WAGGING TONGUE

(Continued from the last post A Tongue Of The Slip

The power of the tongue is aptly illustrated by this anecdote: Once a gaggle of women were taken on a sight-seeing tour of the 'Niagara Falls.' The tour guide, after explaining all about the falls, finally announced, "Now , ladies, if you can interrupt your talking just for 10 seconds, you can hear the mighty roaring sound of the Niagara."
With this backdrop, it was no wonder that a garrulous aunt of mine was fondly called 'Tongue-sten' within the family circle for her rapid-fire blabber like the outburst of a stengun.
When we refer to the first language we learnt from childhood, we call it the mother-tongue and never the father-tongue(poor father!) even though it is the father who gives the tongue-lashing when the children play mischief. So, when we talk of the mother-tongue, I always remember the story of a lady candidate seeking a job, who, in her application form, had mentioned her mother- tongue as 'Spench.' When questioned about this at the interview, she replied, "My maternal grandfather spoke Spanish and the granny spoke French. So my mother speaks a combination of the two, which I call 'Spench'. Explaining further she said, "Since my my father's mother-tongue is German, my children's mother tongue is going to be 'Spenchman'.
And finally, when the General Elections come, look at what happens. Politicians click their tongues having tasted the spoils of power hoping for more. They approach the electorate with their tongues hanging out, drooling at the mouth, trying to catch your fancy with tongue-twisting slogans such as 'Cast costly crosses(X) to cobble credible class-creed-class crusade'. Like snakes in the grass with their bi-pronged tongues, they will promise you the moon only to retract later. When that happens, don't be tongue-tied. Loosen your tongue and speak your mind out. Then elect the right one(if you can find any) and stick your tongue out at the rest.
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A TONGUE OF THE SLIP

Continued from the last post Tongue-in-Cheek Trivia

There are people with slippery tongues who call a 'Burning Train' as 'Turning Brain.' A friend of mine has this habit of mixing up words in a spooneristic style. "I hissed the mystery classes", he would say(meaning, he missed the history classes). Or, "I tasted a whole worm(meaning he wasted a whole term). But best part was that each time his tongue slipped, he would apologise saying, "Oh, it was only a tongue of the slip"(sic).

Linguists vouch for the fact that in many languages(tongues) world over, the the tongue is used as feminine gender. In Hindi for instance, the word zuban(tongue) is feminine. Meri zuban, one would say implying that the word is feminine. Same is true of Greek, Latin, Italian, Spanish, French and German. There must be some reason for his ground rule., that came about during the evolution of languages. Is it because the almighty God, to compensate for the deficit of muscle mass, bestowed upon women this highly specialised muscle tissue? Or, is it because women as a class have an inborn skill to put this small bundle of flesh to it's maximum use? Read on, Sir/Madam, for an insight into these premises.

Just listen to what William Congreve, the 17th century English dramatist, had to say about one of his female acquaintances: "She has that everlasting rotation of the tongue, that an echo must wait till she dies before it can catch her last word."

Then, Charles Dickens once exclaimed, 'Tongue, well, that's very good thing when it ain't a woman's". Why, even the great bard of the yore W. Shakespeare didn't lag behind by saying, " You shall never take her without her answer, unless you take her without her tongue. Lucky that in days of Mr Shakespeare, there were no women's' lib activists. Or else they would have lynched him and the world would have poor by one great poet.

(Continued in the next post Wagging Tongue )

TONGUE-IN-CHEEK TRIVIA

Which is the most flexible part of human anatomy? The tongue, of course. For, it can wriggle like an earthworm with bellyache, lash out like a whip, roll like a porpoise, twist like a well-cooked vermicelli, wag faster than a tail of courting lapdog and dance with agility that can make Michael Jackson look like someone who is taking correspondence course in dancing, having just reached the third lesson.
Besides, the tongue is stronger than the teeth, because it can heap choice abuses on a passing desperado thereby vastly improving the chances of one's teeth being displaced out of their sockets. Therefore the the tongue is that errant member which, more often than not, needs reining in. If people are unwilling to hear you, better it is to hold your tongue than them. So, teach your child to hold his tongue, he will learn fast enough to speak.
The tongue can make and mar men and their empires. Someone with a silver tongue can sell goggles to a blind man (or ice-cream to an Eskimo), while the one with evil tongue may get bitten by sanest and mildest of poodles. A sharp tongue is a guaranteed means of supplying you with enemies in their dozens. In fact, a sharp tongue is the only edged tool that grows sharper with constant use!

SHARPEN,BUT HOW..

There was a neighbour of ours whom we called 'Mr Sharp Tongue' for his harsh and angry talk. My 8-year-old son was quite perplexed about the reason behind that nick-name. That was until one day he came up and triumphantly announced, "Papa, now I know why you call the uncle Mr Sharp Tongue. This morning, soon after he brushed his teeth, I saw him sharpening hid tongue with a plastic strip!"

DON'T SWALLOW!

Once a chemistry professor asked one of his students to name certain chemical compound. The student racked his brain for some time and then said, "I know the answer, sir. It's on the tip of my tongue and I can't get it out." To which the professor said with a wry smile, "In that case get it out fast and certainly don't swallow it. Because the compound happens to be Potassium Cyanide."

To be continued in the next post A Tongue Of The Slip