It’s a conical sort of effort. Either a cherished memory or the monkey on my back. Either a shining example of succinctness or a demonstration of woeful descriptive powers.
Ah yes, the story behind this.
Picture the scene: an ordinary afternoon, several moons ago, several friends are clustered into a room playing Rolemaster. My character, Esran Phillips, heads off on a scouting mission; seeking one part of the macguffin the party need to complete the current plot. He peers in through a window and the GM gives a glowing description of the item in question; colours, shapes, sizes, the way it catches the light. Esran returns to the party to report and, naturally, they ask him what it looked like. To which I respond:
“It’s a conical sort of effort.”
Several minutes later we continued with the game, but the damage had been done.
Some years later I was trying to think of a name for my very own personal vanity domain. A friend suggested conical effort and I felt that had a nice ring to it.