Don't make me sweat it out, even if I am a bit hip-happy.

That's right, my fellow teens: it's time for another vocabulary lesson from the fine folks at DC Comics! Soon you'll go from being just another broom with a lousy hair-raid to an on-the-chain hep ca, the subject of many a sugar report!

This batch of purported slang seems to be even shakier than the last, especially if guys really were that hostile about making introductions - the last thing that I'd want to do is give a guy with that expression on his face an excuse for physical violence. Actually, I'm kind of sad that "Boot me!" hasn't had the success that "Shot down in flames." has enjoyed - I'm sure that hundreds of Archie punchlines alone could have resulted.

Unquestionably, though, there is one bit of slang from this page that we should all try to resurrect:

Setting aside the fact that hardly anyone writes letters any more, and that our horrible 21st Century brains can't help but think that any phrase with the word sweat in it is dirty in the extreme, you have to admit that referring to a love letter as a sugar report is just adorable. I command you to write one this week!

So until next time, fileboners, remember:

Hip-Happy means plump!

It's no secret that I have a big love on for the media of the past, especially in the form of books and comics. Part of this is due to the sheer entertainment value of it all - there's usually a reason that something has managed to survive the vagaries of time and human distractability, right? - but in addition to the content of the work there's often a completely fascinating element of trying to figure out exactly what was going on in the heads of the person or persons responsible.

Here, look at this:

For a long time, every DC comic had something like this, a little half- or full-page filler like "Flash Facts" or "Metal Facts and Fancies", possibly so that they could claim some portion of their content was educational. Of them all, I prefer "Science Says You're Wrong if You Believe That..." because it's the only one that flat-out insults the reader. These things are terrific insights into what the heck people were caring about at the time that they were written, or at least what comics writers were caring about. For example, read enough stuff from the 60s and you'll see that bit about deadly gasses from the tail of a comet coming up again and again, though nowadays it's gone the way of the classic plot to kill someone with a weak heart by scaring them to death. So were people obsessed with comets or was it just a case of writers getting as much use as they could out of a stlye of disaster with a lot of dramatic appeal?

With every one of these things you learn more about the people who wrote them, whether it be through what they felt needed to be debunked or what they were wrong about or how early they were right about something that you maybe thought was such a very contemporary bit of knowledge. I wish that I could have found the one on superstitions of the world, because it's a fantastic example of the absolute rock-solid belief in Science that characterized so many of the comics of the 50s and 60s.

Which is all a very long introduction to this:

... which I found in Lois Lane No 16, from way the heck back in 1960. What's going on here? Is this a guide? Some sort of mockery (look how funny you teen types talk.)? Heck, is it even accurate? I can't believe that there's a variation on the theme of Nerd that contains the word "boner" and has fallen into disuse.

Man, can't you just feel the attempt to figure out what the heck those crazy teens are talking about? All writing down what the copy boys say to each other and then quizzing them on it in private later?

It's okay if you don't, though. I'm not here to make sure that your experience of the world is identical to mine. No, what I'm here for is to make sure that you all know about the word hip-happy.

Hip-happy means plump!