Tic tac teddy bears and teardrop tattoos - Book #64

Tic Tac Teddy Bears & Teardrop Tattoo’s
by Justin Scroggie

A great little book looking into the slightly hidden things of the world, from prison tattoos and gang signs to secret codes and slang. You can quickly pick up little tidbits of information and trivia that you can later use to bore your friends and acquaintances.

My favorite stories involved TV shows. Catalina, the Latina maid/dancer in My Name is Earl, is often shown to be yelling in Spanish. The impression is she is swearing when in actuality she is sharing messages with the Spanish speaking audience. For example (and I am paraphrasing), she actually made the statement “We would like to thank our Hispanic viewers for supporting our show. And if you are not Hispanic than good for you learning a second language.”

And now that I know, I am surprised I never noticed it before. House is an homage to Sherlock Holmes. Both are cranky Englishmen who solve mysteries using strict logic. Both have a drug addiction and live in apartment 221B. And while Holmes relies on the ever supportive Dr. James Watson, House has his Dr. James Wilson. Obvious really.

He also gets into some logo’s including one I have noted before, the hidden arrow in-between the E & X in Fed-Ex.

And the subtle message in Amazon’s smiling arrow. It points from A to Z suggesting it all can be found at Amazon.

The author is English and a lot of his examples come from that culture (though not all). One he discusses is the origin of English slang words like yob. It was a slang that used reversed words, so originally yob was for boy. It was also the source for Bonk. I will let those of you familiar with both uses (bonk and its counterpart) enjoy that historical insight.

Mormon Mentions: None