The Greensleeves phantom
Mar. 30th, 2008 01:42 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
todayiamadaisyFor the last week or so, I've been hearing snatches of "Greensleeves" on the wind, played in that unmistakable Mr Whippy van chime. Only I haven't actually seen a Mr Whippy van anywhere. So where's it coming from, hmm?
It just occurred to me that Mr Whippy might not be a global company (and in case it isn't, I should say it's a mobile ice cream van franchise), so I googled and came to the official Australian Mr Whippy site, which has a capital letter-filled page devoted to how there is actually only ONE Mr Whippy van in Australia and all the rest are IMPOSTORS called Mr Wippy or Mr Hippy or Mr Yippy or Mr You Get the Picture-ippy and the public should stop calling them Mr Whippy AT ONCE because the REAL Mr Whippy van is an environmentally and health conscious alternative to the other OLD-FASHIONED VANS. And that may be the funniest thing I've read ALL WEEK.
Ahem. So, collections (sorry, parcels) of birds. Some of them are quite negative, aren't they? An unkindness of ravens, a murder of crows, a piteousness of doves, a darkening of jackdaws, a quarrel of starlings, a siege of bitterns, a dread of terns, a scold of jays, a trembling of finches, a deceit of lapwings... balanced out by the exultation of larks and shimmering of hummingbirds, I suppose. And now I've put my collective noun collection away, so that's the last you'll hear of them, I promise (although anyone asking what to call a group of rattlesnakes or weasels would not be disappointed).
It just occurred to me that Mr Whippy might not be a global company (and in case it isn't, I should say it's a mobile ice cream van franchise), so I googled and came to the official Australian Mr Whippy site, which has a capital letter-filled page devoted to how there is actually only ONE Mr Whippy van in Australia and all the rest are IMPOSTORS called Mr Wippy or Mr Hippy or Mr Yippy or Mr You Get the Picture-ippy and the public should stop calling them Mr Whippy AT ONCE because the REAL Mr Whippy van is an environmentally and health conscious alternative to the other OLD-FASHIONED VANS. And that may be the funniest thing I've read ALL WEEK.
Ahem. So, collections (sorry, parcels) of birds. Some of them are quite negative, aren't they? An unkindness of ravens, a murder of crows, a piteousness of doves, a darkening of jackdaws, a quarrel of starlings, a siege of bitterns, a dread of terns, a scold of jays, a trembling of finches, a deceit of lapwings... balanced out by the exultation of larks and shimmering of hummingbirds, I suppose. And now I've put my collective noun collection away, so that's the last you'll hear of them, I promise (although anyone asking what to call a group of rattlesnakes or weasels would not be disappointed).