and pull out all its feathers, and cut off its head and feet and scoop out its internal organs -- and then chop it into pieces and fry the pieces, and put the pieces in a waxed paper bucket with a lid on it . . ."
-- From Kurt Vonnegut's 1973 novel "Breakfast of Champions" -- Chapter 15 (page 157 - 158).
by Dinkum September 3, 2013
Get the Kentucky Fried Chickenmug.