[gregpilling]

Applied Psychology, in the Financial Transactions Sector. *

I find it amusing that they named it 'real' once it was done.

*- a little inside joke. While I was dating my wife 15 years ago, I was very self conscious of the fact that I had barely graduated high school, and here I was dating a professor and going to many professor parties. Many, many parties. I would be asked by almost everyone "What do you study?" as a little ice-breaker conversation starter. Since I had no PhD and was not even a college graduate, this made me a little uncomfortable and so I developed the above line to describe my business of buying and selling used capital equipment (which I did out of my pickup).

It went like this: They would ask what I studied, and I would respond with "Applied Psychology in Financial Transactions" and then steer the conversation to their work. I also learned quickly that I should have no opinions on THEIR work, or my night would be bad. It was a rare event to have to explain further, most people were delighted to talk at length about themselves.

[jerf]

"then steer the conversation to their work. I also learned quickly that I should have no opinions on THEIR work, or my night would be bad. It was a rare event to have to explain further, most people were delighted to talk at length about themselves."

Sounds like it's time to add Applied Psychology in the Academic Sector to the resume.

[mixmastamyk]

Real (pronounced rey-al, as in royal) is a common historical currency name from the Iberian peninsula, which has spread to other areas.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Real

[soneca]

But was also a natural name from "URV", which means Real Unity of Value - using 'real' as something real.

Maybe the irony is more that URV was a virtual/fake currency named "real".

[schoen]

A cute thing is how Portuguese "real" has two different etymologies, one from Latin regalis 'royal' (from rex 'king'), and one from Latin realis 'actual' (from res 'thing'). That can produce some funny jokes (like a title mentioned elsewhere in this thread by motobol, "A real história do Real").