Jessica’s attack bunny comment further down reminded of something I’d been meaning to mention about the international Cult of Python. Everywhere I go, around the world, I meet people of various walks of life and appearance, nothing else in common but the fact that they snicker when you say “Ministry of Funny Walks” or “I fart in your general direction” or “I didn’t come here for an argument”. Snicker and start reciting the rest of the sketch. Say, in a French accent, “would you like a mint? It eez very seen,” and they answer, in a Mr. Cresote voice, “oh, I’m absolutely stuffed, I couldn’t eat another bite. Oh, alright,” [exploding noises].
I was doing this sort of thing with another photographer just this weekend, an Austrian fellow, standing around the lobby of a luxury hotel in Vienna, waiting to photograph presidents. Is Monty Python the only cultural icon to have this effect, or are there other fan cultures like this? I can’t remember my PIN codes or passwords half the time; I have memorized exactly one poem, but for some reason the Python skits stick with you.
Or do Trekkies do this as well? [Deep, raspy Gorn voice: "Kirk, come to me. I will be quick and merciful... hiss...]
Saying “Spooooooock!” has a similar effect.
“a cunning plan!” (Black Adder) is still not as effective as “wafffer theen!”
But yeah: “make it so.”
They do pop up from elsewhere, but Python seems to have provided so MANY of those little recitations.
And not enough people get “a cunning plan.” Usually when I say it, I get blank looks (“Yes? Well, what is it?”).
Ba-SIL!
I had friends who taught their bird to squawk whenever it heard Sybil Fawlty calling Basil.
Well now I feel foolish because I have been known to say “but wait – I have a cunning plan” but I had forgotten where I’d lifted that from! Which never made much difference as no one knew what the hell I was quoting from anyway. They need to rerun Black Adder here more often….