Supercalifragilisticexpialidocious
05/06/2004 05:40 p.m.

The straight dope on one of my favorite childhood words from one of my favorite childhood movies:

"Supercalifragilisticexpialidocious" is a long word that was invented simply to be a long word. Its meaning is incidental. Nonetheless, it appears in some dictionaries. Wordsmith.org defines it as:

A nonsense-word used esp. by children, now chiefly expressing excited approbation: fantastic, fabulous.

(Or in other words, the last 29 letters are essentially superfluous.)

Most of us know this quite atrocious-sounding word from the song of the same name, which featured prominently in the 1964 Disney classic Mary Poppins. I always assumed that this was how "supercali..." was introduced into the English lexicon, and that Disney's fantastic songwriters Richard and Robert Sherman coined the word themselves. But it turns out that's only true for this specific spelling of the word.

The "supercali..." phenom was not a Sherman brothers invention. In fact, in 1965, Disney and the Sherman brothers faced a lawsuit from the writers of "Supercalafajalistickespeealadojus," a different song published in 1951 — 13 years before the Disney hit. They weren't technically the same word, but only a moron would think they weren't related. However, the lawsuit was dismissed, since it was determined that the word in question — or at least one similar enough — existed before either of the songs were written. (Also, Disney's song and the earlier song had nothing in common other than the word in question.)

So where did The Word come from in the first place? It's still a mystery. While it seems pretty clear that The Word was made up by someone — probably a kid — with the specific intention of creating "the longest word ever," there's no written documentation of its origin. Rumours persist that 19th century Scottish miners used the word to give "orders" to prostitutes, but that's almost certainly poppycock.

The Sherman brothers claimed it was coined in 1918 as "super-cadja-flawjalistic-espealedojus," and that they picked it up at summer camp in the '30s. But they couldn't document it either.

Sources: Wordsmith.org, The Straight Dope, The Phrase Finder

Japanese Haiku Computer Error Messages
03/08/2003 04:12 p.m.

I found this e-mail message from a friend rather cute, and so I thought I'd share with my friends here at Pathetic.org:

In Japan, they have replaced the impersonal and unhelpful Microsoft

error messages with Haiku poetry messages. Here are 16 actual error messages from Japan,

approaching the essence of Zen:

Your file was so big.

It might be very useful.

But now it is gone.

--------------------------------------------

The Web site you seek

Cannot be located

but Countless more exist.

--------------------------------------------

Chaos reigns within.

Reflect, repent and reboot.

Order shall return.

-----------------------------------------------

Program aborting:

Close all that you have worked on.

You ask far too much.

------------------------------------------------

Windows NT crashed.

I am the Blue Screen of Death.

No one hears your screams.

--------------------------------------------------

Yesterday it worked.

Today it is not working.

Windows is like that.

---------------------------------------------------

First snow, then silence.

This thousand-dollar screen dies

So beautifully.

---------------------------------------------------

With searching comes loss

And the presence of absence:

"My Novel" not found.

--------------------------------------------------

The Tao that is seen

Is not the true Tao --

until You bring fresh toner.

--------------------------------------------------

Stay the patient course.

Of little worth is your ire.

The network is down.

---------------------------------------------------

A crash reduces

Your expensive computer

To a simple stone.

--------------------------------------------------

Three things are certain:

Death, taxes and lost data.

Guess which has occurred.

---------------------------------------------------

You step in the stream

But the water has moved on.

This page is not here.

---------------------------------------------------

Out of memory.

We wish to hold the whole sky

But we never will.

------------------------------------------------

Having been erased

The document you're seeking

Must now be retyped.

---------------------------------------------------

Serious error.

All shortcuts have disappeared.

Screen. Mind. Both are blank.

--------------------------------------------

Now, isn't that better than, "Your computer has performed an illegal operation?"

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