Peculiar Label

       I noticed an unusual label the other day on an old sweater of mine.  The brand appeared to be "Bowen & Wright," which had a rectangular box inscribed around it and underneath it the words "Registered Trademark."  But above them both in a semi-rainbow-shaped arc was "AUTHENTIC CLOTHING."  What?  Was there some doubt?

       Imagine finding a loaf of bread labeled "AUTHENTIC FOOD."  Wouldn't you wonder?  In fact, I had taken the sweater off its hanger simply to confirm it was wool as I figured all along it was.  There were no other labels than this one.  Now the "Authentic" has me wondering what the darned thing IS made of.

      

Misleading Label Again

       I probably wouldn't have gone for an ice cream called "Black Raspberry" as Connie did, not being attracted to fruity flavors, but might have been lured by the rest of its name "Dark Chocolate Chunk."

       Since I was out of my own ice cream, I tried hers and found the "chunks" tiny and disappointing.  I looked back at the cover label and read in smaller print "pieces of dark chocolate folded into..." "pieces" already being a reduction from "chunks," but what was inside would not have been misnamed "bits" or even "specks."

       If you're going to call something "chunk," remember the sound and heft as well as image of that;  I imagined mini-iceberg size chocolate fragments, not dainty dots, especially with most of the container covered in a rich deep brown! 

      

"The Child Is Father of the Man"

       I just finished munching a "Nut Goodie" candy bar that I ordered by email and had sent to "Donnie" at my address here in California, a box of ten bars.  I loved them as a kid in St. Paul where they're made.  I even wrote a note to include to my younger self:

                 Dear Donnie,
                      
                          Since "the child is father of the man" (Wordsworth),

                 Happy Father's Day.

                          I know how much you loved Nut Goodies.

                 And because of that, thankfully, I do too.

                          Let's share the box!

                                      Don

"Under Penalty of Law"

       How many of us leave tags untouched on the end of new pillows?

       Consumers can rip them off if they want.  They're unsightly; they hang out the pillow case ends and tickle a bed partner.   YET I BET THERE ARE THOUSANDS of homes with those tags present and accounted for!

       We are intimidated by those first words in the federally mandated statement, "UNDER PENALTY OF LAW"...my God, I've got to obey whatever follows: 
                       UNDER PENALTY OF LAW THIS TAG
                                    NOT TO BE REMOVED
You see jail bars and hardly notice the final
                             EXCEPT BY THE CONSUMER

       Consider this changed word order:
                              EXCEPT BY THE CONSUMER
                          THIS TAG NOT TO BE REMOVED
                                UNDER PENALTY OF LAW
The threat is allayed!  I predict a lot more joyous tag-ripping ceremonies in America.

"Day" Thoughts upon Awakening

Today is Friday wash day because yesterday's usual wash day daughter Elizabeth was still in town;  must confirm next date to read newspapers over the air (my regular every-other-Wednesday was Christmas Day, no broadcast).    Good to have set days for things.  What was Friday for in that song my dad sang?..."Friday Fish"..."Monday Hasenpfeffer," I think, "All the German mothers we wish the same to you"; Tuesday can't remember, I know Wednesday was "Zooop" (Soup), Thursday "Roast Beef," pretty sure;  doing week backwards each time brought me "Tuesday String Beans"; Saturday I think was "Payday"; Sunday of course "Church." 

       Good to have those set days, those things to anchor your week on, whether broadcast day or fish day...or wash day (even a day late)--better get up to do it.

Lazy Day Repartee

       Exhausted from family stuff for the last two days, Connie and I were sitting in late morning poring sleepily over newspapers in our sunroom with sunlight pouring in.

       After reading awhile and my sharing a funny passage from a humanizing piece about John McCain in the N.Y. Times Magazine, I contemplated my situation and said,  "I'm trying to figure what to do with my day....Do you know what you're doing with your day?"

       "I'm just trying to sit here and let it go by," said Connie.

       It cracked me up good.

Oof, He's At It Again

"The Love of Self"

       "The curse of our house...has been the love of self; has ever been the love of self.

       "There is a kind of selfishness...I have learned it in my own experience of my own breast:  which is constantly upon the watch for selfishness in others:  and holding others at a distance by suspicions and distrusts, wonders why they don't approach, and don't confide, and calls that selfishness in them."

                        Martin Chuzzlewit, Charles Dickens

      

"Keelhaul"

       In the final blog post yesterday on "Naming Rites," it was noted that the sports team nickname chosen by the California Maritime Academy was "Keelhaulers."

       It's a word I'd run into but was unsure of its meaning.  Kevin Baxter thought the name was appropriate for a school with a "nautical mooring."  After all, "What could be more threatening than keelhauling, an often deadly form of punishment."

       As the OED defines "keelhaul," "Haul (a person) through the water under the keel of a ship, as a punishment (obsolete except Historically).  Now also figuratively, rebuke or reprimand severely."

"Naming Rites," 5

Sidebar 2  by Kevin Baxter, L.A. Times Sports Section

       So what's in a nickname?  PLENTY.  As Kevin Baxter's December 15, 2013, L.A. Times sports section article reveals.  (I don't know whether Baxter or the headline writer gave us the pun in the title, but it's an excellent one, both humorous and appropriately illuminating.)

"Naming Rites," 4

Sidebar 1 by Kevin Baxter, L.A. Times

"Naming Rites," 3

From Kevin Baxter's L.A. Times Sports Section piece

"Naming Rites," 2

Excerpted from L.A. Times article by Kevin Baxter.

"Naming Rites," 1

Excerpts from L.A. Times Sports Section, Dec. 15, 2013 

Waning "Gibbous" Moon

       Today is actually a full moon, traditionally called the December "full cold moon."  But what happens after today?

       The words above caught my eye yesterday and reminded me, after full moon, the moon's phase becomes "waning gibbous moon."  No longer circular, the moon loses some of its roundness and gains the term "gibbous" (pronounced GIB-us) from the Latin gibbus ("hump").

       As long as the moon is between 50% lit and full, it's called gibbous for its rounded but not round appearance, or "hump-backed" if you wish.  When the moon is becoming smaller, it's "waning," when the moon is becoming larger, it's "waxing."

       Just so it's between 50 and 100% illuminated, it's gibbous.  As soon as the moon has "points," it's no longer a gibbous moon.  

"Being Alive," by Stephen Sondheim, 5

      At the end of Bobby's song, the words "being alive" are sung three times, meaning something a little different and a little more each time in accord with Bobby's progression:   surviving the challenges of "being alive"; going through those together is "being alive"; and what life's about, "being alive!"

       There's a beginning, middle, and end in "Being Alive," it develops, and Bobby is NOT in the same place at the end as he was at the beginning.  Stephen Sondheim has thrillingly fulfilled the prescription of his mentor Oscar Hammerstein for lyrics in a musical.

       As for words, well Sondheim must have to pay words overtime for making them do so much for him.

       In the new documentary film Six by Sondheim, you'll see Dean Jones give a memorable and moving performance of "Being Alive."
   
       

"Being Alive" by Stephen Sondheim, 4

       Stanza seven makes a dizzying turn, Bobby welcoming the helter-skelter of relationship and life.  By stanza eight,  Bobby has worked his way through to acknowledging this turn from "alone" to "alive."

       And in the final ninth stanza the intensity of stanza four is reprised but with the same small word changes of five and six, bringing their height of emotional angst and yearning, Bobby pleading "Somebody crowd me with love," the intensity now at a peak.

       "Alive" appears a dozen times in stanzas four, five, six, eight, and nine:  Bobby and someone being "frightened" "of being alive,"  Bobby asking somebody to make him "aware of being alive,"  to "support" him "for being alive," to "make" him "alive,"  Bobby will "help us survive / Being alive." The repetitions and variations are exalting and affirming.

      
      

"Being Alive" by Stephen Sondheim, 3

       In the lyrics as I posted them yesterday, you can see the progression of language, expressive of Bobby's resistance, wrenching transformation, and change.

       In the first three stanzas, Bobby is aggrieved and distanced ("Someone to hold you too close") and satiric ("To ruin your sleep"); in the fourth stanza the language intensifies ("Someone to crowd you," "to force you," "to make you"), and Bobby's  distance collapses ("[Someone] as frightened as you/Of being alive.")

       In the fifth stanza, with Sondheim altering only two or three words from the first stanza, Bobby's complaint ("Someone to hold you too close") transmutes to an anguished and yearning self-referenced plea ("Somebody hold me too close").  And that little but amazing shift carries through every line of stanzas five and six, raising emotions right along with it.

"Being Alive" by Stephen Sondheim, 2

In Company, Robert (Bobby) a confirmed bachelor of 35 goes through two acts observing the plight & joys of his married friends, plus his own plight & joys with three girlfriends, & sings this culminating song:

click on lyrics to enlarge

"Being Alive" by Stephen Sondheim, 1

       In the film Six by Sondheim the composer/lyricist says when he was 15, he learned from Oscar Hammerstein directly the most important single thing about lyric-writing for a musical:  the lyric had to have a beginning, middle, and end; it had to develop; the character singing needed to be in a different place when the song finished than when it began.

       I think it's a marvel of language the way Sondheim does it in "Being Alive," one of the six songs of the documentary's title.

       Tomorrow:  The Lyrics

"Cinerama" Anagram

       Amongst many other revelations in the marvelous new documentary film Six by Sondheim which HBO premiered the other night, this linguistic tidbit was noted by Steve Sondheim,

                 CINERAMA has an anagram:
                    AMERICAN 

"Mad Libs": the Hanukkah Edition

  
       Mad Libs books have been out for years:   brief stories with blank spaces for you to fill in words.  But you don't know the STORY till you read it with your created words now filled in.  My sample.

                      CELEBRATING THE JEWISH HOLIDAYS 101

We all know how to celebrate Hanukkah, but other holidays?  Well, on Tu B'Shevat, we celebrate by planting a participle in the ground.  On Passover we have a special meal called a Seder, which means "Duck."  Someone hides the furnace, and all the kids try to find it at the end of the Seder.  On Sukkot we build a glove outside and then crack up in it for 17 days.  There are many more holidays, but one of the most furtive is Shavuot.  That's when we stay up and curse all night long.

"The Long Boat" by Stanley Kunitz

"Lagniappe"

       "Lagniappe" was used in the headline of a review of Treme´ (about New Orleans) for its new, final, abbreviated season on HBO. 

       1.  Lagniappe (LAN-yap) was italicized in the headline when it needn't have been.  None of my references treat it as a foreign word;

       2.  Lagniappe is nowhere in the review itself, thus added by the headline writer based on Robert Lloyd's L.A. Times review calling the five-show season perhaps "an unnecessary appendix" to the series essentially completed last year, but welcome--a bonus, something tossed in extra for good measure;

       3.  The last words of #2 are indeed the word's definition;

       4.  It's a Southern Louisiana word from American Spanish la napa "the gift," and with the Creole dialect mix in New Orleans, then turned into Louisiana French.

        

Self-Serving Insurance Claims

       Actual excerpts from auto insurance claim forms in California.

Claim 1:  A pedestrian hit me and went under my car.

Claim 2:  I pulled away from the side of the road, glanced at my
                 mother-in-law, and headed over the embankment.

Claim 3:  My car was legally parked as it backed into the other vehicle.

Claim 4:  An invisible car came out of nowhere and struck my
                  vehicle--and vanished.

Claim 5:  The telephone pole was approaching fast.  I was attempting to
                 swerve out of its path when it struck my front end.

Claim 6: Pedestrian had no idea what direction to go, so I ran over him.

P(r)i(r)(v)acy

       Campaign Political Funds solicited online:

           when they use the phrase
                                                     "To Protect Your Privacy"--
           why do I always read
                                                      "To Protect Your Piracy"?

"Paraphernalia"

       I employ the term for a spacer tube I use with an asthma inhaler.

       But every time I think of the word "paraphernalia," my first association is with accoutrements for drug taking.

       The word comes from Greek para "beyond," pherne "a dowry," that is, a wife-to-be's personal possessions outside her dowry.

       Generally, the word refers to objects or appurtenances that go along with some main thing else.

Sycamore (forgive me)

Sycamore

                

More Sycamore

                                 
                                                                         

Sick o' More Sycamore?

 

                                                                                                                                                

Oops, Cartoonist & I on a Single Track

Click on cartoon to enlarge.

Photo I took some years back.

Solicitous Husband / Sardonic Wife

       Don:  Are you OK?

       Connie:  Yes.

       Don:  I heard you sneezing.

       Connie:  All I need is a Jewish mother.  I sneeze; therefore, I am.

Out-of-Control Cartoonist

click on cartoon to enlarge

       You kind of wish he'd just been tempted to do this cartoon but hadn't.  (Still, why am I glad he did?)

       So far as I can find out, there are only Jack Russell Terriers, called thus for a reverend of that name who was also a hunter and bred these dogs in the early 19th century.  Of course there have to be female Jack Russell Terriers, but apparently no Jane has given her name to a breed.

       Maybe the dad being happy birthdayed in the cartoon had a crush on the buxom actress back in the 1940s and 50s.

Clothing Labels Can Still Confound

       I bought a new semi-fancy sweat shirt with a hood and just now noticed the label:

click on image to enlarge

       Looks as though it could have been on an original garment manufactured in Brooklyn in 1896 as it says.  And then you see the tab beneath it and know the truth.

Elevating the Cartoon

click on cartoon to enlarge

A Rhythmic Observation

       There's a rhythm that develops in the practice of your trade
       Whether medicine or lawyering or gard'ning with a spade.

       The meter of this poetic truism happens to be (˘˘ˇ´) three light beats for each heavy.

       I learn that the meter is called quartus paeon, originally used by the Greeks in hymns of praise and thanksgiving.   By coincidence then I created a couplet appropriate for this Thanksgiving Day! 

       And one is thankful, after all, when one finds one's rhythm.

"Yearny"

       Where are the song-writers of yesteryear?  

       Bud Green gave us the perfect word "yearny," to rhyme perfectly in all respects with the word, the song title, and the common theme for many of us of a "Sentimental Journey."

       With Thanksgiving and the religious holidays upon us, with people getting together thankfully, it's been too long since I've seen my family and friends still living in or returning to Minnesota, and that's how I'm feelin'---"yearny."

       The word is in none of the major dictionaries I use.  But it is in The Urban Dictionary and Wiktionary.  Anyone might have created the adjective out of the verb "yearn,"  but I'm nominating Bud Green in 1944 for maybe creating, at least helping circulate the word and bringing it into viability and heart-perfection.

 

      

Cartoon Punning "Beware of Dog"

       Our next door neighbor has a sign on the back yard gate:  BEWARE OF DOG.

       This reminded me that the former neighbor on the other side of us used to have a sign that read something like TO HELL WITH THE DOG.   YOU'D BETTER BEWARE OF DOG'S OWNER!

       Altogether this reminded me of my cartoon:

"Self-Referential Sentences"

       What are self-referential sentences?  They are sentences that speak about themselves:

• This sentence was in the past tense.
•  
• This sentence is missing a sylla.
•  
• This is a sentence with "onions," "lettuce," "tomato," and "a side
•      of fries to go."
•        
• This sentence would be seven words long...if it were...six words
•      shorter.
•     
• This here sentence don't know english to good.
•      
• I have been sentenced to death.

        

The "Font"-ain of Youth

       Late night and eye sight can produce funny language to me at this age.  Reading of a favorite poet Stanley Kunitz, I came across the following line:

               Early in his adult life, Mr. Kunitz spent time on a 100-acre
               herb farm in Connecticut which was destroyed when a
               tomato blew through.

I laughed heartily.  I've commented before that an "r" and an "n" next to one another in print can appear a lot like an "m."  Once I saw the "m," it was easy to breeze by the "d" seeing it as a "t."

       It's a lot more exciting and fun when a tomato blows through and destroys a farm.  The thing must have been enormous and impelled by a wind of at least tornado force!

"The Shehecheyanu"

       There s a nice blessing said at the beginning of happy occasions in Judaism; it's from the Talmud, and it'll be said next Wednesday on the first night of Chanukah.
   
       The blessing starts with the usual "Praised be Thou, O Lord, our God" and then gives the reason for the blessing:

                "Who has granted us life, sustained us, and enabled us
                                          to reach this season. "

It feels good to say because it expresses thanks for being allowed to arrive at a joyful moment.

       It also helps that the Hebrew language affords such a rhythmic and rhymed combination of syllables to say those words:

            sheHECHeyanu, viKEYamanu, viHIGeyanu, lazMAN haZEH.

There's a built-in affirmation in the very roll of the utterance.
                                      Listen here.

"The Gettysburg Address"

       My computer was not cooperating, and I couldn't post this on Tuesday, November 19th, 2013, the 150th anniversary of its delivery by Abraham Lincoln.   But here it is now.

Same Old Same Mold?

click on "Dilbert" comic strip to enlarge

Gender Neutral Language

       Connie's "Patient Instructions" sheet when she left Kaiser today read,  "The patient was instructed to keep his follow up appointments with his primary care physician."  It's way too late in the evolution of gender neutral language to accept that kind of thing.

       It made me recall a Readers' Theatre show I wrote 30 or more years ago about language in which we attempted to find new words for some common sexist ones:

                  "Foreman" could become..."Supervisor."
                  "Motorman" could become..."Driver."
                  There can be both "Councilman" and "Councilwoman" OR
                       "Councilmember."                                                    
                  "Chairman" can be "Chairperson"; or, some think "Chair" is
                       even better.
                  "Men" at work:  "People" at work.
                  A "Manmade" lake:  "Artificial," it's been dammed and filled.
                  "Manmade" shoes?  "Synthetic."
                  "Manhole" cover:  "Access" cover.

 "Patient was instructed to keep follow up appointments with primary care physician."

"Selfie"

       "Selfie" is the word of the year according to the Oxford English Dictionary.  They just announced it.  It's a photo you take of yourself with your smartphone...a newbie for dictionary makers.

       The "ie" ending is appropriate, a diminutive affectionate suffix.  I was called "Donnie" a lot in my earliest years and through the teens.

       Of course, we are a pretty "self"-absorbed society with individualism a strong marker for our characters and life styles.  I was astonished around 50 years ago to see a new magazine called "SELF."  Really?

       The OED says "self" is of "unknown origin."  Yes, the self may be at the center of each of our lives--which we need to value.  We also need to be humble about it since we don't know, in the final analysis, whence it comes.

      

"Dish Towel"; "Hanging Up"

       I used a dish towel yesterday in an unusual way.  I dried a dish.  We carry hot containers wrapped in a towel; we wipe up spills with a towel; we dry our hands with a towel.   Rarely do we use a towel to dry a dish.

       Yet people still call it "dish towel" though the dishes it "towels" may be few and far between if you're a dishwasher household, which I'm sure not everyone is.

       It's a little like we say "hanging up" the phone, which less and less is the mode of discontinuing telephone calls, that is, hanging up.

"Eschew," "Bollix," "SCUTTLEBUTT," 3

       "Scuttlebutt” is “rumor, idle gossip, unfounded report,” and the OED seems glad to tell us that meaning originated colloquially in the United States in the early 20th century.  But before the colloquial meaning, where does it come from?

       Scuttlebutt, its first published use dated 1805, is “a water-butt kept on a ship’s deck for drinking from.” It's a contraction of “scuttled butt,” “butt” being a cask for water or other liquid and ”scuttled” a nautical term for “having a hole cut in it," from Spanish escotar, “cut out.”
  
       So when you next gather around your water cooler to chat, you can share both the “scuttled butt” and the scuttlebutt.

       Spanish escotar, of course, is also the source for "scuttling" a boat.

"Eschew," "BOLLIX," "Scuttlebutt," 2

       To “bollix” up is “to bungle, confuse; mess up,”  “to throw into disorder.”  But why does the OED say it is “coarse slang”?  British sensitivity to sexual matters?  The word is a variation of bollocks or ballocks: testicles.  This further comes from Middle English balloks and from Old English beallucas, thence back to Indo-European bhel- “to blow, swell; with derivatives referring to various round objects and to the notion of tumescent masculinity.”

       Yes, ball comes from the same root, as does indeed even phallus.  Nothing can botch things and throw them into disorder more than a man’s private parts, and that’s where we’re at, all bollixed up.

       (Tomorrow, "scuttlebutt.")

"ESCHEW," "Bollix," "Scuttlebutt," 1

       This is a threesome of words I corralled for the peculiarity of their sound and in the case of the latter two, the peculiarity of their roots as well.  Let's look at each.

       “Eschew” has always been a strange “chewy” word to me, to “avoid, escape, keep clear of.”  Some sources allow for the “shoe” pronunciation, but all accept “chew,” which is my preference.  It comes from a Germanic root scheuen, meaning simply to “shun.” 

       Now I think "eschew" is peculiar enough that I am choosing to eschew using eschew.  How about you?

       (Tomorrow, "bollix.")

Not Only "Except After C"

       Found on a T-Shirt in a signals.com catalogue:

                                             I BEFORE E
                                              except when
                                       eight feisty neighbors
                                             seize a surfeit
                                         of weighty heifers.


       There are five different pronunciations of the "ei" syllables in these seven "ei" words.       

So Near, And Yet So Far

Cartooning "Oxymoron"; "Sophomore"

                                                        
       "Oxymoronic" comes from Greek oxys, "sharp," "keen" + moros, "foolish"; hence "keenly foolish."   An oxymoron is a combination of contradictory or incongruous words--"cruel kindness," for example.

       Like oxymoron itself, "sophomore" is a built-in oxymoron in one word.  Perhaps it's appropriate that a person part way through an education would be half wise (sophos) and half foolish.

"Huh?"

       "Huh" is not just a palindromic gasp.  It's apparently a pretty universal, quick conversational word to express failure to understand something.  Speakers of many languages offer up a very similar sound under the same circumstances, linguistic investigators have discovered.

       They found that in all ten disparate languages they researched, the sounds were single syllables, there were a lot of low vowels like "ah" and "eh" and "uh," the word always started with a [h] or a glottal stop (the sound in the middle of English "uh-oh").

       Mark Pagel, who studies language evolution, says "huh" has undoubtedly been invented independently many times over because its brevity and ease of utterance answer a constant conversational need.

       A news article reporting on these findings by the Max Planck Institute for Psycholinguistics in the Netherlands can be read here.  

Only in America

             In a strip mall near where we live, Ali Baba's Persian
           Restaurant is two doors down from Al & Bob's Carpets.
                (No, I checked, and the carpets are not Persian.)

 

Another Candidate for Worst Pun of All Time

click on cartoon to enlarge

Election Language, 4: "Derivation"

       To conclude this series of posts, starting from Ancient Rome and Latin, let's light a "candle," (same shining, glowing root as "candidate") for the political process as well as the linguistic process.

       Governments do "run," societies do "flow" through time, and the stream (rivus) of language flows with them, carrying all its derivations.

Election Language, 3: "Senator"

       Let us say one of two "rival" "candidates" is fortunate enough to be elected "senator."  Senators are such by virtue of being “old,” from Latin sen-, senex, “old, old man.”  

       Now some U.S. senators truly are old, if not “senile,” and are most likely the “senior” senators from their respective states, therefore, the older elder, i.e., longer in office, of the two senators from that state.
 
       But there also has to be one “junior senator” from each state, (juvenis, “young”), and so you have a “younger oldster” as well as an older oldster.  But if the older oldster is driving a roadster, look out for second childhood and mere oblivion.  In which case, the junior senator will become the senior.

Election Language, 2: "Rivals"

       Candidates differing from one another in their candor and other qualities is what makes "rivals" in political competition.  And whence cometh "rivals" from the Latin source bag?

       Rivalis means “one using the same stream as another.”   It comes from rivus, “stream” or “rivulet.”  People who dwelled by the same source for water, cooking, bathing, and so on might indeed become contentious with one another over that life-giving, cleansing, and beautiful liquid, become, in fact, rivals.

       Rivus goes back further to Indo-European rei-, meaning “to flow, run.”  And the word “run” itself is also derivative from that root rei-.  So get a couple "candidates" together, turn them into "rivals," and they’ll “run” for office.

Election Language, 1: "Candidate"

       Election Day USA.  No federal elections in odd years, some local elections and votes on issues.  On a day typically swamped with candidates, let us appreciate...Latin...for its contributions to our political language!

       First off:  “candidate,” for which we owe thanks to the toga-wearing populace of ancient Rome.  In this case, those who were running for office wore white togas to mark them as candidates, and candidatus meant “clothed in white.”  The Indo-European root here is kand- meaning “to shine,” and gives us also the words we hope to find associated with candidates, namely “candor” and “candid.”  Do we find them?  Not usually.

       But this leads to other Latin-rooted, politically connected words...tomorrow... 

Polarizing/Paralyzing

      Some words that are "poles" apart are yet related, maybe attached, connected at the hip.  I'm thinking of the word "polarizing."  

      Coming across the two together in the same sentence wrapped them up for me :

                                    Polarizing/Paralyzing

What do they share in today's politics?  PUH-lenty.

       The first word produces the second word, and once we are paralyzed,  the population gravitates further towards its poles; hence Paralyzing produces more Polarizing.

       That little slash between them (/) is a teeter-totter, lifting one, then the other, then settling them into a stasis of perpetual accusing eye-stares.   








     

"Nuclear" and "Jewelry"

       I don't like hearing [NEW-kya-lar] instead of [NEW-klee-yar].   The "l" comes after the "c," not a vowel.  Merriam-Webster seems ready to accept either pronunciation because some educated and prominent people use [NEW-kya-lar].

       I have heard an occasional educated person pronounce "jewelry" as [JEW-luh-ree] instead of [JEW-uhl-ree].  But no; the "e" comes before the "l", not after it.  Would Merriam-Webster accept [luh]?

      The apparent challenge in pronouncing "nuclear" is almost all the sounds are produced in the upper part of the mouth with the tongue moving from front to back to front then middle of the mouth, making it effortful to get all the sounds in in the right order.  Only the effort needs to be made...say I, and many others!    

      

ONE YEAR

       Today is the anniversary of "Living with Language" on "blogspot.com".   Why did I start the blog on that particular day, November 2, 2012?  Here's how I recalled it on New Year's Eve:

       "The little girl Abigael crying and expressing her impatience with both Mitt Romney and 'Bronco' Bama, home videoed by her mother, which then went viral, was just too precious a moment with language to let pass by.  The president had been likeable to many, but to see him transformed into a Western Cowboy Hero by a four-year-old through her quite understandable misnaming told me the blog had to begin that very night.  And so it did."

Geriatric Anagrams, 2

       Connie offered me the bag of remaining M&Ms from our movie a few days ago.  I took a couple, then refused more, said, "I shouldn't; both chocolate and peanuts are not recommended if you've had..."

       I paused because I was experiencing trouble recalling the word for my problem.  It's a stymie like the one I referred to as Geriatric Anagrams in my Tuesday, July 30, 2013 post.

       The word I came up with was "Kennedys."  "Not recommended if you've had Kennedys."  You know that it's the wrong word, but it's on the way to the right one.  So you say it, "Kennedys."  And then it comes.

       "Kidney stones."

        But you've found the word(s)!

"Hagiography"

       Kevin Peraino was interviewed tonight about his new biography on Lincoln's foreign policy.  He spoke of wanting to avoid a hagiography and pronounced the first syllable with a long "a" instead of to rhyme with "bag."   I figure any of these causes for his mispronunciation:

       1.  He was influenced by the Hague in the Netherlands;
       2.  He was influenced by memories of Alexander Hague;
       3.  He's a wide reader but learned words before he heard them pronounced;
       4.  He's Jewish and knows the Hagiographa is the third part of the Hebrew Bible, The Writings, and can be pronounced with long "a";
       5.  He's Catholic and knows hagiography can have long "a" when it is a life of the saints.

       I gather Peraino's is a good book and not a hagiography (an idealized biography of anyone).

Actions Speak Too

       I had trouble understanding Alphonso on one word.  Alphonso was helping put in our wood floors.  His English was fine, but he was telling us how he would keep dust from permeating other rooms:  plastic sheet from floor to ceiling with a [SIH-ped] down the middle.  His gesture was very clear; so after momentary puzzlement, I said, "zipper"?  Alphonso nodded.  The plastic could be zipped or unzipped so one could walk through.

       Looking up Spanish pronunciations online, I learn the "z" is pronounced [th] if you're from Spain and [s] if you're from South of the border.  The "r" except at beginning of words is pronounced more like English "d"; hence Alphonso's [SIH-ped]. 

       Gesture, on the other hand, pinned the meaning home!

Be CAREFUL When Writing for the Ear!

Heard on NPR news today:

              "European diplomats are coming to Washington to question
               President Obama about the tapping of Europe's phone
               communication.  The President is planning to sue them."

       No way for the ear to tell the difference between "sue them" and "soothe them."

      

Two Interesting Language Tidbits

       1.  "Listen" and "silent" use exactly the same letters.


       2.  Place a mirror in the center of this word, and it is exactly
                                  the same in either direction:

       

"Character"

       “Character” comes from Latin character, from Greek kharakter, from kharassein, “to inscribe” or “scratch” or “engrave,” from kharax, “pointed stick."  Shakespeare’s Polonius uses the word in a verb form that conveys its original meaning when he says to Laertes:

                And these few precepts in thy memory
                See thou character.  Give thy thoughts no tongue....
                                             Hamlet, Act I, Scene 3


Character is not a mask.  It is engraved, it is etched into you.

       In "Weathering," Alastair Reid speaks of his

                         father’s carved face, the bright eye
                he sometimes would look out of, seeing a long way
                through all the tree rings of his history.


Time may “delve the parallels in beauty’s brow,” but in the way we act and live...in that is inscribed character.

"Buncombe"--or Worse

       The county that's given its name to the hogwash that emanates from the mouths of politicians has managed to outdo itself!

       A Republican official from Buncombe County, North Carolina, had to resign after his "Daily Show" interview about the state's strict new voter ID laws.  The remarks were unguarded and so racially tinged that Aasif Mandvi even asked Don Yelton, "You know that we can hear you, right?"  County and state GOP leaders disowned Yelton almost at once.

       That county is the origin of the word "buncombe" or "bunkum" or, for short, "bunk."  In 1820, a Representative from the county made an irrelevant speech to Congress just to impress his constituents.

       Now the residents have something else to live down.

And Why Would You Want to Scratch It?

       Seen in the L.A. Times yesterday:

                        "The potential for crowd-
                 funding is immense, and
                 we've just barely scratched
                 the tip of the iceberg," said
                 Anindya Ghose, a New York
                 University professor who
                 studies crowdfunding.

       Once again, a couple cliché images wedded.
       (Note also Monday, October 14, 2013.)

"Palindrome"/Cartoon

       Palindrome, from Greek palindromos, meaning "running back again," palin, "again"; dromos, "a running," which fits...for words that are spelled the same backwards as forwards.

       "Bizarro" is at it once more today.

Words Worth Saving

       While cleaning up my dresser drawer, I found a note that I jotted down years ago after Connie said it:


         "I think that the world is bigger and kinder than most people."


       That's my wife.

Maybe One and One Are...One

In the personal ads of the UCLA Bruin newspaper on Valentine's Day:

                                Waldo,
                                     We're two odd socks that have
                                     found each other in the dryer of
                                     life--a perfect match.  I love you.
                                                      Hillary

I can't help thinking Hillary would have liked this piece of mine:

                                                     Eve

                                            odd Adam
                                            
                                            added odd Eve 'n'

                                            odd and odd are

                                            Eden

Cartooning Punster I

Good Journalism Can Heal

       Yes, the Dodgers lost big 9-0 to St. Louis in their last game of the National League playoff series.  It was humiliating, disconcerting, and deeply sad for Dodger fans.  Two days later Plaschke spoke, ok wrote, in the L.A. Times, acknowledged the worst of it, and then brought us back to the joys, the craziness, the fun, the spiritedness, the team camaraderie, of the regular and post-season all the way (almost) to the end.

       A great sports writer, Plaschke was absolutely in the hearts, minds, and mood of Dodger fans everywhere.  I wrote him these words:

       "Plaschke, You know how to put salve in our wounds and joy in our hearts again."

                                        The link is here.

First Fruits

       Going through my study finally (as I've promised myself for years) to get rid of everything but what I can't bear to throw away, I come upon the first "great" article I wrote for the Quarterly Journal of Speech.  I'd forgotten it was given the lead position in the journal for that issue.  It was the main fruits of my PhD dissertation.  It still reads great, what can I say?

       I remember delivering it as a paper at the national convention the year before.  There was a packed "house"; I was a "rock star" of young academia.  Congratulations and requests for copies flew from the rafters.  Can I throw this article away?

        No.

"Diversity"/"University"

       I'm recalling an art work, a photograph.  The photo centers on many hands, at least ten with a variety of skin colors, resting on top of one another above the word "DIVERSITY."   Beneath that, these words:

                "The privilege of a lifetime is being who you are."
                                      Joseph Campbell

       I am proud that higher education during my active years honored diversity, espoused multi-cultural values, encouraged giving voice to the voiceless.

       It strikes me now as an irony that a "UNIVERSity" should be valuing "DIVERSity," that is...by derivation...that "turning toward oneness" would place value on "turning toward difference."

       But then oneness: wholeness or completeness implies making room for the multiple strains within it.

How I Knew I Loved Language

       Each week during my childhood "Dr. IQ, the Mental Banker" came on the radio asking questions of live audience members, giving them money for correct answers.

       My favorite question was always "that little monument to memory, the Thought Twister."  If you could repeat Dr. IQ's rhyme exactly, you'd get 25 silver dollars.  He'd say it only once.  For example:

              The bed is red said Ted to Ned.
              The bed is red, Ted, to him said Ned.

Almost everybody failed and ended up with a box of Milky Ways instead.  I caught onto the pattern and could always repeat the rhyme.

       All four principal rhyming words appeared twice in the same order.  And punctuated properly, it would make sense:  "The bed is red," said Ted to Ned.  "The bed is red, Ted," to him said Ned.  

"Brevity is the Soul of Wit"

       Yesterday, I exceeded my self-prescribed limit for number of words per entry in this blog.  As I was doing so and forgiving myself because I was in a hurry to finish and get to bed with a busy day ahead of me, I thought of George Bernard Shaw.

       In a letter to a friend, Shaw said, "I'm writing you a long letter because I don't have time to write a short one."

Puns Aweigh!

       Headline writers can have fun, especially in the sports pages.  The Los Angeles Dodgers playing in the National League Championship Series had to depend upon their 3rd best pitcher to win after their best two didn't.  Ryu is South Korean, his name is pronounced [rih-YOU], and here's the L.A. Times headline on the morning of his night game:

                It has to be Ryu

I read it about four times yesterday and today, and on the fourth time only, I realized the writer was summoning an old song:  "It had to be you/ It had to be you/ I wandered around, finally found/ Somebody who..."

       Ryu won his game, and today's headline read

                 A BUOY NAMED RYU
The sub-headline read "Rookie's brilliant outing keeps the Dodgers afloat..."  You see the connection between "BUOY" and "afloat" and "BUOY" and "boy" and "Ryu."

       These headlines may be a "stretch," but they are also playful and
true...or should I say [trih-YOU]? 

Radio Language that Made Me Wonder, 2

• Heard in a radio interview:

                 "You hit it on the nutshell, Jackie. . . "


         
                                Why use one cliché?  Combine two.

• Heard on a radio commercial:

                    With sentimental music behind her, a woman delivers
               a Father's Day message to her Dad (courtesy of a local bank):

                       "You told me I should think for myself.  So I often think,
                        'What would Dad say?'"



              
                                Hmm?!      

Radio Language that Made Me Wonder, 1

•  Heard on a radio news cast:

                        "Wilma Mankiller became the first female to head an
                   Indian tribe, the Cherokee."


                                  Hmm.  Wonder how she pulled that off . . .

•   Announcer on radio:

                        "The Judo-Christian tradition."

         
                                  Yes.  A couple quick moves, and you've got a pagan
                                  just where you want him.




          


           

Society's War on the Left-Handed Writer

       My son David's written a piece called "It ain't Right:  Society's War on the Lefty."  David notes "the small impediments we encounter every day."  In school, for example:

        "Scissors come in 'Normal' and 'You.'  Desks have a support for the right arm, leaving the 'Port' side hanging and exposed.  Some desks have a built-in inkwell for--guess which hand?  Taking an exam your pencil or Eraser-Mate pen smudges the paper and your palm as your scrawl crawls rightward.  That's Western writing's left-hand brand."

       And David ends with the image of a hand waving, yes, it's actually moving and waving, or is it signaling for help, or is that hand going under for the last time, drowning?  It is a left hand!
            

Good Thinking, Cartoonist!

Click on Cartoon to Enlarge

Apple, App a Map

       Leaving Northridge Fashion Center, I was driving...Connie directs me to the shoe store she wants to shop at; it was not the route I would have taken, but I used it.  It involved two right-hand turns instead of two left, and that was the point for Connie.  The two accidents she's had in recent years were both while taking left-hand turns.

       I chided her she could put out a unique app:

                   "Map a Route to Anywhere by Right Turns Only!"

Finding the Right Word

       Patriotic songs are not in favor, but if a song was popular in WWI when your father served and also in WWII when your older brother served, almost any random phrase or association with its words can set you off singing, which is the case for me with George M. Cohan's

                    Over there, over there
                    Send the word, send the word over there
                    That the Yanks are coming, the Yanks are coming
                    The drums rum-tumming everywhere.

       As I launched into it today, all I could think of was that 'rum-tumming.'   How did Cohan come up with that?

       "Yes, something to rhyme with 'coming'--'drums,' let s see--uh--'rum-tumming,' that's it, 'everywhere'!"         

Sip These Wines with a Smile

       Recently Connie and I visited a newly opened Sprouts Farmers Market in the neighborhood.  As Connie noted, there are a lot of gluten-free products, vegetarian ones, natural, low-fat, etc.

       Meanwhile, I got a kick out of two of their wines.  One is named "Our Daily Red," and the other "Ménage à Trois" (containing three varietals of wine).  One is having a little fun with religion, the other with sex.  I don't know how that fits the store image, but the names do make me chuckle.

"Bunt, You Fool!"

       I have to reprint this (from my August 20th 2013 post) because-- talk about not being able to read bunt signs, tonight Juan Uribe of the Los Angeles Dodgers purposely fouled off two pitches bunting so he would be released from the bunt sign to swing freely...and hit the HOME RUN that not only won the game but won the National League Division Series from the Atlanta Braves, and launched the Dodgers into the National League Championship Series!

       Somehow Juan both honored the sign and undermined it at once, then personally consigned all quibbles about "not following orders" into
the
      dustbin
                    of
                         history.

"Oooh" Is Another One

But What's it Called?

click on image to enlarge

       Yes, it's real, photographed from Griffith Park overlooking Hollywood, front page of today's L.A. Times.  It's being tracked and imaged by well-protected cameras where infrared beams trigger the shots at night when the creature is up and around.

       I saw one once in a different local mountain, just for a moment, in daytime, and gone, and have seen a trailhead warning in the north San Fernando Valley, one being sighted--I turned back from that hike, not to return.

       But I've heard the animal called a number of names, and today's article used all of them:  puma, cougar, mountain lion.   Merriam-Webster even includes two more:

            cougar:  a large powerful tawny brown cat...formerly
            widespread in the Americas but now reduced in number or
            extinct in many areas--called also catamount, mountain lion,
            puma, panther.

Artistry with Words

       Toby Lurie is a long time friend and poet/painter who, like Feodor Voronov (my blog two days ago), incorporates language into his art.  I knew Toby first as a poet and performer, but he's been an avid painter also now for over twenty years.

click on image to enlarge

    This gives you an idea of how Toby can make his poetry a basis for his painting, the visual helping express the spirit of the words.

    It's called "I Will Not Be Confined," acrylic on canvas.




     This one's called "From My Journals," mixed media on canvas.

       Toby's journals, densely cross-hatched and barely legible, form a background for the other work and colors done atop them.  The writing's not meant to be read, but, something like Voronov's words, meant to be an integral part of the overall design and composition.

       To me this is both fun and artistry...with language.  Visit Toby's website here.