this post was submitted on 01 Sep 2023
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Showerthoughts

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A "Showerthought" is a simple term used to describe the thoughts that pop into your head while you're doing everyday things like taking a shower, driving, or just daydreaming. The most popular seem to be lighthearted clever little truths, hidden in daily life.

Here are some examples to inspire your own showerthoughts:

Rules

  1. All posts must be showerthoughts
  2. The entire showerthought must be in the title
  3. No politics
    • If your topic is in a grey area, please phrase it to emphasize the fascinating aspects, not the dramatic aspects. You can do this by avoiding overly politicized terms such as "capitalism" and "communism". If you must make comparisons, you can say something is different without saying something is better/worse.
    • A good place for politics is c/politicaldiscussion
  4. Posts must be original/unique
  5. Adhere to Lemmy's Code of Conduct and the TOS

If you made it this far, showerthoughts is accepting new mods. This community is generally tame so its not a lot of work, but having a few more mods would help reports get addressed a little sooner.

Whats it like to be a mod? Reports just show up as messages in your Lemmy inbox, and if a different mod has already addressed the report, the message goes away and you never worry about it.

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[–] [email protected] 107 points 2 years ago (4 children)

If you're up for something, or down for something, it means the same thing.

If you fill in a form or fill out a form, it means the same thing.

English is fucked.

[–] [email protected] 20 points 2 years ago (1 children)

Think about filling in a form, though. Filling in a form—“to fill” is unambiguous. In/out isn’t even necessary when you think about it. “I’m going to fill a form” means the same thing too.

[–] [email protected] 10 points 2 years ago

I feel like you're technically correct, but saying "fill a form" just sounds weird to a native English speaker.

[–] [email protected] 13 points 2 years ago

The alarm went off, so I turned it off.

[–] [email protected] 11 points 2 years ago (1 children)

Also try this inflammable table with flammable chairs.

[–] [email protected] 2 points 2 years ago

I hate this one, it confuses Dutch people from time to time, so they think “inflammable” means “fire resistant”.

Extra scary when there's only an English-language warning on this

[–] [email protected] 11 points 2 years ago

Don't forget you might already be in the right place and don't need to go up or down. Then you can say you're "there for something"

[–] [email protected] 62 points 2 years ago (1 children)

I guess fat chance is said sarcastically.

[–] [email protected] 31 points 2 years ago (3 children)

I've never not heard it said sarcastically.

[–] [email protected] 11 points 2 years ago (2 children)

There are words and phrases in English that get used sarcastically so often they lose their original meaning. There is a word for this and I swear I've seen a whole list somewhere but my google fu is weak today.

[–] [email protected] 2 points 2 years ago (1 children)
[–] [email protected] 6 points 2 years ago* (last edited 2 years ago) (2 children)

No - semantic satiation is when you read or hear a word so much in a short timeframe that it stops feeling like a real word, and briefly feels like just a jumble of letters/sounds.

[–] [email protected] 4 points 2 years ago

I hate semantic satiation. It happens all the time while programming for me. I'll have a variable name with some common word and, after typing it a few times my brain just stops recognizing it as a real word. This sometimes sends me into etymology dives to figure out why the word "jump" (or whatever) looks so strange.

[–] [email protected] 1 points 2 years ago

Row•ads, that is a freaky word

[–] GarytheSnail 6 points 2 years ago

There's a fat chance you're gonna be eating those words.

[–] [email protected] 0 points 2 years ago* (last edited 2 years ago) (5 children)

Now, I expect to be down voted.

I don't care, but I'm going to piss a lot of people off.

I say "I could care less".

That's sarcasm. It's what my nineties, heroin chic, grunge music adolescence gave me.

I could care less. It would just require that I make an effort. That's not caring less. That's caring about something.

It's like how the biggest homophobes always seem to be closeted. They care too much.

[–] [email protected] 11 points 2 years ago (1 children)

You think "could care less" is actually legit? Fat chance!

[–] [email protected] 4 points 2 years ago

You think it isn’t? Slim chance!

[–] [email protected] 6 points 2 years ago

I remember we used to say “like I could care less” sarcastically back in the late 80s. I moved to a non-English speaking country in ‘89 so I have no idea when “I could care less” shifted from sarcasm to incorrect grammar, but I was surprised the first time I encountered people online mention it as a grammatical pet peeve.

[–] [email protected] 3 points 2 years ago

With you 100%

[–] [email protected] 1 points 2 years ago

I only down voted you, so you'd be right 👍

[–] [email protected] 27 points 2 years ago (2 children)

You can make profit on and profit off

[–] [email protected] 7 points 2 years ago (1 children)

I could build on your point or build off of it.

[–] [email protected] 2 points 2 years ago

But if you’re hardly working, you’re not working hard.

[–] [email protected] 6 points 2 years ago

Alarms can go off and be turned off

[–] [email protected] 21 points 2 years ago (1 children)

Yup. And one means it via sarcasm.

[–] [email protected] 9 points 2 years ago

Yeah, with this argument, "excellent" and "terrible" means the same thing.

[–] [email protected] 15 points 2 years ago

one is just said sarcastically

[–] [email protected] 12 points 2 years ago

Fun fact: awful and awesome used to be synonyms

[–] [email protected] 9 points 2 years ago

Antiautonyms! https://people.sc.fsu.edu/~jburkardt/fun/wordplay/antiauto.html

Or contronyms. I don’t funny understand the delineation between the two.

[–] [email protected] 5 points 2 years ago

I've always loved Mace Windu telling someone "your chances come in two sizes: slim and fat" in an old Star Wars Novell called Shatterpoint.

[–] [email protected] 2 points 2 years ago

Fat chance is a sarcastic phrase, so they don't actually have the same literal meaning

[–] [email protected] 1 points 2 years ago