# Baking Purple, Gerald Became Oblique **URL:** \ **Category:** Factual Questions\ **Created:** [August 23, 2002, 3:18am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/baking-purple-gerald-became-oblique/125169 "2002-08-23T03:18:04Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 9\ **Page:** 1
**Author:** ![scarabus](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/ec9cab/32.png) [@scarabus](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/scarabus)\ **Post date:** [August 23, 2002, 3:18am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/baking-purple-gerald-became-oblique/125169/1 "2002-08-23T03:18:04Z")
I saw the above on a licence plate in San Francisco. Does anyone have the slightest ides what it means or refers to? ---
**Author:** ![peasea](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/p/bc79bd/32.png) [@peasea](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/peasea)\ **Post date:** [August 23, 2002, 3:32am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/baking-purple-gerald-became-oblique/125169/2 "2002-08-23T03:32:59Z")
This was on a license plate? California? Was there any picture or anything with it? Did you mean bumper sticker? ---
**Author:** ![EmbarrassingDad](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/embarrassingdad/32/5441_2.png) [@EmbarrassingDad](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/EmbarrassingDad)\ **Post date:** [August 23, 2002, 6:38am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/baking-purple-gerald-became-oblique/125169/3 "2002-08-23T06:38:14Z")
This is interesting. My guess is that it’s an anagram of _something_. I even downloaded some anagram tools but… ugh. Here are a few of the “better” ones 😃 Bugger! No able equipped blackmailer! Crap! unequalled, improbable, big geek. Queer rampaged pub-like, angelic blob. Pimp unequalled, barbaric geek globe. Prime quick bleed probable language. Beggar ill-equipped backbone mauler. ---
**Author:** ![scarabus](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/ec9cab/32.png) [@scarabus](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/scarabus)\ **Post date:** [August 23, 2002, 6:06pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/baking-purple-gerald-became-oblique/125169/4 "2002-08-23T18:06:08Z")
> [@](#): > > \*Originally posted by peasea \* > \*\*This was on a license plate? California? Was there any picture or anything with it? Did you mean bumper sticker? \*\* No it was on the frame around the plate, like this: ``` ______________________ | BAKING PURPLE, | | CALIFORNIA | | \/ \/ \/ \/ \/ \/ | | / \/ \/ \/ \/ \/\ | | | | GERALD BECAME OBLIQUE. | ``` My thought was that it could be some kind of mnemonic, like Richard Of York Gave Battle In Vain or similar. Or maybe the driver had been to too many Grateful Dead gigs, if you know what I mean. ---
**Author:** ![peasea](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/p/bc79bd/32.png) [@peasea](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/peasea)\ **Post date:** [August 23, 2002, 6:40pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/baking-purple-gerald-became-oblique/125169/5 "2002-08-23T18:40:47Z")
Huh. Bizarre. I’ll see your anagrams and mnemonic and raise you some synonyms. I’ve seen puzzles where old sayings or movie titles are replaced with synonyms or definitions, like “The penchant for discovery resulted in the death of the feline”. Problem is I can’t think of anything reasonable for this license plate frame. Maybe it _is_ a Grateful Dead thing (Gerald == Jerry?). ---
**Author:** ![TheeGrumpy](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/779978/32.png) [@TheeGrumpy](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/TheeGrumpy)\ **Post date:** [August 23, 2002, 9:18pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/baking-purple-gerald-became-oblique/125169/6 "2002-08-23T21:18:30Z")
The first thing that popped into my head was [“Colorless green ideas sleep furiously.”](http://www.wikipedia.com/wiki/Noam_Chomsky/Colorless+green+ideas+sleep+furiously) Except that this plainly isn’t colorless. It’s purple. So you’re on your own. ---
**Author:** ![xicanorex](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/x/a88e57/32.png) [@xicanorex](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/xicanorex)\ **Post date:** [August 24, 2002, 12:29am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/baking-purple-gerald-became-oblique/125169/7 "2002-08-24T00:29:55Z")
I don’t know if it helps, but google the whole sentence withouth the " and got this site: [http://www.shanetracey.com/txt/Overdrive\_en.doc](http://www.shanetracey.com/txt/Overdrive_en.doc) > [@](#): > > Mona Lisa Overdrive (MICROSOFT WORD) - Mona Lisa Overdrive. by William Gibson. VERSION 1.1 (Feb 23 00). The Smoke. The ghost was her father’s parting gift, presented by a … Being that it is based on a Gibson book, I would be surprised if it appeared there as a sentence. 😉 😃 XicanoreX ---
**Author:** ![scarabus](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/ec9cab/32.png) [@scarabus](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/scarabus)\ **Post date:** [September 3, 2002, 6:42pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/baking-purple-gerald-became-oblique/125169/8 "2002-09-03T18:42:18Z")
Yeah, I tried that. All the words are in there, but not as a sentence. A shame because it did seem a promising lead. ---
**Author:** ![scratch1300](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/dfb087/32.png) [@scratch1300](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/scratch1300)\ **Post date:** [September 3, 2002, 7:12pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/baking-purple-gerald-became-oblique/125169/9 "2002-09-03T19:12:58Z")
Did you get a good look at the construction of the sticker, or plate holder, or whatever it was? I have a wild-assed guess that it might be that magnetic “refrigerator poetry”? You know, the set contains a whole bunch of different words – nouns, verbs, adjectives – and each word is on a separate magnet, and you scramble and re-arrange the magnets to form sentences at half-random? Maybe the driver doesn’t like them on his refrigerator, he likes them on his car, and maybe he has them a certain way for a while, then when he gets tired, constructs a new, but not necessarily meaningful, sentence?