- By Jim Evans
- Entertainment
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SMART TALK by Dr. Laconia Crisp
NO PARKING ANY TIME: Perhaps writers of warning signs are of the ilk who officiously say lacerations and contusions instead of cuts and bruises, hoping someone, anyone, will think they might have a medical degree.
No Parking Any Time is no improvement over No Parking. After all, since when did No Parking mean you could park there at, say three in the morning? As the tee shirt says, What part of NO don't you understand?
To the linguistically impaired, No Parking Any Time has a huge attraction: twice the words. Like the pompous official who describes a car as traveling at a high rate of speed instead of going fast, the sign maker may hope to sound like a lawyer.
At the Institute for the Linguistically Impaired, we show our patients how using bloated language impresses only those even more ignorant.
The prizewinner, however, is a real "Wet Paint" sign we saw with the helpful additional information, Applied With Paint Applicators.
Food for thought there.
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