Did Someone Actually Think This Would Work?

Yesterday, after my review of What in the Word?, Soda & Candy posted a link in my comments section to Schott's Vocab Blog at the New York Times website. Therein, the author describes, as he puts it, "unconsidered lexicographical trifles", or strange words. For the most part, it's entertaining.

And then...I found an entry for "sea kittens". The definition of sea kittens:

A bizarre euphemism for fish – advocated by People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals in an attempt to persuade children that fish are too cuddly to eat.
Seriously, PETA? This is the best you could come up with? Like my friend, Joe, suggested, couldn't PETA have though of some euphemism that would indicate that it's something you don't want to eat, as opposed to something as ludicrous as making fish into cuddly--if slimy--entities? My suggestion, of course, was to call them "Sea Dick". Of course, that's going to bring a whole host of foul images to mind when someone screams "Thar she blows!" Someone better get a towel.

While PETA was trying to liken fish to their cute and cuddly land-based relatives, they heinously forgot sea kittens' other taxonomically related land-based cousins: the Sweater Kittens. When compared to fish...er...sea kittens, Sweater Kittens are far more cuddly and warmer. Not to mention, they taste a lot better, too.



Although, this does lend a whole new aura to the Shakespearean phrase "groping for trouts"! Have a nice weekend, everyone!

Can I Get Another Word for 'Ho-Hum'?

Let's continue on with the "books I'm reading to make me a better author", shall we? Excellent. Today's installation is What in the Word? Wordplay, Word Lore, and Answers to Your Peskiest Questions about Language by Charles Harrington Elster.

In January, I reviewed The Mother Tongue by Bill Bryson. Read that one. Leave Elster's book on the shelf.

Oh, you probably want something to substantiate those instructions. If that's the way you're going to be, fine. I'll play along just the once.

Elster is a contributor to the "On Language" column in the New York Times Magazine. As such, he gets lots of people writing in lots of questions about words, usage, and etymology. As such, this book is written in a question and answer format which makes for some nice natural breaks when reading this book on the shitter. Otherwise, it's just kind of annoying. Now, I will say that, when answering questions based on etymology, usage or "is there a word that..." describes a certain situation, Elster does a stand-up job. However, in several chapters, Elster decides to exercise his "wit" by crafting new words. Sure, creating new words is nice and all, but it was difficult reading these chapters and not imagining some smug motherfucker talking down to you while he creates a word to describe the holes in Swiss cheese or some other useless entity.

Added into these are sidebars where he makes up more stupid words, as well as "Bodacious Brainteasers" which are supposed to be quizzes but end up being impossible to decipher because he will randomly change the rules of the puns that he's using, oftentimes in the middle of the quiz itself. At the bottom of every couplet of pages is a pun in the vein of "I could have been a doctor, but I didn't have the patience". Get it? Laugh, clown, laugh!

I did, however, like the "Unfortunate Eponyms" piece that he wrote, telling stories about people whose lives or actions were so fucked up, we used their names to describe a similar situation. For instance, to "bowdlerize" is to go through and cut out all the "offensive" material from a written document. For instance, if I were to bowdlerize this blog, it'd look something like this:


Hi.


In Elster's defense, some of his best work is in the pronunciation questions (he has a separate book just on mangled pronunciations). Herein he reminds everyone that, yes, there is a /t/ on the beginning of "tsunami," despite the media deciding it was pesky and dropping it back when they covered the one on Phuket Island. Also, he tells us that it's pronounced "homm-edge" and not "oh-mahj" like some self-important cocksnots have decided in recent years *cough*Alex Trebek*cough*. Also, he clears up that whole question of the plural of octopus: it's octopodes. See, the ending "pus" is a Greek derivative of foot, and as it's a Greek word, the proper pluralization is "podes", thus giving us "octopodes." See, the pluralized form of "octopi" is a Latin pluralization, so you're taking a Greek root and forcing a Latin rule on it, despite the fact that they're two different languages. It's kind of like the bastard who decided that we can't have split infinitives in English because they couldn't have split infinitives in Latin...despite the fact that it's impossible to have a split infinitive in Latin. Latin infinitives are all one word (you'll learn that in the upcoming weeks)! Should you think octopodes too silly, octopuses is also acceptable.

The other big reason for reading Bryson's book The Mother Tongue is that Elster cites it constantly (along with Bryson's Dictionary of Troublesome Words), so you're just cutting out the middle man and going to a better written and more enjoyable source. However, if you feel like being talked down to by a book, by all means, read What in the Word?

Friday Morning Latin Lesson, Volume III

I'm liking where this is going. So far, we've delved into the seedy underworld of bananas stuck in auricular orifices and the arrogant world of literary criticism. This week, we're going more practical. We're going to analyze a phrase that can be used while out on the town in the bar scene. Or, hell, this might even be utile the next time you're at the forum and especially if you're rocking out at Delta House, smashing guitars, doing it a little bit softer now with Otis Day and the Knights, fooling around with the Dean's wife, or banging thirteen year olds.

And look! This feature has become so popular, I've got a celebrity guest to provide the translation for this week's phrase. Everybody, please welcome the fabulously gorgeous Amy Adams! Ladies, this one is for you:

"Estne volumen in toga, an solum tibi libet me videre?"

Pronounced "Est-nay woe-loo-men in toe-gah, an sow-loom tee-bee lee-bet may vee-dare-ay?"

*Once again, translation in the hovertext...try to focus on the words, pervy*

For Mature Audiences Only

Created by OnePlusYou

How'd I get to be so low? Apparently, the scanner found five instances of fucking, three shits, a pair of crappies (not the fish), and a single dead. Wait. Dead? Makes me NC-17? I guess my four-year-old is a sailor-mouth, then.

Before you turn away in anger/fear/disgust/rage, just remember that "Clerks", "Dogma" and "Zack and Miri" were all NC-17 originally, and look how funny they were. Yeah, I'm not buying it, either.

I shudder to think what some people's blogs would be rated. Even though they totally go and try to sweeten things up...and fail miserably...I'm guessing they'd be rated pretty high. But, forget the sweetening. I say, revel in what you are, and don't try to hide behind the ruse of fanciful unicorns and kittens licking dew drops.

I'm all out of inspirational messages, so here's a picture, instead:

Abuse of Language

The other day, I was in lab talking about something, some reaction or such, and I said, "What's the worst that could happen? An explosion?" The labmate with whom I was speaking and I had a nice chuckle, and then he said "Well, I guess we could always crank the heat up and see what happens." To which I replied, "Don't blame me when it goes 'Poon!'" I then used very large, sweeping hand and arm gestures to pantomime the billowing clouds of fire and smoke as I wrapped up my sentence.

Then I realized what word I used to recreate the onomatopoeia of the explosion. My labmate and I had a good laugh over that, too.

I realize I'm going to probably offend my female readers here, but this little exchange got me to thinking. We have a perfectly lovely and utile language here in English, and yet we seem to spend most of our creativity on developing and inventing clever words to describe our sexual organs. Take, for instance, poon. Said in a deeper, almost airy way, it's a lovely way to describe the sound made during an explosion. However, I think we all know its "true" meaning--actually, the word "poon" is often used to reference a certain group of trees from the East Indies known for their solid, durable wood. Yep, that's right. You get hard wood from poon.

*taps microphone* Is this thing on?

It's not even taking another word and twisting it to some perverted means, like hooters. We all know what hooters are, thanks in large part to Al Bundy and that rather mediocre restaurant. I prefer to think the Al Bundy had more to do with it than the restaurant, but that's just me. We can make up any number of words to describe a body part, and instantly one knows what it means. Such as, if I were to say, "Wow! Look at those mugumbas!" you'd know instantly that I was ogling some girl's breasts.

Of course, this doesn't stop with just the female body. It works for the guys, too, lest we forget James Van der Beek's soliloquy from Varsity Blues in which he lists a very long stream of words, phrases, and descriptors for the penis. Or the wangdang. Or the John Thomas. I think I've made my point.

If nothing else, I've proven on this here little blog that I'm fairly proficient at throwing around words that some people consider offensive. So, it might seem like I'm a hypocrite, complaining that we're using our creativity to come up with new words for our naughty bits--especially when I use them every day. Maybe I am, maybe I'm not; that's for you to decide. However, in all the words used to describe genitalia, there is one used to describe female genitalia that I find completely and downright terrible, and thus I never use it.

Yeah, that one.

Happy St. Hugh Day!

Today we celebrate the Feast of St. Hugh. Hugh was appointed the Bishop of Grenoble by the council at Avignon in 1080, which was impressive as he was not yet ordained as a priest. Apparently, his piety was so great that everyone just knew he was destined for great things.

What kinds of great things? Well, he had a dream in which he saw seven stars. This, of course, inspired him to form his own monastic society, which is naturally named the Carthusian Order. He founded the Carthusians (along with St. Bruno of Cologne, who perhaps taught him many things about how to be a bishop without being a priest) in a snowy, alpine village called Chartreuse. The Carthusians are famous for their lurid yellow-green robes and their ability to craft very fine fishing lures.

Hugh (also know as Hugh of Châteauneuf, which means "Nine Castle" en français) was the Bishop of Grenoble until his death in 1132, though he tried to quit and enter a monastary at Cluny two years after taking the seat of bishop. After his death, Hugh wasn't done. No, his body was burned by the Huguenots during the Wars of Religion. However, at this point, Hugh had already been canonized. Clearly, they didn't like sharing a name with poor Hugh.

Also, today is April Fool's or All Fool's Day. Since it's also Hugh's day, and he was French, I'll add that it's poisson d'avril en France. What is poisson d'avril?, you might ask. I'll tell you. Poisson d'avril means "fish of April" or "April's Fish" (get your mind out of the gutter now), and it is the day set aside for hanging small paper fish on the back of your friends. Oh, those plucky French, what won't they think of next?

As you may have been able to tell, I do have the ability to quickly and easily translate all of these French terms into English (or a reasonable facsimilie of English). That is because I studied French for four years in high school (I mentioned that a while ago, but it's always good to remind folks who might be new or whatever...plus it allows me to add the extra level of yet another parenthetical clause). And, what would high school be like if you could not torture some poor, unsuspecting fool on poisson d'avril? It would be even more painful than usual, let me tell you. Of course, the unsuspecting fool in this case was our French teacher, Ms. Knipp.

Madamoiselle Knipp was, perhaps, the one person in all of history I've met with a heart of solid, 18K gold, mostly because she put up with this stupid shit and didn't beat the hell out of us with her enormous yardstick, knicknamed Spanks. Anyway, the first time we learned of poisson d'avril, a couple of my friends (since I lived in a tiny village in the eastern part of the county and I didn't have a car nor parents who were willing to drive my ass around for such stupid endeavors) sat around most of the night of March 31st drawing thousands of tiny fish on little post-it notes. They arrived at school early, a few minutes after the janitors went around unlocking all the classroom doors, and snuck into Ms. Knipp's room, covering the walls with all of these little fish. A good time was had by all, and we were finding tiny paper fish for months after the prank, which would have been legendary by French standards.

The following year (when I was a junior), right before the third period, someone in the office paged Ms. Knipp to come to the office. Confused, she obliged, and as she went around the corner, my friends came running in with an electric skillet, oil, and, yes, fish. They fried up fish for everyone in the class, and when Ms. Knipp returned from her fool's errand, everyone yelled in unison "poisson d'avril!" Incidentally, I think that's when I got a fish bone caught in my throat and I ended up puking (I did make it to the restroom). It took me several years before I could eat fish again.

So, let us celebrate Hugh of Châteauneuf, his yellow-robed friends, and French fish everywhere today. Also, since it's St. Hugh day, let's celebrate guys named Hugh. [1]


Also, today is FitzChivalry Farseer's Beloved day. Yes, that's an obscure reference. No, I don't expect most of you to understand it (if you do, post it in the comments, you vile lurker).

[1] Two of the three of these men, my wife finds very, very sexy. The third is simply cute and on the list because he has a British accent. I hope everyone appreciates how hard I had to work on this picture.

I Can Has Komuhdee Now?

Long about the sixth grade, I thought Garfield was the funniest thing going. This was fostered by my teachers, as Jim Davis--Garfield's creator--was from Muncie, IN. Being a born and bred Hoosier, I was spoonfed from an early age that all things Indiana (minus the things sullied by Purdue) were practically set upon the Earth by the Almighty himself. I guess feeling proud about your state meant that you had to love Garfield (and Robert Frost, but he's still pretty cool, and beside the point). It was impossible to check out a Garfield collection from the school library; all the copies of all the books were already taken in someone else's name (incidentally, the picture book that came out about the Return of the Jedi was also impossible to get ahold of...when I finally did lay my hot little hands on it, I was underwhelmed...but I digress). We would sometimes have a reading of the daily Garfield strip aloud in the class. My teacher, Mrs. Van Dyke, would read it in her awkward, not-quite-connecting-with-the-kids old lady way. I think that actually made the strip a lot more funny than it was.

A lot of things have changed since then. For instance, I've found a sense of humor. And some common sense. Both of these things have led me to realize that Garfield is pretty lame. Imagine my confusion a couple of years ago when the computer-generated fat cat made it to the big screen (only about 13 years too late, as I feel Garfield's height of hilarity was sometime in the late 80s). To date, I have not seen either of the Garfield movies, and I don't plan on them, either. I don't care if Jennifer Love Hewitt appears topless and is rolled in a vat of honey. I have zero desire to see those movies.

I think the big downfall for me was the introduction and continued use of Nermal, the world's cutest kitten. About the only thing that I gained from that was a sense of where Abu Dhabi is on a map. Also, what the fuck ever happened to Lyle, Jon's buddy who came over from time to time? Concurrently, the Garfield cartoon on Saturday mornings sucked. Hard. The only saving grace was that there were also episodes of U.S. Acres included in the episodes, and even calling those a saving grace is a stretch. And by "stretch", I really mean "my ass is way to fat for these black spandex pants". Again, the cartoon suffered from way too much Nermal, who was not only most definitely not the world's most cute kitten, as he claimed, but also had one of the most historical instances of a really bad name. Odie is saved from this title simply because I made a joke in the ninth grade during a vocab section of English. We were discussing the meanings of our new vocab words, and I defined "odious" as "Garfield's Latin friend." Mr Cotton (my English teacher) and Kathy Jeandevin, the girl who sat in front of me (and who I thought was cute until she wore a Purdue t-shirt to school one day--no lie!), thought the joke was great.

I did find a new appreciation for Garfield a couple of months ago when I was shown the following cartoon:


Yes, that would be a near perfect mixture of Garfield and lolcatz, two things which, taken separately, are annoyingly unfunny (I will admit to being mildly amused by lolcatz for a brief time, but the grammar-and-spelling Nazi inside of me has since won out and now I simply find them tiresome), but put together are suddenly sheer, comedic brilliance.

Another thing that I've learned, thanks to my stumbling across "Garfield Minus Garfield", is that Garfield is hilarious once Garfield no longer exists in his own world. Feel free to follow either the link provided to you above or the one listed in the sidebar. I feel that the brilliance of the man behind Garfield Minus Garfield knows no bounds, and he should be celebrated for the magnitude of his comedic genius often and loudly.

If you're a Robot Chicken fan, you should also appreciate the greatness that is the sketch titled "Cat Court" in which Heathcliff sues Garfield for being a copycat. I won't ruin the end, but it's very satisfying. The final joke of the segment is hilarious, especially if you sat through the shorts during the Saturday morning cartoons as a kid during the 80s.

EDIT: Ok, I found this. It's totally nerdy, but if you've dedicated time to any of the Final Fantasy games (I think this is a take off of the American Final Fantasy III), you'll appreciate the hell out of it: Youtube Link

The Century Mark

Thanks to my cheap-o update earlier in the day with Dr. Rat's revelation of the unifying theory of quantum physics and such, this is post number 100. All these posts with all these words, and still nothing of real import has been said. Sad, really.

Anyway, so, I promised a book update, and so I thought I would offer it. Between sickness, tournaments, trying to get the house cleaned up, home improvement projects, really nice weather and, well, general laziness, I've not been real diligent in my writing of late. However, I was thinking about this the other day while sitting on the bridge on Duke St. (a place where I get stuck every day on the daily commute home) and I realized I--according to my spreadsheet--have only nine chapters left to finish. Wow. I knew I was getting close, but that's less than ten. That's less than a third. And, taking into account that several of those chapters are started and orphaned for the time being, that's even less of the book to complete (probably down between a fourth and a fifth or so).

That led me try and redouble my efforts toward typing, so I've actually been doing more of that lately. It's very nice, especially since I can have the windows open (for the time being) and enjoy the lovely spring breezes (for the time being) that feel more like summer (for the time being). Plus, I can listen to the deer walking through my yard. Keen.

So, my goal is to try and finish this thing by the end of the month. That is, getting all of the words onto "paper" and the story wrapped up. That doesn't include finishing the reread/rewrite process (caveat, I know), but it does involve starting it.

To that end, I've been hitting chapter 25 hard. It's about two thirds done. I've got it to the place where I might be a little stuck, only because I'm not sure how a certain set of characters should react to meeting the other characters. It's the initial meeting that bothers me, not the entire meeting. I know where to go next with that.

And then I started 31, which is the final chapter. I still have more to write, but so far what I've constructed for the final pages of the book really please me. I've built in the "not so happily ever after" ending that I want and wrapped up at least one storyline and tied it together. To say I'm pleased with myself would be an understatement; terribly egotistical, but also very true. At least I can admit that flaw.

I'm hoping to have both 25 and 31 finished by week's end. I think I would take a step back and do 30 next, which is the ultimate battle scene, as opposed to 29, which is the penultimate (I added this only to write the word 'penultimate'...I need more sleep).

Okay, I'm rambling, and I apologize. Here's the run down:

Word Count: 119069
Page Count: 387

This is turning out to be exactly what I wanted size-wise. I'm very pleased with myself. And now my enormous, inflated head and I are going to go lay down.

Edit: I forgot that to mention that I'd post some more "fun" updates later in the week. I downloaded a drawing program that is better than Paint (I hope) and I'm going to be doing some extra work on some images that tie in with my book (and will be shown more readily elsewhere). I like painting pretty pictures.

Word-a-day for July 18th, 2006

I actually got this in my in-box this morning. I was amused. And then pissed when the better definitions were glaringly absent. So, I amended it.

WORD: skulk SKUHLK (verb) : To hide, or get out of the way, in a sneaking manner; to lie close, or to move in a furtive way 2) A group of foxes 3) A kickass character known as a young fox who helps Redear and Jane end the Boar War
SYNONYMS: * lurk * slink * lie low
WORD WISE: Skulk is from Middle English skulken, ultimately of Scandinavian origin. QUOTE: He was forced to creep and skulk into every place for fear of being taken and hanged. --Anthony Wood, Athenae Oxoniensus

There. That's a little better.