Instead of "quiet as a mouse", Keith said "quiet as a ninja mouse."

Instead of "Always a bridesmaid, never a bride", I said:

• "Always an aunt, never a mother."
• "Always a pig, never bacon."

See more of our warped sayings.

Other suggestions always welcome.

In a previous post, I provided my favorite warped sayings, such as "more fun than a bowel full of monkeys". Here are a few more:

• "There wasn't a dry seat in the house."
• "An apple a day keeps Newton away."

Here are some word tweaks:

• "I got my second wind" (pronouncing the last word to rhyme with "bind", like winding a watch).
• "ridonculous", which I first heard from a colleague I assumed made up the word, but it's in urban dictionary.

I welcome additions.

I saw this bumper sticker in the Google parking lot:

Don't get it? It's a reference to the Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency (DARPA) challenge to build a vehicle capable of driving itself and, of course, to the Christian bumper sticker, "In case of rapture, this car will be unmanned."

(Other responses to the rapture bumper sticker are In case of rapture, can I have your car? and In case of rapture, this car will be unmanned. It will then recklessly careen into children at a school crossing -- killing all of them.)

After complimenting the owner, I found out that the sticker is sold by ThinkGeek.

Today we received a mailing from the San Francisco Democratic Party, part of which is scanned above. The only alteration I made was blanking out Keith and my address.

From Martha Barnette's blog, the London Guardian ran a correction (Feb. 6, 2008):

Whether the romance of the French president and Carla Bruni was very pubic only they can say. We meant to say it was very public (Sarkozy marries royally with Versailles wedding night, page 15, February 4).

It reminds me of the time a student in a math class at my high school referred to "circumcising" a circle (instead of "circumscribing").

If you like language, I recommend Martha Barnette and Grant Barrett's radio show, A Way With Words, available as a free podcast.

Keith and I were listening to a radio show together when the host exhorted people to send in their comments:

Host: We read all your emails.
Keith starts laughing.
Ellen: What's so funny?
Keith: Do you know how mad people would be if Google said that?

The use of search-and-replace can lead to entertaining reading, such as this classic from the July 21, 1990, Fresno Bee via Herb Caen via Peter van der Linden:

An item in Thursday's Nation Digest about the Massachusetts budget crisis made reference to new taxes that will help put Massachusetts 'back into the African American.' That item should have said 'back in the black.'

(I was surprised to learn from the reputable Peter van der Linden that the original error was a prank, not an accident.)

A co-worker pointed me to an article that apparently underwent automatic online censorship. The headline reads:

CHRISTIAN loveUAL ABUSE CHURCHES TO PAY HUNDREDS OF MILLIONS

and the article states:

Spokane's lawyers, like those in Portland, argued that the bishop holds "bare legal breastle" to the property and buttets that lawfully belong to the diocese's 81 parishes and affiliated enbreasties, such as schools and cemeteries.

The Daily WTF user ezrec has described this phenomenon as the "clbuttic mistake", pointing out that there are thousands of hits for "clbuttic" on Google and cautioning:

People who make buttumptions about their regex scripts, will be embarbutted when they repeat this mbuttive mistake.

I won't give the translations, but some kind commenter may.

gratuitious xkcd cartoon

Keith and I were amused by the Onion headline "Child Bankrupts Make-A-Wish Foundation With Wish For Unlimited Wishes" but didn't watch the video or decide to post it until finding out that people were asking Snopes if the story was true.

The fake news segment is very well done, including the inane chatter between the hosts.

Link site FARK is known for the clever headlines used to point to interesting articles. [Warning: crude language ahead.] Their top wordplay headlines of 2007 included:

• Mom wants schools to ban books filled with sin. There goes my trigonometry textbook
• Bingo hall worker B-10 and robbed
• Police officer charged with molesting mentally handicapped girls. This is not just an abuse of his authority, it's fucking retarded
• Cannibal who ate fellow inmate had previously asked authorities to separate him from cellmate; finally threw up his hands out of frustration
• Teen walking along Long Island Railroad shocked that she gets to be the conductor
• Skywalkers in Korea cross Han solo

[After watching our nieces play with a Wii]

Ellen: Apparently, the physics simulation on the Wii is so advanced that it's even more accurate than real life.

[Discussing the week's news]

Ellen: Hillary Clinton criticized Barack Obama for trying drugs when he was younger.

Keith: As opposed to trying them but not inhaling?

[On a Chicago Hauntings Tour that our niece wanted to attend; we are more skeptical]

Tour guide: Signs of haunting include lights turning on and off, unexplained noises, broken glass...

Keith (sotte voce to Ellen): Sudden appearances of baseballs.

[Ellen and Keith with their nieces]

Ellen: Did you hear about the restaurant on the moon? It has great food ... but no atmosphere.

Niece: I thought it would have lots of dairy.

Keith: From cows jumping over the moon?

Ellen: Or ground beef from the ones who didn't make it.