Look, in the grand scheme of things, I’d have to say that the problems of starving children in South Africa probably bother me a tad more than this. But it’s annoying nonetheless.
It’s these two words: pun unintended.
No, it wasn’t “unintended” ya schmuck. It most certainly, clearly, completely was intended. You typed it, didn’t you? You caught the pun within the same post, didn’t you? You didn’t change it so that it was no longer a pun, did you? Then it was intended!
The only reason you put “(pun unintended)” in there is because if you didn’t people might skip over it without realizing it was a pun. So you called attention to it by telling people you didn’t mean to call attention to it. What Vulcan-like logic that was.
It ranks right up there with laughing at your own joke using LOL as if that will somehow propel your lame ass statement into superstardom.
Oh, for those witty souls out there who purposely plan on using my rant against me in replies, I’m going to pre-emptively strike back. I already admitted that this whole rant is quite trivial in nature. You won’t annoy me. Hey, it might actually amuse me. Go figure that one out.
I think you may be right, Enderw23, that is a pretty darn lame rant. Does anyone actually say/write “pun unintended”? I’ve only heard/read “no pun intended.”
I don’t really see much of a difference between those two phrases. The semantics work out about the same for each. (Actually, I just decided that “unintended” may not be a word. [Note to self: Let sleeping dogs lie…])
I would guess that folks use one of those phrases when the pun wasn’t intentional, but they notice it after typing/speaking. (Well, duh, thanks for that insight!) No, what I mean is that the pun wasn’t intended when first stated, but the poster (poser?) decided to leave it in. When speaking, it is of course far more difficult to back up and rewrite what has been spoken.
Speaking for myself, I usually write/say “pun intended” or just hope that that the reader/listener is acute enough to pick up on it.
I know they mean the same thing; it’s just that I’ve never heard “pun unintended.” BTW, unintended is indeed a word, going back to the 1600s no less. It’s not a word that I come across often (apart from “unintended consequences”), which is why I asked about the usage here.
I will think before typing.
I will think before typing.
I will think before typing.
JeffB, you’re entirely right. “Unintended” is very much a word, and I can not recreate the train of thought that led me to believe it might not be. Please accept my apologies for that.
Well, hell’s bells! It annoys the hell out of ME!! I HATE that simpering coyness, “–pun unintended”, tee-hee. Blast you, you tittering middle-aged junior high school English teacher with an obviously false hairpiece that your students have named “George”! Do you think we don’t know you sat there in front of the computer for a solid 30 minutes, racking your brain for a pun? Do you think we didn’t hear the frantic flipping of thesaurus pages as you drove your four-cylinder brain desperately up and down the back roads of the English language, searching for a double entendre, a word play, a paranomasia with which to stun Posterity, as your pixels were enshrined forever within the stately Archives of the Straight Dope Message Board?
Give it up, loser! You have no writing talent whatsoever, for puns or anything else. Go back to writing copy for those Home Plans magazines, a literary venue in which puns are conspicuous by their absence, and thus one for which a puny scribbler like you is admirably suited.
oh for Christ’s great googly moogly on a surf board,
you think it’s possible to have one pit thread nowadays that doesn’t involve peace somehow? Just one. That’s all I’m asking.
And TPATP, I’m sure there are one or two children down there that are feeling a bit peckish.
DDG, good rant. Thank you for pulling the lameness of this thread out of the gutter, dusting it off, and buying it a cheap suit and a bowl of chicken noodle soup from Joe’s all night diner to help it get back on its feet.
