Quote:
BOSTON (Reuters) - Are you feeling screwed, blued and tattooed because the man slipped it to you? Like, stay loose, hit the pad and share a thumb with your pash.
Huh?
If that made no sense to you, check out "The Hippie Dictionary" by John McCleary. Using the new book to translate, readers come up with the more conventional: Are you feeling mistreated by the authorities? Relax, go home to bed and share a very large marijuana cigarette with your significant other."
Those expecting the dictionary, published by Ten Speed Press, to be a stodgy reference work are in for a jolt.
McCleary's book is chock-full of pointed editorialising, slang and swear words culled from the vernacular of the 1960s and 1970s hippie youth, who questioned authority and created their own counterculture.
McCleary said he wouldn't have it any other way.
"In order to be truthful to the era, I had to put every term that I could remember in the dictionary," McCleary, who spent eight years writing and compiling the 700-page tome, said in an interview.
Hence, among the book's entries are such gems as "absofuckinglutely" (without a doubt), "hey man" (the most prevalent greeting of the era) and "swacked" (high on drugs or alcohol).
One of the more amusing entries is found under "like," which McCleary calls an unnecessary word that along with "you know" and "I mean" has come to dominate U.S. speech.
"What is strange about these exclamations is that, even though they have no real bearing on the conversation, they indicate a desire ... to communicate with clarity and understanding."
<font size="2" face="Verdana, Helvetica, sans-serif">Yeah. Like, you know. Clarity