When I was a kid, “You berk” was a common mild rebuke.
Yesterday, I learned it’s not so mild
@urlyman My (Canadian) mother who does not swear picked up "berk" from British TV.
It was quite the amazing conversation when I explained to her what it meant.
She no longer uses it.
…Over the course of my life we’ve gotten much better at counting what we’re doing.
Making us so much more aware of numbers going down on things that should not go down (e.g. biodiversity, job security)
and going up on things that ought to go down (e.g. GHG emissions)
or would probably be better if they were not a thing at all (e.g. plastics).
Compute computing comparison to produce an ever larger compendium of incompetence.
Which seems perhaps to make us a bunch of counts, or berks ☝️
…The counting is mounting:
Things are heating up in Berk-shire and where the Berkeley Hunt took place (Gloucestershire).
But getting most uncomfortable in London 🥵
@urlyman that's practically punctuation around here. Only they don't bother with the rhyming slang 😯
@urlyman as a bonus, the rough Viking island in the kid media franchise How to Train Your Dragon is called "Berk".
As the author of the original book is British I'm sure it's not a coincidence (although it's best she'd be as surprised as you) 😁
@urlyman Rhyming slang, that is.
If you watch Only Fools and Horse, Rodney uses 'berk' pronounced 'bark' quite a bit.
@urlyman I learnt recently that cobblers is rhyming slang also.
Short for cobbler's awls.
@lydiaconwell I thank you for dangling that in front of me
@urlyman Rhyming slang, that is.
