Mostly Pointless (The Meaning of Liff - Douglas Adams)

Member Name: lilmsnaughty79

Product:	The Meaning of Liff - Douglas Adams
Date:	29/06/06 (104 review reads)
Rating:

Advantages: Funny

Disadvantages: Pointless

Mostly Pointless
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In 1755 Dr Samuel Johnson published the first dictionary of the English language. Since then the great and the good have made many revisions.

There are still two things wrong with the English dictionary.

1. There are many things that there are still no word for.
2. It's not very funny.

Fortunately for us there is now a new dictionary that addresses these problems, it's called "The Meaning Of Liff".

The book is layed out the same as a regular dictionary. Most of but not all of the words in the dictionary are place names, this is probably just for convenience as it's pretty damn hard to come up with a completely new word, especially when there are hundreds in the book. The definitions are usually humorous situations that we might find ourselves in.

This dictionary is compiled by Douglas Adams and John Lloyd. Douglas Adams is the writer of the excellent "The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy" series. John Lloyd is a producer and is in part responsible for the equally excellent Blackadder series and more recently QI.

I have my favourites and I'll list a few of them here as an example :

NAD (n.)
Measure defined as the distance between a driver's outstretched fingertips and the ticket machine in an automatic car-park. 1 nad = 18.4 cm.

BRISBANE (n.)
A perfectly reasonable explanation (Such as the one offered by a person with a gurgling cough which has nothing to do with the fact that they smoke fifty cigarettes a day.)

To clear up any confusion about what Liff is here’s what the book itself has to say.

LIFF (n.)
A common object or experience for which no word yet exists.

Versions Of The Book
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There are two versions of this book, the latest is the Deeper Meaning Of Liff, this is basically the same book but just has more definitions in it, this is the book to go for. The cover of the one I have is black with gold writing on the front. Some of the definitions also have illustrations. In fact the definition for Liff itself is only in the “Deeper” book.


Towel Day
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Douglas Adams tragically died in 2001 at the age of 49 while at a Gym (I always knew exercise was bad for you), since then May 25th (two weeks after the date of his death) has been known as "Towel Day" as a mark of respect, because as we all know, anyone with anything about them always knows where their towel is.

Summing Up
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In conclusion, I thoroughly enjoy this book, it's great just to pick up for a laugh now and then. There are often situations I come across that I had read about in the book and have a little chuckle to myself. Especially the "Nad" one that seems to happen to me an awful lot, and my arms aren't that short.

Recommended.

Summary: A Dictionary Of Things There Aren't Words For Yet