That and Zed Zed Top.
It took years before it hit me why the news channel playing in the background in some NCIS scenes is called ZNN.
Outside the U.S., “easy to use” products with EZ in their names go over like lead balloons for the same reason.
Ignorance fought!
Same here.
I don’t get it. Why?
Again, limited as I am to my U.S. frame of reference, I don’t get it. Why?
The letter “Z”. In the US, we call it “zee”, in the UK they call it “zed”.
Fucks up the alphabet song big time.
I’ve seen it atributed to Metallica, Led Zep, Scorpions, AC/DC… and those are only the ones singing in English! Some people are as good at telling musical groups apart as they are at remembering the capitals of African countries - or the books of the Bible.
There’s a Spanish group whose closest thing to a hit used as lyrics romantic Espronceda’s most famous poem (there’s a link to a translation at the top of that same page) - and people who get so confused by this that they need it spelled out that this “Espronceda” dude did not copy down that song’s lyrics some 150 years before it got written, it was the songwriter who used an out-of-copyright poem as his lyrics.
“Put them in the iron maiden.”
“Iron Maiden?” air guitars “Excellent!”
“Execute them.”
“Bogus!”
I confess, I’ve never read LOTR or the Hobbit. I got dragged to a theatre once to see the 2nd film and I saw part of the first one on the tube. But I have an excuse. Back in the day, my friends and I had memorized Bored Of The Rings, so when I took a stab at LOTR, I just couldn’t take it seriously. Frito, Spam, and Dildo were much more interesting than Frodo, Sam, and Bilbo. I don’t think I ever got past the 3rd chapter.
How far is Germany from Europe is about the only one here I would really shake my head over. That’s pretty inexcusable for anyone to ask, but not sure if that really counts as a pop culture reference.
The Beatles, as influential as they were, are essentially ancient history at this point (even if 2 of them are still alive and the other 2 probably would be if not for being murdered). I don’t think you should be that upset with anyone under 30 who couldn’t name all the Beatles members. Not having ever even heard of the Beatles is a bit more worthy of a head scratching but I can still see it.
Now, if someone didn’t know who the Secretary of the Interior in 1993 was, well now that might just send me into a shock-induced comatose state permanently. That level of ignorance is truly unforgivable.
drew-George Harrison died of lung cancer.
Zee?
I remember the* Fractured Flickers* sspoof of the Zee Tissue commercial. It began with snippets of wild parties, cannon firing, screams, explosions, etc., then a tranquil scene in a meadow with this voice-over:
“This moment of softness is brought to you by Bee. Bee, the only tissue woven in mid-air by Bees.” 
I am… really surprised you don’t know the whole “Z is pronounced Zed in the UK/Australia/New Zealand/quite a lot of the English speaking world” thing.
Actually, no, surprise isn’t really adequate; I think I must resort to astonishment. Seriously, how have you not encountered this before?
**Martini-**This Yank has never heard this either.
Again, I am truly astounded an educated, adult American with internet access could not be aware of this.
Would someone else please, please come in and reassure everyone this isn’t arcane trivia?
Meaning no personal nastiness – and, stuff which I might fantasise about, but which I hope would not prejudice me were I ever to meet you and your friends in real life; but I’ve always loved LOTR, and have for that reason taken care to avoid so much as ever opening “Bored of the Rings”.
Mind goes to a fairly recent and ongoing fantasy / speculative fiction series, in which a prominent character is a somewhat eccentric young woman who is such a Tolkien nut, that she lives most of the time in an imaginary Middle-Earth world, and is convinced that all the Master’s works are historically, absolutely true. In the novel series, a catastrophe strikes Earth which disrupts the laws of physics big-time, and basically throws the world a millennium back from 2000 A.D. – 95% of the human race, dies. Our heroine is one of the few survivors – and she finds the “new order”, to her taste: much more like Tolkien’s Middle-Earth, than the high-tech civilisation in which she’s reluctantly spent her first seventeen-odd years. This lady would, with full religious fervour, have regarded “Bored of the Rings” as blasphemy – if you and your friends had survived the disaster: let’s say, you’d have been well advised to keep quiet about the subject, in her presence.
While I’d mostly reckon that anyone holding such views, in whatever circumstances, was batshit crazy; I’ll admit to feeling a tiny bit of sympathy with the described character.
I am a very well read educated adult American, and I did know this.
But yes, it is in fact arcane trivia. I couldn’t even tell you where I learned it – I would guess I picked it up somewhere along the line in my reading about the US military. “Z” has never been referred to as “Zed” in popular culture AFAIK.
Murdered by CANCER!
Hmm. I had no idea he died of lung cancer. I really thought he was murdered. Now I have no idea who I was thinking of. <_<
I knew it but I learned it from a Straight Dope column and was completely unaware of it until I was in my mid-20’s. I am educated. It is probably a whole lot less commonly known in the U.S. than you might want to believe. Most people don’t consume much foreign media and, if they do hear the term, they may not make the association between the terms Zee and Zed at all.
Okay, since you are apparently person #114 in this thread to not get the LotR reference, here:
“ignorance” fought.