The Banter Thread / Banter Topic / Sean Bean

[Adrock]

Tyson and Polanski, I think.

[Lebowski]

Ah tyson forgot about him, didnt know about the other guy.

[Hohum]

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-england-york-north-yorkshire-11609438

This bit made me laugh:

The images were taken from a Facebook page, which Mr Gardner said was a "total violation of my privacy".

What a prat.

[randombs]

Asked why he had chosen to wear the Nazi-style uniform, Mr Gardner said: "It's one of those situations, you had to be there."

[Kieran76]

I do have a little sympathy for him to be honest. Dressing up as Hitler and getting drunk isn't the worst thing in the world is it? I would like to think that people would not jump to the conclusion that dressing up as somebody for a fancy dress party is the same as idolising or supporting them. If he dressed up as Stalin would he have been suspended?

[prinnysquad]

Uncle Joe was on our side, man!

[randombs]

On the Wright Stuff one morning, Matthew was talking about the Nazi salute and how doing it is taking the piss out of them rather than glorifying them(assuming the person who does it is doing it to take the piss out of them, of course) and so should not be so controversial. I think he did it himself to make his point.

[charlesr]

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-scotland-highlands-islands-11610817

HMS Astute runs aground. Ooops.

[toythatkills]

You know how you take language for granted, but sometimes you type something and it triggers something and makes you think "actually, that's mental."

Why is a tea towel called a tea towel?

[noobish hat]

Because they were originally used to dry tea pots. Not particularly mental.

[toythatkills]

Well no, can't you make up something more exciting instead?

[randombs]

It was originally called a tea trowel. Extremely poor people without access to suitable containers to drink tea from would wrap their palms with towels and the tea would be poured onto these. The word trowel in this case is due to the cup-like shape of the towel-covered hands full of tea.

The term 'tea trowel' was used out of necessity, as 'tea towel' had already become slang for a specific type of sexual service rendered under cover of darkness(hence, towel) during the early 1800's when the legality of prostitution was being brought into question.

By the late 1800's, prostitution had been declared illegal(initially in Wales and Scunthorpe, but later spreading rightwards and upwards across the country) and, coupled with the new 'hippie' movement sweeping Walthamstow, drove the slang meaning out of circulation and so 'tea towel' became the standard term.

[prinnysquad]

They used to be made from the feathers of a nocturnal bird of prey shaped like a tit.

A Teat Owl

[noobish hat]

Back in the olden days, before cups were invented (but after teapots), there was no way to transfer tea from the pot to people's mouths. You couldn't drink directly from the pot, because that would have been vulgar and you would have to have been shot. Lord Fossington Towel of Cambridgeshire, on the verge of bankruptcy from the crippling health care fees he was having to pay out for his maids, who were constantly scolding themselves, carrying boiling hot tea around in their hands, decided to develop a rudimentary fabric-based tea delivery system. What he came up with is a rectangular stretch of "Towel", which could absorb tea from the pot, and then be wrung out at a later date, perchance into the gaping mouth of one's houseguests. Of course, the advent of revolutionary cup technology in the late 1980s rendered towel sucking all but obsolete, the humble tea towel is still with us, though its origins may be forgotten.

Edit: I see Bilal has heard some mangled version of this story, doubtless through some kind of Chinese-whispers style urban legending, but he seems woefully misinformed about the full truth of the matter.

[randombs]

That'll teach me to get my learning from Wikipedia!