Роман Иэна Макдональда "Король утра, королева дня" (который никак не дочитаю за недосугом) полон змеиных лап - вот, например, описание теста на беременность (по понятным причинам не могу судить, насколько достоверное).
According to the instructions, you pass the little plastic wand through your stream, place it in the indicator unit, and wait four minutes.
Four minutes, that's two hundred forty seconds counting at one hippopotamus two hippopotamus that's a long time and an awful lot of hippopotami (a veritable stampede, do hippopotami stampede, are there ever anything like two hundred forty of them in one place at any time?) damn, cloud-gathering again, she's missed the four-minute mark, will that matter, will that make a difference; no, no matter, no difference; it's blue, bright blue. Blue as the most incredibly blue thing you can think of. Bluer.
