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Ladle Rat Rotten Hut (“Little Red Riding Hood”)

“Lorem ipsum dolor” is so mundane. Marketers know that when showing clients a new advertisement, website, brochure, newsletter, or other layout, you “greek” in some gibberish that looks like words, but it really isn’t.  It helps keep clients from getting bogged down in the details of the content (“Hey, you missed a comma!”), so you can focus simply on the way the layout looks. The standard filler starts “Lorem ipsum dolor sit amet…”  Anguish Languish

It seems simple, but lawyers and other detail-oriented folks can find this design convention confusing. “How can I tell how it looks unless I see the actual words?!” they anxiously exclaim.  It’s not an insurmountable problem, just an interesting aspect of some lawyers’ personalities.

Sometimes, just for fun, instead of the repetitive lorem ipsum palaver, we drop in pieces of Ladle Rat Rotten Hut, from H.L. Chace’s clever 1956 book, “Anguish Languish” [i.e. “English Language”].

It still looks like gibberish, but on second glance it’s also pretty smart, once you get into the rhythm, and most lawyers love wordplay. Every word in the story is wrong (e.g. “groin-murder” = grandmother), but miraculously it still works. Read it out loud, if you can’t figure out what’s happening:

Ladle Rat Rotten Hut

Wants pawn term, dare worsted ladle gull hoe lift wetter murder inner ladle cordage, honor itch offer lodge, dock, florist. Disk ladle gull orphan worry putty ladle rat cluck wetter ladle rat hut, an fur disk raisin pimple colder Ladle Rat Rotten Hut.

Wan moaning, Ladle Rat Rotten Hut’s murder colder inset, “Ladle Rat Rotten Hut, heresy ladle basking winsome burden barter an shirker cockles. Tick disk ladle basking tutor cordage offer groin-murder hoe lifts honor udder site offer florist Shaker lake! Dun stopper laundry wrote! Dun stopper peck floors! Dun daily-doily inner florist, an yonder nor sorghum-stenches, dun stopper torque wet strainers!”

“Hoe-cake, murder,” resplendent Ladle Rat Rotten Hut, an tickle ladle basking an stuttered oft. Honor wrote tutor cordage offer groin-murder, Ladle Rat Rotten Hut! Ladle Rat Rotten Hut mitten anomalous woof.

“Wail, wail, wail!” set disk wicket woof, “Evanescent Ladle Rat Rotten Hut! Wares are putty ladle gull goring wizard ladle basking?”

Armor goring tumor groin-murder’s,” reprisal ladle gull. “Grammar’s seeking bet. Armor ticking arson burden barter an shirker cockles.”

“O hoe! Heifer gnats woke,” setter wicket woof, butter taught tomb shelf, “Oil tickle shirt court tutor cordage offer groin-murder. Oil ketchup wetter letter, an den-O bore!”

Soda wicket woof tucker shirt court, an whinney retched a cordage offer groin-murder, picked inner windrow, an sore debtor pore oil worming worse lion inner bet. En inner flesh, disk abdominal woof lipped honor pore oil worming, an garbled erupt. Den disk ratchet ammonol pot honor groin-murder’s nut cup and gnat-gun, any curdled ope inner bet.

Inner ladle wile, Ladle Rat Rotten Hut a raft attar cordage, an ranker dough ball. “Comb ink, sweat hard,” setter wicket woof, disgracing is verse. Ladle Rat Rotten Hut entity bet-rum an stud buyer groin-murder’s bet.

“O Grammar!” crater ladle gull historically, “Water bag icer gut! A nervous sausage bag ice!”

“Battered luck chew whiff, sweat hard,” setter bloat-Thursday woof, wetter wicket small honors phase.

“O Grammar!” crater ladle gull historically, “Water bag noise! A nervous sore suture anomalous prognosis!”

“Battered small your whiff, doling,” whiskered dole woof, ants mouse worse waddling.

“O Grammar, water bag mouser gut! A nervous sore suture bag mouse!”

Daze worry on-forger-nut ladle gull’s lest warts. Oil offer sodden, caking offer carvers an sprinkling otter bet, disk hoard-horded woof lipped own pore Ladle Rat Rotten Hut an garbled erupt.

Mural: Yonder nor sorghum-stenches shut ladle gulls stopper torque wet strainers.

Howard L. Chace, Anguish Languish

The book is out of print, but you can read it online here.

“Anguish Languish” and “Ladle Rot Rotten Hut” Copyright 1956 by Prentice-Hall, Inc. Englewood Cliffs, N. J.