Antenantiosis (an’-ten-an’-ti-os’-is): See litotes. (Deliberate understatement, especially when expressing a thought by denying its opposite. The Ad Herennium author suggests litotes as a means of expressing modesty [downplaying one’s accomplishments] in order to gain the audience’s favor [establishing ethos]).
I have always loved going fast, fast food, and fasting.
As a tribute to my love of fast, and what I have allegedly accomplished in the name of fast, you Governor Christie and the New Jersey State Legislature have proclaimed this “Freddy Fast Fast Faster Day.”
Let me tell you what I think it took for you to decide to proclaim this Freddy Fast, Fast, Faster Day.
When I ran away from my wife and kids, talk about fast, they couldn’t believe I had packed and left in under two minutes. They didn’t even have time to start crying or asking for money!
As for fast food, I am the only person in the world to eat 12 McDonald’s Quarter-Pounders raw–that’s fast food as fast as it gets!
And now, ever since that vomit-stained day, I’ve been fasting–dieting for so long that people are calling it a hunger strike!
I am honored by having a holiday named in my honor, but I also have a confession to make.
If I were Roadrunner, or Mickey D’s mother, or a prisoner protesting about something by not eating anything, then, maybe I could say “I deserve this honor.”
When I found about it, I said out lound “I’m just plain Freddy.”
My bookie overheard me. He smiled and said, “Freddy, in a New Jersey kind of a way, being fast to leave your family, being a fast-food junkie, and being an obese guy with B.O. and occasional diarrhea from fasting on prune juice and raw clams, you deserve to have a day named in your honor.”
Well, that did it. I said out loud, “There should be a Freddy Fast, Fast, Faster Day! Al said, “Yes! And for the hell of it, let’s call it Freddy FFFer Day. Freddy, you always were, and still are, an F’n F-er!”
And so, with all my heart, thank you Governor Christie and all you state Senators and Representatives who’ve made such a wonderful judgment call. I also want to thank my cousin Joey, who owed me, and Turtlehead who set me straight.
Happy Freddy FFFer Day! Fast, Fast, Faster!
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Definition courtesy of “Silva Rhetoricae” (rhetoric.byu.edu).
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