Date: Wed, 18 Aug 2004 16:54:41 -0400
From: "Michael Walsh" <MJW at press.jhu.edu>
To: <WSFAlist at WSFA.org>
Subject: [WSFA] Re: How Odd . . .
Reply-To: WSFA members <WSFAlist at WSFA.org>

> sgs at aginc.net 8/18/04 4:44:21 PM >>>
>Michael Walsh wrote:
>
>>>From the UK, the Diagram Prize for Oddest Title, some
>nominees:
>>
>>>From the publisher that brough the world: Psoriasis at Your
>Fingertips
>> and Acne at Your Fingertips, a new addition: Sexual Health
>at . . .,
>> ahem, yes.  Moving right along . . . .
>>
>> Detecting Foreign Bodies in Food
>> Bombproof Your Horse
>> The Aesthetics of the Japanese Lunchbox
>> Ethereal Packet Sniffing
>> Applications of High Tech Squids
>> The Woodworker's Joint Book
>>
>> I just report 'em, I don't explain 'em.
>>
>> mjw
>
>Spooky.  Three of them actually make sense.
>
>For those who care, "Ethereal" is a computer program for
>packet sniffing
>(yes, that's a real technical term) and a SQUID is a
>"superconducting
>quantum interference device".  Woodworkers make a lot of
>joints; the
>phrasing is just interesting (like "at your fingertips").
>
>It's fun, of course, to speculate on how (and why) one would
>bombproof a
>horse.  I suspect that it would make the horse nervous.

Actually, the opposite.  The subtitle of the book is:

Teach Your Horse to Be Confident, Obedient, and Safe No Matter What You
Encounter

As with the three books you mentioned,  technical lingo will usually go
right over the head of the non-specialist, while meaning much to the
specialist . . . like Squids.

Nonetheless, book titles stripped of context are amusing.

In 1996 Johns Hopkins published this - and no, it wasn't a blank book:

Holding the Line: The Telephone in Old Order Mennonite and Amish Life.

mjw

>
>--
>Steve Smith                                           sgs at aginc.net
>Agincourt Computing                            http://www.aginc.net
>"Truth is stranger than fiction because fiction has to make
>sense."
>