LOLspeak as a Second Language (LKSL-101) in Five Easy Steps
UPDATE:
>> LOLspeak has become a cultural phenomenon! Visit and contribute to the LOLspeak wiki.
ORIGINAL:
Thanks to Elfinugget for her submission 
Step one: Think of something to say. This is tricky for some people. 
We’ll try a simple, common comment to start:
“That’s a really cute cat. And look, he has a bow on his head!”
Step two: “Engrish” it.
1) Mis-decline verbs, especially misuse the verb “to be”
2) Misuse gerunds
3) Overuse prepositional phrases
4) Blatant rearrangement of syntax
5) Incorrect plurals and past-tense verbs
6) “noun” your adjectives. (For instance, the adjective “blue” can become the noun “blueness”)
7) Improper pronouns
8 ) Drop the articles (”a”, “and”, “the”) in favor of adding “-age” to the end of a noun
9) Use “younger” words (”kitty” versus “cat”, “fuzzy” versus “furry”, etc.)
10) Use the word “with” inappropriately.
11) If you really can’t wrap your head around the concepts behind “Engrish”, try this: Go to babelfish.altavista.com, type your desired comment in, hit “english-to-Japanese”, then re-translate back to English. You have to be able to view special characters (the kanji). If you can’t get that to work, try translating to a different, european-text language, like German.
So, we get:
“That being the kitty very full of cuteness. And to be with looking! Him gots bowage on hims head!”
Step three: Misspell everything. There’s no wrong way to do this, just try not to accidentally correctly spell a completely different word (especially one that’s pronounced differently than your spelling intends). Some words (usually short words) should simply remain spelled correctly for continuity’s sake.
1) Think like a little kid / cat / dog / goldfish, and get hukd on foniks
2) I cannot stress this enough: Vowels are your friends! Do not neglect vowels!! We’re speaking LolKitteh here, not text messaging! (My advice: use alternate vowels, Y’s are particularly handy, but don’t overuse them.)
3) Extra W’s and H’s (”awl” instead of “all”)
4) Z’s instead of S’s are easy
5) Double-letters versus single letters are always fun
6) Don’t be afraid to further pluralize things, including your verbs
7) Remember that the word “THE” must always be spelled “TEH”
now, we have:
“Dat beesing teh kiti vary ful ov kutenis. An to bees lukingz! Hims gotz bowwagez on hims hed!!”
Step four: Add exclamations and extra words.
1) Use commonly accepted internet abbreviations. Misspell them if necessary. (LOL = lawlz! ROTFL = rofflz! OMG = omgwtfbbq!?! … etc … )
2) Imagine that you’re actually in a crowd of people and you want everyone to look at this particular picture. Extra exclamations are thus necessary.
3) Think Valley Girl. The words “like,” “totally,” etc can be added. Remember to misspell!
4) Some common statements have been severely abbreviated into one single multi-syllabic word. These are good to use. The best example is “Okay, thank you, good-bye!” Which has been shortened to “kthxbye” (or “kthxbai”)
And, we have:
“OMG wau!! Dat beesing a kiti vary ful ov tewtul kutenis!! Bees wif da lukingz! Omg him gotz da bowwagez on himz hed lyk WTF?!?”
Step five: Add additional information. This can be the desire to interact with the subject of the photo, personal information, empathetic or sympathetic statements, responses to other posts, etc. Again, nothing right or wrong here, just whatever comes to mind.
Finally:
“OMG wau!! Dat beesings a kiti vary ful ov tewtul kutenis!! Bees wif da lukingz!! Omg him gotz da bowwagez on himz hed lyk WTF?!? OMG I tewtul wuntz to grabz dat kiti and fuzziez himz awl ovar … him sooooooo mooshy an fullz ov win!! Don werry lil kiti, I no eetz u! I luvz kitiz! I can has bunchiz ov dem! Mah kitiz luvz bowwagez too! YETH!! GIMME!! Kthxbai!”
Remember that all of the above steps are basic guidelines for conversational lol-cat. Some regions do not always rearrange syntax. This a treasure for you. With some practice, you too can be writing (and speaking) in Conversational LolKitteh!
(this class is copyright ELFN 2007, all rights reserved, pliz to be kreditz if u be usingz da verbatumz kthxbai.)
Elfi iz full of win! (alzo, headbowage!)
+++ many cheezeburgers!
I lurvz you, Elfkittehspeakin’ purrson.
whille this is DEFINITELY one of the more amusing “tutorials” found on the net, i think i might kill myself if everyone on this site followed your directions faithfully.
in other news:
i be heartsing lolcats! demz so kewt en fuzzy wif omgwtfbbq funnee wurdz on dem!!1!! i wantz to totawy eetz em awl up! kthxbai!
hai
ilukthxbai
Y it is kan be so hardz? S’notz. Thx fur awl ur heppz widteh speeekngz tooturrealz, kitteh speechz purrson!
The scary thing is, after doing for a day or two, you start to think in lolkitteh.
Just saying.
kthxbai
A day or tow? is to be trying a hour and be thinking lolcatese. meyowzzz!
Dis iz beeyin a ossumeness tootoriel!!!1 OMG, I wood goh tortilly isane iv evuryone wur 2 b speekageing like dat!!!!1!!
Qbert: I actually don’t always rearrange my context (this a treasure for you!)
It’s all good. My biggest pet peeve, if one can exist, about written conversational lol-kitteh, is that some people just omit all vowels, which is an utter chore to read. It really should be phonetically easy to read.
And yeah, I think in lol-cat; in fact, while on vacation (and while CheezServer was meltored), Hogarf (my husband) and I were in such withdrawal that we were speaking lolcat to each other.
ME: “I can taykz piktor ov yu?”
HIM: “kay do you haz da kamra?”
ME: “no u haz kamra. I can haz kamra?”
HIM: “NOOO! yu be steelinz mah kamra!!!!”
ME: “wtfbbq I juz wunt tayk piktor. Needz kamra.”
HIM: “fyne, heer.”
ME: “Kthxbai.”
(translated into human) woah. i think in lolcat alot, often say something and map it out in my head as lolspeak, and sometimes i even talk in it “i are hungry. i can has breakfast?”
i am learing lolspeak quickly for someone who only found out about it like 3 months ago.
wow.
heh.
(tranletied 2 lolkitteh1!!!1) liek omg wau! i can has lolthoughts?!?!? i can say in 2 wayz nau wft? i speekz in it also liek I R HUNGRI I CAN HAS BREEKFIST?!?1/
draginkitteh is lolskolar!1!
omgwtfbbq?
lulz
[...] April 24th, 2007 · No Comments I CAN HAS CHEEZBURGER? [...]
Thanx 2 b halpin mee speek lolcat betterz!
InfamousQBert is speaking truth to power up there.
I know, I know: I’m the cranky old pain in the neck in the bunch. But here’s my two ancient, gnarled cents’ worth:
The lolspeak kitteh meme tags on the adorakittehs are what makes us laugh until milk comes out our noses on ichc. Like all funny stuff, they’re funny partly because they’re unexpected.
But when every single word of every single sentence is hyper-lolspoken, it gets to be like hearing a really good song so many times you start to hate it, or when a once-hilarious comedy bit gets beaten to death (anyone besides me old enough to remember when everyone said “psych” so much, it ruined Eddie Murphy?).
It’s funnier when it’s judiciously deployed, and when it’s clever rather than gratiutous.
“I has a flavor” is funneh. “A flavor: I has it” still makes me laugh out loud every time. And “Excuse me, do you has a flavor?” is a brilliant variation on the theme. But stuff like “pleez 2 B tellingz ees dere flavr hazness of u?” just makes me — yes, Artist Formerly Known As Elfnow, you called it — roll my superannuated eyes.
Do not want!
Yours in well-meaning, crotchety goodwill (I has a issue),
L (kthxbai!)
Thiz iz a wizdom! You very smart old brain!
I has a issue too. Us KSL (Kitteh Second Language) peeplz haz trouble if lolcat talk too complicated. I skips some posts when no read easy. Plz kitteh frenz, use lolcat careful for poor KSL peeplz.
Kthxbai
is teh true. is not for lol when lolspaek is teh abused. use sparingly! is just like sugar. kthxbai! ^_^
but who is to teh using sugar sparingly? *hyperrrrrrrrr* Sugar if for teh guzzling
dis coment, duz it has a flavr?
(lulz)
I AGREE!!
Elfnugget you iz good. ii gonna mak shure i spell eveyfing fuxed. I lubs you an dis here site. YAY FOR CHEEZBUGGAH! YAY FOE TOFUSBUGGAH!
I agree with only adding one or two perfectly incorrect grammaticlalations.
see what I did there? LOL
kthx elfinugget to lernz lolcats for me.
is much bettur, noes?
Ones problem Iz finded with LOLKITTEH speak: When Iz at workz, peeples lookz at me funneh when Iz says “I R smart cat” and suches. Parently, wholez wurld knot speak teh lolkitteh.
Ifn I learns gud, I can has LkD? (LOL-Kitteh Doktorate)
lezzismoar: Is okay. I unnerstans.
U no hav to be of the speakings.
lolcatz iz lyk esperanto.
–E
Lessizmoar–I agreez with you. I was just trying to follow teh tutorial. But from now on, I will use kitteh speak juicedituously. thx.
zomgwtf plz to no bi forgetingz insershunz ov memez!! As elfnugget an Hogarf waz tu dymonstrat whyn talkeen abut kamraz!!!
Zomg! Teh tutorial maeks mah eyes bleed! No moar lolcatpseek!!1one
OMGWTFBBQBACON! This are da halpfulz!
We nede moar intarwebz tew lern kittanz!
YEAZ!!! Lolkittehspeek lessunz r be fulled awl two teh brym wif WIN ‘nd AWESUM! awesum plus foar! Mak me qwite happeh to haf a handie gydebook if’n i shood evar luze mah ways
OMFG TY!!!1
/hug
[...] how to make me want to leap through my monitor to kill you with ICanHasCheezBurger’s handy five-step tutorial to transform English into LOL-Kitteh (using Engrish and l33t as guides). Powered by Gregarious [...]
thanx 2 dis site, I hases problems wif the speakings! i no can make sentences rightness! it suxxors. i tewtally are thinkings in lawlcatz!
A winnar is YOU, elfinugget!
Iz a joke. Not to beez taken litterly.
kthxbai
Coolbeans, Elfi…..yu do dis alla ina day???? Yu won smart kookie
bizkitmama: “The scary thing is, after doing for a day or two, you start to think in lolkitteh.”
The REALLY scary thing is when you start actually talking in lolcat. An example:
My husband and I are getting coffee at a local coffee place. I’m searching in vain for the lids when he hands me my cup with a lid already on it. My response? “Oh! You gots me a drink hat? YAY! Teh awsums!”
Is troo–hubby & i liek smoo smoo smoo. Kidz go pleh.
hehehehe
[...] LOL-Kitteh As A Second Language (In Five Easy Steps) April 25, 2007 at 5:07 pm | In Humor | Dat beesings a kiti vary ful ov tewtul kutenis!! [...]
The problem with this is that the slang found in the original cat macros is hacker slang, or “l33t” (Google it). It developed into a mix of “l33t” and “engrish.” Neither of these was intentionally created to achieve a cutesy effect, so when paired with a cute cat pic, you actually get something cute. But when you TRY too hard to be cutesy with the constant misspellings and made up words, it becomes cloying (Google that too).
1337 is not hacker slang. It’s cracker slang. Hackers only use that sarcastically. The only people who really use 1337 are noobs who think they are hackers just because they can break into computer systems that they shouldn’t be able to access. That just makes them crackers. Hackers are those who write computer programs for the fun of it, rather than just stitching together other people’s code with simple scripts in order to mess up other people’s computers. Crackers call themselves hackers even when they don’t deserve the title. There are hackers who are also crackers, but there are many crackers who think they’re hackers when they can’t write any programs beyond simple scripting to break other people’s things.
Hackers make things, crackers break things.
Excellent. Very well explained.
Bad Rd.. assumption that one needs to google the word “cloying” or the word (if it can properly be called a word) l33t or more correctly (lol) l337
One person knowing both cloying and l33t/l337 might seen rare, but really isn’t… all it takes is an education or a person who enjoys reading, and some awareness of pop culture.
Google it
Saintpikachu: I can has grande brevi mocha, pleez? thx.
RD: I always thought lolkitteh speak was the result of cat-like typing. And I think you mean clawing, not cloying.
Clawing: To cause distaste or disgust by supplying with too much of something originally pleasant, especially as it relates to cutez kitteh pixez, k? thx.bai.
Elfnugget: I has kompleet worships of u. U r incredibilliness!! So much awsum in one playss fur meh to refferanss whinevers needing.
An to b thinking I’s new u bak whin u was Elfnow.
(Hoep ur surgery wint wel)
Yeah, the surgery went very well, thanks. Doc decided to do a little septoplasty while he was in doin’ the bilateral endoscopic ethmoidectomy and bilateral maxillary endoscopic roto-rooting or whatever they called it. (I is not dumb, I just wuz real druggaged.)
Oh for pete’s sake you all…
it’s a JOKE. this isn’t like…. a requirement for posting here. Get over it. It’s funny.
–E
CrazyOldLady: Actually… once I set my brain to working on it, it took about an hour, plus minor tweaks. It’s really not that different from speaking, say, German. The steps are only barely different: “Decide what you want to say, figure out the syntax, translate the words, add regionalisms, add personal touches.”
[...] I CAN HAS CHEEZBURGER? LOL-Kitteh as a Second Language (LKSL-101) in Five Easy Steps « Tutorial for making your own lolcats catpions (tags: lolcats funny) [...]
Advanced LOL-Kitteh as a Third Language (LKAdv-401)
en Frankay:
Say oon shatt traay jolly. Ay walla: eel a oon cordon soore son tette!
My brain hurtz.
The Grammar Policeman in me wants to break out teh trunchonz butz ZOMG WTFBBQLOLZ eys haz bin infectedz…
Halp me!
No, darn it! You can’t try to explain something funny — it knocks the funny out of it!
OMG DIS ARE TEH BESTEST POST OF KITTEH SPEEK EVAR!!
Me is fowndz dis fery funnies an intrustings!!! fery gud instrokshuns!!! I is being praktis longwage mor. yis, meez luves da kitins tu.
This is so funny.
I’m not a native speaker, so kitteh speak is really too hard for me to do, but I enjoy reading it! 
I iz form Germ-any (plz spare me, I iz way too young to have started WW2 ;D )
I went to my cousin’s house today - they got new puppy, a teeny Scottie puppy that I could probly have put in my pocket. My first reaction to seeing it? I picked it up and put it on my head and said “I HAS A HAT.”
fankoo ICHC, u haf roond mah mynd… or mayd it fyfteh tymz bettah!
what is kthnkxbai
is that OK thanks bye?
(I am trying to learn LOL cat speak)
yvi: I wish to learn German at some point.
I did well enough in it when I took it in college (a zillion years ago) that I was able to think in it and even DREAM in it; I think that’s a sign of being really ready to launch into the language. My husband, “Hogarf”, bought me a Conversational German CD set for Christmas, and of course I haven’t opened it but I really do THINK about it a lot. 
I keep telling Hogarf that we should both speak another language fluently in the household, so we can enrich our children with it as they grow up. Obviously I haven’t got any kids yet, only cats, so my current second language is Lol-Kitteh. (I was speaking it fluently before it was making its grand entrance onto the internet… mostly because it’s really how kittehs in the household think.)
And WW2 is NOT the first thing that comes to my mind about Germany, so you get no static from me on that topic. There’s an entire channel called the Military channel… my mother calls it “the Hitler Channel” because it’s always showing the same WW2 informational stuff over and over… And of course it’s all her boyfriend will watch.
Worry not. My advice, if you desire to speek Kitteh, is to just type English words using German sentence structure.
Don’t worry about misspelling, although if you throw in some “OMGWTFBBQ!!” into the mix, it wouldn’t hurt. 
Theresa: Actually that’s defined above. You are correct. “Okay, thank you, good-bye!” (which would be so appropriate in polite daily interactions with other people) has been shortened to “Kthxbai”, and is used when lol-minals are caught doing their swiping thing. “I can has this cheezburger kuz I is gud kiti? I just takes it, kthxbai.” It’s also still used in its original context, only shortened significantly.
There is another version, “kluvyabibi” which was made popular by the character “Mindy” on Animaniacs, a Warner Brothers cartoon of vast superiority to the stuff out there today. (Except Avatar. Avatar roxx) … Mindy was a cartoon three-year-old, always getting into mischief, and her dog was supposed to keep her in line. The cartoon was based on the mother leaving the dog in charge for an hour or so, and having NO IDEA how bad Mindy was… and how incredibly valiant the dog was in just plain keeping the kid ALIVE… only to be scolded when they were safely back in the yard and mother gets home… “you let her outfit get dirty!! BAD DOG!!” Mindy’s line was “okay ah luvya buhbye!!” which she said to nearly everyone.
Animaniacs rocked. 
And Hysteria, its successor, also rocked.