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#4564 08/17/00 07:46 AM
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jmh Offline
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There was a series of badges (buttons) in the eighties including:

"A woman needs a man like a fish needs a bicycle"
and
"A woman needs a man like a moose needs a hatrack"
(I assume the latter was American as we don't really have moose, only deer.)


#4565 08/17/00 01:53 PM
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this was my favourite way to begin an essay at school:

"businesses, like pizzas, come in three sizes; big, medium and small."

this invariably got me a good mark, possibly because the teacher could easily understand it.
by the way (BTW) you can substitute just about anything for "businesses".


#4566 09/06/00 09:32 AM
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One simile I only ever heard used by my grandmother and my mother both of whom alas no longer with us..

in describing a thin person... straight up and down like a yard of pumpwater


#4567 09/06/00 03:06 PM
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Not original, and not exactly a simile, but catchy:

"Benetton's ads using deathrow inmates are very well-executed."

"He now stands squarely in the president's inner circle."

"This deadlock has life in it yet."

I readily add that I am not prepared to offer any similes.


#4568 09/06/00 07:04 PM
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not exactly a simile, but catchy:

That phrase reminded me of one of the most descriptive sentences in the Hitch-Hikers' Guide to the Galaxy, one that has always been a favourite of mine: "The ships hung in the sky in much the same way that bricks don't."



#4569 09/07/00 06:41 AM
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moving at the speed of a pregnant snail


#4570 09/08/00 06:20 AM
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Or the scholar's favourite: a virgin field pregnant with possibilities.

Bingley


Bingley
#4571 09/12/00 10:52 AM
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<"A man without a woman is like a fish without a bicycle">

Bridget, there's an article in today's Melbourne Age [from the Telegraph, London] about Gloria Steinem which attributes the maxim to her in the form "A woman needs a man like a fish needs a bicycle". It seems pretty tame stuff to some of the vitriol being squirted among feuding feminists (according to the article): "an imploding beanbag of poisonous self-pity" and "infirmary feminism … a catch-all vegetable drawer where bunches of clingy sob-sisters can store their mouldy neuroses".


#4572 09/13/00 09:37 AM
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an article in today's Melbourne Age [from the Telegraph, London] about Gloria Steinem which attributes the maxim to her in the form "A woman needs a man like a fish needs a bicycle". It seems pretty tame stuff to some of the vitriol being squirted among feuding feminists (according to the article): "an imploding beanbag of poisonous self-pity" and "infirmary feminism … a catch-all vegetable drawer where bunches of clingy sob-sisters can store their mouldy neuroses". <

Ah. Not sure whether I should be grateful to you or not for pointing out my apparent common ground with the Torygraph! However, the quotes sound much as I would expect from this particular newspaper!
(Whoops - politics! No offence intended to anyone!)


#4573 09/14/00 07:08 AM
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>apparent common ground with the Torygraph

Sound's like you might prefer the Grauniad! I've posted a list of British newspapers in "Politics and the Press" in case anyone is wondering what we are talking about.

I found this explanation for "Grauniad" (or is it just another urban legend?): A while ago, the Guardian (which had not long ceased being the Manchester Guardian) was printing in London as well, but was having operational difficulties that meant that, as I understand it, all the text of the paper had to be re-keyed a second time, in a hurry. As a consequence, it became a by-word for typos. One day, they printed their own name as "Grauniad" in a classified ad. Private Eye took this up with amusement and has been referring to the organ as "Grauniad" ever since. -Ian Phillipps, Brass Band mailing list


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