The "I just don't get it thread".

[clapton is god]

I doubt I'll ever get a better laugh at the Spanish language then the two international truckers who came into a cafe in Nerja one morning and ordered "Dos eggos and baconos Manuel" from a bemused waiter. I kid you not.

Not long after the current Mrs C and I met we went to Barcelona for a cheeky weekend.

We went into a small bakery (el Greggo or similar) for breakfast and her, trying to impress, pointed at two pastries and said "Dos two of those please."

I've never let her forget it!

[TANGODANCER]

I like the simplicity of some Spanish descriptions. They say "Parasol" ( our sun umbrella) because it means, "for sun". and Paragua (umbrella) because it means "for water" . Simple.

The para bit comes from the verb parar, to stop. Hence windscreen is parabrisas, literally stop-breeze.

Actually, L.G.M, I've always known "para" ( in order to) as an altaernative to por , the basic "for". Thus para in the umbrella form actually means in order to combat sun, rain etc. Spanish can be a bit baffling at times because, "Hay un banco por aqui" means "Is there a bank around here?" . You get used to it after a while.

LGM is correct here - the Spanish and French took it from the Italian and Latin. The sense of the suffix 'para' is 'protection from' - so parachute is protection from falling (chute is French for fall). Parabrisas is protection from wind (in English we use screen as the protecting term). Por is a different root.

As you were..

[Bruce Rioja]

Might get my Parabollocks out!

[Montreal Wanderer]

Might get my Parabollocks out!

Aye, could save your life and your unborn children.

[Bijou Bob]

Mrs Brown's Boys. Nope.

[Bruce Rioja]

Mrs Brown's Boys. Nope.

Read also Citizen Khan and possibly the least funny thing since news of the death of Churchill broke - Count Arthur Brown.

[Harry Genshaw]

Mrs Brown's Boys. Nope.

Read also Citizen Khan.

And for that matter, Citizen Kane

[bobo the clown]

Mrs Brown's Boys. Nope.

Read also Citizen Khan and possibly the least funny thing since news of the death of Churchill broke - Count Arthur Brown.

Agreed.

.... & while we're at it chuck Keith Lemon on the pile. How the fck he cuts a living God only knows.

[Prufrock]

Keith Lemon has a similar effect on me to Count Arthur Stong. It's not just that they are apocalyptically bad, which they are, but that they come from writers with the pedigree they have. Bo' Selecta was fantastic, but even Leigh Francis' horror-show doesn't come close to wondering how a man who co-wrote Father Ted, Black Books, Big Train, The Fast Show and the IT Crowd can put his name to that shite.

Brucie is certainly right that with Citizen Khan and Mrs Brown's Boys, "The Count" makes up the un-holy trinity of pish.

[thebish]

Mrs Brown's Boys. Nope.

Read also Citizen Khan and possibly the least funny thing since news of the death of Churchill broke - Count Arthur Brown.

aye - all of the above...

[Hoboh]

Father Ted!

[Bruce Rioja]

Nina Conti. A shit ventriloquist who drags some mug/s up from the audience, appends some shite to their face which she then operates via air pressure and delivers an act as funny as food poising. Her being quite fit does absolutely nothing to gloss over the fact that she's utterly fecking dreadful!

[bobo the clown]

^^^ funny once.

But only once. From then on you may as well be watching adverts.

[Bruce Rioja]

^^^ funny once.

But only once. From then on you may as well be watching adverts.

I didn't even get the "once" that you garnered!