Real Funny Headlines

Two Sisters Reunited after 18 Years in Checkout Counter

I've actually been to that WalMart. Yes, it does take 18 years. And that's the express lane.

I've actually been to that WalMart. Yes, it does take 18 years. And that's the express lane.

I can go to the store; not another vehicle in the parking lot; fill my cart. As soon as I make one move toward the checkout stand, a dozen others pop out of nowhere and form a line ahead of me. Most of them need at least 2 price checks, and 3 need check verifications from the manager who is in the back of the store on coffee break. At least one little ole lady pays cash, but needs $0.96 to finish her purchase. Rather than hand the clerk a $1 bill and get $0.04 in pennies, she digs into her purse, giant size, and digs out 30 years of contents to get to the bottom to count out...$0.95 cents. "I know I've got another penny in here somewhere...wait just a minute."

And yet somehow, I still end up behind you in line.

Two Sisters Reunited after 18 Years in Checkout Counter.........I've actually been to that WalMart. Yes, it does take 18 years. And that's the express lane.

I have the same problem at a local Safeway, at every hour of the day or night. They are always careful to ensure that they have enough checkout counters open so that there are no more than twenty people in line.

I've actually been to that WalMart. Yes, it does take 18 years. And that's the express lane.

Hey! I didn't know you live near Laurel, Maryland! It's too bad I moved away, or we could get together for a cup of coffee.

The most interesting thing about the Laurel store (the absolute worst-run Wal-Mart I've seen in my entire life)... besides the people dozing in the checkout lines... and the fact that every aisle is filled with shopping carts full of stuff to be put back on the shelves (someday)... and the dozens of semi-dead balloons littering the ceiling... is the small flock of birds that live at the back of the store and flit chirping between the children's and sporting goods departments.

If you want to pick up some diapers (and have a couple days to kill), it's very entertaining for the kiddies...

Investigator: "Hands tied" in bondage probe.

This was an actual headline in the Boston Herald a few months ago.

I remember this one from a small town in West Virginia:

"Big Ugly Child Found"

Here are a few more I got off Google

The following are all newspaper headlines that really occurred.

Here are some proposed linguistic descriptions of what has lead to the wrong (usually humourous) interpretation.

POLICE BEGIN CAMPAIGN TO RUN DOWN JAYWALKERS

run down has two interpretations: 'find' or 'hit with a car' (lexical ambiguity)

SAFETY EXPERTS SAY SCHOOL BUS PASSENGERS SHOULD BE BELTED

belted has two interpretations: 'hit with a belt' or 'secured with a (seat)belt' (lexical ambiguity)

DRUNK GETS NINE MONTHS IN VIOLIN CASE

case has two interpretations: 'container' or 'court-case' (lexical ambiguity)

SURVIVOR OF SIAMESE TWINS JOINS PARENTS

This is not strictly ambiguos, but the use of join 'go back to' is slightly incongruous in the context of siamese twins who are joined in the

sense of 'attached'.

FARMER BILL DIES IN HOUSE

Multiple ambiguity: Bill could be a proper name instead of 'legislative proposal'; then, depending on the interpretation of the grammatical

subject, die could be taken literally or figuratively. To complete the interpretation, we must understand house to mean 'House of

Commons'.

IRAQI HEAD SEEKS ARMS

Amusing juxtaposition of two polysemous words, head 'chief' and arms 'weapons'.

STUD TIRES OUT

Allowing for the American spelling of tyres, and the American term (in Brtitish English we would say studded tyres), the ambiguity is

structural based on the noun-verb ambiguity of tires and the lexical ambiguity of stud; to get the correct meaning we have to accept that

there is no main verb, as is typical of newspaper headlines.

PROSTITUTES APPEAL TO POPE

Ambiguity of the verb appeal: 'entreaty' vs 'attract'

PANDA MATING FAILS; VETERINARIAN TAKES OVER

One way to account for the ambiguity here is to note that the first clause is ambiguous between a reading with panda as the deep subject

- The panda is mating - and as deep object of a causative construction They are mating the pandas. With the second reading, there is

nothing odd about a vet taking over trying to mate pandas. The verb marry has a similar less common causative interpretation as in This

vicar has married three couples this week.

SOVIET VIRGIN LANDS SHORT OF GOAL AGAIN

The main ambiguity is whether lands is a noun or verb; in the former case we also have to understand, again, that like in many newspaper

headlines there is no tensed verb.

BRITISH LEFT WAFFLES ON FALKLAND ISLANDS

Double category ambiguity (noun vs verb) for left and waffles. Of interest is that to an American reader, the sentence is not ambiguous,

but bizarre, since American English does not have a verb waffle meaning 'prattle', so the only possible reading is the one where left is the

verb.

LUNG CANCER IN WOMEN MUSHROOMS

Noun-verb ambiguity in the word mushrooms. The example is slightly ingenuous, since the normal pattern of noun-noun compounding in

English would call for woman mushrooms: compare schoolboy geniuses, lady barristers, parent governors, not *schoolboys geniuses,

*ladies barristers, *parents governors. The first element is normally singular, even in cases such as trouser press where the word

normally does not have a singular form.

EYE DROPS OFF SHELF

Another verbless headline where the wrong reading comes from misinterpreting a noun-verb ambiguity.

TEACHER STRIKES IDLE KIDS

Some readers will find striking the enforced interpretation of idle as a causative verb; like many other examples, we have two noun-verb

ambiguities combining.

REAGAN WINS ON BUDGET, BUT MORE LIES AHEAD

Noun-verb ambiguity of lies coupled with the ambiguity of more as a quantifier or a kind of pronoun.

SQUAD HELPS DOG BITE VICTIM

This is a nice deep structure ambiguity arising from the fact that help can take either a direct obect or a (in this case reduced) infinitival

complement, coupled with the noun-verb ambiguity of bite which supports the two alternatives.

SHOT OFF WOMAN'S LEG HELPS NICKLAUS TO 66

There are several levels of ambiguity here: shot can be either a noun or the past participle of the verb shoot, while off is either a

preposition or a particle. The pun also involves the polysemy of shot, and we have to know that Nicklaus is a golfer and even have some

understanding of what kinds of things happen on a golf course to get the right reading.

ENRAGED COW INJURES FARMER WITH AXE

A classic PP-attachment ambiguity: VP or NP modifier?

PLANE TOO CLOSE TO GROUND, CRASH PROBE TOLD

Actually there's no ambiguity here: pragmatically, a symptom is cited as a cause. One could also say that there's an element of tautology

here.

MINERS REFUSE TO WORK AFTER DEATH

Alternative presuppositions lead to a deep ambiguity here: an explicit meaning representation would have to clarify whose death was being

mentioned.

JUVENILE COURT TO TRY SHOOTING DEFENDANT

This is a case of polysemy (try) coupled with the ambiguity of the V-ing +N sequence, which can either be a modifier + noun or a verb +

direct object.

STOLEN PAINTING FOUND BY TREE

The grammatical function of the PP is ambiguous between true locative and deep subject (of passive).

TWO SOVIET SHIPS COLLIDE, ONE DIES

Anaphoric reference ambiguity: normally a pronoun like one would refer to the nearest explicitly mentioned noun, here ship, rather than

the implied noun sailor or passenger. An alternative analysis could describe it as category ambiguity, numeric quantifier vs. pronoun.

2 SISTERS REUNITED AFTER 18 YEARS IN CHECKOUT COUNTER

PP-attachment ambiguity: agaian, VP or NP modifier?

KILLER SENTENCED TO DIE FOR SECOND TIME IN 10 YEARS

Attachment ambiguity for adverbial clause which can attach to either of two verbs.

NEVER WITHHOLD HERPES INFECTION FROM LOVED ONE

Ambiguity results from the polysemy of withhold in its literal meaning against the metaphorical extension 'withhold information about'.

DRUNKEN DRIVERS PAID $1000 IN '84

Homonymy of the simple past tense and the past participle lead to alternative active or passive interpretations.

WAR DIMS HOPE FOR PEACE

The humour is in the tautology; but notice that there is also an ambiguity if you can imagine that a pacifist is for some reason known as a

war dim.

IF STRIKE ISN'T SETTLED QUICKLY, IT MAY LAST A WHILE

COLD WAVE LINKED TO TEMPERATURES

MAN IS FATALLY SLAIN

ENFIELD COUPLE SLAIN; POLICE SUSPECT HOMICIDE

All the above are simply cases of tautology, except in the last case, which isn't so odd if you know that homicide is not the only way in

which people can get slain.

END TO FREE SCHOOL LOOMS

Noun-verb ambiguity of looms.

I had that book ("Squad Helps Dog Bite Victim") but loaned it to one too many friends.

Some others I recall:

Mauling by Bear Leaves Woman Grateful for Life
Speech Gets Urologist in Trouble With His Peers
Milk Drinkers Turn to Powder

And a 'police blotter' item: "A man exposed himself through the front window of a house to a teen-aged baby sitter inside....police were able to obtain a partial description of the suspect..."

--Boris