thessaly, in Buffy, in the midst of a discussion of what colors to wear

I am earth-tone woman. Hear me mulch.

I set it up, Calli takes it away:

Betsy: Courtesan fantasies.

Calli: Precisely. It falls apart for me when I consider that I'm not the sort that tends to make it as a courtesan. The whole "leave me alone while I read instead of paying attention to you" thing is apparently fatal, professionally speaking. I guess untold riches should buy a certain amount of attention, but I can't see it working for me. Not as long as Steven Brust keeps putting out books.

And more Calli:

My next fantasy involves an unknown great uncle. Let's call him "Ivan". Ivan went off to make his fortune in gay porn back in the early 1950s. The family disowned him, which I why I never heard of him. But he kept track, and he knows which of his relatives has the megs of slash fanfic on her harddrive, oh yes he does. He lead a long, fullfilling life. Upon his death, at age 98, surrounded by loving, handsome cabana boys, he left his entire fortune to me.

I'm waiting for that call from his executors.

ted r, Natter:

Actually I look at France and Germany as saying to the US: Friends don't let friends drive drunk. Unfortunately, they can't get the damn car keys out of our hand.

beth in Bitches:

I find anarchy works best when it is done my way.

John H explains Statistics 101:

Mean is the meanest of averages. It's the average you get when you add up all the averages and divide them by themselves. "Mode" is French and means "the most fashionable number". "Median" means "strip of grass in the middle of the road" so you just pick the most boring number.

BHP (especially funny, since she said it days ago): Oh, the Sofitel, which is French-themed to the max, has stopped flying the French flag out front in order not to offend guests. I sometimes top in at the Sofitel to buy croissants. I hear they're being renamed "Liberty cholesterol death-bombs."

John H. in Natter, amidst cute wildlife stories. Some mockage of the English, all due respect to my homie Tony Blair, et alia.

This never would have happened if the wedding had been inside the church with God and not out here in the cheap showiness of nature.

I was once in the bush, on Stradbroke island, eating salami sandwiches, and this goanna about half the size of a crocodile climbed down out of a tree.

I threw him some salami. He liked it.

He came closer. I threw him some more. He liked it.

I thought it would be cool to see if he would eat out of my hand.

I held out some salami to him.

He would eat out of my hand, it turned out. Except it was not so much with the "out of"...

That's not the funny part. I'm nursing a bleeding finger and swearing, and this eight-year-old kid walks by.

"What's the matter with him?" he says.

"He tried to get a goanna to eat out of his hand" says my girlfriend.

"Oh" says the kid "is he English or something?"

Nutty:

I suddenly realized that I cannot imagine what the phrase "lethal cuteness bomb" would sound like, in an Australian accent. In my head, Billytea's all Oz, and then switches over to American for that one part, like the bad dubbing over curse-words on broadcast TV.

"Oh" says the kid "is he English or something?"

Bwah! Bloody poms.