a wrong turn down wrong and broken street to wrongville

some random Friday thoughts about things that are just not quite right:

- The methodology used to identify our best and brightest for the purpose of bestowing Australia's highest honour.

- The reasons given by jurors in explaining their verdict on the Jackson trial:

"I disliked it intensely when she snapped her fingers at us. That's when I thought, don't snap your fingers at me lady!"*

- The word ethnic, used as a noun.** This story came from a friend of mine, who worked at quite a nice cafe. One day this lady called up because she'd found a hair in her cake. She said to my friend:

"I'm not quite sure how to say this - but [in a confiding tone] do you have any ethnics working for you?"

- The discrepancy between the actual v dictionary meaning of the word moist. It is difficult to put your finger on why, but moist is one of the dirtiest words in the English language. I have verified this observation with a lot of people, who all agree. Unless you wanted to (a) bring a level of innuendo to a conversation which is otherwise absent or (b) sexually harass people in a subtle way, there is no way you'd ever say, for example "Gee - it's shaping up to be a moist weekend".

* Thanks to Jo from Freeway 9, who pointed out that this seemed like kind of an odd reason to acquit.
** Generally speaking, ethnic seems to be used in a vaguely pejorative way (think: ethnic tensions). But the adjectival form tends to be slightly less offensive.