How do you ork a cow?

Miscellaneous and Personal Stuff I Must Share
1

I keep seeing the word “cow-orkers” used on the SDMB. Is this a little joke or an example of IGNORANCE THAT MUST BE FOUGHT? (The word should be “coworkers”, or possibly “co-workers”.)

2

It’s just a little joke.

And I, for one, find it hilarious.

3

Another, and in my opinion, funnier version of this is the “cow-irker”.
$0.02

4

[Mel Blanc voice]

Vewwy cawefuwwy]

[/Mel Blanc voice]

5

I’ve always liked Scott Adams In-duh-vidual.

6

Hmmm, no cow-orkers in my office. But we do have a plethora of co-dorkers.

7

Cow-orker is the standard DNRC label for dim-wits with whom you work. The generic is “In-DUH-vidual”, while a dumb boss is a “PHB” (Pointy-Haired-Boss). More detail in this thread.

8

Another thing you may come across is manny people, as in: “Manny people make fun of their cow-orkers.”

9

  1. Cow-orkers dates from the small community that posted to the SD board on AOL before www.straightdope.com was established. It of course resulted from somebody mishyphenating co-workers.

  2. Manny Peoples is the apocryphal source for that which is common knowledge, and derives from the perennial misspelling of “many people” by another poster over there.

  3. “Hi, Opal” as the third item on any list has a similar origin. (But I lay claim to having this be the first self-referential use of “Hi, Opal”.)

10

Really? That’s odd, because I’ve parsed (and said) it that way my first encounter with the word many, many years ago, well pre-dating AOL.

So I guess I was orking cows before cow orking was cool…

11

From the pages of The Encyclopedia Galactica…

…The mysterious Manny People inhabited a small island on the east coast of the United States, planet Earth. A hardy, indigenous tribe, they managed a subsistence lifestyle amongst the strange spires that typically pox-marked the territory of these barely sentient beings. The Mannies, one tribe out of hundreds of thousands, were mostly limited to one particular island and set of spires, though most biologists agree that individuals would migrate from the area, whether it be for food or mating, or merely because of overpopulation.

It is widely believed that the Mannies built nests within the spires, though no one is sure if they hollowed them out or found them that way. Perhaps they were left by another species. Some outside the scientific community propose that the Mannies constructed their spires, but such claims are usually ridiculed.

It is known for certain, however, that the Mannies had rudimentary communication devices for sending messages to other “villages”. Appropriately enough, the appointed figurehead for the Mannies was known as “manhattan”, presumably after the island on which the tribe was located. Most experts believe that “manhattan” was merely a title, granted to whomever was given the responsibility to use the device…

12

Dang! I thought it was something I started on Fathom. I was unaware of other earlier versions of the orking of the cows. I was in chat once, talking to Opal, and mentioned “coworker.” When I looked at the word (without a hyphen), I saw “cow” and “orker,” instead of “co” and “worker.” So when I saw this thread, I wondered if maybe someone had picked up the ball and ran with it over here at SDMB.

Now I see I was not the pioneer. This is what biologists call parallel adaptation or something.

13

This of course, raises the question - if you can ork a cow, can you also ork a cod?

14

You have to ork them carefully, they irritate easily.

I first ran across the term in alt.sysadmin.recovery about seven or eight years ago.

15

I’m pretty sure that “cow orker” started with a typo in the Usenet news group alt.folklore.urban back around 1993. I can remember a lot of people noticing the typo, falling in love with it, and using it ever afterward.

16

I think it predates 1993. I don’t remember the first time I myself made the typo, but I have made it and seen it a number of times, and it USUALLY results in jokes being made.

17

All of my cow-orkers are outstanding in their field.

Thank You! I’ll be here all weak.

18

The first referance on usenet was

Bolding mine…h

19

If in a cod-river you witness a cod-irection, should you not drink the water?
How much cow-inner does it take to make menudo?

20

HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HAHAHAHAHHAHAHAHAHAHAH!!!
Awwww-Geez-
Gotta catch my breath…
Snicker
tee hee.
It’s always the silly ones like this that get me going…
chuckle