Comments | citizenpsmith: Statistically Improbable Memesheeping

citizenpsmith

Statistically Improbable Memesheeping

May 30, 2006 15:28

Pick ten of your favorite books, look them up on Amazon.com, and find the list of Statistically Improbable Phrases for those books. Pick a few SIPs from each book, list them here, and then have people guess what books they are. (Obviously, using Google or Amazon to figure it out is cheating.). (via huskyscotsmanAs with most people who've posted this, my choices ( Read more... )

Comments 19

hederaivy May 30 2006, 15:53:19 UTC

memesheeping. GREAT word.

hederaivy May 30 2006, 16:13:41 UTC

#9. wyrd sisters

citizenpsmith May 30 2006, 16:17:19 UTC

Still one of Mr Pratchett's best. Yep.

inkylj May 30 2006, 16:16:58 UTC

#7 = Five Red Herrings

citizenpsmith May 30 2006, 16:19:06 UTC

Verra gude.

ceb May 30 2006, 17:05:44 UTC

10. has got to be Ransome, though I dunno which one.

(Hello, Clare here, sometime rgrn-meet attendee.)

citizenpsmith May 30 2006, 17:24:30 UTC

It'd be hard to pin any particular one down from those, yes; as it happens, Swallowdale appears to be the only one to have SIPs provided. (Otherwise I'd have gone with Winter Holiday.)

huskyscotsman May 30 2006, 18:28:36 UTC

Ooh, hey, I'll have read #1 if it's an O'Brian, and "sea pie" may just pin it down to a particular book... hmm, I think I vaaaaguely recall the scene, even...

Aha! I finally found a use for this copy of Lobscouse and Spotted Dog that somebody bought me! By a process that I'm going to claim is not cheating I find that #1 is The Far Side of the World. (My vague memory was actually wrong; the sea-pie is eaten on the ship, but I was thinking of a scene from the Grapes.)

citizenpsmith May 30 2006, 20:55:55 UTC

It may not be cheating, but it's also not right. #1 is not O'Brian at all, in fact. (Though I expected someone to think it was.)

huskyscotsman May 30 2006, 21:14:47 UTC

Curses!