What's All This Brouhaha? » Phrases

Nerd knob

Eric — Fri, 20 Jul 2007 22:38:43 +0000

Heard in a meeting. Apparently not new, but new to me. The meaning was fairly obvious from context. Definition from the Jargon File:

[Cisco] A command in a complex piece of software which is more likely to be used by an extremely experienced user to tweak a setting of one sort or another – a setting which the average user may not even know exists. Nerd knobs tend to be toggles, turning on or off a particular, specific, narrowly defined behavior. Special case of knobs.

Reverse defenestration

Eric — Thu, 31 May 2007 22:09:14 +0000

Around 1992, I started using the term “reverse defenestration.” I no longer remember whether I’d heard anyone else use that term previously. Example usage: “I reverse defenestrated that PC, and now it is faster and more reliable.” Such an upgrade is most commonly from Windows to Linux or BSD.

reverse defenestration /rÉªËˆvÉœrs dÄ“-fÄ›n’Ä-strÄ’shÉ™n/, noun, the act of throwing Windows out of a computer.

Leaking blue liquid

Eric — Sat, 03 Mar 2007 04:27:19 +0000

In response to one of my recent dreams, Richard wrote:

I hereby decree that, henceforth, the expression “leaking blue liquid” shall be mean “I did something wrong, but I don’t know what it is.”

Examples:

“I seem to have leaked blue liquid in the boss’ office.”

“I’ve been trying to clean blue liquid out of my computer all day, and the error logs have been no help at all.”

“I thought the Iraqi people would throw roses at us, but instead it’s blue liquid.”

Nether region

Eric — Fri, 02 Mar 2007 00:02:39 +0000

Seen on a forum:Â [someone] might get a wild hair up their alien probe-hole

Oooh! A snowclone posted to my blog!

Eric — Mon, 24 Oct 2005 21:56:48 +0000

To my rant on the CBS evolution survey, Tsar Chasm posted a response that is a snowclone, of the form: X make(s) baby Y cry.

All your snowclone are belong to us!

I, for one, welcome our new snowclone overlords.