Get your G&S geek on . . .

[sovay]

For everyone who's every wondered, "Exactly how useless is all this knowledge I've acquired?"

Acquired from fleurdelis28, who apparently got the idea from me.
Copy the text of this song and put in bold all the things you can do, and in italics the things you can sort of do:

I am the very model of a modern Major-General,
I've information vegetable, animal, and mineral,
I know the kings of England, and I quote the fights historical
From Marathon to Waterloo, in order categorical;
I'm very well acquainted, too, with matters mathematical,
I understand equations, both the simple and quadratical,
About binomial theorem I'm teeming with a lot o' news,
With many cheerful facts about the square of the hypotenuse.

I'm very good at integral and differential calculus;
I know the scientific names of beings animalculous:
In short, in matters vegetable, animal, and mineral,
I am the very model of a modern Major-General.

I know our mythic history, King Arthur's and Sir Caradoc's;
I answer hard acrostics, I've a pretty taste for paradox,
I quote in elegiacs all the crimes of Heliogabalus,
In conics I can floor peculiarities parabolous;

I can tell undoubted Raphaels from Gerard Dows and Zoffanies,
I know the croaking chorus from the Frogs of Aristophanes!
Then I can hum a fugue of which I've heard the music's din afore,
And whistle all the airs from that infernal nonsense Pinafore.

Then I can write a washing bill in Babylonic cuneiform,
And tell you ev'ry detail of Caractacus's uniform:
In short, in matters vegetable, animal, and mineral,
I am the very model of a modern Major-General.

In fact, when I know what is meant by "mamelon" and "ravelin",
When I can tell at sight a Mauser rifle from a javelin,
When such affairs as sorties and surprises I'm more wary at,
And when I know precisely what is meant by "commissariat",
When I have learnt what progress has been made in modern gunnery,
When I know more of tactics than a novice in a nunnery--
In short, when I've a smattering of elemental strategy,
You'll say a better Major-General has never sat a gee.

For my military knowledge, though I'm plucky and adventury,
Has only been brought down to the beginning of the century;
But still, in matters vegetable, animal, and mineral,
I am the very model of a modern Major-General.

Next up, "If you give me your attention . . ."

[EDIT]
Never mind, just talk to thomasfreund . . .

Comments

[fleurdelis28.livejournal.com]

I want to see that washing-bill.

[sovay]

Let me get hold of greyselke's online cuneiform font and I'll see what I can do . . . How do you feel about a washing-bill in Assyriac cuneiform? It doesn't scan, I'll grant you, but I can get hold of a specialist in Neo-Assyrian much easier right now than I can one in Babylonian.

[fleurdelis28.livejournal.com]

Yay! (You know, you could have just told me it was Babylonic cuneiform...)

[zdenka]

Gaudior pointed me to this -- I think it is splendid, and I hope it will propagate among my G&S-loving Friend-list.

[fleurdelis28.livejournal.com]

Yay!

[sovay]

So glad you approve! Long may our crazy G&S quiz propagate.