"Halt Die Klappe!"

So last night my trying-to-sleep roommate texted me to "Halt Die Klappe!". I, of course, don't speak German, so it seemed like an absurd thing to text me, because if it was instructions of some kind, I sure wasn't going to be able to follow. Luckily another roommate was in the room who claims to know some German, and he told me it meant "Shut up!". I thought surely that can't be right...if anything my roommate would have just said, "be quiet", right? Nope, I looked it up today on multiple sites and all of them interpretted it as a harsh way of telling a German to shut up (several of the interpretations included swear words to define its more precise English meaning).

Now I don't take offense to my arian roomie, because - as stated before - I don't speak German so a harsh phrase in it just sounds like gibberish to me (although I was a tad annoyed that he didn't just open his door and say something, as it was several people being loud). But it got me thinking about curse words. Now language itself is a very odd phenomenon if you think about it...this odd collection of sounds which somehow have meaning to us, but swearing is extra-odd. The concept that certain sound combinations OFFEND us is really kindof mind-boggling. What is it about these words that offend us anyway? It's obviously not the actual meaning behind the word, 'cuz there's a non-swearing way to say the same true meaning behind every curse word I can think of.

Is it bad to swear in another language? I guess it's the same bad-ness that is if you swear when you're by yourself. I've heard it said that the reason it's "bad" to swear is that the offender is exhibiting a loss of self control...but what if you say a swear word NOT in a moment of anger with no malice AND it's in another language...it's completely meaningless to you and your audience...that's not really bad, is it? But then if that's the case is it bad to simply SAY a swear word in your native tounge if you're by yourself (so as not to offend anyone) if you're not saying it in anger and are just saying it for fun? lol. Anyway, just some random thoughts that came from an evening of keeping my poor, sleepy roommate awake. ^^

Drunken Nights With No Hangover!!

This past week I've had 3 (THREE!) nights where I dreamt that I was drunk. It's not a recurring dream per se, as the circumstances change in each dream, but definately a recurring theme. Now not ever having been drunk I don't know what it really feels like, so I don't know how accurate my dreaming representation of it is...basically I just feel really relaxed and kinda dizzy. It was actually kinda nice, lol. Don't worry, I'm not gonna go out and buy a liter of Jack Daniel's or anything...anyway, I think I'd be more of a Scotch man...there's just something sexy about scotch...not sure what it is.

AAAANYWAY...The question in my mind is, 'WHY do I keep having dreams in which I'm inebriated?' Back when I read the "The Outsiders" I had LOTS of dreams in which I smoked, but smoking is a big topic in that book (and EXTREMELY romanticized), so it doesn't surprise me that it was on my mind, but why all these dreams about being drunk is beyond me. My only conclusion is that I had the dream once and it was just a weird random thing, but then I kept thinking about that dream, so I dreamt about it again, and now it's sorting of turning into a self-perpetuating theme of my dreams.

Oh well...I guess I can't complain, they're not "bad" dreams, and I get to experience something that I'll never get to in real life...even if it is only what I imagine it would be like.