Subject: "paphian" - The Finale

From: Jeff Hutchinson <[email-masked]>
Date: Tue, 3 Aug 1999 01:50:47 -0600

A couple of amusing observations:

Three people accused Elliot's definition of being David Randall's. Two
people actually gave it points. One (Two?) was Nova/James, who actually
correctly picked it as being Elliot. The other, though was David Randall
himself.

Elliot mentions some kind of odd story about "pope smoke." Did I miss
something? Or should Elliot be forced to tell "Jim Moskowitz's Pope Smoke
Canard" to us all?

Finally, until I sent out that last-minute request for votes, MyShaner,
J-J, and Judith had been in a very tight race all the way through vote
collection. However, two points apiece from Jed and Nova/James moved
Melissa firmly into the win! Congrats, MyS! And take it away!

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- - - 

paphian - adj - covered with a fine protective powder, as butterfly wings
MyShaner - 10
Aussie Meyer - 2 points, right off the bat. That's one fine damn
definition.
Judith Schrier - Two points
Jean-Joseph Cote - I suspect this is an attempt to elicit thoughts of
"papillon", but I'll give it a point, even though I don't believe that
butterfly wings are covered with protective powder (I think that's just
scales flaking off) [Hutch - Surprisingly, "papillon" was another word I
had in mind as a possibility. (Though not meaning butterfly. "any of a
breed of small slender toy spaniels resembling long-haired Chihuahuas")
But I think he's right about the scales.]
Kir Talamage - 1 pt for loveliness
Jed Hartman - 2 points.  "It emerged from its chrysalis, its paphian
wings resplendent in vermillion and black, and sat for a moment on the
cherry twig, awed into stillness by the birth of the new day." [Hutch -
Jed, as always, delights me with his poesy.]
Nova Myhill & James Kushner - TWO POINTS. It seemed the least like
anything else.

paphian - n - 1 a purveyor of base pleasures to private soldiers 2 a
condemned man who by fortune survives execution. [Both senses from
Paphian, a citizen of Athens, sentenced to die in connection with the
mutilation of the Hermae. Three volleys were fired but not a single arrow
found its mark. Thus exonerated by miraculous intervention, he was
released, and died old and very wealthy. The story is related by
Thucydides (IX:4).]
Elliot Moreton - 2
Aussie Meyer - My vote for "most likely to be David Randall"
Jean-Joseph Cote - David Randall has won exactly once since I've been
saving Fictionary rounds, and with a rather un-Randalllike (ooh, a triple
L!) definition. [Hutch - Unless I'm mistaken, this should probably be
spelled "un-Randall-like". But maybe not.]
Kir Talmage - You're either trying to skunk us by choosing a definition
more Davidesque than David himself, or someone's imitating David, or
David really went all out.  Wow.
David Randall - 1 point
Jed Hartman - ...and is re-related by Tarantino (Pulp Fiction).
Nova Myhill & James Kushner - Wins the Most Likely To Be From Elliott
Award. (This time round, the award seems to be some slightly elderly
vegetables, mostly lettuce, along with ONE POINT.)

paphian - adj - (med) pertaining to the skin area covered by the overhang
of a recumbent breast
Aussie Meyer - 2
MyShaner - I'll have to go with the body parts this round, and give two
to breasts and one to toes.
Jed Hartman - I like this, but I'm out of points.
Nova Myhill & James Kushner - At first, I thought that (med) was
"medieval", which led to all sorts of interesting associations. [Hutch -
Now if I could just make them?]

paphian - n - the white smoke which heralds the election of a new pope
Nova Myhill & James Kushner - 1
Aussie Meyer - Nah, papal defs are too easy.
Elliot Moreton - Also, next time I tell people about Jim Moskowitz's Pope
Smoke Canard, the one about the pope smoke will come in very handy. One
point.

paphian - n - (Hind) minor spirit; a deva
Kir Talmage - 0
Nova Myhill & James Kushner - That strikes me as an un-Hindu sort of
vowel arrangement.

paphian - n - a Vatican functionary, usu entrusted with menial tasks
meant to take on a meditative aspect
E Zuckerman - 1
Pierre Abbat - 1
Nova Myhill & James Kushner - Too much like our def [Hutch - see Pope
Smoke], though it does have interesting secular analogues in the modern
workplace...

paphian - adj 1 of or relating to Paphos or its people 2 of or relating
to illicit love, wanton -- n 3 a native or inhabitant of Paphos 4
prostitute
Webster's New Collegiate Dictionary
E Zuckerman - There's no such place as Paphos, is there?!? [Hutch - Not
anymore, I would expect *G*]
Jean-Joseph Cote - I must say, "prostitute" is probably second only to
"drunk" in terms of having the most synonyms. [Hutch - Somewhere I
remember seeing a list of several thousand synonyms and euphemisms for
drink, drinking, drunk, and drunks. Wonder if there's such a list for
prostitutes.]
David Randall - 2 points
Pierre Abbat - 2
Jed Hartman - Good set of defs, but no. [Hutch - Er, sorry Jed, yes.]
Nova Myhill & James Kushner - Ah. Solving the adjective/noun problem by
making it both! Comment re meanings 1 and 3: Duh.

paphian - adj - susceptible to sensual enthusiasms
David Randall - 2 (2 for picking correctly)
Nova Myhill & James Kushner - I should hope so. [Hutch - Me too!]

paphian - adj - 1 having second toes that are longer than the first toes
2 belonging to the nobility
Jean-Joseph Cote - 5
E Zuckerman - 1 point, because the two of these right next to each other
amuses me.
;-D
Elliot Moreton - Guess I'll just have to vote for utility. I've SO often
needed a term for....
Judith Schrier - One point
MyShaner - I'll have to go with the body parts this round, and give two
to breasts and one to toes.
Jed Hartman - I like this, but I'm out of points.
Nova Myhill & James Kushner - Damn right, they're equivalent! [Hutch -
Well, to be honest, I thought everyone had these *G*]

paphian - adj - characterized by an abundance of prickly extrusions
Judith Schrier - 6
Aussie Meyer - 1 point for prickliness.
Jean-Joseph Cote - By process of elimination, two points.  Unless this
one is sexual, too...egad, I hope not!
Kir Talmage - 2 pts for wonderful description of hedgehogs.
Jed Hartman - 1 point
Nova Myhill & James Kushner - Replace "characterized by" with "having",
and we'd be more tempted. To give it points, that is.

paphian - adj - sensuous
Pierre Abbat - 4 (2 for picking correctly)
E Zuckerman - 2 points, because there's another def just like it, and
this one appears to be more grammaticalistically writed.
Nova Myhill & James Kushner - See above. [Hutch - Presumably they mean
their comment about "sensual enthusiasms"? If so, I add my same hearty
agreement to this opinion.]

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- - - 

Finally a few general comments from folk.

Elliot Moreton - Can't wait to find out the truth. All defs this time are
really loopy. Good word! Five vaguely sex-related definitions, none of
which I believe. Three religious defs, ditto. And three miscellaneous,
all equally improbable.

Jean-Joseph Cote - The definitions in recent rounds seem to have been
pretty diverse, but here I believe we have a return to the days when
things used to bunch up, in this case around the themes of sex and
religion. Lacking any better criteria, I will throw out all defs in
either category.

[Hutch - Elliot and J-J seem to have hit the center of the matter. The
etymology of this month's word is from Paphos, ancient city of Cyprus
that was the center of worship of Aphrodite. Thus, paphian is about BOTH
sex and religion.]

Kir Talamage - Jeez, a lot of sex in this batch. Is it the word or the
season? [Hutch - The word, I would suspect, Kir :-) ]

Jed Hartman - I haven't even read the definitions for the last n rounds,
much less participated.  Sigh.  Oh well, guess it's never too late to
rejoin.  Here goes: Clearly several people recognized a root here that I
don't know.  Lots of good defs here...

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From: Elliott A Moreton <[email-masked]>
Date: Mon, 16 Aug 1999 10:42:13 -0400 (EDT)

> something? Or should Elliot be forced to tell "Jim Moskowitz's Pope Smoke

Sorry, yall -- I completely forgot to follow up on this.  The Pope Smoke 
Canard was invented by Jim Moskowitz circa 1987, as an attempt to come up 
with a plausible and catchy urban legend.  It goes something like this:

sub PopeSmokeCanard {

When a Pope dies, the cardinals meet in solemn conclave in the Vatican to 
choose a successor.  They keep voting until someone has a majority.  
After each unsuccessful round of voting, they burn their ballots, 
producing a puff of white smoke which signals to the spectators outside 
that no decision has yet been reached.

When a new Pope is finally chosen, that fact is announced to the world by 
a puff of black smoke -- and that's the old Pope burning.

}

Now, this canard is demonstrably false, since it has the smoke colors 
backwards -- they burn, I believe, wet straw for black smoke (no Pope) and 
dry straw for white smoke (new Pope).  But if I had heard it in, say, 3rd 
grade, I would certainly have believed and repeated it, and might even 
have rejected the true story when I heard it later on.

Hope I haven't garbled this one in repetition.  Jim is, of course, the 
final judge of accuracy.

Anyone interested in a canard contest?

em

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From: Mark-Jason Dominus <[email-masked]>
Date: Mon, 16 Aug 1999 10:49:44 -0400

> Anyone interested in a canard contest?

There is an album by The Who called `Odds 'n Sods'.  It is a
compilation of discarded demo tapes and other material that wasn't
good enough to get onto their other albums, and was probably produced
to fulfil a contractual obligation.  The cover apparently depicts the
four members of The Who, wearing football uniforms.  Two of them are
wearing helmets.

All through high school I solemnly informed people that the album was
so bad that Roger Daltrey and Keith Moon had refused to be
photographed for the cover, and that Pete Townshend had grabbed two
people in the corridor and had them pose as Roger and Keith---hence
the helmets.

(Please permute the names as appropriate; I not longer remember who is
actually wearing a helmet and who is not.)

---

From: Elliott A Moreton <[email-masked]>
Date: Mon, 16 Aug 1999 11:00:21 -0400 (EDT)

> > Anyone interested in a canard contest?

I used to tell people that in Germany, pedestrians have to signal.

em