Bob Eager wrote:
On Mon, 12 Mar 2007 23:06:16 UTC, Grimly Curmudgeon
wrote:
We were somewhere around Barstow, on the edge of the desert, when the
drugs began to take hold. I remember
(Andrew Gabriel) saying something like:
Ping****it! What a perfect description!
Sadly, I can't claim to have invented it. First heard it some
6 or 7 years ago from a PC lab guy when I was working in the US.
Then I saw someone mention it in this newsgroup a few months back.
A Google search shows it mostly comes up in motorcycle forums, and
as it happens, the PC lab guy I first heard it from was a biker
who was in to stripping his engines down (there were bits of them
on the shelf in his office).
Japanese handlebar switchgear usually contains a copious supply of
ping****its, but they are just carrying on the tradition established
by Joe Lucas and the Fabulous Flying Marelli Brothers.
And Wipac. Who remembers Wipac?
Back in the early '60s my dad had a BMC Farina model with the indicator side
stalk on the steerig column. It'd played up on the way home, so back in
the dark garage he thought he'd see if he could fix it. Well, that Big
Bang of ping****its is still expanding into the Universe. There wasn't
any point in even getting a torch - a 3-position switch on the dashboard
was the easiest and permanent solution. Pity it didn't self-cancel.
Martin