DEC 30, singable satire: "AND NO BIRDS SING", a parasite-ody

 

"PARASITE-ody":  Substitution of an invading poem, or a second song's words, for the lyrics of an otherwise unrelated song.

ORIGINAL POEM (invader): "La Belle Dame Sans Merci" John Keats, 1819.

ORIGINAL SONG (recipient/host): "Seven Bridges Road", written by Steve Young in 1969, covered by many groups, most famously The Eagles in 1980. For those who need their memories refreshed, a portion of the original song is found on minified slides at the bottom of this post.

UKULELE VERSION: Chordcharts for adaptation to ukulele were provided by Steve McNie at Toronto Ukes; (the key has been been transposed from D to F by G.C.)

PARODY COMPOSED: Giorgio Coniglio, August 2017. Note that the verses were reduced from 12 to 9, but the poem was otherwise essentially unchanged from the original.

PARODY-SONGLINK: To find ukulele chord-charts to help you accompany "AND NO BIRDS SING" on your favorite instrument, click HERE.

DEC 29, patients and maladies: knee effusion

Authors' Note: This verse resulted from the author’s personal experience (as patient).

  Following trauma, standard X-rays taken in the Emergency Department show most fractures where the bone fragments are displaced. They can not, however, diagnose many undisplaced fractures, particularly in elderly patients with reduced bone density. 

  Nonspecific swelling with evidence of leaking of fluid into the adjacent joint space (joint effusion) is particularly common in injuries about the knee, and is easily discerned on visual inspection and X-rays. Follow up radiographs after another 3 weeks sometimes display an initially missed healing fracture. In cases where instability, ongoing pain, or persistent effusion are prominent, injury to ligaments may be suspected. 

Be sure to check out the whole collection of verses on 'Patients and their Maladies" by proceeding to our full-service blog, "Edifying Nonsense." CLICK HERE !

DEC 28, old world palindromes, #5 and #6

 

DEC 27, wordplay map: American Scramble-towns, 12

Who would ever have guessed? It turns out that an unparalleled word in generating anagrams (letter scrambles) is P-A-L-I-N-D-R-O-M-E-S. We have taken advantage of that property to create this unique series of wordplay maps of imaginary American (and Canadian) locales, each one completed by its official two-letter state (or provincial) abbreviation. 

 

LINKS to other nonsense in this series: 

Forward to the first Canadian map.

Forward to the next American map (13).

Back up to the first American map.

DEC 26, old world palindromes #3 and #4

 

DEC 25, submitted palindromes: RANDOM PILES 5

You have reached the "Submitted Palindromes" thread on the blog "Daily Edifying Nonsense", a light literary entity that emanates through the blogosphere daily (almost), i.e. 30 times per month.

  On the 25th of each month you will find a slide-filling group of palindromic phrases submitted to the editors by a panel of 7 palindromists. These folks have all been working on this project since January 2020. The personal profiles for each of these contributors are displayed in panels published here at the start of things, and then, we have asked them to provide (palindromically, of course) their views on one of the iconic items in the classic literature, starting with "A man, a plan, a canal -- Panama", continuing with other well-known phrases, such as "Dennis sinned". Otherwise, their contribution will be grouped in monthly random piles (a phrase that you might recognize as an anagram of the word p-a-l-i-n-d-r-o-m-e-s).

You can access this delightful entertainment right here by entering submitted palindromes in one of the two search bars at the top of this post and scrolling downwards through the wordplay posts that you will discover, OR, just follow the links indicated above. 

Devotees of palindromic wordplay can further explore limericks and other short verses about the classic palindromes (and quite a few recent concoctions) that are randomly scattered on this blog after September 2000, or collected into grouped postings on our more encyclopedic blog "Edifying Nonsense" -- start HERE.

DEC 24, holiday verse: "The Night Before Christmas", pandemically

 

DEC 23, classic palindrome: 'Yreka bakery'

HAPPY BIRTHDAY, PEH !!!

 

You can review these illustrated verses in a wider context by proceeding to 'Reversing Verse: Limericks About Classic Palindromes' on the full-service blog 'Edifying Nonsense'. 

DEC 22, waterfowl: brown pelicans

TO ENLARGE any slide or stand-alone photo on this blog, just click on it. To reverse the process, and return to this standard view, find the little 'x' in the upper right corner of the black field and click there.

More illustrated verses about brown pelicans can be found on our blogposts "Caribbean brown pelicans", and "at the pelicatessen".

And to learn even more, you might want to review our posts "photo-collage: brown pelicans" and "folio-entry: a brown-pelican couple".

You can review the illustrated verses in a wider context by proceeding to 'Immersible Verse: Limericks about Waterfowl' on the full-service blog 'Edifying Nonsense'. 

DEC 21, anagram swarm: A-VERY-STABLE-GENIUS -- wordplay for the holiday season

Today's collection should definitely wrap up this excessively extended effort. (But I am proud to say that you can now find some 350 anagrams developed as part of the total undertaking -- and some of them do seem to have some important meaning!)  

You can review an amazing number of anagrams based on this book title on our full-service blog 'Edifying Nonsense'. There are two posts to view: 

 

'A Very Stable Genius': Theme and Variations (97 anagrams),   and 

'A Very Stable Genius': additional funky anagrams.

DEC 20, singable satire: Tom Lehrer sings "REDUPLICATIONS A to K"

 PARODY SONG-LYRICS

ORIGINAL SONG: "The Elements", Tom Lehrer, 1959.

PARODY COMPOSED: Dr. G.H. and Giorgio Coniglio, 2015. This song is the seventh of nine in the series on Word- Pairs. You can find the links to the lyrics of the previous songs at the bottom of the post. 

EXPLANATION:  For a  discussion of reduplications, check an earlier post on this blog-site by clicking here. This post also honours our previous venture of Feb 15, 2017 entitled 'Abracadabra' to 'Zoom-zoom': possibly the world's largest compendium of reduplications'. 

UKULELE and GUITAR-FRIENDLY LINK: Our whole series of songs can be found in a friendly format for ukulele (and guitar)-players on our sister blog  "SILLY SONGS and SATIRE" with chord-charts and helpful performing suggestions. Click HERE to proceed to this site. 

This post is a follow-up to "The Reduplications: A Lesson"

  This collection of fascinating phrases has been modified somewhat since its original posting on the site AmIRight.com. Thanks are due to Al Silver, Becky Hurwitz and Uncle Paul for suggesting several examples which were incorporated into the current version. 

 WARNING!  Do not attempt to sing this lesson at the pace of a patter-song. The management of this blog will take no responsibility for any injuries sustained.

Many of these words have fascinating stories of their origin and subsequent use; the hotlinks highlight those with instructive or amusing information available on the web.

A mini-lesson found on the Internet

There’s achy-breaky, artsy-fartsy, bigwig, BB, and aye-aye

Abracadabra, bric-a-brac, and boulder holder, and bye-bye

And Bora Bora, beriberi, (good) bees knees, and (bad) boo-boo

And bonbon, buddy-buddy, bunga-bunga, can-can, and choo-choo

There's crackerjack, couscous, and chili, chugalug, chin-chin, cocoa 

And clap-trap, culture vulture,  chit-chat, chock-a-block,  cluck-cluck, dodo 

And dilly-dally, deadhead, dum(b)-dum(b), dingle-dangle, and clip-clop 

And easy-peasy, even Steven, fifty-fifty, and flip-flop.

There's flim-flam, fiddle-faddle, fuddy-duddy, fat cat, funny mon-

-ey; Folderol and fender bender, flower power, honey-bun.

And four-door, ga-ga, goody-goody, golden-oldy, and hotshot

And go-go, gibber-jabber, hurly-burly, honky-tonk, hotspot. 

                       

There’s hocus-pocus, harum-scarum, holus-bolus, hoi-polloi

And holy moly!  hoity-toity, hip-hop, heeby-jeebies, oy!

And hullaballoo and hokey-pokey, hotpot, hoodoo, and hobo

And handy-dandy, hari-kari, Henny-Penny and heigh-ho!

Hell’s bells! there’s hanky-panky, hootchie-kootchie, hobnob and hoo-haw

Hush-hush! knock-knock, NewYork NewYork, (its zip is fixed twixt MA and PA)

Ill will, and itsy-bitsy, heyday, juju, bass-ackward blackjack

And jingle-jangle, jeepers-creepers, kow-tow, kiwi, and knick-knack. 

Ta-Dah !!!

And, for those interested, here's how you find the lyrics-only-version

of the nine songs that make up this cycle. If you would like to  accompany yourself on ukulele or guitar, find relevant chord charts by following the links that will take you to the versions in our blog "Silly Songs and Satire". 

1. PAIRS, to the tune of "Words" in the style of the Beegees

...  the following songs in the style of "The Elements" by Tom Lehrer

2. ALLITERATIVE BINOMIALS, part#1

3. ALLITERATIVE BINOMIALS, part#2

4. RHYMING BINOMIALS, part#1

5. RHYMING BINOMIALS, part#2

6. A LESSON ABOUT REDUPLICATIONS

7. REDUPLICATIONS, part#1

8. REDUPLICATIONS, part#2

9. LEGALISTIC DOUBLETS, in the style of "Supercalifragilistic..." from  the musical "Mary Poppins"

DEC 19, insects: the (cock)roach

Authors' Note: 

cucaracha: Spanish for cockroach, presumably giving rise in the early 17th century to the English name for the insect

cockroach: adjectival form for the common insect (of thousands of species, only four are characterized as pests; cockroachlike might also be used in appropriate instances)   In the 1830s, Victorians adopted the shortened form roach to avoid the sexual connotations of the insect's name.

      

You can review Giorgio's other verses about pesty and occasionally beneficial insects, as  collected in 'Buzzwords: Verses about Insects' on the full-service blog "Edifying Nonsense". Click HERE.

DEC 18, American anagram swarm: 'C-O-N-S-T-I-T-U-T-I-O-N-A-L'

A brief explanation of anagram swarms, and some other examples can be found on the blogpost "A Brief Saga: Anagram Swarms"; click HERE.

 

DEC 17, palinku (poetic novelty) : partying #2

 

  In this post, we will continue with our novel form of poetic wordplay, inspired by Japanese haiku poetry. This new form, in its English-language version, is used for a terse verse with a total of 17 syllables displayed on three lines. Unlike its classic Japanese analogue, this concoction does not mandate the precise distribution of the syllables among the three lines, but does stipulate that each word in the poem be included in a palindromic phrase or sentence in English (i.e. one that can be read either forwards or backwards). 

  To help the reader discern the origin of the lyrics, each palindrome (generally occupying one of the three lines of the poem) has been color-coded. And, as you likely surmised, the first verse in this collection has already been published here. Part #1 of this trilogy was exhibited in November, 2020.

  And, just in case you have forgotten what palindromes are about, your blogsite hosts have arranged a serial set of brief lessons on the topic ('Political Palindromes') which you can review by clicking HERE. 

 You can view all our "palinku" verses if you proceed with a single click to our more encyclopedic blog "Edifying Nonsense". Click HERE. (Or if you prefer, you can stay on this particular blogsite and look for the offerings for the 17th day of each month -- there are now more than 60 of these.)

DEC 16, holiday verse: Advent #3

 

DEC 15, etymology: 'miser'

 

For fans of etymology, we have two blogposts on our topic-based blog "Edifying Nonsense" that summarize our poems about the origin of some English words. You can start to review some of this intriguing material by clicking HERE, and then following the links!

DEC 14, Toronto: upbeat art

NEWSFLASH !!!

December 14th: The Electoral College meets, and according to all expectation confirms the victory in the November election of Joe Biden as incoming President and Kamala Harris as Vice-President. 

 

DEC 13, wordplay maps: r-i-c anagrams #13-#15

 

You can view the entire collection of 18 wordplay maps of 'R-E-P-U-B-L-I-C-A-N-S in Canada' on our full-service blog "Edifying Nonsense" by clicking HERE.

DEC 12, portraits of couples: Introduction (domestic turkeys)

Giorgio and I have decided, despite the limitations of the new COVID-19 lockdown regulations, to undertake a novel business venture -- family photographic portraiture.

Please call or email to make an appointment with our staff for a photo-shoot, which can be conducted in your front yard, sidewalk or parking area. Owing to the inclement weather, clothing (other than pyjamas or gym-shorts) is recommended.

With the approval of our earliest clients, I will post some samples here over the next few days for your perusal.

Best wishes,

Giorgio / Dr.G.H.

Enjoy an illustrated poem about domestic turkeys by clicking HERE.

You can view this photo from our portfolio of 'Couples' portraits in a wider context on our full-service blog "Edifying Nonsense" HERE.

 

DEC 11, American satire: government shutdown

Author's Note:  The verse imagines an advisor or supporter picking up on an assertion by the contentious 45th US president. The latter had remained steadfast in demanding budgeting for a southern border wall with Mexico (putatively to decrease the unregulated influx of refugees), and was prepared to take the credit/blame for the pending global shutdown of government financing should it occur.

A venous cutdown is a maneuver to provide reliable access for fluids and drugs during a medical emergency. 

We hope that you enjoyed this verse. You can find dozens more on this topic in 7 collections on our full-service blog 'Edifying Nonsense'. Click HERE to start! 

DEC 10, a brief saga (holidays and celebrations): for Hogmanay (Auld Lang's Sine)

For the purpose of this blog, a 'brief saga' is defined as a poem, usually narrative, but occasionally expository, that tell its story in at least 15 lines. Most commonly, the format involves three stanzas in limerick form. Your blogging team has been presenting these concoctions at the rate of one per month, mixed in with the shorter poems, wordplay and other stuff that we offer.    

To access the next 'brief saga' on this blog (January 2021), proceed to 'Italian Treats'. 

To access the most recent previous 'brief saga' (October 2020), back up to 'Cyclades' (Greek Islands).  

 To access all of our 'brief sagas' by the year of their creation, click on your selection below.

2020
2021
2022
2023.