We’d Love to See His Expense Reports

Quote:   “Hell, I couldn’t write a better piece if given a month, five naked research assistants, and a crate of whippets.”  Jack Shafer in Slate.

Figure of Speech:  adynata (a-dyn-AH-ta), the last-people-on-earth figure.

Slate’s media columnist expresses admiration for a colleague’s hurricane story with an adynata (“without power”).  It’s a kind of hyperbole that links impossibilities:  “Even if you and I were the last people on earth, and the survival of humankind depended on us, I still wouldn’t date you.”

The adynata is like a three-ring circus of absurdity, throwing in dogs, unclad assistants, and long deadlines.  Use it as a humorous way to express, “Words cannot express…”

Snappy Answer:  “Maybe you would write better if you weren’t thinking about naked research assistants.”

Comments

[me]

I think he means nitrous oxide not dogs here man. Dogs dont come in crates but those wonderful little compressed gas cans do - break them open and suck down the balloons

[Figaro]

Ohhhhh. Figaro is red in the face. He had no idea that "whippets" referred to laughing gas. Apparently, the term comes from whipping cream chargers.

On the other hand, the illustration (Figaro bakes his own from scratch) wouldn't look as cute, right? Ignorance sometimes really is bliss.