Conference thebay::joyoflex

    Let's not forget
    	RADAR

    or Napoleon's alleged confession of
	ABLE WAS I ERE I SAW ELBA
    
    (Not to put words in his mouth, but I'd bet Eric has a program to
    find the palindromes in his dictionaries!)

My favorite old chestnut:

	A man, a plan, a canal -- Panama!
						>>>==>PStJTT

   Bolton <--> Ipswich

    Re: .3
    
    For those of us who are not Monty Python fans, what's the connection?
    It bears no resembence to a palindrome.
    
    If it's an "inside joke", could it be shared?

  It's part of Monty Python's infamous "Parrot skit," in which the 
  owner of a Norwegian Blue parrot returns the bird because it's dead.
  The owner of the pet shop denies that the bird is deceased, explaining
  at various times that it is merely "pinin' for the fjords" or "tired
  and shagged out after a prolonged squawk."   The customer counters
  that the bird "is not pining; it's passed on.  Its metabolic processes
  are history; it has left this mortal coil and joined the choir and
  visibule.  Furthermore, the bird had been nailed to its perch."  And
  on and on...

  Somewhere along the way, the pet shop owner directs the customer to
  his brother's pet shop in Bolton.  When the customer arrives, he asks
  whether the town is Bolton and the owner says, "No, it's Ipswich."
  When the customer finds out that the town really is Bolton and goes
  back to demand an explanation, the shop owner says, "That was a palindrome."
  
  The customer (played by the way by John Cleese, the greatest practitioner
  of the comedic slow burn) explains that the palindrome of Bolton is
  Notlob.   

  Anyway, if you like madness, give Monty Python a try.

  JP

    RE: .5
    
    Funny that YOU should like Monty Python's parodies......

    from the Guiness Book of World records:
    
    longest english word: Redivider
    
    longest palindromic composition devised is one of 5023 words completed
    by Jeff Grant in March, 1976.  It begins:
    
    "Evils nag a part- Lunacy a war.  A few erase ..." and hence
    predictably ends "... Are we far away?  Can ultra pagans live?"
    
    -Kurt*

re .7: How does it end ?

/e

    A Toyota.
    
    Straw?  No, too stupid a fad.  I put soot on warts!
    
    God a dog?
    
    Variations are also fun - for instance, sentences made of words
    which are palindromes or which spell other things backwards
    can be read forward or backwards and may or may not make sense.
                                             
    Dog a Toyota-level radar? God!
    Dog-radar level a Toyota? God!
    
    and such gibbersense
    
    MP

Back when I was at university, we used a time-sharing system called
the "Edinburgh Multi-Access System" or EMAS.  This was popularly
believed to be a palindrome since it was the 'same' backwards!


I don't make 'em up, I just report 'em.
Nigel

    Palindrome fans will be interested in:
    
    Palindromes and Anagrams, by Howard W. Bergerson. Dover, 1973. Probably
    still in print.
    
    This book has a large collection of palindromic sentences and poems,
    anagrams, and a few vocabularyclept poems (poems that share the
    same set of words). 
    
    					Val

    re:.5
    
    That should be "...joined the Choir Invisible"
    
    --- jerry

  Re: .12

  Thanks much for that tip, Jerry.  I've been searching for a definition
  of "visibule" for years...   So, what's the complete reference for
  "Choir Invisible?"

  JP

    The "choir invisible" is just a somewhat fancy, sentimental, and
    archaic term for the dead.  I can find no literary reference for
    it, but then my resources are limited.
    
    ESW

Thanks, Earl -- I figured that out...

JP

    You figured out that his resources were limited?
    							Ann

    But they're not invisible!
    
    -bs

  Sorry -- mea maxima culpa.  Earl's resources are apparently very nearly
  unlimited and highly visible.  What I figured out was that the phrase in
  question meant "dead" (bleedin' demised, if you insist on the technical
  term...).  The problem is that British diction is too good -- when I heard
  John Cleese say "..visibule" I thought that was what he meant.

  JP

    Of course, the first human conversation consisted of palindromes.
    It went:
    	He: "Madam, I'm Adam."
    	She: "Eve."
    
    There is a book of crossword puzzles whose answers consist entirely
    of palindromes. It's titled "Rats Live on No Evil Star". I forgot
    who wrote or published it.
    
    Lynn

    Aibohphobia: the irrational fear of palindromes.

There was recently a flurry of interest in the MATH notes file about 
palindromes (badge numbers, primes, whatever), and someone wanted to extend 
the discussion to palindromic words. The moderator refused, citing this 
discussion as adequate for the whole company. The moderator's last entry on
that topic says, among other things, 

	"I prefer pi."

Has this been pointed out? I can't recall seeing it. You can make an 
arbitrarily long English palindrome by recursion, thus: given ANY
English palindrome X, then a bigger one is

	"'X', sides reversed, is 'X'."

All you have to do to make it intelligible is to provide the appropriate 
levels of quotes and other punctuation for X (and its reversal).

Lynn Yarbrough

    dietary advice:
    
    	sup on no pus!
    
    to find out what time it is, you could use:
    
    	emit a time!
    
    

     "The Choir Invisible" turns out to be a poem by George Eliot -
    "Oh, may I join the choir invisible
     Of those immortal dead who <dum de dum>..."
    
    or something like that. Stumbled across it a few days ago in one
    of my books of quotations, and since this Note just came up again,
    well, better to do it now than to go back home and look it up and
    all that bother. If anyone REALLY wants the exact quote, let me
    know.
    
    -John
    

    Please include the exact quote.  
    
    When I read the preceding entry, I thought "What does this have to do
    with Palindromes?" The answer was "Nothing."  But -- it is a wonderful
    example of the byroads VAX Notes sometimes follow.  The digressions
    are often more interesting than the original topic.
    
    					andrew

    Oh, all right:
    "Oh may I join the choir invisible
     Of those immortal dead who live again
     In minds made better by their presence."
    
     That's all the the Penguin Book of Quotations considers
    memorable.
    
     I mention it here because there was a previous question about
    the source of the phrase at Reply .13. I am not the sort of amateur
    Noter who pops irrelevant Replies into whatever Note happens to
    appear on the screen, he harrumphed.
    
    -John

    There is a short story about a man who was obsessed with
    palindromes that I read a number of years ago. It ended with
    his wife murdering him and the Judge decreeing "No evil, Madam,
    live on."
    
    Does anyone remember the title and author?
    
    Bonnie

    Back to palindromes, almost a year later ... :-)
    
    Rotor
    
    Lewd I did live, Evil I did dwel
    
    
    
    Pierre.

    Dwel, dwell ? Had I the spelling wrong ?
    
    Dwell (dwel) vb. dwelling, dwelt or dwelled.
    (intr.) 1.formal, literary. to live as a permanent
    resident. 2. to live (in a specified state) : to dwell
    in poverty.
    
    (Courtesy 'The New Collins' - Concise English Dictionnary)
    
    Ok, I cheated a bit :-)
    
    
    Pierre

    ...and one of your `I did's should be `did I'

    Re .28
    
>>    Back to palindromes, almost a year later ... :-)
    
    Pierre, that makes you the REVIVER of the palindrome topic.
    
    A friend and I once set up a Boggle (tm?) game to have the word
    "reviver" as many times as possible, to see how high a score we
    could get for one round in that game.  Each occurrence counted
    towards the point total twice!
    
    Dan

Yesterday I saw a motorbike in my rear view mirror. It was following very
close, and I could clearly read the name:

		AHAMAY

Obviously the name was really 'xxxxxxx' (brand name omitted), but what I
thought was interesting was the fact that each letter read clearly as a mirror
image. Then I started wondering about mirror-image palindromes - ie palindromes
made up of letters which are reversible - you could then read the word
correctly in the mirror.

I stopped at MUM.		Can you do better?

	Steve	:-)(-:

    Re .33 (Steve):
    
    Well, of course, the cry of discovery,

                                    AHA
    
    would also work.  As would its variant, OHO
    
    As well as MUM is MOM;
    
    Then there's
                                 MA'AM
    
    As in "Thank you ..."                      
    
    Steve Kallis, jr.

There's also OTTO, as in:

	"But Otto, what about our relationship?"

Larry

    ATOYOTA
    
    ?
    
    

    G'day,
    
    Mirror imaged palindromes clearly rely on symmetrical lettering.
    Looking at my keyboard I see
    
    AHIMOTUVWXY as being candidates.
    
    If we allow vertical disposition of the letters then mirror imaging
    is easier!
    
    ie
    
    W
    H
    A
    T
    
    A
    
    W
    A
    X
    Y
    
    M
    O
    U
    T
    H
    
    
    and so on..
    
    Horizontally is not so easy
    
    Derek
    

If you allow vertical writing, we have

		T
		O
		Y
		O
		T
		A

This will look correct in a mirror.  (Scientists don't yet know
why mirrors reverse letters left to right but leave them rightside up :-)

/Eric

The following words will also look correct in a mirror:


	H	A	M	O	T	V	Y
	A	X	O	V	A	O	O
	Y	I	U	U	X	M	U
	M	O	T	M	I	I	T
	O	M	H			T	H
	W		Y


/Eric

    A word that looks corect in a mirror both vertically and horizontally
    is:
    
                               WOW
    
    of course, any word that reads okay horizontally (MOM, AHA, etc)
    will read the okay vertically ...
    
    Steve Kallis, Jr.

Then there's the truck that was bearing down on me hard from behind.

What I saw in the rear view mirror was:

				IMAIM

Interesting how a location becomes a statement of intent when reversed!

    There is (or was) a brand of bullion sold in England that formed
    the ultimate palindrome -- no matter how you read it: upside down,
    upside up, mirror imaged, etc., it always read the same.  The name:
    
    				OXO
    
    					andrew

    Re .42: -< Don't do any better than this... >-
    
    Actually, you were doing a little too well, Andrew...
    
>   There is (or was) a brand of bullion sold in England that formed ...
                                 ^^^^^^^
    
    It still IS sold in England (also in the USA, at my local continental
    grocery store) and just to prevent a gold rush from getting out of
    hand, it should be understood that a cube of OXO contains (the makings for) 
    bouillon, not bullion.

    You know, I looked at that word, and it didn't look right,
    but for the life of me I come up with an alternate version,
    so I let it stand.
    
    					andrew

    I knew someone whose license plate was
    
    	3M TA3
    

    Until a policeman looked in his rear-view mirror at it.
    
    	Jon

    Speaking of palindromes, the following is ascribed to Dan Hoey,
    at Carnegie Mellon (as reported in the M.I.T. Technology Review):
                      ---------------------------
    A man, a plan, a caret, a ban, a myriad, a sum, a lac, a liar, a hoop,
    a pint, a catalpa, a gas, an oil, a bird, a yell, a vat, a caw, a pax,
    a wag, a tix, a nay, a ram, a cap, a yam, a gay, a tsar, a wall, a car,
    a luger, a ward, a bin, a woman, a vassal, a wolf, a tuna, a nit, a
    pall, a fret, a watt, a bay, a daub, a tan, a cab, a datum, a gall, a
    hat, a fag, a zap, a say, a jaw, a lay, a wet, a gallop, a tug, a trot,
    a trap, a tram, a torr, a caper, a top, a tonk, a toll, a ball, a fair,
    a sax, a minim, a tenor, a bass, a passer, a capital, a rut, an amen, a
    ted, a cabal, a tang, a sun, an ass, a maw, a sag, a jam, a dam, a sub,
    a salt, an axon, a sail, an ad, a wadi, a radian, a room, a rood, a
    rip, a tad, a pariah, a revel, a reel, a reed, a pool, a plug, a pin, a
    peek, a parabola, a dog, a pat, a cud, a nu, a fan, a pal, a rum, a
    nod, an eta, a lag, an eel, a batik, a mug, a mot, a nap, a maxim, a
    mood, a leek, a grub, a gob, a gel, a drab, a citadel, a total, a
    cedar, a tap, a gag, a rat, a manor, a bar, a gal, a cola, a pap, a
    yaw, a tab, a raj, a gab, a nag, a pagan, a bag, a jar, a bat, a way, a
    papa, a local, a gar, a baron, a mat, a rag, a gap, a tar, a decal, a
    tot, a led, a tic, a bard, a leg, a bog, a burg, a keel, a doom, a mix,
    a map, an atom, a gum, a kit, a baleen, a gala, a ten, a don, a mural,
    a pan, a faun, a ducat, a pagoda, a lob, a rap, a keep, a nip, a gulp,
    a loop, a deer, a leer, a lever, a hair, a pad, a tapir, a door, a
    moor, an aid, a raid, a wad, an alias, an ox, an atlas, a bus, a madam,
    a jag, a saw, a mass, an anus, a gnat, a lab, a cadet, an em, a
    natural, a tip, a caress, a pass, a baronet, a minimax, a sari, a fall,
    a ballot, a knot, a pot, a rep, a carrot, a mart, a part, a tort, a
    gut, a poll, a gateway, a law, a jay, a sap, a zag, a fat, a hall, a
    gamut, a dab, a can, a tabu, a day, a batt, a waterfall, a patina, a
    nut, a flow, a lass, a van, a mow, a nib, a draw, a regular, a call, a
    war, a stay, a gam, a yap, a cam, a ray, an ax, a tag, a wax a paw, a
    cat, a valley, a drib, a lion, a saga, a plat, a catnip, a pooh, a
    rail, a calamus, a dairyman, a bater, a canal--Panama.

    In Boston, control of the Damon Corporation is being contested by 
    Nomad, Inc. 

    I was cleaning out some *old* files and found the following palindromes.
    
sit on a potato pan, otis.

'naomi, sex at noon taxes!' i moan

do good? i? no! evil anon i deliver: i maim nine more hero-men in saginaw;
sanitary sword a-tuck, carol i (lo!) rack; cut a drowsy rat in aswan; i gas
nine more hero-men in miami -- reviled, i, nona, live on, i do, o god!

Piel's lager on red rum did murder no regal sleep.

A slut nixes sex in Tulsa.

Sex at noon taxes.

Naomi, sex at noon taxes, I moan.

I moan, 'live on, o evil Naomi!'

Now Ned, I am a maiden nun; Ned, I am a maiden won.

Dennis sinned.

Dennis and Edna sinned.

Dennis Krats and Edna Stark sinned.

Niagara, O roar again.

Lew, Otto has a hot towel.

Sit on a potato pan, Otis.

Norma is as selfless as I am, Ron.

Draw pupil's lip upward.

Straw?  No, too stupid a fad.  I put soot on warts.

Doc, note, I dissent.  A fast never prevents a fatness.  I diet on cod.

I, man am regal; a German am I.

Snug & raw was I ere I saw war & guns.

Si nummi immunis.  [If you pay, you will go free]

Ablata at alba.  [Out of sight, but still white]

SATOR
AREPO
TENET
OPERA
ROTAS   [Reads the same horizontally and vertically]
        [The mechanic Arepo guides the wheels at work]

In girum imus nocte et consumimur igni.
        [We go into the circle at night and we are consumed by fire]


Never odd or even.

Name tarts?  No, medieval slave, I demonstrate man!

Stiff, O dairy-man, in a myriad of fits!

Stop, Syrian, I start at rats in airy spots!

No sot nor Ottawa law at Toronto, son.

... And there's a good story that goes with the "ABLATA AT ALBA" one.
A lady who was attached to the court of Queen Elizabeth was banished on
suspicion of too great familiarity with a nobleman then high in favor.
She adopted as her device the moon covered by a cloud, and as her motto,
		     *** ABLATA AT ALBA ***
which, in addition to the literal "Out of sight but still white," meant
"Banished but blameless."

    Incidentally, I was told that the word-square in .-1 was used as a secret 
    sign by the early Christians. If you reorganize the letters in:
    	
	SATOR
	AREPO
	TENET
	OPERA
	ROTAS
    
    you get the words `Pater Noster' twice, in the form of a cross
    (crossing at the `n').
    
    (This could be bunk, but it works).
    
    b

    Re .last_two:
    
    There has been m ore speculation on the "SATOR" square thanm one
    might imagine.
    
    It was apparently originally discovered scratched on fragments of
    wall plaster from a Roman villa in England, was inscribed on drinking
    vessels, etc.  Translation attempts include:
    
    Arepo, the sower, delays the wheels with his work.
    
    The sower is at the plow; the work occupies the wheels.
    
    The Creator, slow-moving, maintains His creations as vortices.
    
    The "Pater Noster" explanation seems the best bet.  According to
    Cavendish, it may be an anagram of PATER NOSTER, twice, with the
    letters A and O added, standing for Alpha and Omega, as mentioned
    in Rev 1:11, and standing for Christ.
    
    Steve Kallis, Jr.

OK, here's a bizzare one...  my wife wanted to talk baby names for our 
soon-to-be son, and I was tired and a little distracted.  

She: How about Joseph?  We could call him Joe.
Me:  Joe! Great! It's a palindrome!
She: Huh?

You see, I had spent the last couple of weeks studying morse code.  I had
deamt in code, I had tried to decode the sounds the baseboard heat made in
the morning and in code, Joe is

	o = = =    = = =   o 
    (Didahdahdah Dahdahdah Dit)
 
It had translated it without thinking.

				>>>==>PStJTT

    Re: .-1
    
    Not unlike my initials.
    
    RK (._. _._, not a palindrome but having a certain symmetry)
    

< Note 193.51 by PSTJTT::TABER "It offends my freakin' dignity" >
                         -< translational palindrome? >-

>You see, I had spent the last couple of weeks studying morse code.  I had
>deamt in code, I had tried to decode the sounds the baseboard heat made in
>the morning and in code, Joe is
>
>	o = = =    = = =   o 
>    (Didahdahdah Dahdahdah Dit)
> 
>It had translated it without thinking.
>
>				>>>==>PStJTT


I think that you're ready to take the test now.

;^)

Perry (KW1O)

    Yeah, and you should consider naming you soon-to-be-son Notlob.
    
    	Jon

    How about:
    
    May we nag Nils to order a red root, sling a new yam?
    
    Dorian

    Bucko...

    re .56
    
    I love it! It sounds like an original one, is it? At my last job
    I became addicted to palindromes, and was in a group that stayed
    up late at night concocting them. We didn't dare look in any of
    the books of them. (Of course, there's always independent simultaneous
    discovery...) Is there any interest here in restricting 'dromes
    to the home-grown variety?
    
    Dorian

    here's a new one a friend of mine sent me (variation on an older one):
    
    "A man, a pain, a mania - Panama"
    
    -Jody
    

    So many dynamos!

    Dial Nehru! Our hen laid!

The personal name and the year say it.

Jerry

		Seen recently:

		SATAN, OSCILLATE MY METALLIC SONATAS!

		Is this a record?  

		Or is it more likely a CD?  Heh heh!

		Jim

    
    
               <<< NOVA::NOTES_DISK:[NOTES$LIBRARY]SQL.NOTE;1 >>>
                                 -< SQL notes >-
================================================================================
Note 2028.2           SELECTing many columns in dynamic SQL               2 of 7
NOVA::SMITHI "Lay a wallaby baby ball away, Al..."   33 lines  13-NOV-1991 10:32
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------

    Ian says the wallaby palindrome in .-1 came from a palindrome calender
    he saw on a friends desk.  His other favourite was
    
    	"Must sell at tallest sum".

I take it from an earlier reference in this note that numbers as well as 
letters when combined to read the same frontwards and backwards are called 
palindrones.  Correct?  

Matt

    >I take it from an earlier reference in this note that numbers as well as
    >letters when combined to read the same frontwards and backwards are called
    >palindrones.  Correct?
     --------=--
    
    Nope.  Palindrones are popular songs that sound the same played backwards
    as forwards.

    A notable number one has gone now, and wouldn't have worked in American 
    English anyway - 29/2/92.
    
    b

    Ah, THAT kind of numeric palindrome.  OK.
    
    There was no date 1.1.1 because the new era (Heisei) began on January 8th.
    The first date of the new era was 1.1.8  (1989 01 08 in SI format.)
    
    However, there was a 2.2.2 in 1990, a 3.3.3 in 1991, and 4.4.4 is coming
    up in 3 days.  (No, this is not an April fool.)
    
    Also there were 1.1.11, 1.11.1, 1.11.11, 2.2.22, and several other
    palindromes which contained repetitions of more than just one digit.

RE: my inquiry on whether #s can be palindromes

Tough crowd...don't even allow me a typo (palindrones)....

From other replies, apparently #s can be palindromes as well.  Thanks!

Matt

	



		If T.S. Eliot's parents had reversed his 
		first two names, we would have had a 
		wonderful palindromic legacy  .......

			   S.T. Eliot's toilets
	

    I'm not sure "S.T." would have regarded it as "wonderful".

    from the cartoon strip "Cathy":
    
    Boyfriend playing golf:  "OH, NO!! Why didn't I keep my head down??!
    	Why didn't I follow through?? Why did I tense my wrists? Why did
    	I lift my shoulders?!  I'M HOPELESS! I'M AN IDIOT!! WHY DON'T
    	I EVER LEARN!!"
    
    Cathy: "Golf: flog spelled backwards."

    Noticed the other day:
    
    Evian is na�ve spelled backwards, which prompted my wife to wonder if
    the French are just bottling their tap water and laughing at us all the
    way to the bank.
    
    namdooG yoR

    Dam, I saw a Toyota. Was I mad!
    
    for us dyslexics 
    
    boB who's mother was moM and father daD  and siS 

Date: 21 Jul 1993 17:36:02 GMT
From: [email protected] (Peter Cohen)
Subject: Palindrome from hell!
Newsgroups: ne.general

Someone just gave me a copy of this.

A man, a plan, a canoe, pasta, hero's rajahs, a coloratura, maps, snipe,
percale, macaroni, a gag, a banana bag, a tan, a cat, a mane, paper, a
Toyota, rep, a pen, a mat, a can, a tag, a banana bag again, or: a camel,
a crepe, pins, spam, a rut, a Rolo, cash, a jar, sore hats, a peon, a
canal, Panama!

for numerically/verbally challenged folks, the split happens at the y in
Toyota...

    Apparently my daughter's 3rd grade class is doing a palindrome unit. 
    She came home with
    
      GO HANG A SALAMI!  I'M A LASAGNA HOG.
                                     ^
    				     |
                        (I've decided to forgive this!)
    
    Leslie

I don't object to "lasagna".  Do you mean it should be "lasagne" (plural)?

    I always eat my lasagne one at a time, so lasagna is fine with me.

    re: .71
    
    Somewhere I read:
    
    T Eliot, top bard, notes putrid gnat tang dirt upset on drab pot
    toilet.