What is "Narf"?

**Craig Crumpton** · 07-13-2001, 05:31 AM

This is for any fans of Warner Bros animated series "Pinky & The Brain":
http://dmoz.org/Arts/Animation/Carto...and_The_Brain/

(...or for any others who have nothing better to do than to take the time to read this.)

I've been working on an extensive and tedious project that has been a rather wearying experience, but there is a bit of pay involved, so I tried to ignore how much of a task it was.

A few days ago, I felt the overwhelming urge to take a break from the monotony, and for no other reason than "why the @#$% not", I decided to do a google.com search on "narf".

Now, any "hardcore" P&TB reading this will most likely recall a key plot point in the premiere P&TB episode "Das Mouse" when the CIA deciphered Pinky's random password "NARF" as "Nuclear Attack Readiness Formation".

I can assure you that this organization does not exist (at least not on the web), though there was a P&TB fanpage with that name at one time.

In the space (or waste, I should say) of 2 hours, I discovered that N.A.R.F. has been in use as an acronym by a number of organizations -- some of them many years before the actual "word" (or "emotional sound effect", as it has been defined by the show's producer, Peter Hastings) was popularized (immortalized, even) by Pinky -- with credit largely due to Rob Paulsen's performance as the voice of Pinky - and also to Peter Hastings, but especially to Eddie Fitzgerald, a Warner Bros animator who once received a gag credit on "Tiny Toon Adventures" as the: "Guy Who Says 'Narf.'"

Following is the outcome of my research (from approximately 543 search results):

First off, one that many A! fans should be familiar with:

The Nifty Animaniacs Reference File (though horribly out of date)
http://www.faqs.org/faqs/tv/animaniacs/faq/

Now, prepare to be amazed and amused at all that is N.A.R.F. on the web:

[Note: If there are any non-English sites linked which you wish to view and comprehend (for whatever reason suits your fancy), I recommend using http://babelfish.altavista.com ]

The Native American Rights Fund
http://www.narf.org/

The Nortwest Agricultural Research Foundation
http://mtvernon.wsu.edu/NARF.html

The Nike Animal Rescue Foundation
http://www.narfrescue.org

The Northfield Animal Rights Front
http://www.stolaf.edu/orgs/messenger...news/narf.html

The Nordic Arctic Research Forum
http://www.geo.ruc.dk/nors/phd_net/narf.htm

NAzaRines In Fellowship
http://www.naznet.com/

The Nazarene Amateur Radio Fellowship
http://www.norcal.org/NARF/

The North American Railway Foundation
http://www.narfoundation.org/

The National Association of Research Fellows
http://www.anu.edu.au/narf/

The Newport Autumn Rowing Festival
http://www.newportaquaticcenter.net/.../narf_main.htm

Novell Account Request Form
http://www.cas.unt.edu/gal/narf/

The National Assembly of Rifle Forces
http://www.eckardt-web.de/narf/

The National Association of Retired Firefighters
http://www.narfire.org.uk/narf.html

Nathan Azrin & Richard Foxx (co-authors)
http://www.nurturingourfamilies.com/...narf/narf.html

The North American Racewalking Foundation
http://www.hoys.com/narwf.html

Nambudripad's Allergy Research Foundation
http://www.naet.com/subscribers/naro.html

New Account Request Form
http://mira.lcsc.edu/olg/narf.html

The National Association of Retired Federal Employees
http://www.narfe.org/

Not Another Ridiculous Fanfic
http://xovers.reikaifiles.com/a/NARF.html

Natural Axial Resonant Frequency
http://www.bently.com/support/glossary/BncglossNARF.htm

The Natural Areas Rescue Fund
http://www.savetheprairiesociety.org/NARF/NARFdo.htm

Notgeile Alte Rentner Fraktion
(A Series of "Counterstrike" Clans, mostly in German)
http://www.narf-clan.de/
http://www.narfclan.de/
http://www.clan-narf.de/
http://www.narf-clan.de.vu/
http://www.clansite.com/NaRF/
http://narf-clan.virtualave.net/
http://narf.da.ru/
http://counternarf.fateback.com/

The Naval Air Rework Facility
http://www.skyhawk.org/NARF_AL.htm

The New Age Renaissance Fair
http://www.california.com/~eameece/narf.htm

NAtionale Regio Finale
http://www.tsr-vidar.nl/archief/NARF1998/narf.html

The Nuclear Air Resistance Fleet
http://www.geocities.com/Athens/Troy/8663/

Norges Autoriserte Regnskapsføreres Forening
http://www.narf.no/

And for those of you wondering how others have "defined" narf:

http://www.greyjedi.net/wordofweek.html#narf
http://www.csupomona.edu/~jasanders/slang/csrpn.htm

Two Dweebs Who Erroneously Claim to have Coined "Narf"
http://www.google.com/search?hl=en&s...princeton+narf
(The actual page is offline, but can be viewed via Google "cache". For the first search result listed after you click the above link, click where it says "Cached" to read the text in question. If you still can't get it to work, I'll post the text here later.)

Other noteworthy NARF-related sites ---- "Narf" is:

An Internet Service Provider
http://www.narf.com

An Invention (En Espanol)
http://www.argos.edu.uy/narf.htm

A Usenet Spam Filter
http://utcc.utoronto.ca/abuse/antispam-stuff/narf/

A Stamps & Graphics Company (En Espanol)
http://www.catar.com.br/hg/serv/narfs/

A French Anime Fansite
http://narf.free.fr/

A Windows Application for Playing Chess on your Computer
http://www.chessvariants.com/programs.dir/narf.html

A Swiss Punk Band
http://www.kuzeb.ch/narf/

A Canadian-themed Star Trek Spoof (with sequels)
http://www.theinsaneasylum.com/stori...k/narftrek.htm
http://www.theinsaneasylum.com/stori.../narftrek2.htm
http://www.theinsaneasylum.com/stori.../narftrek3.htm

A Dutch Hard Rock Band
("Narf - The Band")
http://www.narftheband.com/ ...coming soon!
http://move.to/narf
http://members.tripodnet.nl/ANDRIESHANNAART/
http://www.redrival.com/narftheband/indexe.html
http://narfmusic.cjb.net/

A Breakfast Cereal
http://www.hytti.uku.fi/~halen/thepeli/pelinarf.html

The We-Call-Our-Site-NARF-For-No-Apparent-Reason Homepage
http://www.narf.gen.nz/

A Clever, Brief P&TB Fanfic
http://www.sonic.net/~xodiac/stories/narf.htm

A Cult
http://members.tripod.com/~Evk_Damascus/narf/

On a related note - the following are registered domains for sites not yet online:

http://naarf.com/
http://narf.net/

And in case anyone is curious, http://narf.cc/ is not currently registered.

And perhaps the most useless (or creative, depending on your POV) uses of "narfdom" on the web:

http://homepages.strath.ac.uk/~acu95268/narf.html
http://home.allgaeu.org/mkaltenh/
http://www.locksley.com/opennarf.htm
http://www.wcug.wwu.edu/~narf/

Gookie
--wins the prize for the *longest*, *most researched* yet thoroughly useless post of all time.

**Craig Marinaro** · 07-13-2001, 10:38 AM

--wins the prize for the most useless post of all time.

Well, I'll venture to say that I've made *MUCH* more pointless posts than that. Yours was even on-topic!

But it would probably win the award for *LONGEST* useless post of all time, if it's any comfort. Not to mention most researched!

The only one I was previously aware of was the Native American Rights Fund. "Narf Trek" is probably my favorite (the Swiss punk band might be if I could understand any of it). "Mr. Spork" was the same name used in the A! "Star Truck"...not sure if the writers are A! fans, or if it's just a coincedence. But making him a "strange guy from Mexico" was a nice touch, anyhow.

Hope all the new guys who've come along since your original reign on the Board take notice of this...stuff like this is why we all love Gookie, kiddies! ;)

-C
The Man With No Sig.

**The Mad Hatter** · 07-13-2001, 12:00 PM

I'll go with Craig... I've missed Gookie's meticulously-researched yet completely useless info. The man knows how to do useless facts that are absolutely fascinating.

**joker** · 07-13-2001, 12:25 PM

thats a lot of narfs

**Nftnat** · 07-13-2001, 12:56 PM

I'm just surprised NarfPinky hasn't weighed in on this yet.

**don Jaime** · 07-13-2001, 01:14 PM

Narf is all, man.

**Danielle** · 07-13-2001, 02:24 PM

Congrats, Gookie!

Honestly, I went to that Renaissance fair and didn't even know...and that Narf cult page is creepy.

**Sharklady** · 07-13-2001, 04:02 PM

Egad, Gookie, brilliant!

Esp. that "Clever, Brief P&TB Fanfic." Thanks for bringing it to my attention.

And that Cult page was good for a laugh too.

**Danielle** · 07-13-2001, 07:22 PM

I'm not sure if this was already mentioned (I'm not looking through that whole list!), but whatever. Here's another acronym for NARF:

NARF= Navy Arctic Research Facility

If it is.....sorry. Go ahead and mallet me.

**Narfpinky** · 07-13-2001, 07:53 PM

Originally posted by Nftnat
I'm just surprised NarfPinky hasn't weighed in on this yet.

NAAAAAAAAAARRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRFFF!

Egad, interesting, but NARF for me is just like ZORT or POIT!

Narf-ragious!

**Craig Crumpton** · 07-13-2001, 09:48 PM

Originally posted by Danielle
I'm not sure if this was already mentioned (I'm not looking through that whole list!), but whatever. Here's another acronym for NARF:

NARF= Navy Arctic Research Facility

If it is.....sorry. Go ahead and mallet me.

Nope, didn't find that one.

There's no website for it though - I checked. I found a "Navy Arctic Research Laboratory" which is also called the "Navy Arctic Research Consortium", but no "Facility".

Thanks for the addition.

**Craig Crumpton** · 07-13-2001, 10:08 PM

Originally posted by Craig

Well, I'll venture to say that I've made *MUCH* more pointless posts than that. Yours was even on-topic!

But it would probably win the award for *LONGEST* useless post of all time, if it's any comfort. Not to mention most researched!

If I'd been looking for comfort, I'd have gone to bed instead.

Hope all the new guys who've come along since your original reign on the Board take notice of this...stuff like this is why we all love Gookie, kiddies!

Well, it's nice to have friends who can appreciate this sort of pointlessness. I'm pleased you guys got a kick out of it. If you wanna know my personal favorite finds - it'd have to be:

- the 2 Nazarene organizations (really got a chuckle out of those two, for some strange reason - perhaps because it was 3am)
- The National Association of Research Fellows (which I find delightfully clever)
- Norges Autoriserte Regnskapsføreres Forening (those wacky Norwegians...)
- NARF Cereal (admit it, you know you wanna try some)

And like Sharklady, I also enjoyed that little P&TB fic.

Gookie
--Nerdy Anal-Retentive Fanboy

**Calhoun07** · 07-14-2001, 12:42 AM

I am most certainly impressed. Next time somebody asks me about "narf" I will know what to tell them!

**DR. BELCH** · 07-15-2001, 08:38 PM

--"narf" was just "Fran" spelled backwards. Perhaps Pinky is subconciously yearning for some kindly female scientist who took care of him as a whelp but has since left Acme Labs...and his poor, fragmented, backwards brain is still pining for her in its dim monosyllabic fashion....

...or perhaps that's one too many pina colada fruit smoothies talking.

This was post 600.

**Danielle** · 07-15-2001, 08:56 PM

*gasp* What if Billie found out?!

Post 191 for me.

**Nftnat** · 07-17-2001, 11:02 AM

And now it'll be interesting to get Romey's take on this. You must admit, it'd make for an interesting plot twist. As if Billie didn't have enough to worry about with the non-human competition (the dolphin, the pig, still waiting on Phar). Not to mention it maybe being genetic as Pinky's (& Brain's) clone --- oh, what was his name >:E) --- fell for a human, Pat / Bunny.

**DR. BELCH** · 07-17-2001, 01:28 PM

A further mystery of Pinky and Brain's origin...Dr. Mephisto apparently headed the B.R.A.I.N. project, though we see two male scientists, presumably his underlings, did most of the work. Fran may have been either a third scientist, or a kindly intern who comforted young Pinky in his darkest hours. Somewhere in the back of his tiny mind he still harbors a crush....
And what of whatever Snowball and Billie had? I've referred to it as a Liza-Higgins thing, although the hamster's intentions may have been less than noble--maybe a scheme to breed the perfect offspring with her (which she would have none of). She seldom speaks of it, and to my knowlege Brain never asks. Also, there's no reason Billie coundn't have her own crush on an Acme doctor....
As for Pinky's strange affairs, there was also (in the FanFic realm) Quinn Morgendorffer, who shares, as Brain might say, "Pinky's perversely original take on life". Here's a particularly humorous exerpt from my own "The Plot in a Nutshell" where Brain, posing as a Spanish tutor, tries desperately not to lose his mind as he teaches Quinn espanol:

BRAIN: Greetings, class, and welcome to Basic Introductory Spanish I. I am your teacher, Professor Braindulce. Today weshall be examining the differences between "ser" and
"estar", conjugating a few simple "-ar" and "ir" verbs
[PINKY starts waving his hand in the air and "ooh ooh"ing
excitedly. When BRAIN fails to notice him, he starts waving
both hands and "ooh"s louder], and, if we have the time, we
may examine masculine and feminine noun endings and how they
correlate to the endings of their respective adjectives--
[he notices PINKY at last and breaks off with an impatient
sigh] Yes, Pinky. What do you want?
PINKY: Poit! May I go get a drink of water, BRAI--er--Professor Braindulce?
BRAIN [sighs]: Yes. You may.
PINKY: Woo-hoo! Zort! [leaps off the pile of books onto the
floor and races happily out the door. QUINN starts raising
her hand and "ooh"ing for attention.]
BRAIN [sighs again]: Spit it out, Quinn.
QUINN: I don't think I need Spanish in my life, Professor
Braindulce. I mean, I have all I need to get by.
BRAIN: Oh, really? If life were all about getting by, my
child, then that would be all well and good. But it isn't.
Tell me--just how much Spanish do you know?
QUINN: Um-- [counts on fingers]--taco...enchilada...chimichanga... guacamole...burrito grande...lasagna....
BRAIN: That's Italian, Quinn.
QUINN: Oh. I meant to say...crepe suzette.
BRAIN: That's French.
QUINN: Schnitzel?
BRAIN: German.
QUINN [gasps]: God! I am so out of it!
BRAIN: Perhaps it would help to figure out where your interests are.
QUINN: Oh...that's easy. One, clothes. Two, bouncy hair.
Three, boys. Four, school. [ticks off each on her fingers]
BRAIN: Are you sure you don't wish to pause and reconsider
your priorities?
QUINN: Mmmm...nope.
BRAIN: Very well. From what you've told me, and from what I
see here [noticing QUINN's overstuffed closet], you are very
interested in haberdashery. Correct?
QUINN: No...just clothes.
BRAIN: Yes...well...suppose you purchased a garment that had
a label saying "Lavar en lavador en agua tibia con colores
similares. Secar en secadora a tempertura baja." What would
you do?
QUINN: Get a salesgirl to translate for me.
BRAIN: Forget the salesgirl. There is no salesgirl available.
QUINN: Find the label instructions in English.
BRAIN [exasperated]: There are none! [sighs] The garment is
made of 100% "algodon"...cotton. What would happen if you
washed it in hot water?
QUINN: The shirt would shrink up and pinch my [chest]! Duh!
BRAIN: Yes. The washing instructions clearly say "Machine wash in warm water with like colors. Tumble dry low." If you
can understand how to read the label instructions in another
language, you can avoid having your--ah--mammaries
constricted by a confining garment.
QUINN: Oooh...I think I'm going to like this class.
BRAIN: Okay...now...the Spanish word for "a shirt" [writes
it on the board] is "una camisa". Repeat that, please. "Una
camisa".
QUINN: Una camisa.
BRAIN: Now..."los pantalones" [writes it] means "pants".
Repeat that, please.
QUINN: Los pantalones.
BRAIN: Good. "Los zapatos" [writes it] means "shoes".
Repeat, please.
QUINN: Los zapatos.
BRAIN: Excellent! "Underwear" is "la ropa interior".
QUINN: La ropa interior.

Time passes, and Quinn eventually catches on.

BRAIN: Quinn...What would you say to the salesgirl if you
purchased a pair of trousers that were too tight for you?QUINN: "Perdoname, senorita, pero esos pantalones me demasiadan apretato."
BRAIN: And if your shirt had a stain on it?
QUINN: "Mi camisa es sucia."
BRAIN: And if you wished to look at a pair of brown shoes?
QUINN: Brown shoes? Uck!
BRAIN: Very well. Red shoes, then.
QUINN: Oh! OK! "Me deseo a mirar a los zapatos rojos, por
favor."
BRAIN: Excellent! Excellent! You've done very well today,
Quinn.
PINKY [raising hand]: Oh! I've got one too, Brain! Ahem!
"Puedes tu poner el sopa en mi bolsillo y vomitar en mi
sombrero?" Narf!
BRAIN [an exasperated sigh]: Pinky, you just asked me if I
could put the soup in your pocket and vomit into your hat.
PINKY: Oh...well...could you? Poit?
[QUINN claps her hand over her mouth and tries to stifle
giggles.]
BRAIN: Okay, class. Before we wrap this session up, we shall
learn one more useful phrase. [taps chalkboard with
chalk, indicating a phrase written there in block caps]
"Estas creando que yo estoy creando?" it's something to ask
another person to determine if the two of you are in
agreement. It means "Are you pondering what I'm pondering?"
QUINN [tilts head, smiling]: I think so, Professor
Braindulce, but calling it a flea market! I mean, what were
they thinking?
PINKY [high silly giggle]: Narf!
QUINN [high, girlish giggle]: Narf!
BRAIN [sotto voce, an aside]: D***ation...they're multiplying.
Be thankful Billie doesn't know about her. I have a feeling the words "strawberry-blonde tart" would be the nicest words out of her mouth at this revelation.

**Naraht** · 01-12-2002, 09:49 AM

and all this time, I thought Narf was a misspelling of my initials..
N.A.F.

*sigh*

Nicholas A. Frame

**Sharklady** · 01-12-2002, 02:51 PM

It's amazing what nuggets of information pop up on this Board from time to time.

**Calhoun07** · 01-12-2002, 03:42 PM

Originally posted by Danielle
*gasp* What if Billie found out?!

Post 191 for me.

*gasp* Danielle's been keeping track of those post numbers for quite some time!

And isn't there a time limit when old threads should no longer be resurrected? Wow...this one goes back to July. brings back memories...