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Thank you very much Bob

Posted by Bald Eagle on February 23, 2004

In Reply to: Thank you very much Bob posted by ESC on February 23, 2004

: : : : "She is like the *purple elephant".

: : : : Does anyone knows why it is considered as a compliment?
: : : : then he says she has a wonderful personality.

: : : : Thanks a lot

: : : Hard to say without more context, but there is a common remark about "the elephant in the room," something it is impossible to ignore. A purple elephant, in this context might mean someone so larger-than-life, so unusual, that one cannot possibly ignore it. Or her.

: I paged through a few children's poems and rhymes books on the off chance that there was a purple elephant poem. No luck. Maybe I'll write one.

I had thought the elephant in the room was the really big obvious fact that nobody was prepared to talk about, e.g. the elephant in the White House is clearly President G. W. Bush's low IQ but nobody wants to talk about that because, well, it's just too damned embarassing.

The Purple elephant is the scandal in the Roman Catholic Church regarding the abuse of children by priests and possibly other figures higher up the chain of command in that organization.

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