TheBanyanTree: Helpful information meets Godzilla

[Peter Macinnis]

Famish.  A small and emaciated tribe living in the Horn of Africa.  Their
main fear in life was high winds, until a recent UNCTAD airlift of beans
into the area.

fanatic.  A force-ventilated upper-storey room.

Faraday's constant.  One of the basic assumptions made at the Royal
Institution during the 19th century.  Luckily for them, they were right,
although he did begin to slow down a bit, towards the end.

fast Fourier transform.  A computing term, referring to a standard
graphics/artificial intelligence challenge, involving the conversion of a
GIF file of Baron Jean Baptiste Joseph Fourier into a word processing file
which contains a significant proportion of real words.  Originally
conceived as a 'thought experiment', this has led to significant
developments in the understanding of theoretical evolution, and experiments
are now being carried out on an infinite number of GIF files of monkeys,
with a view to finding some of the lost plays of Shakespeare.

fauvisme.  Named after les fauves, literally 'the wild beasts', a group of
artists who named themselves after Matisse's hairy overcoat, or so it is
claimed.  It is wild stories like this that bring the art of art criticism
into disrepute.  The truth of the matter is that van Gogh's ear, having
been badly preserved, began to grow a fungus in about 1905, and it was this
which gave fauvisme its name and its start.

fecund.  When you consult another gynaecologist, this is usually referred
to, at least technically, as a fecund opinion.

feedback.  What people get when they swim at a beach near a sewer outfall.

felon.  An entrepreneur who lacked the wit to secure the services of a
sufficiently reliable accountant.

fen.  An extremely wet area, as exemplified by the proverb 'the fen is
muddier than the sward'.

fencing.  The art of fighting with swords, usually with 'buttons' placed on
the sword tips to prevent injury.  The movement known as the parry comes in
four forms, from high to low, while lunges are only found in two forms: the
type one lunge, which is high, and the type two lunge, which is low.  There
is no such thing as a three lunge.

festina lente.  When the Mardi Gras celebration is not enough, some people
lacking a religious commitment may utter this cry, meaning by it 'Let's get
rotten during Lent'.

fete.  A means of raising money for a charitable cause, often by selling
people's junk back to them.  These are usually painful experiences for the
people who visit them, and may often be classed as a fete worse than debt.

fetish.  1. In New Zealand, tending to be plump.  2. A small rough
vegetable.  There is no truth in the legend that it emits an agonising
shriek when it is pulled from the ground, although it is rather inclined to
groan.

fibula.  A technical term used to describe a white lie, or tall story.
Excessive leg-pulling often leads to a broken fibula.

fickle.  Used to describe undesired changes made by a third party.

fiction.  The opposite of fact.  In fiction, the meek inherit the earth,
the good flourish, and the bad live unhappily ever after.

field archaeology.  The act of digging up old fields to see what is buried
underneath.  In many respects, hard to distinguish from farming, except in
the sizes of the words used.

field theory.  Any set of beliefs in physics developed from intuition, from
the famous statement by Oswald Einbahnstrasse, who said 'I field it in my
bones'.

file server.  A clerical employee of low status in the public service.

film studio.  A place where films are made, but also part of a massive
operation, involving many things other than the actual making of films.
Perhaps the most serious problem for any studio is feeding the actors,
since their morale depends on this.  If the players start to worry about
their food, a severe bout of cast ration anxiety can be set off.

fin de siècle.  A form of shark harvesting used in the French-speaking
Moto-Moto Islands of the Central Pacific.  Only the fin is harvested, for
sale to Chinese traders.  The hunters cruise close behind the sharks and
cut off the dorsal fin with a sickle (siècle), allowing the startled sharks
(in theory) to escape and grow another fin for later harvesting.  In
reality, the sharks perish, so the practice will die out by the end of the
century.

fire damp.  Otherwise known as methane.  While it is common in coal mines,
many authorities assert that it is harder to smell in some mines than in
others.  In reality, it is only the small mines which are quite variable,
while great mines stink alike.

firm.  The first person form of the irregular verb conjugated thusly: 'I am
firm, you are stubborn, he is a pig-headed fool . . .'  The fact that so
many commercial businesses are called 'firms' is not without significance.


  _--|\    Peter Macinnis                 macinnis at ozemail.com.au
 /     \   Cross-cultural watercraft maker, polymorphic monohulls 
 \.--._*   and Delphic coracles a specialty, also Tribo-economics
      v    http://members.ozemail.com.au/~macinnis/index.htm