Heenan's Universal Dictionary
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PAGANOSTIC
One who doubts the existence of many gods.
[Anon]
PAINTING
The art of protecting flat surfaces
from the weather and exposing them to the critic.
[Ambrose Bierce]
PALZHEIMER'S
Allowing friends tio drift from
consciousness, as you get promoted, move on, etc.,
[Anon]
PANSEXUAL
When 'bisexual' is too limiting.
[Queen's]
PAP SMEAR
A fatherhood test. [Rural]
PARALYZE
Two far-fetched stories
[Rural]
PARA-SITE
Web site that wraps its own frame
around other sites linked from it, creating confusion as to who is responsible
for the content. [Palo Alto]
PARENTHOOD
Feeding
the mouth that bites you. [Peter De Vries]
PARENTS
The
bones on which children sharpen their teeth.
[Peter Ustinov]
PARTRYDOM
A potentially fatal surfeit
of social gatherings. [Indie]
THE PAST
[1] A foreign country; they do things differently
there.
[L.P.Hartley]
[2] The only dead thing that smells sweet. [Edward Thomas]
PATHOLOGICAL
A reasonable way to go
[Rural]
PATIENCE
A minor form of despair, disguised
as a virtue.
[Ambrose Bierce]
PATRIOTISM
[1] The last refuge
of a scoundrel.
[Samuel Johnson]
[2] Willingness to kill and be killed for trivial reasons.[Bertrand
Russell]
PEACE
In international affairs, a period
of cheating between two periods of fighting.
[Ambrose Bierce]
PEBCAK
"Problem Exists Between
Chair And Keyboard." [Palo Alto]
PEDANT
One who knows, as described by those who didn't [James
Reeve]
PEPPIER
The waiter at a fancy restaurant whose
sole purpose seems to be walking around asking diners if they want ground pepper.
[Anon]
PERCUSSIVE MAINTAINANCEThe fine art of whacking
the **** out of an electronic device to get it to work again.
[Anon]
PERSEVERANCE
A lowly virtue whereby mediocrity
achieves an inglorious success.
[Ambrose Bierce]
PETOPHOBIC
One who is embarrassed
to undress in front of a household pet.
[Anon]
PHARMACIST
Person who makes a living dealing
in agriculture [Rural]
PHARMING
Pharmaceutical farming; the process of genetically engineering crops.
[Palo Alto]
PHILOSOPHY
A route of many roads leading
from nowhere to nothing.
[Ambrose Bierce]
PHISHING
Creating a replica web page, to con
passwords and cash from trusting souls.
[Anon]
PHONESIA
The affliction of dialing a phone
number and forgetting whom you were calling just as they answer.
[Anon]
PICTURE
A representation in two dimensions
of something wearisome in three.
[Ambrose Bierce]
PIGS
Creatures that treat us as equals, while
dogs look up to us and cats look down on us.
[Sir Winston Churchill]
PIPE
A device that gives
a wise man time to think and a fool something to put in his mouth.
[Anon]
PIRATTITUDE
The appropriate attitude to adopt on International
Talk Like A Pirate Day (September 19th). [Mark Summers and John Baur]
PISALITE
Gangly person sitting in front of you at the
movies who, no matter what direction you lean in, anticipates your every move.
(see also eiffelite).
[Anon]
PLAGIARIZE
To take the thought or style of
another writer whom one has never, never read.
[Ambrose Bierce]
PLATES
Feet (Plates of Meat).
[Rhyming]
PLAY
Work that you enjoy doing for nothing. [Evan
Esar]
PLEASE
No. Often pronounced 'Pu-Lease.'
[Queen's]
PLEASURE
Nothing else but the intermission
of pain.
[John Selden]
PLONK
Wine (Plink-Plonk = vin Blanc).
[Rhyming]
POEM
A momentary defeat of pessimism. [Tony
Harrison]
POLITENESS
The most acceptable hypocrisy.
[Ambrose
Bierce]
POLITICIAN
[1]
A person with whose politics you disagree.
[David Lloyd George]
[2] A statesman
who places the nation at his disposal
[Georges Pompidou]
[3] An animal that can sit on the fence while keeping
both ears on the ground. [Henry Louis Mencken]
POLITICS
1. Nothing more than a means of rising in the world.
[Samuel Johnson]
2. The art of choosing between the disastrous and the
unpalatable. [John Kenneth Galbraith]
POOKA
A fairy spirit in animal form, always very large. A benign but mischievious craeture and how are you Mr Wilson? [Mary Chase]
POORGASM
Sex among paupers
[Anon]
PORKIES
Lies (Pork Pies).
[Rhyming]
POSITIVE
Mistaken at the top of one's
voice. [Ambrose
Bierce]
POSSLQ
Person of Opposite Sex Sharing Living
Quarters; [Anon]
POSTAL
In a rage; inspired by a rash of workplace shootings by post-office employees
('going postal') [Palo Alto]
POWER
The ultimate aphrodisiac.
[Henry Kissinger]
PRAIRIE-DOG
Doing something in a cube farm that
prompts everyone's head to pop up over their cubicle walls to see what's going
on. [Palo Alto]
PREBUTTAL
Rebuttal written in anticipation
of the need to rebut. [Palo Alto]
PREHAB
The stage before rehab. If you can remember it?
[Anon]
PREJUDICE
An opinion without visible means
of support.
[Ambrose Bierce]
PRESENT
That part of eternity dividing
the domain of disappointment from the realm of hope.
[Ambrose Bierce]
PROBABILITY
The 50/50 chance of
something occurring. Either a thing will happen or it won't.
[Anon]
PROCRASTINATION
[1] The thief of time
[Edward Young]
[2] The art of keeping up with yesterday.
[Anon]
PROGRESS
[1] Based on a universal desire to live beyond
our means. [Samuel
Butler]
[2] The exchange of one nuisance for another [Henry Havelock
Ellis]
PROPAGANDA
Nearly deceiving your friends without
quite deceiving your enemies.
[F.M.Cornford]
PROPERTY
Organised robbery
[George Bernard Shaw]
PROTEIN
In favor of young
people [Rural]
PROVERB
Much matter decorated into few words.
[Thomas Fuller]
PUNCTUALITY
The politeness of kings.
[Louis XVIII]
The virtue of the bored. [Evelyn Waugh]
PUNIVERSITY
The college at the foot
of the academic league tables. [Indie]
PUPKUS
The moist residue left on a window after
a dog presses its nose to it. [Anon]
PURITAN
One who hated bear baiting; not because it
gave pain to the bear, but because it gave pleasure to the spectators.
[Lord Macaulay]
PURITANISM
The haunting fear that
someone, somewhere, may be happy.
[H.L.Mencken]