guilty pleasures

guilty pleasures are things that a person enjoys even though they might be frowned upon, negative or embarrassing.

street tacos are a guilty pleasure for almost everybody in mexico.

nobody will confuse flash gordon with the avengers or the dark knight, but i like it; in particular brian blessed‘s performance as prince vultan, the lord of the bird people. the soundtrack by queen is also perfect.

at:55 vultan says “oh, well, who wants to live forever?” and then yells “die!” a bunch of times as he attacks and kills the enemy.

i don’t watch a lot of reality tv, but i have seen almost every episode of flavor of love.  if they remake flash gordon, flava should be considered for the part of vultan.

tight organization

a question on this post asked for more examples of how tight is used to describe something that is well organized. organizations are commonly referred to as tight when they are well-run.

tight operation is widely used as well.

for example, tight operation is one of the chapters in the game max payne and early in this video of the game the title character says “the mercenaries were running a tight operation, paper work and all”.

also costco , the wholesale membership warehouse chain, reports this on their uk website 

according to jim sinegal, the company’s group chief executive officer, “we run a tight operation with extremely low overhead which enables us to pass on dramatic savings to our members.” 

tight ship is an expression that means the same thing. like the title of this stephen and damian marley song

or the 7-eleven convenience store chain. 7-eleven president and ceo joe depinto appeared in an episode of the reality show undercover boss.  the bbc entertainment website that promotes the show describes him like this

[he] runs a tight ship. joe is a no-nonsense former military man determined to make his company run as efficiently as possible.

that guy gettting ready to clean the bathroom is actually the ceo of the company

tight bodies & muscles

in response to a question from a previous post, here are some other examples of how to use the adjective tight when referring to the body or specific muscles or body parts.

a search for the idiom tight bodies on-line will produce gyms and fitness centers, but it will produce more examples of sexy media or porn.

tight is used with some muscles to indicate well-toned, especially…

tight abs (abdominal muscles)

and for a man tight pecs (pectorals:chest muscles).

it’s strange, but in addition to well-toned, tight can be used to describe muscles that are stiff (not sufficeintly stretched out).

a lot of bench pressing can lead to tight pecs.

tight glutes (gluteals: buttocks) also refers to muscularity but searching tight ass on-line will lead to sex-related sites as will tight pussy (vagina), obviously.

tight ass can also be used to refer to someone who cannot relax or is stingy (extremely conservative spending money).

in lazy town he’s known as stingy for being such a tight ass

south park f word

the f-word episode of south park is full of info previously addressed on richyrocks.com.

the f-word in the title is not fuck but faggot, frequently abbreviated as fag. today the word is most commonly used as an offensive insult to homosexuals, but at 9:50 in the episode a group of bikers gather around a dictionary to discuss the meanings that the word faggot has had over time.

u guys know that everyone thinks you’re total fags, right?

at 3:00, after cartman confronts and insults the harley riders, one biker defends how the group acts by answering we roll how we roll.

at 5:35 the kids of south park are in a meeting trying to determine what to do about the harley problem.  stan observes that nobody is willing to do anything and jimmy says “i have had it with those loud, annoying faggots”.

left to right: token, kenny, kyle, stan, cartman & jimmy

finally at 15:00, convinced by testimony from stan, kyle and cartman, the mayor of south park has signed a city ordinance that changes the meaning of the word fag to annoying, inconsiderate harley riders. the mayor tells the boys that she should’ve never listened to their ideas becuase fag still means homosexual in the dictionary and activists across the country are criticizing her action.  the boys vow to help the mayor by working to get the dictionary definition changed.

despite what happens at the end of the f-word, it’s probably not really a good idea to yell “fags!” at a gang of harley riders

SPOILER ALERT!!!!:  the conclusion of the episode is an embracing of the term fag by the harley riders, a call to action for americans to call them fags, and a change to the definition in the dictionary.

tight & loose (not lose)

loose and lose are frequently confused.

the s in lose sounds like a z.  lose is the opposite of win, and loser is a common insult, like in this video by beck

loose means free, not restricting or binding.  it is used in expressions like on the loose, stay loose (relax, don’t get nervous), let loose (get a little crazy) , loose affiliation,  and loose lips (to refer to someone who can’t keep a secret).

paul simon‘s song the boy in the bubble is a description of modern life on planet earth. at 2:35 the lyrics say

these are the days of lasers in the jungle, lasers in the jungle somewhere

staccato signals of constant information, a loose affiliation of millionaires & billionaires                                                                                                                                                                                                     

a loose-fitting dress

tight is the opposite of loose. it can be used to describe well developed body parts or the human body in general, something that is well organized, or two friends who are very close.  some typical expressions are tight security (difficult access), a tight schedule (very busy) and a tight ship (disciplined).

 tight-fitting shorts on tight asses

when george clooney says “damn, we’re in a tight spot” several times in this scene from o brother where art thou the idea is that he and his companions are in a difficult position.

a tight squeeze means there isn’t enough space.

in twilight edward tells bella to hold on tight before they fly to the top of a tree.

walmart bribes in mexico

for the past week there has been extensive media coverage of $24 million that walmart paid in bribes to speed up construction of stores in mexico.

walmart is mexico’s biggest private sector employer

a bribe is a quantity of money paid to get around what is legally required.

this article about an on-line petition against walmart contains examples of the noun bribe

wal-mart is alleged to have paid out $24 million in bribes to mexican officials

the verb bribe

venanzi luna, a walmart employee who has worked for the company for 7 years and is a company shareholder is behind the  petition. “i am angry that top walmart executives are reported to have bribed public officials in mexico”

and the noun bribery which is the act of paying a bribe

wal-mart did not respond when asked about luna’s petition. but the company has spoken out since the bribery story was first reported by the ny times last saturday.

this blogspot is about bribes, not brides

shareholders or investors in the company also appears multiple times

in the first six hours the petition was available online it was signed by more than 2,900 shareholders and employees.

hindsight is 20/20

hindsight is perspective on something after it happens.  it is commonly said that  hindsight is 20/20 which means it’s easy to be right after the fact.  20/20 is a measurement that indicates perfect vision.

captain hindsight at the bp gulf oil spill

the coon 2 episode of animated comedy series south park has a character called captain hindsight who arrives to the scene of emergencies and gives advice on what people should have done to prevent accidents.

south park’s writers are using captain hindsight to make fun of the media and the public for expressing anger and suggesting solutions when it’s too late, and there are several great examples of should in the past (third conditional) used to indicate that somebody made a mistake.

south park super heroes coon and friends

at 4:10 captain hindsight tells observers at a fire that the building’s constructors should’ve built fire escapes for the windows on the higher floors.

at 9:00 captain hindsight arrives to the bp gulf oil spill and tells people on the beach that bp shouldn’t have drilled in that deep of water.

at 10:40 he advises environmental workers that they should have used a non-bleaching cleanser to clean off the dolphins.

at 10:45 the writers make a joke about another pop culture scandal when captain hindsight tells a police commissioner that brett favre never should have sent actual pictures of his schlong (penis).

we’re sorry

at 11:35 in an apologetic announcement bp ceo tony hayward tells consumers that the oil spill is a tragedy that never should have happened.

supposed sex photos of captain hindsight and courtney love

and at 16:45 captain hindsight is a victim of coon and friends who blackmail him with sex photos.  his response is that he shouldn’t have drank that much, shouldn’t have mixed alcohols and should have never gotten around courtney love and a camera.

had it vs been had

the expressions had it & been had are both most commonly used in the present perfect tense (and thus based on the participle had), but have very different meanings.

had it is used to show extreme frustration or irritation. the most famous line from the movie snakes on a plane is a great example

i’ve had it with these motherfuckin snakes on this motherfuckin plane

 

been had indicates that someone has been tricked or deceived.

in the biographical movie malcom x set in the 1960s the title character gives a speech in harlem (new york city) about the racism black people confront. he describes how the white man pacifies harlem residents with politics, drugs & prostitution and he concludes his speech emphasizing the white man’s deceptive nature (at 1:58) by telling the audience you’ve been had

towers or towels?

enrique peña nieto is currently leading in the polls to be mexico’s next president.

pound it with the next president, kid

he has been campaigning  that he knows how to make a committment and how to get things done based on his six years as governor of the state of mexico.

a mama dinosaur & her baby used to mark the entrance to toluca  

one of the things he got done here in toluca, the capital of the state of mexico, was to remove the puerta tollotzin (pictured above), a monument that resembled two abstract giraffes or dinosaurs but was actually a pre-columbian timepiece that marked one of the entrances to toluca from mexico city.

cooler than puerta tollotizin?

puerta tollotzin was replaced by a more modern-looking construction named the bicentennial towers (torres bicentenario) in honor of 200 years of mexican independence.

bicentennial towels?

since 2010 the bicentennial towers have contributed to a common mistake that english learners in toluca make because the towers kind of look like two big towels being twisted to extract liquid.

u can see a shot of the bicentennial towers in my tribute video to toluca.

is castro a badass?

earlier this month florida marlins manager ozzie guillen made this controversial statement

i respect fidel castro.  you know why? a lot of people have wanted to kill him for the last 60 years but that mother fucker is still here.

ya sé. my bad. no more political commentary.

the marlins play in miami which has a significant cuban population and many of the cubans who live in miami escaped from castro’s dictatorship.  for this reason, the florida marlins and major league baseball have distanced themselves from and criticized guillen’s comment. guillen has apologized extensively, and served a 5-game suspension.

castro with major league baseball comissioner bud selig (far left) and baltimore orioles owner peter angelos (next to castro) in 1999

this article detailing comedian bill maher‘s commentary about the controversy on his show real time last week contains a great example of the expression badass which means cool, tough or talented

castro’s longevity in the face of over five decades of attempts on his life make him a “badass.”

as dictator, castro frequently showed up to games and batted whenever he wanted

and also has a nice example of the word odds, which has been discussed recently here on richyrocks.com

despite all odds and all logic, castro still draws breath