Everyman's Guide to Computer Speak

The time has come for a plain and basic guide to computer terms. A list of meanings that really express what people feel is needed. The following is just that. It is something designed for those wanting to know what the "big words" and not so big words really mean.




BIT - A word used to describe computers, as in "Our daughter's computer cost quite a bit."

BOOT - What your friends give you because you spend too much time bragging about your computer skill.

BUG - What your eyes do after you stare at the tiny green computer screen for more than 15 minutes. Also: What computer magazine companies do to you after they get you on their mailing list.

CHIPS - The fattening, non-nutritional food computer users eat to avoid having to leave their keyboards for meals.

COPY - What you have to do during school tests because you spend too much time playing games on your computer and not enough time studying.

CURSOR - What you turn into when you can't get your computer to perform, as in "You %@& computer! "

DISK - What goes out of your back after bending over a computer keyboard for seven hours at a clip.

DUMP - The place all your former hobbies wind up soon after you install games on your computer.

ERROR - What you made when you first walked into a computer showroom "just to look. "

EXPANSION UNIT - The new room you have to build on to your home to house your computer and all its peripherals.

FILE - What a secretary can now do to her nails six and a half hours a day, now that the computer does her day's work in 30 minutes.

FLOPPY - The condition of a constant computer user's stomach due to lack of exercise and a steady diet of junk food (see "CHIPS").

HARDWARE - Tools, such as lawnmowers, rakes and other heavy equipment you haven't laid a finger on since getting your computer.

IBM - The kind of missile your family members and friends would like to drop on your computer so you'll pay attention to them again.

MENU - What you'll never see again after buying a computer because you'll be too poor to eat in a restaurant.

PROGRAMS - Those things you used to look at on your television before you hooked your computer up.

RETURN - What lots of people do to their computers after they receive their first billing from their internet service provider.

TAB - What your friends pick up when they meet you for lunch because you spent all your money on new software.

TERMINAL - A place where you can find buses, trains and really good deals on hot computers.

WINDOW - What you heave the computer out of after you accidentally erase a program that took you three days to set up."

Funny Definitions

Below is a list of  Washington Post  winning submissions to its yearly neologism contest, in which readers are asked to supply alternative meanings for common words. 

The winners were:
1. Coffee (n.), the person upon whom one coughs.
2. Flabbergasted (adj.), appalled over how much weight you have gained.
3. Abdicate (v.), to give up all hope of ever having a flat stomach.
4. Esplanade (v.), to attempt an explanation while drunk.
5. Willy-nilly (adj.), impotent.
6. Negligent (adj.), describes a condition in which you absentmindedly answer the door in your nightgown.
7. Lymph (v.), to walk with a lisp.
8. Gargoyle (n), olive-flavored mouthwash.
9. Flatulence (n.) emergency vehicle that picks you up after you are run over by a steamroller.
10. Balderdash (n.), a rapidly receding hairline.
11. Testicle (n.), a humorous question on an exam.
12. Rectitude (n.), the formal, dignified bearing adopted by proctologists.
13. Pokémon (n), a Rastafarian proctologist.
14. Oyster (n.), a person who sprinkles his conversation with Yiddishisms.
15. Frisbeetarianism (n.), (back by popular demand): The belief that, when you die, your soul flies up onto the roof and gets stuck there.
16. Circumvent (n.), an opening in the front of boxer shorts worn by Jewish men.

I think these are very funny. Do you have any more to add? I am thinking of starting a collection.

Favorite Quotes from the Past Year or So

Below are some of my favorite quotes collected from various bits of reading over the past year. Quotations also have the Source and Author because I don't want anyone thinking they're just made up.


Fran Lebowitz (1950 - ) US writer and humorist. Found this on a desk calendar and am still chuckling:  "All God's children are not beautiful. Most of God's children are, in fact, barely presentable."


G. H. Hardy English mathematician (1877 - 1947). A quip from an essay about democracy I was reading on Wikipedia. Sometimes humor points out the flaws in a concept to quickly:
"It is not worth an intelligent man's time to be in the majority. By definition, there are already enough people to do that."


Oscar Wilde always good but this one is like a sharp pin: "Always forgive your enemies; nothing annoys them so much."


H. L. Mencken US editor (1880 - 1956) "All men are frauds. The only difference between them is that some admit it. I myself deny it."


Anatole France  "To be willing to die for an idea is to set a rather high price on conjecture."


Kurt Herbert Alder "Tradition is what you resort to when you don't have the time or the money to do it right."


Robert Pirsig, Zen and the Art of Motorcycle Maintenance "There is an evil tendency underlying all our technology - the tendency to do what is reasonable even when it isn't any good."


Orson Welles from a biography in an online movie Database: "My doctor told me to stop having intimate dinners for four. Unless there are three other people."


George Bernard Shaw "Martyrdom is the only way in which a man can become famous without ability."


British actor Peter Ustinov "It is our responsibilities, not ourselves, that we should take seriously."


Doris Egan "Rational arguments don't usually work on religious people. Otherwise, there wouldn't be religious people."


Capt Jack Harkness last episode of Torchwood "The end is where we start!"


Kurt Vonnegut in an Encyclopedia of ScFi "One of the few good things about modern times: If you die horribly on television, you will not have died in vain. You will have entertained us."


William James (not a Dons Party quote) "A great many people think they are thinking when they are actually rearranging their prejudices."  


Quotes are quite collectible. I like new ones so let me know of any worth chasing up.