I can't say how the term began, but I first encountered in the high-end audio world - several reviewers agreed that Thiel loudspeakers had the best WAF of any in their bracket. This would have been in the late '80s. Since it's post-1984, this is clearly off-topic terminology. Thiel 'speakers in some cases are on-topic.
On Thu, Jan 28, 2010 at 6:24 AM, Thomas Adams <thomasthomasa@yahoo.com>wrote:
>
>
> "He told me before we were married, 'Honey, I don't drink, do drugs or
> chase other women. But I do collect old bikes'. Now that we've been
> married a while, drugs and other women are sounding better all the time---"
>
> Tom Adams
> Manhattan, KS
>
> --- On Wed, 1/27/10, verktyg <verktyg@aol.com> wrote:
>
>
> From: verktyg <verktyg@aol.com>
> Subject: Re: [CR] True Appreciation of what's Real - WAF
> To: "Thomas Adams" <thomasthomasa@yahoo.com>,
> Classicrendezvous@bikelist.org
> Date: Wednesday, January 27, 2010, 10:34 PM
>
>
> WAF - WIFE ACCEPTANCE FACTOR!
>
> New term - old concept (for those of you who share a home with a
> significant "other")...
>
>
> Most of the respondents so far have a more understanding partner than this
> poor blogger:
>
> http://mauisvintage.blogspot.com/
>
>
> About 30 years ago a former fiancée made some suggestions hinting to the
> effect that it was her or the bikes (I only had about 8 or 10 of them at the
> time and there was still lots of room in the garage).
>
> A simple "Sheez I'm gonna miss you."... End of discussion!
>
> She did manage to get me to sell several of them to her girlfriends as a
> consolation. ;-)
>
> Chas. Colerich
> Oakland, CA USA
>
>
> Thomas Adams wrote:
> > So a package came in the mail today, flat and wide, well secured by tape,
> requiring several strokes from the trusty Swiss army knife to remove the
> contents. And what do I see, but a NOS 50 tooth bis Stronglight 99 chain
> ring. Oh Joy, oh rapture! I held it in it's swiss cheesy glory, reveling
> in it's airy, delicate structure, my mind already a-whirl, picturing long
> leisurely rides down shaded country lanes, happily twirling this ring on a
> fine lugged steel steed, myself somehow magically slender and black haired
> again. I slowly emerged from my meditation to see She Who Must be Obeyed
> looking at me oddly.
> > "Look dear!" I squealed. "A chain ring!" "Terrific", said she, "why
> am I looking at it?"
> > Crushed, deflated and demoralized, I slunk from her presence. Oh my
> darling, after so many years of patient evangelizing, still you're soul is
> dark and closed to the true path. Still you think of a bicycle as merely a
> tool for recreation, instead of a holy metaphor for all that is right and
> beautiful if it is lugged steel, or the embodiment of evil and decadence if
> not. Still are you more concerned that your jersey matches your bar tape as
> opposed to being happily mesmerized by a chain ring with 108 holes in it,
> declining to agonize over whether the bolt holes should or should not count
> in the count, or what value to assign to the hole with the over shift peg in
> it. No, instead you ask "What good do the holes do?"
> > In truth I always knew this sad day would come. For never did the
> beloved object respond favorably as I read to her from my dissertation on
> the relative merits of the flat fork crown versus the sloping, or that
> heretical hybridization, the semi sloping. Just to annoy me, she would fall
> asleep as the second hour of the recital started. But never before had I
> despaired of being some day able to bring her to the true faith.
> > But now I can deny the truth no longer: she does not love bikes as I
> do, nor can I hope to convert her. But I will be big about it: I will
> understand that due to some defect in her genetics or upbringing she is
> incapable of ascending to the true heights of appreciation, where counting
> the number of holes in a chain ring is not an act of lunacy, but a simple
> ritual of devotion. As an act of charity, we will remain together. After
> all, who else will I get to stoke the tandem? Tom Adams, broken hearted but
> unbowed,
> > in Manhattan, KS USA
>
>
>
>
>
> _______________________________________________
>
--
Ken Freeman
Ann Arbor, MI USA