TheBanyanTree: The Son of Helpful information

[Peter Macinnis]

cabaret.  A full taxi rank.

caber.  A pole which is allegedly tossed for sport by the Scots.  It
is in fact used to drop on unwary English, but no Sassenach who has
seen this use of the caber has ever lived to tell the tale.  The most
famous cabers are from Kilmarnoch, Killiecrankie, Kilmore, Kilnave and
Kiltarlity, making you wonder why the English have missed realising
what is going on.

cabinet.  A group of people who jointly rule the nation.  The origin
of the name is a puzzle, unless it is in some way related to the Great
Filing Cabinet in the Sky.

Cabinet Minister.  A person responsible for ministering to the needs
of the Great Filing Cabinet in the Sky.  Not to be confused with a
*closet vicar*.

cable.  A rope formed of fibre or wire, twisted around each other.
Rope cables are usually a neutral brown, although some rope is made of
artificial fibre, when it can often be a hawser of a different colour.

cable TV.  A form of entertainment operated by people skilled at
pulling strings.

caddish.  Drunken people who carry golf bags.

cadenza.  A variable disease which commonly afflicts musicians.  First
they get a quavery voice, then they become crotchety.  It is only
occasionally fatal, and usually only leaves minimal after-effects.

café au lait.  The special shout of praise given by Spanish people to
a particularly fine performance of the 'Coffee Cantata'.

Cage, John.  A composer who has been responsible for too many bars.
His finest work is undoubtedly 4'31".  See *devil*.

calamari rings.  Not the full squid.

calculus.  The technically correct name for gall stones and bladder
stones caused by the stress of doing too much serious mathematics.
People suffering from this condition in the gall bladder often end up
demented, trying to trisect the angle.  This arises from the mistaken
belief that the Angles were living in Gaul when Julius Caesar was
there.  They were actually in the Marbella region at that time.

calibration.  behaving in a manner similar to that of Caliban.

camel.  The camel has a harelip and a back that is bimodal, and it has
a nasty temper because it cannot yodel.  Its Australian distribution
is from Broome to Bomaderry, and it hates to be confused with the
one-hump dromedary.

can belto.  A style of singing, often incorrectly and senselessly
rendered as bel canto.  The people who do this are not to blame, as it
is generally the fault of the singer that they have become senseless
in the first place.  The incorrectness comes from alleging that the
person was a singer in the first place.

candela.  The international unit of luminous intensity, named for
Giovanni Candela, who invented the electric light globe in 1783. His
work remained on a shelf, ignored for many years, for no better reason
than that there were no suitable sources of electricity at first,
other than rubbing cats with lumps of amber.

candidate.  A person seeking election, who generally has an infinite
faith in the ability of human beings to forget.

cane toad.  A largely poisonous and venomous amphibian.  The only safe
part of this animal for eating is the liver.  In recent years, this
has become a delicacy, but the chefs involved are often less committed
to perfection than a fugu chef in Japan.  For this reason, people
planning to sample this culinary delight are advised to take out toad
paté insurance.

cannibal.  An anthropophagist, an eater of other human beings.
Contrary to popular belief, cannibals do not usually eat missionaries,
since the missionaries taste horrible.  This explains why some former
cannibals have since become missionaries, on the principle that if you
can't eat them, join them.

canonisation.  The process of strapping a victim across the mouth of a
gun, which is then fired.

Canopic jar.  A jar used by the ancient Egyptians to hold small and
tasty savouries, such as caviar and anchovies on bread or toast.

capacity.  A measure which depends on the dialectic constant.  As
anybody with experience in this area knows, dialecticians are
notoriously inconstant, which really makes rather a mess of this
definition, not to mention what it does to the dialecticians.

capillary action.  A form of warfare practised in damp climates in the
Middle Ages, which involves showering the opposing forces with large
amounts of hair, which got inside the opponents' armour, causing them
to shed it.