LOCKS AND BAGEL Houdini decided to postpone his escape. He took a RAIN CHECK for his CHAIN WRECK. What’s so funny about this? This is a kind of sophisticated spoonerism. First of all, you have to know who Houdini was - the photo itself won’t really tell you. Secondly, you need to know what a “rain check” is. Without this information, you don’t stand a chance. Let’s start with Houdini. He was a world famous magician and escape artist who lived in the early part of the 20th Century. He was so famous that his very name has become a generic term for “magician.” He was most famous for his escapes and he claimed that there wasn’t a lock made that he couldn’t pick, or open, without a key. They buried him in a coffin in the ground and wrapped the coffin in locks and chains. The photo you see here is Houdini before he was lowered into a glass tank full of water. In all these cases, not only did he have to break free and wreck his chains, but he had to do so fast enough not to drown or suffocate. But this is a spoonerism after all so let’s look at the words involved. “Chain wreck” I’m sure you can figure out. If you spoonerize it, you get. “rain check”. Here’s a good explanation of the origins of the term: The literal sense of rain check, which is an Americanism, was first found in the 1880s in reference to a baseball game. The practice of giving a rain check to a ticketholder was formalized in 1890 in the constitution of the National League. In other words, if it rained (something the purchaser had no influence over) and the game was postponed, the ticket holder could come back for another game, by showing the ticket stub. Over time, “rain check” has come to mean any postponement to a future undetermined date. So why did Houdini postpone his escape? Maybe he was just hungry and needed fresh lox for his bagel? And THAT’s what’s so funny! https://audioboo.fm/boos/2330427-locks-and-bagel
Posted on: Wed, 16 Jul 2014 17:22:10 +0000
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