"There's really no point in risking injury, if the result of a fight is predictable."

I'm quoting Sir David Attenborough, transcribed from a video at "When a hippo is angry, even other hippos get out of the way/Hippos are huge and possess powerful teeth, so real fights are rare because the risk of injury is so great" (BBC).

I stumbled into that after beginning the day posting about the death of Peggy Sue Gerron, which felt off because I'd received the clear impression — as I scanned the news on my iPhone while still in bed and listened to the NYT podcast as I made my coffee and toast — that the theme of the day was anger. Why angry hippos? I had the idea that there was an old children's game called "Angry, Angry Hippos," and the rest is blogging happenstance. I can't embed the Attenborough video, so here are some children, viewing hippos, noticing the teeth — which Attenborough says are for threatening violence — and receiving the fake news from a woman that the hippos are smiling:



• Here's the NYT podcast. The episode is "Kavanaugh's Classmates Speak Out." It's not mostly about anger, but drinking. I learned the jocular phrase "holding up the wall." It means so drunk you need to lean against the wall.

• Here's the main article that influenced me to believe the subject of the day is anger: "'The trauma for a man': Male fury and fear rises in GOP in defense of Kavanaugh" (WaPo). I'm going to do a separate post about that. I'm just warming up. I have an aversion to anger, and I have a sense of how that can be used to manipulate me — me, a microcosm of women. Don't make me angry!, smiles the hippo.

• And here's the real children's game that became more ominous in my imperfect memory: Hungry, Hungry Hippos:

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Senator Whitehouse, just now: "I don't believe 'boof' is flatulence. I don't believe 'the devil's triangle' is a drinking game."

"And I don't believe calling yourself a girl's 'alumnius' is being her friend. And I think drinking 'til you 'ralph' or 'fall out of the bus' or 'don't remember the game' or need to piece together your memory the next day is more consistent with Dr. Ford's and other's testimony than his own. If Dr. Ford's testimony is true, I hope we can all agree that Kavanaugh has no business on the Court. And I for one believed her."

On the front page of Urban Dictionary right now:

Devils Triangle
A threesome with 1 woman and 2 men. It is important to remember that straight men do not make eye contact while in the act. Doing so will question their sexuality....

by W_J May 11, 2008

boofed
to have taken it in the butt; had anal sex.

Nick boofed Mal last night.
by Andrea M. October 11, 2004

These definitions go back to the early 00s, so they're not concocted to hurt Kavanaugh, but they don't go back to the early 80s, so they're somewhat weak as definitions used by teenaged Kavanaugh in his yearbook.

Also on the front page at Urban Dictionary because of (I presume) the Kavanaugh hearings (WaPo transcript):

7 f's
Find them
French them
Feel them
Finger them
Fuck them
Forget them
Forever

I did the big 7 f's last night
#find#french#feel#finger#fuck#forget#forever#them#7#f#f's#club#big
by * * February 21, 2007

The 7 f's relates to this part of Whitehouse's questioning of Kavanaugh yesterday:

WHITEHOUSE: And there are, like, one, two, three, four, five, six, seven F’s in front of the Fourth of July [on Kavanaugh's high school yearbook page]. What does that signify, if anything?

KAVANAUGH: One of our friends, Squi, when he said the F word starting at a young age, had kind of a wind-up to the F word. Kind of a “ffff.” (LAUGHTER) And then the word would come out. And when we were 15, we thought that was funny. And it became an inside joke for the — how he would say, “Ffff” — and I won’t repeat it here. For the F word. 

In the same questioning session, Whitehouse had asked Kavanaugh about "Devil’s triangle," and Kavanaugh had said, "Drinking game."

WHITEHOUSE: How’s it played?

KAVANAUGH: Three glasses in a triangle.

WHITEHOUSE: And?

KAVANAUGH: You ever played quarters?

WHITEHOUSE: No (ph).

KAVANAUGH: OK. It’s a quarters game.

Asked about "boofed," Kavanaugh had said "That refers to flatulence. We were 16."

WHITEHOUSE: OK. And so when your friend Mark Judge said the same — put the same thing in his yearbook page back to you, he had the same meaning? It was flatulence?

KAVANAUGH: I don’t know what he did, but that’s my recollection. We want to talk about flatulence at age 16 on a yearbook page, I’m — I’m game.

ADDED: Do I agree with what Whitehouse said "I hope we can all agree" about? I think many people, when they are young, drink and say crude things about sex, including things like that 7 fs business and voicing enthusiasm for anal sex and threesomes, and I don't think any of that junk is even relevant to the question whether a person with a long professional career has the character needed to serve on the Supreme Court.

But Whitehouse only asked us to agree that if Ford's allegations are true, he should not serve on the Court, and I will agree to that. The question remains whether Ford's allegations are true, and Whitehouse is using Kavanaugh's testimony about the meaning of "boofed" and "Devil's triangle" to attack his credibility. If we think he lied under oath about that, then it's more likely that he lied about other things, including his denial of Ford's allegations.

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