If you were disposed to going around making noises at strangers...

[steve(thelil)]

what noises would you want to make?

Gosh. The list is endless. In the past I've had success with:

Muh! Muh!

Wuh, wuh, wallaaaahhhhh!!

Ooooooh Da Djuyyyyyyyyyyyy!!!

Ya fafa fafa

[mjb]

If?

[Uli]

Yo!delidodee!

[cookie]

My favorite piano player and I, plus another singer with whom we're mutual friends and colleagues often have these strange little conversations made up of strange sounds. Here's a typical exchage:

Dave:NnnnnEEEEE!
Me: (gutteral) hmmh. HMMH!
Dave: (all laid back and sultry) Yeah, babee! (high pitched)Heeh! (gutteral)mmh. mmh.
The Martian: nnneee!

Yes, we have gotten our share of strange looks when we're hanging and this happens. But it's a habit at this point. We are communicating absolutely nothing with these exchanges, but it's at least as satisfying as your average small talk.

So we're not making noises AT strangers, but we make noises within earshot of strangers which is almost as weird.

[Monte Smith]

I think I would do something like this: "Shut the fuck up, Steve."

[graypencil]

ruling out biologically generated ones, of course

[mjb]

My late great grandfather, Jack Daly, took great delight in aggravating strangers.

He would take me, when I was but a youngster, atop a double decker bus in London and point to the Houses of Parliament and say loudly "there, my boy, is The Tate Gallery. He would continue to do such misidentification, getting more off the mark as he went. I cannot recall anyone trying to correct him.

[jesus marion joseph]

I had a friend in hiogh school whose last name was Lemoine, so his nickname was, of course, "Lemon". My nickname was "Brimmer", (for reasons we don't need to go into here. We would often engage in brief exchanges which went like this:

Me: "Lemon!"

Him: "Brimmer!"

Me: "Lemo-"

Him: "Brimme-"

Me: "Lem-"

Him: "Brim-"


and so on, until we were eventually just grunting at each other. This would all take place in the space of about 10 seconds. Very odd now that I look back on it.

Lemon and I were friends with at least three other guys named John in high school also, so whenever all of us were at a party together, we'd all stand around saying "Hey John, how's it going?" "Good, John, how are you?", etc. etc.

It all seemed so much funnier back then......................

[moneyp]

I want to hear about "Brimmer." (I think)

[jesus marion joseph]

Originally posted by mone peterson
I want to hear about "Brimmer." (I think)

My last name was originally Brim. naturally, I was known as "Brimmer". There are people I went to high school with who knew who "Brimmer" was, but if you mentioned my real name, they'd give you a blank stare.

Pretty interesting, huh?

[steve(thelil)]

Originally posted by jesus marion joseph
I had a friend in hiogh school whose last name was Lemoine, so his nickname was, of course, "Lemon". My nickname was "Brimmer", (for reasons we don't need to go into here. We would often engage in brief exchanges which went like this:

Me: "Lemon!"

Him: "Brimmer!"

Me: "Lemo-"

Him: "Brimme-"

Me: "Lem-"

Him: "Brim-"


and so on, until we were eventually just grunting at each other. This would all take place in the space of about 10 seconds. Very odd now that I look back on it.

Lemon and I were friends with at least three other guys named John in high school also, so whenever all of us were at a party together, we'd all stand around saying "Hey John, how's it going?" "Good, John, how are you?", etc. etc.

It all seemed so much funnier back then......................

My brother and I (and now various family extensions and friends) have a remarkably similar ritual

In a grunting like voice you do a phonetic progression. You start with "me moenster uh" and continues with one phoneme removed from the front until you're done. It's fantastic when done by a large group at a family event.:

Me Moensteh er
ee Moensteh er
Moensteh er
oensteh er
'nster er*
ster er
ter er
er er
r er
er
r



*Everyone who is slightly familiar with it gets to the 'nster er part too soon because it's so much fun to say.

Thank you.

[Dr Dave]

"I got a Bible in my Home,
I got a Bible in my Home,
I don't read and my soul be lost,
Ain't nobody's fault but mine.
Nobody's fault but mine.
I don't read and my soul be lost,
Ain't nobody's fault but mine."

[steve(thelil)]

Oo stinch
Doo ass dis pinch
An oo doo ondlhi assdhi finch
Dooround HAAAA

[clinthopson]

Farting does it for me.

Especially in elevators or busses.

[Jimmy Cantiello]

As young punks we would walk up to complete strangers, shake their hand and act as if we actually knew them. We would ask about non-existent relatives of theirs. "So, how the hell is Doris?" And "Be sure to tell Murray I was asking for him". Things like that. In all the time we played this game, not one person ever admitted that they didn't know us. They would just play along as if they did. I think they were embarrassed that they couldn't remember our name. We would end the conversation only after making the person sufficiently uncomfortable. Apparently it didn't take much to amuse ourselves..................

[Ron Thorne]

I think it could be highly effective to utter nonsense words along with some carefully selected goofy Alaska place names, such as ...

Fert
Sleetmute
Feekal
Eek
Igigik
Klawock

[HenryMc]

I was at a meeting once where I was introduced to a Gary, a Garry, a Larry and a Barry

The intros went like this

Harry, Barry, Barry, Harry,Harry Gary, Gary, Harry,Harry Garry, Garry, Harry,Harry Larry, Larry, Harry, Larry Barry, Barry, Larry, Larry,Gary, Gary,Larry,Larry, Garry, Garry Larry, Larry, Harry Gary, Garry,Gary, Harry, Gary, Barry, Gary......oh fu*k this ..guys ..thats Harry, thats Barry, this is Larry, this is Gary, This is Garry

[cookie]

Wouldn't you know that HenryMc would rhyme????

A Haiku in Gibberish (for HenryMc)

Indictu schnurff szik
Krit ho ho ho zurchophit
Pflehh, nyek dzigat gleef.

[steve(thelil)]

My lifetime love of nonsense noises might have started with the (Scholastic Books) book "Danny Dunn and the Homework Machine". It was probably 5th grade. In it, boy hero Danny Dunn somehow got hold of an amazing machine that did his homework. He got so cocky after it worked a few times that he even stopped reading the work. Then one day he got called on in class and he started reading his homework. It was fine for awhile and then it became clear that the machine had gone Kaplooey when Danny read " ....oogle blurp"


I thought oogle blurp was absolutely brilliant.

[baksheesh]

'Wibble' would do it for me i think
Either that or 'neek neek'

[Robert de St. Loup]

Kush kush and ki-yay.