Banoodled

Jenn and I are on a steady diet of Summer reality television, having been on vacation for nearly two weeks in Hawaii. I know. Pity me.

Killing your brain with snack food entertainment isn’t advisable but it is nearly inescapable. Plus, you never know when you’ll get a nugget of idiot-savant-style linguistic genius just for watching.

The most recent example came during a taped episode of Fox’s “So You Think You Can Dance” which is normally quite good. It doesn’t suffer from the type of fawning and hyperbole as American Idol, plus watching lithe young dancers beats out warbling any day. Also, less celebrity preening than “Dancing With The Stars” but I digress.

During the broadcast, that week’s guest judge, choreographer Mia Michaels, used the phrase “Banoodles” much to the bemusement of host Cat Deely. Jenn & I had to rewind several times to catch Michaels’ use of the word and Cat’s reaction just to make sure we fully understood the meaning. Was this a compliment, an insult or something ironic? Turns out, all three.

For the clueless like us – and count yourself lucky here, you can’t unlearn “knowledge” of this sort – “Banoodles” is the bastard child of “bonkers” and too much Kraft Mac N Cheese. It’s what Gwen Stefani was talking about in her song Holla Back Girl where she substituted “Bananas”. Still wrong – both Stefani’s solo career AND “Banoodles”.

I bring all of this up not to highlight my own questionable viewing habits, dredge up “old” internet/pop culture (the term has been around since at least 2003) or otherwise sully the blogosphere by repeating crap, but thinking about the word today I had one thought: George Carlin is rolling over in his grave right about now.

I say this for two reasons:

  1. *That* joke is going to get a lot of use soon (too soon?) because, well, the man’s career was all about railing against the stupid and with Idiocracy fast becoming reality, that joke will kill. Sorry for the multiple puns.
  2. In all seriousness, the man would have literally *hated* this kind of juvenilization (Ha!) of the English language. Come to think of it, he probably didn’t like the term “blog” either, but Googling (another one) for “george carlin blog” just returns remembrance posts.

For my part I have no biting social commentary other than the fact that hearing “Banoodles” conjures up other “B” words that seem funny to me. For instance, bonobos, bonnaroo and borscht immediately spring to mind.

I guess the most fitting tribute would be to foist the word on Carlin/hoist myself with my own petard:

Petard above should not be confused with the Family Guy episode “Petarded” but that’s another blog post entirely.

I miss George Carlin already. The world still needs him. Desperately.

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