BARBOLA WORK: lost ballot

[eLLioTT morEton]

Hi,

This ballot was lost in transit and had to be re-sent.  It doesn't change 
the outcome, but it does provide MORE COMMENTS!!!!!!!

em

---------- Forwarded message ----------
Date: Thu, 19 Jul 2007 19:28:51 -0400
From: Jean-Joseph Cote <jjcote at alum.mit.edu>
To: eLLioTT morEton <emoreton at alum.swarthmore.edu>
Subject: Re: Vote! Vote! Vote! For BARBOLA WORK!

eLLioTT morEton wrote:
>  Fewer people have voted so far than entered defs!  This is intolerable! It
>  makes a mockery of our democracy!  To the polls!  Vote!  Vote! Vote!!!!
Okay, let's see what I can do...  Far fewer whisker-based definitions than I 
expected.  And I'll guess that since Elliott called for derivations, citations, 
and the like, that the real definition is likely to have some such feature.

>  barbola work (n.) -- A type of tile arrangement used by the Romans in their
>  baths. There was often much decoration using colored tiles and fragments,
>  plus swirled patterns.  Barbola was originally a slave captured off the
>  coast of Sicily, who found favor with Augustus Caesar for his splendid
>  craft.
Four artwork definitions, not easy to choose between them.

>  barbola work (n.) -- (colloq.)  A complicated task, "harder than untangling
>  a wet beard".
Is that hard?  I've never had a beard, so I don't know.  But I have had long 
hair, and it seems like it's easier to untangle that when it is wet.

>  barbola work (n.) -- Minor tasks assigned to new workers on a ranch, to give
>  the animals a chance to gradually become accustomed to their smell.
Or maybe to give the workers a chance to acquire the smell that the animals are 
already used to?

>  barbola work (n.) -- Decorative work composed chiefly of flowers and fruit
>  modelled in a plastic paste and colored, used to embellish small articles of
>  wood, glass, pulp, etc.
An unembellished artwork definition.

>  barbola work (n.) -- In Jacobean and Restoration drama, interludes of
>  flowery and witty but inessential conversation, introduced to lengthen a
>  play and, often, to allow an older work to be republished and re-presented
>  as a new production.
Interesting recursive effect here, where this looks something like Elliott's 
winning 'hamba' definition with some superfluous talk about drama tacked on.

>  barbola work (n.) -- (metallurgy) - A surface hardening technique in which
>  numerous small protrusions are repeatedly extruded from the surface of the
>  piece and flattened out again.  See also "shot peening".
This is beard-related, the idea being that you cold-work the outer layer by 
growing whiskers and shaving them off.  Shot peening is real; it involves 
hammering the piece with ball bearings to make a zillion little dimples.  At 
least, I think that's what it is.

>  barbola work (n.) -- (obs.) Work performed by an inmate of a debtor's prison
>  that does not accrue to the indebtedness, work performed by an indentured
>  servant that does not reduce the indenture; substinence work.
My remaining point to this one.  What a depressing concept.  And so much like 
an interest-only mortgage.

>  barbola work (n.) -- (boxing term, after heavyweight Emilio Barbola) to
>  knock out an opponent's teeth in the boxing ring.
I just don't like to encourage this sort of behavior, so I'm not going to vote 
for this.

>  barbola work (n.) -- Art done with a kind of enamel that forms bubbles as it
>  dries.
Another unembellished artwork definition.

>  barbola work (n.) -- A "cush job", involving a high salary and little-to-no
>  expenditure of energy.
I probably would have voted for this if the etymology were explained.

>  barbola work (n.) -- In the garment trade, decorative stitching on the rear
>  pockets of a pair of pants, esp. blue jeans.  From Barbola S.p.A., an
>  Italian manufacturer of automated embroidery machines from 1968 to 1973.
>  Also used by industrial garment workers to refer disparagingly to
>  less-demanding jobs in the factory.
The fourth artwork definition, and hat the heck, I'll give it two points.

Jean-Joseph
_________________________
Looks like it's the fake flowers and fruit, and you can even get some on ebay 
right now! *http://tinyurl.com/ysqacd*