Everybody has them -- little in-jokes, obscure references, names for things that only you and your family or circle of friends would “get.”
For example: When my mom and dad were first married, one day they saw a sign on a construction site where a new coffee shop was being built. “CLEAN -- FAST -- MODERN,” it read. From then on, in our family we always called that type of restaurant a CFM.
And there was a then-new office building in the neighborhood that looked very 1930s Streamline Moderne -- alternating horizontal bands of glass and brown brick, round corners. My mother remarked that it looked as if Fred Astaire and Ginger Rogers should be dancing down the front steps. At that point, we christened it “The Fred Astaire-Ginger Rogers Building,” and always referred to it as such.
Then there was the quick-and-easy Mexican casserole recipe that my brother and I dubbed “TJS” -- short for “Tijuana Slop.” And the frozen Birds Eye Green Beans & Spaetzle with mini-dumplings that looked like maggots. So we’d be having “beans ’n’ maggots” with dinner.
Anything like that in your family, workplace, or social group?
For example: When my mom and dad were first married, one day they saw a sign on a construction site where a new coffee shop was being built. “CLEAN -- FAST -- MODERN,” it read. From then on, in our family we always called that type of restaurant a CFM.
And there was a then-new office building in the neighborhood that looked very 1930s Streamline Moderne -- alternating horizontal bands of glass and brown brick, round corners. My mother remarked that it looked as if Fred Astaire and Ginger Rogers should be dancing down the front steps. At that point, we christened it “The Fred Astaire-Ginger Rogers Building,” and always referred to it as such.
Then there was the quick-and-easy Mexican casserole recipe that my brother and I dubbed “TJS” -- short for “Tijuana Slop.” And the frozen Birds Eye Green Beans & Spaetzle with mini-dumplings that looked like maggots. So we’d be having “beans ’n’ maggots” with dinner.
Anything like that in your family, workplace, or social group?
