Jonar's observations

Observations: About the old days

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We know what a bachelor is, but what’s a confirmed bachelor? We use phrases like ‘jump the gun’ but these days they use aerosol cans instead of pistols. Just try playing Pictionary with young people and you will recognise the generation gap. Jonar exchanges notes with Bruce and Phil about the quirky things we do and say.
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Below is a transcript of the audio file.


Host: Jonar Nader author of ‘How to Lose Friends and Infuriate Your Boss’. Hi Jonar

Jonar Nader: Hi Bruce. I thought we would do some more observations tonight.

Host: Good.

Jonar Nader: On a movie ticket I read, ‘entry only with a valid ticket’. I wonder, are there people who truly expect to enter with an ‘invalid’ ticket and has it happened so much that they have to have a meeting to decide to print it on the ticket? What about in the court room when they say ‘beyond reasonable doubt’, whatever happened to ‘beyond ALL doubt’. Here’s something that makes me cringe; when I hear parents talk about ‘putting him down’, or Johnny wouldn’t ‘go down’. I always think of animals being killed.

I was playing Pictionary with my young niece and she could not draw one of the terms. She had no concept of the term ‘self-service station’. She could not quite comprehend what that meant because every station for her is a SELF service station, as opposed to service station. The other thing she couldn’t understand was the term ‘full steam ahead’. The steam engine is not part of her experience. Neither is the phrase ‘jump the gun’, because at athletics events these days, they have an aerosol can with a horn – so should we say ‘jump the can’ or ‘jump the whistle’!

We know what a ‘bachelor’ is but what is a ‘confirmed bachelor’?

Don’t you have misunderstandings when you knock on someone’s door and you are not sure if they said ‘come in’, or ‘coming’.

Host: Let me give you one, the word ‘re-sign’ and ‘resign’ it’s the same spelling but a big difference.

Jonar Nader: Yes and you watch actors who are being interviewed about the new film out and someone always asks them what the director like to work for, and they always have glowing reports.

Host: Yes, yes!

Jonar Nader: And what is a director’s cut? I would have thought that when I am going to see a film that is directed by so and so, I will be getting that director’s cut. Yet 3 months later you get ‘the director’s cut’!

Host: What is the director’s cut? I guess it is the longer version of the movie, with all the bits that were dropped for the cinema release.

Jonar Nader: What about, do you ever feel inadequate when you are watching a movie and they flash words on the screen, and you are reading them but you only get half way and they go off.

Host: Oh I hate that.

Jonar Nader: It makes me wonder if I’m a slow reader or what?

Host: You are talking about foreign movies with translations, and then at the end they say, ‘Jonar Nader was sentenced to 12 months and he now works as a warden….’, and it’s off the screen before you can read it.

Jonar Nader: Don’t you love friends who know dates by the month. They say, ‘Back in 1962, in June I met so and so…’, How do you know that?

Host: Or they say, ‘Do you know Frank? He was married to Patricia, but then she broke it off…’, and this whole string of people you just can’t stand!

Jonar Nader: and they know the dates. If they don’t, they’ll wait there 3 minutes while they’re trying to remember. You say, ‘It doesn’t matter I don’t know Bruce anyway’.

Finally, I don’t know how people understand and remember words to songs. They can sing along to any song that comes on radio and I feel inadequate again. I mean I can’t even decipher the words let alone remember them.

Host: Oh yes, but you are tone deaf.

Jonar Nader: Probably.

Host: What about reading instructions to put something together. It is the hardest thing possible.

Jonar Nader: I was baking a cake. I bought the one that said ‘Easy’, but still I got stuck on point 2. I asked my sister for help. She said, ‘Oh you are so silly, let me do it. Then she had to admit, ‘Yes you are right. This is very confusing’.

Host: Jonar Nader on the web at www.losefriends.com

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