A tribute to Ogden Nash

My sense of humour has likely been partly shaped by the wacky nonsense verses and aphorisms of the American humorist and poet Ogden Nash (1902-1971). My two girls (one turned 33 today, the other will be 30 in May) have not been spared, for better or for verse.

One early "indoctrination", when the girls were little, was this Nashian creation:

The one-l lama is a priest
The two-ll llama is a beast
I bet you a silk pyjama
There isn't any three-l lllama.

Here are another two examples, but I don't think I had told my children about them:

I think I shall never see
A billboard lovely as a tree.
Perhaps, unless the billboards fall
I'll never see a tree at all!

Candy
is dandy
But liquor
is quicker

If you are intrigued by what other clever stuff Nash dreamt up, just Google his name. You might as well check out Edward Lear too. He's famous for "The Owl and the Pussycat" and other nonsense poems and stories.

Back to Nash. Here are some of his well-known aphorisms:

A door is what a dog is perpetually on the wrong side of.
Middle age is when you've met so many people that every new person you meet reminds you of someone else.
People who work sitting down get paid more than people who work standing up.
Progress might have been all right once, but it has gone on too long.

I have also taken liberties with some favouirite children's stories, for example:

Ali Baba and the four tea thieves
Jack and the beans talk

Finally, this family has mangled songs. Given that I am also guilty of teaching my kids the meaning of the word "scatology" when they were young, the "decomposition" of the chorus of an old song below (their grandma actually helped on this one) is self-explanatory if you know the Malay words inserted.

By the light, of the silvery moon,

Kenching, kentut, berak, chaybok

I want to spoon,

To my honey I'll croon love's tune.

Kenching, kentut, berak, chaybok

Honey moon, keep a-shinin' in June.

Kenching, kentut, berak, chaybok

Your silv'ry beams will bring love's dreams,

We'll be cuddlin' soon,

Kenching, kentut, berak, chaybok

By the silvery moon.

Postscript: Thanks Nick, for your anecdote about Truman and MacArthur, referring to yesterday's posting.