Today’s Bizarro:

Portmanteau of Godzilla and Cinderella.

(If you’re puzzled by the odd symbols in the cartoon — Don Piraro says there are 5 in this strip — see this Page.)

xx

Today’s Zippy, with a delightful musical nightmare:

Note the title: “Shindigabaloo”, a portmanteau of the names of two American pop/rock music shows on television in the mid-60s, Shindig! and Hullabaloo.

From Wikipedia:

Shindig! is an American musical variety series which aired on ABC from September 16, 1964-January 8, 1966. The show was hosted by Jimmy O’Neill, a disc jockey in Los Angeles at the time who also created the show along with his wife Sharon Sheeley and production executive Art Stolnitz.

… Shindig! was conceived as a short-notice replacement for Hootenanny, a series that had specialized in folk revival music. The folk revival had fizzled in 1964 as the result of the British Invasion, which damaged the ratings for Hootenanny and prompted that show’s cancellation.

Shindig! focused on a broader variety of popular music than its predecessor (link)

Hullabaloo is an American musical variety series that ran on NBC from January 12, 1965 through April 11, 1966. Similar to Shindig! it ran in prime time in contrast to ABC’s American Bandstand.

Directed by Steve Binder, who went on to direct Elvis Presley’s ’68 Comeback Special, Hullabaloo served as a big-budget, quality showcase for the leading pop acts of the day, and was also competition for another like-minded television showcase, ABC’s Shindig!. (link)

Zippy sez, “C’mon, let’s dance!”

Five years ago I took note of the Teapartyganza segments on Jon Stewart’s Daily Show in 2010 (there’s a set of videos of the shows here). At the time, I took the name to be a one-off playful portmanteau (Tea Party + extravaganza), so I didn’t post about it; if I tried to take note of every portmanteau that comes past me, I’d go nuts.

Then in 2014, Eleganza came past me in a Zippy: Eleganza Fashions, a business that still seems to be going, So then there were two.

This morning, I stumbled upon my Teapartyganza note and thought to check on –ganza nouns. Oh my, it’s clearly gone the familiar route from portmanteau element to libfix (conveying, roughly, ‘an event of considerable size, scope, or complexity’): a Libfix-A-Ganza, to use one of the spellings that’s become customary in these situations.

On the item that contributes its –ganza to these formations, from NOAD2:

extravaganza  an elaborate and spectacular entertainment or production: an extravaganza of dance in many forms.

ORIGIN mid 18th cent. (in the sense ‘extravagance in language or behavior’): from Italian estravaganza ‘extravagance.’ The change was due to association with words beginning with extra- .

(Nice reshaping of the Italian to fit English patterns.)

The libfix has two variants, /ǝgænzǝ/ and /gænzǝ/, apparently with the long variant after consonants, the short variant after vowels. The short variant is sometimes set off from its base by a hyphen. The /ǝ/ of the long variant is spelled with an A or an O, and it is often set off on one or both sides by a hyphen.

Some examples of the long variant:

Drew Carey’s Improv-A-Ganza [an improv show on the Game Show Network] (IMDb link)

Travel-O-Ganza: The Melting Pot for Cultures and Education (link)

Boston Stoker Cigar-a-ganza [sale on cigars at the Boston Stoker Coffee Co. in Dayton OH] (link)

Explor-A-Ganza event {Cedar Valley Nonprofit Association in Northeast Iowa] (link]

The Queen’s 2013 Recap-a-ganza! [Bravo Fashion Queens show] (link)

More short instances of the short variant, in addition to Teapartyganza:

ALLMSES 3rd Annual Eco-Ganza Celebration [Alain L. Locke Magnet School
 for Environmental Stewardship, PS 208, in Harlem, New York] (link)

Agape-Ganza! [Open House at Camp Agapé, sponsored by N.C. Environmental Education, in Fuquay-Varina NC] (link)

I’m sure there are many more.

The title of an Art Spiegelman cartoon in the June 1st New Yorker: a portmanteau title (Narcissus + Sisyphus) with a visual realization:

The woozy protagonist climbs out of his hole, admires himself in a mirror, falls back into the hole, and the cycle begins again.

Spiegelman has appeared on this blog as a celebrated graphic novelist (Maus and all that), but this is his first time here as a gag cartoonist, or at least as a graphic short-story writer (a story in 12 panels).

Advertised in several places (I saw it in the NYRB), a children’s game called Pengoloo (maybe a portmanteau of penguin and igloo, though there are no igloos in the game):

From the makers, on amazon.com:

Go on an eggs-pedition with this enchanting memory game for children. Detailed wooden playing pieces transport you to the South Pole where our quirky little penguins are ready to play with you! Roll the dice and look for the matching colored eggs underneath the penguins. A good memory and a little luck will help you be the first to collect six penguins on your iceberg to win! Pengoloo includes 12 penguins, 12 eggs, 4 scoring icebergs and 2 dice. [ages 4 and up]

One of those games that little kids are often better at than adults — and that’s a good thing.

And the libfixes pour in. From Joel Berson on ADS-L yesterday, a report of ashvalanche ‘avalanche of ash’ (for two types of ash, with avalanche understood metaphorically). And that leads to plenty more examples of X-valanche.

Volcanic ash, coal ash. Berson, yesterday: “Heard on Boston WCVB local news at approximately 5:10–5:15 PM today”, a reference to an ashvalanche, “the recent eruption of Mount Sinabung in Indonesia that has sent an avalanche of, yes, ash down its slope”. He found about 20 raw Google Web hits, of which only two were interesting — one relevant to Mount Sinabung:

2015: WKOW 27 – WEB EXCLUSIVE: Check out this “Ashvalanche”. Video.

But also a 2009 mention from KnoxViews in East Tennessee, from commenter WhitesCreek: “The ashvalanche is bad enough and there is no need to exaggerate”. The background, from Berson: “When a dike failed at TVA’s Kingston Fossil Plant, 5.4 million cubic yards of coal ash cascaded into the Emory and Clinch rivers and smothered about 300 acres of land.”

In both cases, we have a cascade of some substance, resembling the cascade of snow in an avalanche.

Searching on “valanche” pulls up a variety of examples, starting with the website for Ad-Valanche, a metaphorical avalanche of ads:

Welcome to Ad-Valanche! A universal way to boost your advertising budget and potentially earn extra income in a stand alone program.

Then some collections of concrete objects, moving from cascades of them to mere large accumulations:

[my all-time favorite] Dealership Roof Collapse Ends In Massive Audi-valanche: The roof-top parking lot of an Audi dealership in the British city of Milton Keynes just completely caved in, sending approximately 20 cars crashing down into a mountain of cars below. (link)

Oh no! It’s a cow-valanche! What would your caption for this photo be? [photo of traffic sign warning of cows crashing down a mountainside] (link)

Cup Cake Cone’valanche [a pile of failed cupcake cones] (link)

Shoe-valanche! Victoria Beckham Donates 100 Pairs Of Shoes To Red Cross Charity Shop (link)

And on to more abstract referents:

BREAKING: AL-VALANCHE —- Franken WINS [election win for Al Franken] (link)

The Ron Paul-valanche [claimed groundswell of support for candidate Ron Paul] (link)

(Urban Dictionary has an entry for yarn-valanche, but the entry could just be playful inventiveness.)

Phonologically, the examples move from those in which their initial element is close to the /æ/ of avalanche — ash, ad, Al — and so might be viewed as simple portmanteaus, sharing some content between the two parts, on to those in which the initial element is phonologically distant from /æ/ — cow, shoe, Ron Paul, Cup Cake Cone — which suggests that –valanche is simply suffixed to this material. So: yet another libfix.

In this morning’s crop of cartoons, a One Big Happy and a Bizarro:

(#1)

(#2)

In #1, Ruthie once again fails, unsurprisingly, to cope with things in a language other than English, in this case the Italian Che bellissima! Ruthie recognizes che as the personal name Kay, so of course bellissima must be a family name.

In #2, we have an outrageous portmanteau smitation, of (the archaic) smite and citation.

(If you’re puzzled by the odd symbols in the cartoon — Don Piraro says there are 3 in this strip — see this Page.)

Separate animals, sheep and hippo, together (the pair embraced in the portmanteau shippo):

(#1)

From an old friend (whose birthday is today). The hippo is William, from the Metropolitan Museum of Art, a present I gave her some years ago. Now she writes:

I always have him someplace I can look at him. Last week I came home from China with this sheep made out of soap, and they seemed made for each other.

Some words about William.

A better view:

(#2)

From the museum’s site:

Statuette of a Hippopotamus, Middle Kingdom, Dynasty 12, ca. 1981–1885 B.C.
This well-formed statuette of a hippopotamus demonstrates the Egyptian artist’s appreciation for the natural world. It was molded in faience, a ceramic material made of ground quartz. Beneath the blue-green glaze, the body was painted with the outlines of river plants, symbolizing the marshes in which the animal lived.

The seemingly benign appearance that this figurine presents is deceptive. To the ancient Egyptians, the hippopotamus was one of the most dangerous animals in their world. The huge creatures were a hazard for small fishing boats and other rivercraft. The beast might also be encountered on the waterways in the journey to the afterlife. As such, the hippopotamus was a force of nature that needed to be propitiated and controlled, both in this life and the next. This example was one of a pair found in a shaft associated with the tomb chapel of the steward Senbi II at Meir, a site about thirty miles south of modern Asyut.

(The original William is seriously ancient — from about 4,000 years ago.)

William has been a marketing success for the museum, so of course they’ve created some other merchandise featuring him: a board book and a plush toy:

(#3)

Enjoyable, and (importantly) unbreakable. For ages 3 and up. The counting is, of course, in English (from one blue hippo to 10 scarab beetles), not in Ancient Egyptian.

Just when you thought it was safe to go back in the water —

(#1)

it was Shark Week again, and Findependence Day!

(#2)

(This year’s programs premiered on the Discovery Channel on the eight days from July 5th through the 12th, yesterday, but re-runs will continue for a while.)

The portmanteau findependence combines fin (as in shark fin) and independence (as in Independence Day). In another context, it’s been used to stand for financial independence.

Now, on Shark Week. From Wikipedia:

Shark Week is an annual, week-long programming block created by the Discovery Channel which features shark-based programming, real and fictional. Shark Week originally premiered on July 17, 1988. Held annually, normally in July or August, it was originally developed to raise awareness and respect for sharks. Over time it grew in popularity and became a hit on the Discovery Channel. Since 2010, it has been the longest-running cable television programming event in history. Now broadcast in over 72 countries, Shark Week is promoted heavily via social networks like Facebook and Twitter.

… the program Megalodon: The Monster Shark Lives [in 2013] … became one of the most watched programs in Shark Week history, primarily for the controversy and backlash it generated. The mockumentary was based on an ancient giant shark called megalodon, which is now long extinct. The airing of this program fueled an uproar by viewers and by the science and science-loving community. It eventually started a Discovery Channel boycott. Since then Discovery has increasingly come under fire for using junk science, pushing dubious theories, creating fake stories and misleading scientists as to the nature of the documentary being produced.

Shark Week 2015 tilts very strongly to the scientific.

I am a great fan of Monster Creature movies, as well as programs about real science, but I expect the two genres to be easily distinguishable; Megalodon fuzzed them up some, hence the controversy — though I recognized the movie as clearly a Monster Creature flick that used the name of the actual (but long extinct) megalodon as the take-off point for fantasy.

Three of my postings on sharkish matters:

“Odds and ends 8/18/13″ of 8/18/13: #1 on monster portmanteaus, especially from Roger Corman for the SyFy channel (note: not the Discovery Channel): Dinocroc, Supergator, Piranhaconda, Sharktopus, Pteracuda; plus some produced by imitators, Sharknado for instance

“Bunnies run amok” of 7/5/14: on the “natural horror” genre, with nature run amok; link to the  Wikipedia list of natural horror movies, which has a very long sublist of shark movies, including the Shark Attack films (featuring genetically enhanced great white sharks)

“Shark!” of 1/24/15: on the fabled sand sharks, land sharks, and snow sharks (in various media — cartoons, tv, movies)

Bonus 1: Shark Wars. And there are books, for example the Shark Wars series by EJ Altbaker (and games based on the books):

(#3)

Bonus 2: sharkish adjectives. There’s no standard, well-known adjective (like canine or feline) for referring to sharks as a group. In part, this is because of the taxonomic complexities of sharkdom. From Wikipedia:

Sharks belong to the superorder Selachimorpha [or Selachii] in the subclass Elasmobranchii in the class Chondrichthyes. The Elasmobranchii also include rays and skates; the Chondrichthyes also include Chimaeras [cartilaginous fishes in the order Chimaeriformes, known informally as ghost sharks, ratfish, spookfish, or rabbitfishes].

From Selachii, we get selachine or selachian, both of them attested (though not very widely); in some sources, these adjectives take in skates and rays as well as sharks. But these adjectives are the best we’ve got.

The contenders are squaline or squaloid, and pistrine or pistrian. All attested but very sparsely (squaline occurs in the Altbacker books), and they aren’t very satisfying etymologically.

The squal– adjectives go back to Latin squalus ‘a sea fish’, which is way too broad. But there is Italian squalo ‘shark’ (suitably narrowed) and the genus Squalus of dogfish sharks (narrowed still further).

The pistr- adjectives go back to Latin pistris ‘sea-monster’, covering the fearsome creatures whales, sharks, and sawfish, and so also too broad..

Today’s Zippy, which leads in several directions:

(#1)

Zippy at the Bluebonnet Diner in Northampton MA, trading warning signs at the counter with an icon representing a (generic) person.

Stuff here: the diner; broasted chicken; warning signs; icons (for a man, for a person); punchline.

The Bluebonnet Diner. From the VisitNoho site (“the best places to dine, shop and visit in Northampton, Massachusetts”), with some puffery from the diner:

Built by the Worcester Lunch Car Company in 1950, the historic Bluebonnet Diner [324 King St.] stands as a familiar Northampton landmark. The name “Bluebonnet” is derived from the Texas state flower of the same name.

Seeing many additions over the years, yet sparing the original craftsmanship, the diner takes on a character all its own.

The dining room was added in 1960, with the later additions of a lounge and banquet all in 1967. Since its beginning, the Bluebonnet has seen a ten-fold increase in seating; with a present capacity of 110 in the restaurant, and 240 in the banquet hall.

Good food, prepared by competent people is standard fare here. Many recipes have earned us the reputation for good home-style cooking. We are most famous for our home-made puddings and cream pies.

(The diner’s own website is here.)

Outside:

(#2)

And inside, but without Zippy and the Icon:

(#3)

Broasting. The Bluebonnet specializes in broasted chicken. From NOAD2 on the portmanteau verb broast, with part of the story:

verb N. Amer.: prepare food using a cooking process that combines broiling and roasting [as adj.]: broasted chicken.

Now, from Wikipedia, with more of the story:

Broasting is a method of cooking chicken and other foods using a pressure fryer and condiments. The technique was invented by L.A.M. Phelan in the early 1950s and is marketed by the Broaster Company of Beloit, Wisconsin, which Phelan founded.

Broasting equipment and ingredients are marketed only to food service and institutional customers, including supermarkets and fast food restaurants. They are not available to the general public. The method essentially combines pressure cooking with deep frying chicken that has been marinated and breaded.

Broasted chicken at the Golden Basket Restaurant in Green Bay WI:

(#4)

Broasted chicken is popular in Saudi Arabia and Pakistan, and is served at Middle Eastern and Filipino restaurants in the US, as well as at non-ethnic places like the Golden Basket.

There are recipes for “broasting” chicken at home (without the brand-name equipment), by oven-roasting prepared chicken parts, turning them periodically; this is like pan-frying, but in the oven, and with very little oil.

Warning signs. Zippy and the Icon trade the texts on warning signs (serving a number of purposes). These tend to be formulaic, using conventionalized abbreviated wording (THIS WAY OUT, for instance). Zippy’s final contribution, as the Icon leaves, whistling, is a variant of

(A) IN CASE OF FIRE, USE STAIRWAY

as here:

(#5)

Icons.Notice that the ‘(generic) person’ icon appears in #5. Here it is in a “pedestrian crossing” sign:

(#6)

And a “litter container” sign:

(#7)

Note that this particular icon is used, in other contexts, to refer specifically to men; toilets specifically for men are marked with this icon, even if the sign is wordless:

(#8)

This double usage is obviously akin to the use of he and man to refer specifically to men in certain contexts, but (for some people, at any rate) to refer generically in others.

Punchlines. What Zippy says in the last panel of #1, as the Icon strolls away, is not

(A) IN CASE OF FIRE, USE STAIRWAY

but

(B) IN CASE OF PUNCHLINE, USE STAIRWAY

suggesting, perhaps, that this the end of their exchange. On punchline, NOAD2 says:

the final phrase or sentence of a joke or story, providing the humor or some other crucial element

OED3 (Sept. 2007) says the compound noun was originally U.S. (but it has clearly spread); its first cite is from 1916 (spelled punch line); then it has the spelling punch-line in 1921 and punchline in 1993 and thereafter.

And that’s the end of the story.

Two similar brand names, both kinds of portmanteaus, but otherwise very different: acoustic insulation, sturdy soles for shoes.

Vibrafoam. From the RubberGreen site:

Vibrafoam is a range of vibrating insulation mat made of microcellular elastomer based on a specific polyurethane.

The Vibrafoam can be used for

– Decreasing vibration of industrial machinery
– Acoustic insulation or anti vibration of a entire building
– Vibrating appliances (washing machines)

(#1)

The name combines the vibra– of vibration with foam.

Vibram. From the Vibram soles site on their history:

In 1935, tragedy drives Vitale Bramani to develop a sole capable of excellent traction on mixed surfaces. Using vulcanized rubber technology, he develops the Carrarmato design. It will soon be famous. Even today it remains one of the most used soles by mountain climbers.

In 1937:

(#2)

(That’s Pirelli the Italian tire company.)

The name combines the vi- of Vitale with the bram- of Bramani.

Frank Bruni in the NYT Sunday Review on the 19th, in “La Dolce Donald Trump”, beginning:

In Rome about a dozen years ago, I had a long dinner with Donald Trump.

Only his name was Silvio Berlusconi.

Aren’t they essentially the same man? The same myth?

They have the same obsession with their wealth. Same need to crow about it. Same belief that it’s the irrefutable measure of their genius. Same come-on to countrymen: If I enriched myself, I can enrich you.

They’re priapic twins, identical in their insistence on being seen as paragons of irresistible lust. If hideously sexist utterances ensue, so be it. Loins before decency. Pheromones over good sense.

… [Italians] repeatedly elected [Berlusconi], so that he could actually do what Trump is still merely auditioning to do: use his country as a gaudy throne and an adoring mirror as he ran it into the ground.

Trump is Berlusconi in waiting, with less cosmetic surgery. Berlusconi is Trump in senescence, with even higher alimony payments.

Trumpusconi is a study in the peril and pitfalls of unchecked testosterone and tumescent avarice.

No minced words here. But a nice portmanteau name, combining Trump and Berlusconi into a single appellation.(Berluscrump would also have been possible.)

From Ben Zimmer in Language Log (from 2005) on portmanteaus (aka blends) and the name Scalito:

When people’s names are blended, it often indicates the inseparability of the two blendees. Washington Post executive editor Ben Bradlee famously bellowed “Woodstein!” when he had difficulty distinguishing the young reporting team of Bob Woodward and Carl Bernstein. The ascension of Bill and Hillary Clinton to the White House saw the popularization of Billary — once used endearingly (as in the 1992 campaign when Hillary was using the line, “Buy one, get one free”), but later made pejorative by opponents who ridiculed the idea of a “co-presidency.” More recently, we’ve had a rash of blends identifying celebrity couples: Bennifer, Brangelina, TomKat.

(Portmanteau naming for couples goes one step past the “wording up” of conjoined names, as in the “single word” names RichAndAmy and JeremyAndSara in a recent Zits cartoon. After JeremyAndSara comes Jeremara.)

… Scalito is a different kind of onomastic blend [from couple-naming]: an epithet combining elements of two names to suggest a resemblance of one named person to the other [here, of the newly appointed Justice Alito to the already-sitting Justice Scalia]. In recent American political history, such blends have been almost uniformly derogatory.

Bruni’s Trumpusconi goes beyond a perceived resemblance — to virtual indistinguishability. And it’s certainly derogatory. So it’s like Ben Bradlee’s Woodstein, but with a real sting.

(Not much on language, but entertaining nonetheless.)

What unites SoCal teens, shirtless dancers, and fighters of flying sharks? Take a moment to think.

Ian Ziering, that’s what.

(#1)

Yesterday I chanced to come upon the tv-movie Sharknado (one of the great horde of portmanteau-named monster movies, many involving sharks)  — Sharknado 3: Oh Hell No! was released a few days ago, so cable tv was showing the previous two installments — and eventually realized that the familiar-looking male lead was in fact Ian Ziering, of Beverly Hills 90210 fame, and more recently (it turns out) of Chippendales dancing renown. Not the standard arc of an acting career, but it seems to be working for Ziering; the Sharknado films, in particular, have been enormously successful.

From Wikipedia:

Ian Andrew Ziering (… born March 30, 1964) is an American actor and voice actor best known for his role as Steve Sanders on the television series Beverly Hills, 90210, which he played from 1990 to 2000. He is also the voice of Vinnie on Biker Mice from Mars. More recently, he has played “Fin” in the Sharknado film series.

The male leads on 90210: Ian Ziering, Luke Perry, Jason Priestley:

(#2)

Ziering then got work in various tv and movie gigs; recently he snagged two major jobs — the Sharknado films and Chippendales dancing.

From Wikipedia on the first of the shark films:

Sharknado is a 2013 made-for-television disaster film about a waterspout that lifts sharks out of the ocean and deposits them in Los Angeles.

With Ziering as Finley “Fin” Shepard, an ex-surfer who owns a bar.

The second film (set in NYC) followed in 2014, and the third (set in Washington D.C., then moving down the Eastern Seaboard to Florida) was released on July 22nd of this year. Ziering in #2:

(#3)

Meanwhile, Chippendales. From Wikipedia:

Chippendales is a touring dance troupe best known for its male striptease performances and for its dancers’ distinctive upper body costume of a bow tie and shirt cuffs worn on an otherwise bare torso.

Established in 1979, Chippendales was the first all-male stripping troupe to make a business performing for mostly female audiences. Through the quality of its staging and choreography, Chippendales also helped legitimize stripping as a form of popular entertainment. Today, the company produces Broadway-style shows worldwide and licenses its intellectual property for select consumer products ranging from apparel and accessories to slot machines and video games. The Chippendales perform in a ten-million dollar theater and lounge built specifically for them at the Rio All Suite Hotel and Casino in Las Vegas.

From the Just Jared site on 6/16/14, “Ian Ziering Goes Shirtless at 50 for Chippendales Return!”:

Ian Ziering goes shirtless and flexes his big muscles while posing on the red carpet for his big return as the Chippendales guest host on Saturday (June 14) at the Rio All-Suite Hotel and Casino in Las Vegas.

The 50-year-old Sharknado star will be starring in the show for a limited six week engagement. He previously appeared in the production last summer.

(#4)

Ziering on these performances (from Just Jared):

“You have got to take care of yourself as you age. That’s a given. You have the body you deserve. If you treat it well, take care of yourself and focus on health and fitness, you will be equipped to adapt to change and to capitalize on opportunity,” Ian recently said. “When I started thinking that way, that revelation just opened up the world for me. Being 50 is great. It’s none of the things I thought it would be when I looked at it through 20-year-old eyes.”

An Emily Flake cartoon in the August 3rd New Yorker:

There reference here is to people with transgender self-identification, though in fact pluots are biological hybrids, parallel to intersex people. There might also be an allusion to white people who self-identify as black (posting on this blog here).

The NYT Book Review‘s interview on Sunday (the 2nd) was with the author Juan Gabriel Vásquez. Early on, we get:

Who is your favorite novelist of all time?

Yes, who indeed? The post of Favorite Novelist has been filled in my world by Flaubert, Joyce, Faulkner, Conrad…. Right now it’s probably a creature of my invention called Tolstoyevsky: a great Russian who is able to write battle scenes as well as conflicts of the soul, whose astonishing eye for detail is matched by his great gift for making people talk, and who is second to none in describing the crossroads between the public life (history, politics) and the private existence of individuals.

The perfect cross between Tolstoy and Dostoevsky.

I don’t usually post about portmanteaus that have come past me. There are so many of them. But this one struck me as an especially apt creation.

Caught yesterday on KFJC’s Norman Bates Memorial Soundtrack Show: the audio of the trailer for the astounding movie Mant!, a tale of the horror caused when radiation from an atomic bomb affects both a man and an ant, yielding a — OMG! — half-man half-ant.

Watch the trailer here:

This movie trailer is inside the movie Matinee. From Wikipedia:

Matinee is a 1993 period comedy film directed by Joe Dante. It is a ensemble piece about a William Castle-type independent filmmaker, with the home front in the Cuban Missile Crisis as a backdrop. The film stars John Goodman, with Cathy Moriarty, Simon Fenton, Omri Katz, Lisa Jakub, Robert Picardo, and Kellie Martin. A then-unknown Naomi Watts has a small role as a character in a film within the film.

In Key West, Florida in 1962, boys Gene Loomis (Fenton) and his brother Dennis (Lee) live on a military base (N.A.S. Key West); their father is away on a nearby submarine. After hearing the announcement of an exclusive engagement of Lawrence Woolsey’s (Goodman) new sensational horror film Mant! (“Half man! Half ant!” “in Atomo-Vision and Rumble-Rama!”), including Woolsey’s appearance in-person, they arrive home to President Kennedy’s television interruption, stating the presence of Soviet missiles in Cuba. Woolsey finds this atmosphere of fear to be the perfect environment in which to open his atomic-radiation-themed film.

Goodman as Woolsey intones:

I feel I should warn you. The story of Mant! is based on scientific fact, on theories that have appeared in national magazines.

Yes, appeared in national magazines, so they must be true.  Run, screaming. Now!

(I don’t know how I missed this in 1962. Though that was a very busy year for me, going from Princeton to MIT.)

About William Castle, from Wikipedia:

William Castle (April 24, 1914 – May 31, 1977) was an American film director, producer, screenwriter, and actor.

Orphaned at 11, Castle dropped out of high school at 15 to work in the theater. He came to the attention of Columbia Pictures for his talent for promotion, and was hired. He learned the trade of filmmaking and became a director, acquiring a reputation for the ability to churn out competent B-movies quickly and on budget. He eventually struck out on his own, producing and directing thrillers which, despite their low budgets, were effectively promoted with gimmicks, a trademark for which he is best known.

One of his gimmicks:

The Tingler (1959): Filmed in “Percepto”. The title character is a creature that attaches itself to the human spinal cord. It is activated by fright, and can only be destroyed by screaming. Castle purchased military surplus air-plane wing de-icers (consisting of vibrating motors) and had a crew travel from theatre to theatre attaching them to the underside of some of the seats (in that era, a movie did not necessarily open on the same night nationwide). In the finale, one of the creatures supposedly gets loose in the movie theatre itself. The buzzers were activated as the film’s star, Vincent Price, warned the audience to “scream – scream for your lives!” [p. 17] Some sources incorrectly state the seats were wired to give electrical jolts. Filmmaker and Castle fan John Waters recounted in Spine Tingler! how, as a youngster, he would search for a seat that had been wired in order to enjoy the full effect.

xx

Heavy advertisement on cable tv for the summer-end event Shweekend (Shark Weekend — somehow, sharks provoke portmanteaus) on the Discovery Channel.

(#1)

(The poster plays on the film title Sharknado 3: Oh Hell No!)

The press release, in extravagant ad-talk (including significant doses of ALL-CAPS):

This July, Discovery’s SHARK WEEK returned bigger than ever before, blowing the competition out of the water and making a splash as the highest-rated SHARK WEEK in the event’s 28 year history. And because viewers can’t get enough of all things shark, for the first time ever, Discovery will introduce SHWEEKEND, a special weekend of all-new SHARK WEEK programming on Saturday, August 29 and Sunday, August 30, officially making 2015 the “Summer of the Shark.”

SHWEEKEND will feature four all-new SHARK WEEK programs throughout the weekend, delivering even more compelling and jaw-dropping shark stories and never-before-seen shark technology. SHWEEKEND programming includes: MythBusters vs. Jaws and Shark Alley on Saturday, August 29; and Air Jaws: Ring of Death and Still Alive: Shark Surprise on Sunday, August 30.

(In earlier years, Discovery’s Shark Week offerings sometimes veered uncomfortably towards sensational fiction, in the direction of the SyFy channel’s monster flicks, but recently the channel has been sticking more closely to science, but breathlessly presented.)

Now I turn to a review of shark-related postings on this blog, starting in 2009. Every so often I’ll take off on a tangent suggested by one of these postings.

1. From “Over the top” of 2/26/09, a reference to jumping the shark

Tangent: jumping the shark. From Wikipedia:

Jumping the shark is an idiom created by Jon Hein that was used to describe the moment in the evolution of a television show when it begins a decline in quality, signaled by a particular scene, episode, or aspect of a show in which the writers use some type of gimmick in an attempt to keep viewers’ interest, which is taken as a sign of desperation, and is seen by viewers to be the point at which the show strayed irreparably from its original premise. The phrase is based on a scene from a fifth-season episode of the sitcom Happy Days when the character Fonzie [played by Henry Winkler] jumps over a shark while on water-skis.

The usage of “jump the shark” has subsequently broadened beyond television, indicating the moment when a brand, design, franchise or creative effort’s evolution declines.

(#2)

Happy Days is an American sitcom that aired first-run from January 15, 1974, to September 24, 1984, on ABC. The show was originally based on a segment from ABC’s Love American Style titled “Love And The Happy Day” featuring Ron Howard and 3 future cast members. Created by Garry Marshall, the series presents an idealized vision of life in the mid-1950s to mid-1960s United States. (Wikipedia link)

2. “Riffing and ripping on poetry” of 5/13/11, a Zippy with a shark-headed surfer dude

3. “Proud to be an American” of 2/12/12, a reference to the Sharks and Jets in West Side Story

Tangent: The musical and the movie. From Wikipedia:

West Side Story is an American musical [from 1957, with a movie adaptation in 1961] with a book by Arthur Laurents, music by Leonard Bernstein, libretto/lyrics by Stephen Sondheim, and conception and choreography by Jerome Robbins. It was inspired by William Shakespeare’s play Romeo and Juliet.

The story is set in the Upper West Side neighborhood in New York City in the mid-1950s, an ethnic, blue-collar neighborhood. (In the early 1960s much of the neighborhood would be cleared in an urban renewal project for the Lincoln Center, changing the neighborhood’s character.) The musical explores the rivalry between the Jets and the Sharks, two teenage street gangs of different ethnic backgrounds. The members of the Sharks, from Puerto Rico, are taunted by the Jets, a Caucasian gang.

(#3)

From the movie: Sharks on the left, Jets on the right

4. “Ben Cohen” of 2/27/12, on the former rugby player (and now sometime model, shown shirtless in this posting), who retired from playing for the Sale Sharks (in Greater Manchester) in May 2007

Tangent: shark names for sports teams. Not as common as you might think, but here’s a selection, starting with the team most likely to be known by Americans:

San Jose (CA) Sharks (hockey)
(#4)
Worcester (MA) Sharks (hockey)
Bucks County (PA) Sharks (rugby league)
Sale (Greater Manchester) Sharks (rugby league)
Cronulla-Sutherland (New South Wales) Sharks (rugby league)
(#5)
The Sharks (KwaZulu-Natal, South Africa) (rugby league)
Wilmington (NC) Sharks (baseball)
Jupiter (FL) Hammerheads (baseball)
Clearwater (FL) Threshers (baseball)
Rochester (NY) RazorSharks (basketball)
Shanghai (China) Sharks (basketball)
New York Sharks (women’s football)
Jacksonville (FL) Sharks (arena football)
Clark Sports Center (Cooperstown NY) Sharks (swim team)

5/6. “More dubious portmanteaus” of 7/17/12 and “Today’s dubious portmanteau” of 1/9/13, both referring to portmanteaus that are just for ostentatious display, e.g., Piranhaconda, Sharktopus

7. “bat-, -mobile, and -man” of 8/9/13, with bat-shark repellent bat-spray (in the tv series Batman)

8. “Odds and ends 8/18/13” of 8/18/13, section #1 on monster portmanteaus, especially from Roger Corman for the SyFy channel (note: not the Discovery Channel): Dinocroc, Supergator, Piranhaconda, Sharktopus, Pteracuda; plus some produced by imitators, Sharknado for instance

9. “Portmanteau fashion” of 9/6/13, on the question of whether there is a current fashion for portmanteaus in pop culture, as evidenced by cronut, Sharknado, and more

10. “Bunnies run amok” of 7/5/14, on the “natural horror” genre of movies; with a very long list of shark movies, including the Shark Attack films (featuring genetically enhanced great white sharks)

11. “Shark!: of 1/24/15: a Calvin and Hobbes with a snow shark; Jaws; the land shark on SNL; the tv show Street Sharks; the movies Sand Sharks and Snow Shark

12. “Back to edible penises” of 3/19/15, with a passing reference to gummi sharks

13. “Today’s POP” of 4/10/15, a New Yorker cartoon with the phrasal overlap portmanteau student loan shark

Tangent: loan sharks and the film Loan Shark. Wikipedia:

A loan shark is a person or body who offers loans at extremely high interest rates.

and more Wikipedia:

Loan Shark is a 1952 film noir directed by Seymour Friedman and starring George Raft, Dorothy Hart and Paul Stewart. An ex-con avenges his brother’s death by infiltrating vicious loan rackets.

(#6)

14. “Shark statues” of 7/4/15: shark sculptures, statuary, and figurines, including in a Zippy

15. “findependence” of 7/13/15: Jaws 2; Shark Week 2015 (July); the movie Megalodon; previous postings on sharkish matters (8/18/13, 7/5/14, 1/24/15), the Shark Wars books; the adjectives selachine and selachian (and squaline, squaloid, pistrine, pistrian)

16. “Jeri Ryan and Luke Perry and more” of 7/14/15: Ryan in the legal drama Shark (2006-08)

17. “Shirtless shark-fighting teens” of 7/26/15, on Ian Ziering in the Sharknado movies

Yesterday’s Zippy takes us through 15 television series, of an extraordinary variety:

The strip ends with a cute POP (phrasal overlap portmanteau), Playboy After Dark + Dark Shadows.

Two of these shows had short runs and might not be familiar to many readers:

Johnny Staccato is an American private detective series starring John Cassavetes which ran for 27 episodes on NBC from September 10, 1959 through March 24, 1960. (Wikipedia link)

Playboy After Dark is an American television show hosted by Hugh Hefner. It aired in syndication through Screen Gems from 1969 to 1970 (Wikiedia link)

(Mostly about men’s bodies and sexuality. But there’s some language stuff too.)

From Daily Jocks yesterday, a penetrating gaze:

(#1)

The accompanying copy (reproduced here without editing):

Go interstellar with the new Astro range from Teamm8!
The form enhancing briefs and trunks are made from cotton and elastane and feature a thick metalic waistband to give you support where you need it.
Featuring striking stars and geometrics, they are bound to be your next underwear draw favorite!

My caption, using this material:

Astronaut on earth, or the
Steely cruise of the Voltron Blaster

Anthony treasures his Astro time
In space, but now he
Revels in his career as the
Blaster, at $200 an hour,
Out or in.

Now there will be notes.

Note 1, on Teamm8. That’s “team mate”, Company site here. Underwear, swimwear, etc., seen with a gay eye, as here:

(#2)

Hey, he’s on sale.

Note 2, on rentboys. Like the Blaster. Or, maybe, the guy in #2. Discussion in this posting.

Note 3, on elastane. From Wikiedia:

Spandex, Lycra or elastane is a synthetic fiber known for its exceptional elasticity. It is stronger and more durable than natural rubber. It is a polyester-polyurethane copolymer that was invented in 1958 by chemist Joseph Shivers at DuPont’s Benger Laboratory in Waynesboro, Virginia. When introduced in 1962, it revolutionized many areas of the clothing industry.

The name “spandex” is an anagram of the word “expands”. It is the preferred name in North America; in continental Europe it is referred to by variants of “elastane” … and is known in the UK, Ireland, Portugal, Brazil, Argentina, Australia, New Zealand and Israel primarily as Lycra.

Spandex has come up a number of times in underwear postings on this blog, usually in nylon/spandex items, but I haven’t discussed the substance before.

Spandex items can be found on many sites, most notably the Spandexman site, which seems to specialize in unitards, wrestling singlets, and active tops and bottoms, sometimes decidedly playful, as in this selection of “fantasy unitards”:

(#3)

Note 4, on unitard. From NOAD2 on the word:

a tight-fitting one-piece garment of stretchable fabric that covers the body from the neck to the knees or feet. ORIGIN 1960s: from uni- ‘single’ + leotard

The word is a somewhat eccentric type of portmanteau.

Note 5, on underwear draw. Back to the ad copy.

You can find sites with draw underwear: from Cafe Press, referring to underwear with drawings on it; and from other sites, referring to underwear with drawstrings (that is, drawstring underwear). But in the ad copy, we’re faced with underwear draw, clearly a reduced variant of underwear drawer. And there are plenty of occurrences of this variant on the net, for instance here:

(#4)

Even speakers who are normally rhotic might well reduce drawer, especially in underwear drawer, since the context is heavy in instances of /r/, favoring what’s been called “r-dissimilation” (as in February and a substantial number of other words; see Nancy Hall’s paper on the subject, on her website).

The Wondermark of the 24th (Permalink here), with David Malki providing more sharp social / political commentary on attitudes about poverty, gender, and race:

Two linguistic points: the portmanteau fauxtopia, the plural poors.

fauxtopia. The made-up utopian past! The word compacts faux utopia into a single portmanteau word.

It’s been created by others, of course. Remarkably, an elaborate invented land, with a complex website of its own. From Ray Kampf’s Fauxtopia Dedication of 4/1/04:

To all who come to this fictitious place: WELCOME.

Fauxtopia is your land. Here, age relives distorted memories of the past, and here, youth may savor the challenge of trying to understand the present. Fauxtopia is made up of the ideals, the dreams and the fuzzy facts which have re-created reality… with the hope that it will be a source of edutainment for all the world.

Compare my Gayland, the fantasy land of gay male porn, which I’ve posted about here many times.

poors. I don’t recall having seen a plural of the nouning poor (as in the poor ‘poor people’), but there are a fair number of uses on the net that seem to be from native speakers of English. For instance:

[Jezebel] Whole Foods Is Opening a Lower Cost Store Just For Poors (link)

[Gawker] OK GOP Very Sorry You Misread Their Post Comparing Poors to Wild Animals (link)

[Wonkette] Bobby Jindal Sticks It To Planned Parenthood By Screwing The Poors (link)

I suspect that poors arises from attempts to “fix” the nouning poor, which is plural in both sense and syntax, but lacks an inflectional mark of the plural (that is, it’s a species of “zero plural”).