Zingers
I suspect that most of us still carry around in our minds some great retorts we never got to unleash. Too tongue and brain-tied at the time, the perfect zinger didn’t come to us until we’d already left the party, closed the door, hung up the phone or when stewing still in angry sheets.
But as frustrating as thinking of what you should have said is, few things are as satisfying as remembering those few times that your wits were perfectly about you and zing! It was the opposition’s turn for the seething of dumb defeat.
The earliest one I can remember was with my sister when she was deep into her hippie days and ways. ‘Oh, man, what is wrong with your generation, man?’ She said. ‘We had the Stones and Hendrix and Joplin and all that great shit. But you guys, man. The music you listen to is just such soulless commerical crap.’
‘Well,’ I said, ‘it’s your generation that’s making it.’
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Comment
- Gail, you must be coat-trailing here—because you, a translator in France, didn’t mention that this belated wit is wonderfully known as esprit d’escalier, the nifty retort that only comes to you as you’re traipsing down the stairs after leaving the salon in disarray.
Simon
— Simon Fodden Jan 20, 5:16pm # - I’m the slow, plodding type, so I never think of the right thing to say until it is much too late.
I do appreciate a good zinger delivery when I witness one, however, and your example’s a beaut.
Your sister’s face must have been priceless :)
— Mathieu Jan 20, 5:22pm # - Groomsman at a Croatian wedding to one of my friends who was a bridesmaid: ‘A Croatian man is so virile, he can impregnate a stone.’
My friend: ‘It must be nice to have a hobby.’
— John Hudson Jan 20, 10:47pm # - How true, we always think what we should’ve said. Of course there’s a Seinfeld episode about just that, where George couldn’t wait to use the perfect zinger ” The jerk store called..and they’re all out of you.” and then he got zinged right back when he finally got to use it.
— northerngurl Jan 21, 1:40am # - Two come to mind.
My perennially grumpy neighbor appeared suddenly and started ranting:
G: HEY! I don’t appreciate your goddamn dogs in my yard!!! (begins to stalk away)
Me: (politely) Can’t we talk about it? (my dogs NEVER get out of my yard)
G: I’ve said what I had to say!
Me: (still polite) But I didn’t.
G: Go to hell!
Me: (Ever so politely) I’m already there. I’m YOUR neighbor!
___
A group of us were having dinner with Louise March, a Swiss woman then in her eighties who had been student, translator and secretary to the philosopher and mystic, Georges Gurdjieff. The cook brought out two obviously over-cooked pies and when Mrs. March asked her what had happened, she replied, ‘They didn’t come out of the oven in time.’ Without hesitation Mrs. March quipped, ‘Oh? Free will?
— wizmo Jan 21, 2:57am # - I’m too slow to be an effective zinger myself, but I was thinking of the Seinfeld episode when George used the “jerk store” zing. I hate to admit it, but I’m a bit of a George. If I do zing someone, poorly at that, I just get zinged (zung?) right back. So I just keep my mouth shut.
— Keith Fox Jan 21, 7:10am # - I’m much wittier twenty minutes later. I did get a perfect one in at work one day but I also have a lousy memory and can’t even remember what the zinger was, other than that it was so good I thanked the woman who set it up for me.
— cmb Jan 22, 12:57am # - I once had the perfect line at the perfect time. I still glow over it. I’ll try to tell the story in short form.
The summer between freshman and sophmore year of college I threw a big party combining all my college friends with my high school gang. It was an awesome party, probably the best I’ll ever throw. We didn’t have any alcohol and people still stayed all evening even though I had made alternative plans to allow for drinking in another location.
It was wonderful, except there was some major drama between two college friends and one stormed off to go home. I didn’t want him to leave. I had unintentionally caused the drama by sharing a piece of information that didn’t seem important until the explotion. (I knew I couldn’t tell this story quickly) I felt horrible for starting the fight and I didn’t want him to leave taking one of my closest friends who had come in the same car.
So I followed him across the street crying and begging him not to go, not to leave mad, not to make Linda leave the party too. He then got angry at me for crying. He told me to stop and I said…
“It’s my party, I can cry if I want to.”
At that point Linda and I started laughing so hard we ended up crying and sitting at the side of the road. We couldn’t stop laughing and the harder we laughed the angrier he got.
The fight was never resolved. The two involved never made up. But Linda and I are still close friends and every once in a while we talk about that moment and my best come back ever.
— Kelly Jan 22, 1:31am # - The best zinger I ever heard was from a good Friend (Dave F. in Vancouver formerly Halifax). We were walking downtown past an area known for pan handlers when one of them asked “Hey man. Can you spare some change”. Without missing a beat Dave flung back “I’m not dead yet”.
— Ray Jan 23, 10:33pm # - “Before I went to sleep I went over all the things I wished I had said to that Immigrations man, and some of them were incredibly clever and cutting.”
-John Steinbeck
Travels with Charley
— Amy H. Jan 24, 8:02pm # - Vancouver used to be Halifax?
— palinode Jan 25, 1:00am # - Just remembered and old favorite from ‘The Honeymooners’ TV show. It was a time when Fruit-of-the-Month Club was a popular gift.
Ralph has just come up with another hair-brained scheme. His long-suffering wife, Alice, fixes him with a look, crosses her arms across her chest, and cracks, “Ralph, if there was a Nut-of-the-Month Club, you’d be January and February!”
— wizmo Jan 25, 1:23am # - Best I’ve heard lately: My very drunk sister was talking with friends about some slutty woman they know whose most flagrant feature is her chest. “Yep, she’s got a shelf on her. A shelf and a shelf-life.”
— Andy Jan 25, 11:42am # - Hehehe Right. Didn’t catch that.
He now lives in Vancouver. He used to live in Halifax.
LOL “Vancouver used to be Halifax?” Good zinger ; )
— Ray Jan 26, 4:06pm # - In those days as a boy you had to go to the army. However, one could refuse for conscientious reasons. So I did, and found myself in a large hall, filled with objectors.
Open went a curtain, and there where a dozen generals or whatever. Sitting behind a long table.
Then each of us had to pass them by, and sometimes one was chosen to ‘answer some questions’.
I was the first to receive that honour.
With my dossier in front of him, the chief said: “so, young man, you don’t want to fight in the Belgian army?”
I still can hear the cheering after I replied:
“No, sir, I didn’t say that. I said I didn’t want to fight in the BELGIAN army”.
Flabbergasted was, I believe, the expression on 12 faces.
And: they let me through.
— Koen H Jan 26, 10:34pm # - Yes. Right. Ok.
What that officer said was: ”... so you don’t want to fight in theBelgianarmy” -and my reply was “Belgian army”.
Gail: you will put a post Goofs In Comments, won’t you?
sigh.
— Koen H Jan 27, 1:04pm # - To understand this one you’ll have to know what a German toilet looks like. Here’s a “picture:”:
http://www.banterist.com/archivefiles/00021
Anyway, conversation in a German pub between an American woman and a German man:
German man: “The problem with Americans is that they put women on a pedestal.”
American woman: “Well look what the Germans put on a pedestal!”
— Nick S. Jan 28, 9:35am # - Excuse odd punctuation (“picture:”). I followed the instructions for making a hyperlink, but it doesn’t seem to have worked. Readers will have to cut and paste. :(
— Nick S. Jan 28, 9:38am # - The memory of this one still cheers me when I feel too dull.
I was taking a night course (Spanish) at a local community college. Two young women in the class took a dislike to me. One evening I overheard them, behind me, making snide comments about my outfit (it was a bit eccentric for a small town, but really very chic). I turned to the girls, looked them each in the eye, and asked “Are you talking about my outfit?” To which the leader of the two responded, “Yeah, you look stupid.” My next question to them was “Do you want to be my friend?” Puzzeled, they both spat out a quick “no”. Then I (said) “Wonderful. Then we actually have something in common, because I don’t want to be your friend either. Do you know what that means? It means that for all I care you could eat babies and fuck pigs and it would be none of my business. Please extend the same courtesy to me.” I never overheard them making fun of me again.
christine
— c. severen Feb 3, 10:42pm # - I’ll try to make this quick. Unlike many others who have posted comments here about the smart comeback, mine are out of my mouth faster than I can think to stop them. Whether this is due to my facility with language or my quick mind is really beside the point. Suffice to say that I finally got a handle on it and have things under control now. However…
I do have one reusable line that I continue to deliver when appropriate. I work for a provincial government. Naturally, like every other provincial government I know of, there is a higher than average percentage of gay staff (both male and female). Alas, we find ourselves living in an age when few people under 40 have basic social skills. As such, inappropriate questions or enquiries are often made between and among staff members.
Though I am straight, I am not the studliest character on the block. Jim is a man’s name to me, not a location (gym). Anyway, one day I was sitting in a small meeting room with three or four colleagues brainstorming about something or other. As we arpped up the session, one of these people turned and asked me: “By the way, are you gay?” I turned, flashed him my brightest smile and asked: “Why do you want to know? D’ya wanna f—k me?” MY RETORT WAS MET WITH STUNNED AND TOTAL SILENCE !!!!
So effective was this comeback that I have used it numerous times to rebuff such inappropriate enquiries, whether the questioner was male or female. I have shared it with friends who have, in turn, had occasion to use it themselves.
— Mark Stephen Feb 4, 4:41pm #
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