Justin Fetterman writes:
I've noticed what might be a new snowclone cropping up. As in this article, where, right before the picture, we have the phrase "a scale of one to crazy". Recently, a friend of mine used the same construction to form "on a scale of one to super hot".
"On a scale from one to __" is certainly out there, e.g.
All in all, on a scale from one to weird, it was about a twelve.
On a scale from one to Stupid, I give it a Stupid+.
What I’m trying to say, I guess, is on a scale from one to nerd, we’re off the charts.
on a scale from one to super fucking-riffic you guys are super fucking-riffic!
i think english lit to 1500 may kill me because on a scale of one to boring that class is probably a 9.
On a scale of one to excellent, I'd say a 7.
on a scale of one to creepy this dream was off the charts.
BabelBabe, on a scale of one to insane, I'd give you a three.
On a scale of one to evil, we give that idea four-and-a-half Kissingers!
Okay, so until next time, on a scale from one to awesome, I'm super great.
And of course the psychologists and sociologists have been preparing the way for years, with their incessant questions "On a scale from one to three/five/six/ten/100/etc."
The recent cause of generalization beyond the numerals seems to be the Reunion Show's song "On a scale from One to Awesome (You're Pretty Great)".
But some obvious instantiations of this pattern are not to be found yet on the web, like "on a scale from one to totally __", or "on a scale from one to wonderful". (I'm surprised that the last one didn't even make it into a Cole Porter lyric.)
So on a scale from one to snowclone, I'd give this pattern about a five.
Update -- Aaron "Dr. Whom" Dinkin writes:
The Reunion Show song "One a Scale from One to Awesome (You're Pretty Great)" actually takes its title from a line in an early Strong Bad e-mail: see here. Strong Bad ends the cartoon by saying "Okay, so until next time, on a scale from one to awesome, I'm super great." The Strong bad e-mail appears to predate the Reunion Show album by at least a year.
Yes, it's sbemail #3, which dates from 2001. And the Reunion Show released Kill your Television, which included the "On a scale of ..." cut, in the fall of 2003.
Ethan Glasser-Camp points out an instance of this pattern in the cartoon strip Force Monkeys from 1/25/2003, Superheroics and You. ]
Posted by Mark Liberman at September 22, 2007 09:58 AM