Online Magazine Searches for the Worst Store Name
Puns
Audie Cornish (Host): There is a 1)subset of puns—businesses that name themselves based on a pun. You know, the kind of thing you see on a 2)storefront sign that makes you groan or maybe laugh, depending on your mood.
Ari Shapiro (Host): So, for example, I’ve been living in East London for the last couple years in the neighborhood where actually “Jack the Ripper” operated, and there is a hair salon near my apartment called “Jack The Clipper”.
Cornish: That’s a very good one. Another good one is an e-cigarette 3)emporium named“Darth Vapor”.
Shapiro: You know, if there were only a map of businesses with names like this so you could seek them out or maybe 4)steer clear of them.
Cornish: Well, Ari, it’s happening.
Shapiro: Yes.
Cornish: Reyhan Harmanci is on the case. She’s with the online magazine Atlas Obscura, and she’s asking for you or anyone to 5)submit your favorite punny business names. Reyhan Harmanci, welcome to the show.
Reyhan Harmanci: Thank you, guys.
Cornish: First, tell us how this idea came about.
Harmanci: Well, it’s been a source of much discussion in Atlas Obscura group chat room, and being a place called Atlas Obscura, we traffic in a lot of maps. So, this has been a pet project for the last few months.
Cornish: It’s like lunchroom chatter, basically, you guys going back and forth about maybe business names you’ve seen that you thought, oh, that’s a groaner.
Harmanci: Yeah. And one of the reasons why we decided to do it is when we would bring it up to other people, their response was like, oh, man, there was a place in my hometown or I just drove by a 6)weird nail salon. It felt like it was ripe for some mapping.
Shapiro: What kind of trends are you seeing with the submissions you’ve gotten so far?
Harmanci: Well, it’s funny you mentioned a hair salon in London. I just looked today. We have had already over 600 submissions, and there’s at least 10 different“Curl Up And Dyes”.
Cornish: (Laughter)
Shapiro: Oh, D-Y-E, “Curl Up And Dye”.
Harmanci: Yes, D-Y-E, yeah. So we’re seeing—I mean, I think the 7)bulk have been categorized as restaurants—a lot of Thai restaurants in there. Washington, D.C., is extremely well represented. I think it’s the city with the most submissions thus far.
Shapiro: Here in D.C., we have a “Bow Thai”. We have a “Thai-tanic”.
Harmanci: Yes, yes.
Cornish: Oh, “Thai-tanic”, yeah, I never thought about that.
Harmanci: Yes. Other places have a “Thaiphoon”, “appeThaizing”. For Vietnamese restaurants, there’s also a lot of submissions involving “pho”.
Shapiro: P-H-O—the Vietnamese soup.
Harmanci: Yes, exactly, the soup. Beverly Hills apparently has a “9021Pho”.
Shapiro: Pho.
Cornish: Very nice.
Shapiro: Reyhan Harmanci, how do you anticipate people using this map? Are they gonna seek these places out or are they gonna avoid them as best they can?
Harmanci: I will leave that to the discretion of the reader. I think that puns—it’s a funny thing. It’s not like a ha ha thing. It’s kind of like a 8)gut feeling of, like, oof!
奧迪·科尼什(主持人):雙關(guān)語中包括這樣一種—根據(jù)雙關(guān)語命名的商店名。你知道的,就是那種你在店面的招牌上看到的(雙關(guān)語)。它會使你抱怨或使你發(fā)笑,而這取決于你當(dāng)時的心情。
阿里·夏皮羅(主持人):例如,在過去幾年,我一直居住在倫敦東區(qū)實際上是靠近“開膛手杰克”(注:英國倫敦系列兇殺案的兇手的綽號)作案的地方,靠近我公寓的地方有一家美發(fā)沙龍叫“神剪手杰克”。
科尼什:這是非常好的一個例子。還有一個非常好的是叫達(dá)斯蒸汽(注:Darth Vapor仿造Darth Vader命名。Darth Vader又名“黑騎士”,是電影《星球大戰(zhàn)》里最重要的角色之一,電影史上著名的反派人物之一)的電子煙商店。
夏皮羅:你知道的,如果有這樣一張地圖,上面印有像達(dá)斯蒸汽這樣名字的商店,那么你可能會去尋找這些商店,或是躲開它們。
科尼什:阿里,現(xiàn)在就有人在制作這樣的一張地圖。夏皮羅:是的。
科尼什:雷伊漢·哈曼奇就正在做這樣一件事,她在《奇談地圖》網(wǎng)上雜志工作。她請求你或任何人提交你們最喜歡的雙關(guān)語的商店名。雷伊漢·哈曼奇,歡迎你來到節(jié)目現(xiàn)場。
雷伊漢·哈曼奇:謝謝你們,朋友們。
科尼什:首先,請談?wù)勥@個想法是怎么形成的。
哈曼奇:在《奇談地圖》網(wǎng)上聊天群,大家經(jīng)常會就這些雙關(guān)語店名進(jìn)行討論。作為一家名為《奇談地圖》的雜志,我們從事的是關(guān)于很多地圖的買賣,而這就是我們過去幾個月一直被看好的一個項目。
科尼什:這其實就像餐廳閑聊,你們把之前見過的商店名字來回想一遍,然后你發(fā)現(xiàn),噢,那是一個雙關(guān)語。
哈曼奇:是的。我們決定做這件事的原因之一是當(dāng)我們向其他人提起這個想法時,他們的反應(yīng)是這樣的:他們說“哦,老兄,在我們家鄉(xiāng)有這么一個地方”;又或者他們說“我剛剛開車經(jīng)過一家有著奇怪店名的美甲店”。(于是)我們覺得(繪制這樣一份地圖的)時機(jī)已成熟。
夏皮羅:就你目前所收到的雙關(guān)語店名而言,你注意到有哪些傾向呢?
哈曼奇:有趣的是,你剛剛提到了倫敦的一家美發(fā)沙龍。我今天剛好看到。我們已收到超過600個店名,其中至少有十家不同的名叫蜷縮著死去(注:Curl Up And Dye原意為卷發(fā)和染發(fā),其諧音curl up and die意為蜷縮著死去)的美發(fā)沙龍。
科尼什:(笑聲)
夏皮羅:噢,D-Y-E,蜷縮著死去。
哈曼奇:是的,D-Y-E。那么我們注意到—我的意思是,我認(rèn)為提交上來的大多數(shù)店名都可以歸入餐廳名稱這一類—有很多的泰式餐廳名。華盛頓特區(qū)就特別有代表性。我認(rèn)為到目前為止,來自這座城市的店名是最多的。
夏皮羅:在華盛頓特區(qū),有叫蝴蝶領(lǐng)結(jié)(注:Bow Thai諧音為bow tie,意為蝴蝶領(lǐng)結(jié))的餐廳,還有叫泰坦尼克(注:Thai–tanic諧音為Titanic)的餐廳。
哈曼奇:是的,是的。
科尼什:噢,泰坦尼克,我從沒想到這個。
哈曼奇:是的。還有其他如臺風(fēng)(注:Thaiphoon即typhoon的諧音),胃口大開(注:appeThaizing即appetizing的諧音)之類的名字。至于越南餐廳,提交過來的名字很多是跟pho相關(guān)的。
夏皮羅:P-H-O——越南河粉。
哈曼奇:是的,完全正確,就是越南河粉。很顯然,比弗利山莊就有一家叫9021越南河粉的餐館。
夏皮羅:越南河粉。
科尼什:很好。
夏皮羅:雷伊漢·哈曼奇,你預(yù)期人們會怎樣用這張地圖呢?他們是要去把這些地方找出來,還是要盡量去躲開這些地方呢?
哈曼奇:我會讓讀者們自己去判斷。我認(rèn)為雙關(guān)語——它是很有趣的一件事物。它不像那種讓你發(fā)笑的事物。它就像一種直覺,一種讓你發(fā)出“哎唷”聲的事物。