Conference thebay::joyoflex

A zit of teenagers.

Dave C.

I have some favorites as well:

	A patch of briars,
	A grove of trees,
	a packof wolves,
	and a swarm of bees.

How about:
	
	A bowl of roses.

	A squabble of hens.

a flourish of strumpets!
a pride of loins!
a jam of tarts!

I can't resist adding "a giggle of girls".

-John

One of the trivia questions concerns what a group of frogs is called.
It's...



















      an Army!  



beck

A flourish of strumpets, or
a trey of tarts, or
an anthology of pro's.

    a clutter of cats.   [could also serve for my four kids]
    a murder of crows.   [how about terrorists, too?]
    
    Pride of lions as already been stated, but how about a 'shame' of
    [Massachusetts] politicians?  [a 'scandal' describes a Washington
    D.C group.]
    
    a 'chuckle' of comedians [My carpool buddy, Mark D., made that one
    up.]
    
    a 'riot' of laughter; a 'hush' of silence.
    
    a 'loiter' of Washington D.C lobbyists; a 'porkbarrel' of congressmen.
    
    [some else take a turn?]

    
    a gag of punsteers.

    The World Almanac annually presents a list of animal collectives that
    have "fallen into comparative disuse."  Perhaps we could recycle them.
    For example: 
    
    a 'charm' of goldfinches => beauty contestants
    a 'crash' of rhinoceri => stockbrokers
    a 'drift' of swine => hobos
    an 'exaltation' of larks => choristers
    a 'kindle' or 'kendle' of kittens => Notes flamers
    a 'leap' of leopards => high-jumpers
    a 'muster' of peacocks => military reservists
    a 'mute' of hounds => mimes
    a 'skulk' of foxes => spies
    a 'sleuth' of bears => detectives
    a 'sounder' of boars, swine => musicians
    a 'watch' of nightingales => TV viewers

    A narration of nouns
    A nestling of nouns
    A nard of nouns (I like this one)
    A nomenclature of nouns
    A nascense ...
    A nostrum ...
    A notatation ...
    
    A bevy of balogna from 
                     -bs
    

    My favorite concerns a group of three Oxford dons who saw a number
    of "pavement princesses" in Picadilly Circus one evening.
    
    Don #1:  " Ah, a jam of tarts!"
    
    Don #2:  " No, an Essay of Trollope's!"
    
    Don #3:  " On the contrary, an Anthology of English Pros"

    I just thought that you all should be told about a classic collective
    noun coined by Alexei Sayle, which is :
    
    	A bidet of critics.
    
    Ian.

...that's for real.
    
    fred

    	My daughter was recently asked in a school test for a collective
    noun for "ducks, geese, turkeys" and she produced "protein".
    
    	The teacher had sufficient sense of humour to give her half a mark,
    but you can see where my daughter's interests lie!

     A blush of virgins
     A hover of helicopters
     A haggle of shoppers
     A slither of snakes
     A hassle of bureaucrats
     A mimic of monkeys, apes

     The next reply offers a list of known (to me) collectives in and/or
     out of use.  Feel free to enter ones I've missed.

     						Don

                97 Collective Nouns    
    
     Army - frogs
     Bale - turtles
     Band - gorillas, jays
     Barren - mules
     Bed - clams, oysters
     Bevy - swans, quail
     Brace - ducks
     Brood - chicks
     Bury - conies
     Business - ferrets
     Cast - hawks
     Cavvy - extra cowboy mounts
     Cete - badgers
     Charm - goldfinches, hummingbirds
     Chattering - choughs, starlings
     Clamor - rooks
     Cloud - gnats
     Clowder - cats
     Cluster - cats
     Clutch - chicks 
     Clutter - cats
     Colony - ants, gulls
     Congregation - plovers
     Convocation - eagles
     Covey - partridges
     Crash - rhinoceri 
     Cry - hounds
     Convocation - eagles 
     Covert - coots
     Covey - partridges, quail 
     Deceit - lapwings
     Down - hares
     Draught - fish
     Dray - squirrels
     Drift - swine
     Drove - cattle, sheep, hares, oxen
     Exultation - larks
     Field - racehorses
     Flight - birds
     Flock - sheep, geese, bustards, camels
     Flush - mallards
     Gaggle - geese (on the ground)
     Gam - whales
     Gang - elks 
     Grist - bees
     Herd - curlews, elephants, animals
     Hive - bees
     Horde - gnats

     Host - sparrows
     Hover - trout
     Husk - hares
     Kendle - kittens
     Kindle - kittens
     Knot - toads
     Leap - leopards 
     Leash - foxes, greyhounds
     Litter - pigs, cats, dogs
     Murmuration - starlings
     Murder - crows
     Muster - peacocks
     Mustering - storks
     Mute - hounds
     Nest - vipers, pheasants
     Nide - pheasants
     Nye - pheasants
     Ostentation - peacocks
     Pace - asses
     Pack - hounds, wolves
     Pair - horses
     Parliament - owls
     Plump - wildfowl (my list doesn't say ducks...)
     Pod - seals, walruses, whales
     Pride - lions
     Remuda - extra cowboy mounts
     Run - poultry
     School - fish
     Sedge - cranes, bitterns
     Shoal - fish, pilchards
     Siege - cranes, bitterns, herons
     Skein - geese (on the wing)
     Skulk - foxes
     Sleuth - bears
     Span - mules
     Spring - teals
     Sounder - boars, swine
     String - racehorses
     Swarm - bees, eels
     Team - ducks, horses
     Tribe - goats, monkeys
     Trip - goats, wildfowl
     Troop - monkeys, kangaroos, lions
     Volery - birds
     Walk - snipe(s)
     Watch - nightingales
     Wedge - swans
     Wing - plovers
     Yoke - oxen

    
    bag - potato chips
    box - cookies
    bunch - bananas, geeks
    carton - eggs
    
    - snopes
    

    re: .22
    
    A cavvy of horses is also called a remuda in parts of the west. 
    
    I believe it derives from a Spanish term for "relay" and
    originally referred to the horses kept waiting for relay
    messengers to use.  Later it came to be applied to any group of
    available mounts.
    
    --bonnie

You missed my favorite!

	A singular of hippopotami

						Brian

    re: .24  Bonnie, please also believe "remuda" is on my .22 list.
             As an aficionado of the Old West, how could I possibly
             omit it???
             
    re: .25  Brian, where did you run across *that* one?
                                            
                                            	Don

    A drove of cars
    A parliament of thieves
    A deceit of lawyers
    An escape of lawyers
    A cluster of foxes (foxen?)
    A crash of programs
    A weight of manuals (a mass of volumes)
    A nail of files
    An assistance of directories
    A slip of disks
    A crash of disks
    A compilation of interpreters

re:  -< A system of eunuchs >-
I thought it was a sigh of eunuchs.

    A herd of lies
    An flock of protections (flock = a Unix library routine to lock files)
    A host of networks
    A string of attachments
    A rack of torturers
    A collection of garbage
    A set of structures
    A list of structures etc.
    A division of quarters
    A paradigms  (sorry)
    An exhaltation of puns
    An exhortation of preachers
    A joy of sects
    An Ul of tricks

    Next to my stereo is an array of records.  I don't want to make the
    investment in converting to a pack of disks.

    A suite of chocolates
    A table of malcontents
    A house of comments
    A point of hors d'oeuvres
    A streak of flashers
    A swarm of schools
    A school of swarms
    A sea of languages
    A sea ;-) of streakers
    A sea of saws
    A sequence of flashy dots
    A litter of papers
    A tract of subs
    A colony of node names
    A deck of stations

    Ok I'll stop now

    re: .26
    
    Sorry, I read through twice and missed it both times. 
    
    --bonnie

    The collective noun for bankers (those who work in banks) is a wunch.
    
    There is also a collective for your favourite type of car - for
    example a clot of volvos.  This may describe the driver better than
    the car!

    <RATHOLE>
    
    The London Evening Standard surveyed drivers in the capital looking
    for the most despised drivers.
    
    No, not taxi drivers, but men in Volvos.  Some of the adjectives
    used were arrogant, aggressive, boorish, ill mannered and selfish.
    
    Are all Volvo drivers like this?  (FWIW my mother drove a Volvo
    and all the adjectives applied)
    
    Nick

    A chowder of clams ?

    The assumption that *ALL* Volvo owners would be arrogant is outrageous!
    *I* am not arrogant or aggressive, never boorish, and my manners are
    very civilized, while I am considered (at least by my children) very
    generous.  I now own 3 Volvos and have owned 3 others.  Now really,
    let's not get childish and start lumping all of the elite, inteligent,
    sophisticated Volvo owners into one group.  Just because we let you
    drivers of those other cars on *OUR* roads makes us *very* generous and
    curtious.  The least you can do is get out of the !@$Y&!#*@$#&& WAY!
    
    There, I've said my peice, I'm going to take my nappy poo....
    
    (The preceeding was an interruption of this note, we hope that you take
    this with the intended spirit - 8^))  Thank you

    <END_RATHOLE>

    Nick

    A customer said, with a perfectly straight face, when referring to his
    roomful of about 150 Mac IIcx's:  
    
    "Here, we've networked a whole HOST of Macintoshes."
    
    Since I would like to have this site ultimately buy our group's Client
    bits, I merely smirked internally and didn't point out the delicious
    collective-noun contradiction.
    
    Your Ob't (supplier of :-) Servant,
    Dan, Littleton MA USA

    Naw, a BUSHEL of Macintoshes.
    
    
    A fleet of reporters
    
    A block of initiatives
    
    A chorus of memories
    
    A herd of RAMs
    
    A queue of cards
    
    A posse of interpreters

>   A queue of cards

Also,
    a queue of managers
    a queue of pool hustlers

    ::DIAMOND -- Your nice note made me reread my own .39 and discover
    that I'd already subconsciously associated to this new collective noun.
    
    As a longtime McIntosh apple consumer who greatly prefers them to the
    Delicious variety, I'm happy finally to find SOME good use for that
    misnamed fruit's name... :-)  Cheers, Dan K

    
    
    
    
    	A prevarication of fishermen
    
    
    	-- Glinch

    A gaggle of gliders.

Re .40 (Diamond)

>    A queue of cards

Are you sure it isn't a deque of cards?   (A deque is a Double-Ended
Queue--you can add to either end, you can remove from either end, but
you cannot insert or remove from the middle.)

Dave C.

    A cue of cards
    
    							Ann B.

    
    
                A rack of beer, a rack of lamb, lookit the rack on that
    one.
                A brick of firecrackers.
                A fagot of sticks.
                A sheaf of wheat.
                A bunch of carrots.
                

    A hopeful of college co-ops
    
    An untie of dyslexics
    
    A constellation of actors
    
    A snooze of meetings
    
    A buffer-overflow of keystrokes (not a large collection)
    
    A noose of noun-strings (used by writers to hang themselves)

    
    a clutter of coffeemugs
    a wallblanket of buttons
    a glee of toys
    a wrecktangle of cars
    
    -Jody
    

    a dither of managers
    
    Nick

    a worry of employees
    
    Nick

    A nittery of noters

   An infestation of spiders.

    re: .34
    
    <RATHOLE-REVISITED>
    At last!  A Yuppie expression to replace the old "Ah, Yer Old Lady
    wears combat boots!":
    
    "Your Old Man drives a Volvo!"
    
                                                     Don
    <RATHOLE_EXUENT>

    Re: .54
    
    Then there is the westernized version:
    
    	Why, you low-down, lily-liveried, side-winding polecat!
    	Your ma wears combat boots!
    
    Somehow ending that with "Your old man drives a Volvo" just
    doesn't carry the same punch.

    re: previous 
    
    What's wrong with wearing combat boots?
    
    --ma

    Is the `combat boots' version a twentieth century analogue of `son of a
    gun' [see etymology elsewhere - prob. in the Etymology note]?
    
    b

    Well, there could be that implication.  I believe it's a
    class/cultural slur.  Many immigrant women of central European
    descent do wear heavy boots to do manual labor, which is what they
    were used to back home.  The WASPish middle class tended to
    interpret this in a different way -- that the family in question
    is so sleazy and poor that the woman in question has to wear men's
    boots, implying that she is doing men's work, implying that the
    men of the family AREN'T doing men's work because they're drunken
    weaklings.  There could be an implication that if she has children
    she must have found another man to father them.  There's more of
    an implication that the son is a mama's boy (i.e. gay).
    
    --bonnie

    I always thought the connection was an indirect accusation of
    prostitution: your mother would barter her body to soldiers for
    the goods the soldiers had available, and thus wound up wearing
    combat boots.  It's a variant on "Your mother swims out to troop
    ships."
    			-John Bishop

    A run of boots
    
    A cluster of boots
    
    A tree of shoes
    
    An affaire of laces
    
    A unity of soles
    
    
    
    Also a rush of Tom Swifties

    A few more...
    
    A suit of businessmen         A
    A rack of pool players
    A blazer of schoolboys

    A rack of torturers
    A trail of ho[l]mes
    A reel of fish
    A board of ships
    A library of objections
    A row of arguments

    A rack of lamb?

    
    	A litter of trash
    
    	A mish-mash of potatoes
    
    
    							GTI
    

    A groan of puns

    A crown of thorns
    
    A crown of jewels

    A pan of critics

    A smattering of applause
    
    [I'm fond of the word "smattering" - sounds like something out of a
    Victorian novel, such as Smattering-on-the-Marsh...]
    
    Or how about a smirch of imputations? 
    
    "Elderly antiquary Percy Smattering steadfastly denied having anything
    to do with the theft of Lady Chatterley's Pekinese, the poaching of
    Lord Chatterley's pheasants, and the poison-pen letter to the
    gamekeeper. 'The entire smirch is unfounded,' he shrilled."
    
    -b

Re .23: A bottle of crisps (?)

A milling of cats (I'm not sure if this is a collective noun or an indication
of quantity - but it does seem appropriate when I'm in the kitchen surrounded
by vociferous and hungry felines!).

Chris.

    A pound of nails
    
    A board of builders
    
    A panel of carpenters
    
    A committee of sinners
    
    A meeting of butchers
    
    A deputation of sheriffs
    
    (poor taste warning)
    
    A delegation of amputees 

A sanctity of nuns

	A Hypocrisy of <fill in your favorite target here>

    		...  hypocrites!

    
    the following appearedinthe 4/29/91 issue of New York magazine
    
    A plethora of lispers
    An overbearance of brood mares
    A mingling of broken vases
    A tenet of palindromes
    A hotbed of quilts
    A veneer of newsasters
    A brace of orthodontists
    A rash of dermatologists
    A chain of lynx
    A gaggle of censors (or comedians)
    An amalgam of dentists
    A cast of orthopedists
    A slew of retired hit men
    A box of pugilists
    A concert of yes men
    A flash of paparazzi
    A bunch of florsits
    A sum of adders
    A set of hairdressers
    A herd of otologists
    A lot of (salt, realtors, parking attendants, auctioneers)
    a column of architects
    A ring of jewelers
    A great deal of used car salesmen
    
    
    -Jody
    

    or a convention of nuns
    
    and 
    
    a case of detectives
    a handful of manicurists
    a spray of firemen
    a bouquet of oenologists
    a barrel of gunsmiths
    a load of ammunition makers
    a basket of ball-players
    a row of oarsmen
    a stack of librarians
    a list of worried sailors
    a collection of hobbyists
    a shock of seismologists
    a can of optimists

From our JOYOFLEX member-ex-officio on the Left Coast:

ORIGINAL           LACKSITIVE                      CORKER
--------           ----------                      ------
pride           a shame of lions                an arrogance of lions
clutch          a dropsy of eggs                a squeeze of eggs
flight          a stroll of birds               an orbit of birds
herd            a silence of cattle             a deafening of cattle
gaggle          a giggle of geese               a googol of geese
fleet           a crawl of ships                a warp of ships
bevy            a thirst of beauties            a Gulp of beauties
string          a thread of beads               a cable of beads
hive            an itch of bees                 an eruption of bees
school          a kindergarten of whales        a college of whales
nest            a twig of ants                  a suburb of ants
covey           a cliffy of ducks               a beachy of ducks
congregation    a disintegration of bishops     an aggregation of bishops
congregation    a dispersion of cardinals       a clump of cardinals
beauty          an ugly of finches              a bo-derek of finches
pile            a stick of money                a maypole of money
sheaf           an ear of paper                 a field of paper
row             a drift of corn                 a scull of corn
cloud           a wisp of midges                an overcast of midges
pack            a handbag of wolves             a burden of wolves
troop           a trudge of soldiers            a sprint of soldiers
flock           a flick of gulls                a flak of gulls
string          a point of horses               a plane of horses
loft            a lob of pigeons                a penthouse of pigeons
shower          a show of drops                 a showest of drops
swarm           a scold of bees                 a shot of bees
exultation      a depression of larks           an orgasm of larks

>ORIGINAL           LACKSITIVE                      CORKER
>--------           ----------                      ------
>...
>pile            a stick of money                a maypole of money


Shouldn't that be a hemorrhoid of money?

A friend just loaned me a cassette tape of bagpipe music
titled "A controversy of pipers"

    A network of flames
    A release of bugs

    A farm of collectives    (maybe somewhat dated now...)
    A corps of segmentation faults
    A symphony of con artists
    A ring of telephones
    A handful of palms

    A bucket of bits
    A vault of burglars


                                                 - Rik -
    

    
    
    	A gross of worms

    A pack of troubles.
    
    	"Kit up your troubles in your old pack bag, ..."

    I've read that there is a new book on the market entitled: AN
    EXALTATION OF LARKS by James Lipton, published by Viking Penguin USA.
    Has anyone seen or read it? Any gems to be found therein? I'm in good
    ol' Central Yurrup and such books in English are not readily available. 
    Thanks a bunch for any extracts.
    The advert said the book contained newly-minted collective nouns, such
    as a Charge of Shoppers and a Titillation of Lingerie.
    
    				Michele

    It might be a new edition, but "Exaltation of Larks" has been around
    for many years. Worth checking out, though!
    
    -b

    >a Titillation of Lingerie.
    
    makes more sense than a Chest of Drawers!!!

    And because of my love of politicians....
    
    
    	A discord of MPs 
    	A resignation of Ministers 
    	A flagellation of Whips 
    	A vacillation of Prime Ministers
    	An antiquity of Lords
    
    
    please feel free to substitue appropriate national job-titles ;-}
    
    Jon

    A collection of nouns
    A set of options
    A series of asteroids
    A symphony of frauds
    A convoy of jailbirds
    A handful of applause
    A rush of Swifties
    A blaze of Usenet postings

    An absurdity of collective nouns

    A very small number of these things are real and the rest are
    witticisms.  "A fanfare of strumpets" is not equal to "a school of
    fish" or "a herd of cattle".
    

    An uncomfortableness of own petards
    
    b

    >An uncomfortableness of own petards
    
    Perhaps "discomfort" would be a bette word?
    "Comfort" is actually a collective for something or other, isn't it?
    
    -- Norman Diamond

    Yes, I thought of `embar[r]assment'; but I always have to look
    it up to get the right number of Rs. It's my bette (sic) noire.
    
    I prefer `discomfort' though.
    
    b
    

    You silly geese!  It's a *hoist* of petards!  :-)

    Norman, were you thinking of a 'comfort of quilts'?
    
    Nick
    
    'Comfort' isn't a collective noun in the NSOED - I've looked.

    A deck of layoffs (or resignations, losses, euphemisms, etc.)
    A deal of cards
    A royal flush of thrones
    A full house of PR people
    A strait of heterosexuals
    A round of zeroes
    A tale of woes
    A shortage of pessimists
    A length of optimists
    A herd of notes
    A list of rhapsodies
    A spell of proofreaders
    A cast of fishhooks
    A board of keys
    A pile of drivers

    you mean
    
    "A DEC of layoffs"
    
    no?
    
    ed

    oh, and
    
    A round of snarfs.
    
    :-)
    
    ed

    A harem of e-mails.

    A web of pornographers.
    A litter of junk mail.
    An association of commuters.
    An association of distributors.
    A round of pies.