Troutgirl on lisp as a class marker. "When I first started dating Tim, I thought every programmer used Lisp." Heh.

In my somewhat sheltered career, I don't think I've heard anyone suggest that we "do it in lisp" except where it was a very real possibility that made some sense, and that's even in teams where everyone's favorite language was lisp. (After searching my memory and reaching that conclusion, of course I had to consider whether I might have been the one screeching for lisp. I think I kept that to a minimum, though.) I do, however, hear lots of good natured pining for lisp, along the lines of "C++ sucks, man, I wish we were doing this in lisp". Though instead of lisp, maybe they'll mention OCaml. Or T. Or Eiffel. All languages which could be filling a class marker role, and maybe they are, but I think the usual motivation for saying that is someone thinking "Anything but C++, if God is merciful."

I know that the following admission will tarnish my reputation in the eyes of some, but... more than once I have thought "Man, I wish I was doing this in Visual Basic, it would be so much easier." OK, maybe just once.