Lipstick on a Glossary
Here’s a nifty article on 2008’s buzzwords, with bonus kooky font and mimetic textures. “Fail” (or “FAIL”) is apparently the winner, which makes me snicker. The tone of the explanation comes across as very much these kids today do their craaazy dances so that the author can get on to more important words and phrases like, “Obamanation” and “Caribou Barbie.”
I like the explanation for “Joe”:
An everyman. Seen in this election in Amtrak Joe, Joe the Plumber, Joe the Biden and Joe Six-Pack, among others.
Except now I’m really scared I will have the opportunity to meet the Vice President and accidentally call him Joe The Biden and be very embarrassed and possibly given a ticket or something. Cited for disrespect.
I’m curious about “Throwie.” It’s the only term on the list I had never heard. Have any of you heard “throwie”? Seen a throwie? Participating in throwieing? How the hell do you make that a gerund?
I’m still out on “futarchy.” I appreciate what they’re getting at, but when you look at the word, it doesn’t seem to mean “control by speculative markets.” It looks like it should mean “control by those about to give the hell up” like futile + archy.
My vote for the winner is “Nuke the Fridge.” When a shark can’t be jumped again, you know it’s time to atom bomb the icebox. Fail is good and all, but Nuke the Fridge’s imperative assemblage is just so insouciantly perfect. Truly a phrase for our times.
O Hai 2009!
Y’all! Woo! It’s the first Friday of 2009 and you can do it up as free for all as you want, but I won’t try to bait you.
Instead of making resolutions yesterday, I went on a Resolution Run with a huge group of people. The Birmingham Track Club organized it, and there were 4, 6, and 10 mile runs. I took the 6 mile course, since that was kind of what was on my half-marathon training schedule. It was cold and windy, but there was wonderful bright sunshine and the run was really good. I ran with women I don’t normally run with– one was the wonderful woman who, when I missed a group training run back in late September said “Come with us!” and then helped me do a 3 mile run/walk when I was still really new. It took me almost half a mile to remember who she was, but then we had a great run together.
We finished off that 6 miles in 65 minutes. I ran the Vulcan 10k in November and then 6.2 miles took me 74 minutes. I am improving! The last six blocks or so of the path we took was uphill and as we hit the incline, the wind started to gust. We started talking about all the hot coffee that was waiting for us when we were done. Then we got quieter as it got harder. And then we started to sing. All different songs, but when it started to get rough, several of us started singing and then laughing and we finished it singing and laughing together. It was a fantastic start to the New Year.
I’m going to run 12 miles tomorrow with the group. I think I’m trying to have a mental block, so I’m really working hard at affirming myself about it. I had a big block about taking it up to 7 miles, and that run was hard, but I did it. Then, 8, 9, 10, and 11 miles were awesome. Laurie and I ran 11 on our own the day after Christmas, in the drippy misty humidity. We took our time, and kicked its ass, but it kind of kicked ours back a little at the end. I was surprised at how much pain I was in at the end of 11– not enough to stop, but enough that I could say, “Ow, I hurt a whole bunch.” Our coach reminds us on a regular basis that at this point, it’s mental. Our bodies can totally go the distance. It’s our heads we’re training now, more than anything. So 12 tomorrow, and it’s going to rule! I am going to rock it out! It is going to be such a good run!
The end of the year has been good. I’ve been able to spend a lot of time with family. I had lunch with Apollo, who tells fantastic stories. I’ve been able to look back on 2008 and marvel at how blessed I am, and what good friends I have, and how wonderful you are and how much I love the whole world. Here’s to 2009 y’all. I plan to spend it running and writing. I hope you’ll come with me.
We’re Gonna Need a Bigger F-Stop
Doc is bound and determined to make me a better photographer. If I’ve taken any good pictures so far it’s probably just from luck and having a far better camera than I deserve or understand. He spent quite a bit of time this weekend working with me on f-stops and appertures and figuring out what all the little letters on the top of my camera mean. Results are here and there, because I wandered off a lot to practice and fold laundry.
Last week’s dumb luck attempt at scintillating cooking photography:
This weekend’s attempt at getting some depth of field, via long-distance-Doc-instruction:
Left to my own devices:
For far better seasonal photography, look at Imp of the Perverse, where Doc and I are posting pictures now. Mostly Doc. Look at The Pool is Closed. How gorgeous is that?
A Simile Committing Suicide is Always a Depressing Spectacle
The O’Faust Literature Expert says my writing mostly closely matches that of Oscar Wilde. There is 18% similarity. That’s not high, but as it’s Oscar Wilde, I call this one a win!
And yeah, obviously I have nothing to declare this morning.
Free for All Friday 4
You didn’t think The Beast was funny? French Minister of the Internet my ass? Well. I thought it was hilarious and you all are a bunch of philistines. You all are a bunch of savages from Chile.
Here. Read these articles, savages:
- A long ass article called In Defense of Teasing.
The centrality of teasing in our social evolution is suggested by just how pervasive teasing is in the animal world. Younger monkeys pull the tails of older monkeys. African hunting dogs jump all over one another, much like pad-slapping, joking football players moments before kickoff. In every corner of the world, human adults play peekaboo games to stir a sulking child, children (as early as age 1) mimic nearby adults and teenagers prod one another to gauge romantic interest. In rejecting teasing, we may be losing something vital and necessary to our identity as the most playful of species.
It’s well written, thought provoking piece. I suffered my fair share of teasing. Fat kid and all that and I still remember very clearly the first time someone ever really, publicly made fun of me for being fat (Brian Sheaky, first grade, noon recess in the snow, and I suspect it was because I was kicking his ass at dodgeball). And it taught me good life skills. It taught me some bad ones, too. I’ve talked about my ability to completely dehumanize people who use certain insults. I’m not proud of that. But all in all, I think teasing teaches critical thinking and probably does a lot more for self-esteem than telling everybody they’re the specialest of snowflakes all the time.
- The 10 Worst [Global] Warming Predictions, from Australia. Turns out that there’s data coming in and it doesn’t exactly match up with what the Goracle and AGP alarmists promised. In fact, much of the time, it’s the opposite. We’ll be hotter? It’s actually colder. Seas will rise? They’re not. Ice will melt away? Thicker than it has been in years. More and more folk are starting to suspect that the actual sun might have some effect on the climate. I know, right? People are starting to refer to Global Warming as a religion and I think they’re onto something. Having seen An Inconvenient Truth live and in person, I’ve got to say it was rhetorically indistinguishable from Sinners in the Hands of an Angry God.
- Just in time for Christmas: How to Eat a Burrito.
Oeno-techno-philia!
One minute, seven seconds and you will laugh out loud.
Now I have got to get some wine from Le Languedoc!
Everybody Say, “Hi Poptart!”
Hi, Poptart!
I knew something felt missing around here!
It’s, Like, Ubiquitous Locution
Turns out overusing the word “like” doesn’t make you sound ignorant, if you know that like is no particular part of speech, but it is a qualifier, a indicator of group fealty, and very possibly a synonym for “said.”
Muffy E. A. Siegal, linguistics professor at Temple University, recent wrote a paper on “like,” and classified it as a “discourse particle.”
“It’s not a noun, or an adjective or an adverb.” What seemed clear to her - and what she set out to prove - is that like belongs to a class of expressions linguists call “discourse particles.”These were once dismissively referred to as fillers - among them oh, ah, um, well, y’know. But researchers came to realize that they actually conveyed something about the speaker and the content of a sentence.
Like has, like, semantic content!
Most interesting though, is the idea that the work “like” is a sort of neutron bomb of connection. Siegel finds that far from being a word of awkwardness (um, oh, er), its use rises in situations where people (especially young people) are comfortable with one another and communicating easily. In situations where you may be communicating across a gap (be it age, gender, class, whatnot), you might tend to use the word “like” fewer times, as well as taking longer to answer a question. If someone talks to you peppering their speech with “like,” it would be within reason to assume they were comfortable with you.
The article on Siegel wraps up a bit by noting that “like” is often used as a hedge. It’s shorthand for, “It was similar to what I am about to describe, but not exactly like it.” It tells the listener to assume there is a simile in progress. If speech in general becomes heavily infused with these super-dense references to similies, I wonder if, and how quickly, our language might become more idiomatic. Could we be looking at the embryonic permuations of Shaka When the Walls Fell.
I suspect I’ll probably still get irritated at people who speak entirely by alternating “like” and “you know.” But I’ll try to be like, more open minded about it. You know?
Heroes: “I Wish I’d Taken High School Physics”
First, you all should know that Irish Cavalry came over to my house Saturday night for soup and fun and used the phrase, “Unfuck yourself.” And now it is my favorite phrase. And within 15 seconds of starting this episode, all I could think was, “Peter! UNFUCK YOURSELF!”
Then Sylar’s Scream for the 13th Nightmare on Primatech Street got started and that was awesome! It was like, actual character and plot progress! And it was interesting! And tense! Y’all, they actually told a story! Before I use up my fair share of the exclamation points, just dig that he says the only thing that can damage him is a broken heart. Wow, y’all. It could’ve gone Peter-level emo with that statement, but he follows it up with, “You’re not hunting me, Noah. I’m hunting you.” Which I think is a Watchmen shout-out, cos that is some Rorschach homage. My insides turned all gooey.
Hiro talks to pigeons, once again remind us that there’s no difference between the 10 year old and the 28 year old. Daphne is spunky. And Mohinder was fixin’ to die of Roachlung, in spite of his insistence that if random, uncontrolled experimentation with uncontrolled substances fucked him up once, it would certainly unfuck him this time. But since Peter is incapable of thinking more than 30 seconds into the future, Mohinder just gets doused, thereby absolving him of any injection-pen based moral turpitude issues.
And then Ando gets dosed, too, and wakes up with Red Jedi Lightning, just like Hiro saw. Except it’s not that neat and we’ll get back to it in a sec.
Meanwhile, Claire’s weave is looking a lot better!
Sylar’s Paper Company of Horrors proceeds awesomely apace. He blames his monstrosity on Noah, and on Angela, and on pretty much everybody except himself. Which would normally make me hate his guts, but he accepts who he is and what he does and seems to go through the blaming motions for knife-twisting purposes and I can accept that. He brings it all down to CHOICE or FAULT. And that may crystallize the difference in our two main characters at this point. Sylar made choices, and even though they’re really, really bad, no good, and awful, he accepts them. Peter has everything thrust upon him; it’s everybody else’s fault.
While we’re meditating on that particular gleam of real character insight and whatever drug use led the writers to it, Meredith went out and downloaded the flashlight mod. And gets caught between Eric and Sylar, which would’ve made a lesser woman pee her pants, but Meredith kept her head. Too bad she got the adrenaline treatment and locked in a cell with Noah. Which was a bad-ass maneuver, totally worth of the earlier Rorschach mention, don’t you think?
Meanwhile, back at the plot that makes no sense and will just piss you off: Nathan thinks Peter is a weenie. The whole world agrees. Knox dies. Ando’s Red Jedi Lightning opens a black hole to Stupid Universe.
Eesh. It’s a good thing they parceled that out, because I could hardly take it. Sylar gets Claire and her Good Weave by the throat and starts asking questions. And the Tingle of Truth stings like a bitch, if you’re not careful. Which is why you practice safe questioning with the hot fomer cheerleader who’s suddenly not your niece and who you have stalked before.
And frankly, my mind keeps returning to that bit of questionable fanficcery, because what happens next is a result of the opening of the vortex to Stupid ‘Verse. Claire gets away and goes to find her Dad, who is trapped in a Level 5 cell with Uncontrollable Super Flame Meredith. I’d like to super flame some people, starting with Tim Kring! Shit. So. There’s no way out, because the glass is bulletproof, right. And the only bullets they have are within very close range. But if Meredith heats up the glass, then Noah shoots it, it’s still too strong to give. But Claire, who tops out at what, 115 on a bloated day? Sorta lurches through it. Well then, it gives!
Y’all this proves that Claire’s super power has been jumping through windows all this time. The healing is secondary. Her mass/velocity coefficient is obviously so incredible that windows just give up on her approach. Force = mass x velocity2? No. Force = Claire + Weave / McGuffin-Need (improbable situation + not bothering to think ahead). I mean, I never took physics in high school. But oh, gawd damn, how I wish I had, just so I could use REAL MATH to prove how much FAIL this is made of, exactly.
And just when you thought it couldn’t get any failier, Ando’s Red Jedi Lightning can also defy physics! He can amp Daphne to the point that her speed will take her back in time. She doesn’t get it. She needs to watch more Star Trek, obvs. But I’ll let my two favorite men, Christopher and Doc, sum up how just fuckerated this particular twist is:
Christopher: Explain to me how multiplying her power by any number results in her going backward. She coudl go a hundred times faster or a thousand times faster and she won’t net a negative number. Not only do they suck at writing, they suck at integers! E=mc2 my ass!
Doc: How can they go forward in time? I’ll buy faster than the speed of light, go back in time. But seriously! Crap. Crap. Crap. Peter sucks balls. Crap. Crap. LOOK, IT’S WORF!
Christopher: They just breached some kind of stupidity threshhold. Like a black hole has an event horizon, they just crossed the stupidity horizon.
Doc: Not crossed it. Ran past it at the speed of light!
There’s also the thing Philosaur brought up last week about how Daphne can manage to take people with her while she speeds. But let’s end the Daphne discussion on a high note, shall we? When Hiro bows, apologizes, and then pops Tracy one in the nose, Daphne’s expression is priceless!
Meanwhile, Nathan kicks Peter’s ass while Flint tries to kill everyone and everything. Peter finds this turn of events difficult to understand. Normally I’d say it was because he, as a character, was dumber than a bag of hair, but we did cross the stupidity horizon, so I really should have expected it. Mohinder gets doused in formula, and therefore cured, and all I have to say about that is at least we won’t have to look at his grossness any more. And then Peter doses himself, despite several full minutes of posturing about the absolute awfulness and awfulosity and downright nastiness of the formula. A rational person would say, yeah, confronted with a wall of flames, people will do things they wouldn’t otherwise. But I am not rational. I am at the point where Peter could save a cardboard box of kittens from a white water rapids of nazis and velociraptors and it would just make me hate him more.
And Nathan and Peter end up in what looks pretty much exactly like the clearing outside the high school in Odessa, Texas. Unfortunately, there is no Eden McCain to order them, in a very deep and persuasive voice, to GTFO and go to sleep. DANG.
Sylar tortures a little more truth out of Angela for a while, and we find out that wow, she’s not his real mom. So his parents weren’t his real parents and then his fake real parents aren’t his real parents. Y’all, As the World Turns wishes it had thought of this shtick. And then Claire stabs him in the brain stem and Meredith goes nova, setting the joint on fire.
Sarah: Fuck! They killed Sylar again!
Christopher: I knew he hadn’t had an ass kicking yet tonight. It’s real hard to take their supervillain seriously when th ey beat him up every week. It’s like Lex Luthor. I like pudding, Peter!
Sarah: Ooh, speaking of Lex, John Glover is playing Sylar’s dad next season.
Christopher: So I guess he’s not really dead tonight. Of course he’s not. Who would they beat up every week?
And then? There’s a 90 second preview of Volume 4: Fugitives. Which is apparently all about concentration camps! This is an up show. The worst bit, though, is that I’m legitimately tantalized by the idea of them all working together. It’ll by like a live action Justice League with sexy hairdos and UST! Probably only in my head though, because wow, Volume 3: Villains is over. And I have to go unfuck myself.
This is Your Christmas Card
I decided not to send Christmas cards this year. I usually go out and buy my cards a week or so before Thanksgiving, and it takes about a hour, which is stupid, because I’m trying to find the best design with the most cards per box that doesn’t cost an arm and a leg because I usually need about 75 cards if I’m to send one to everyone I’m related to or talk to on a regular basis.
And I very rarely like the designs I can get for a reasonable price. I want simple, tasteful, maybe a touch of retro insouciance. I don’t want gold foil, or flocking, or kittens or rococo angels. Then there’s the time involved in addressing. Then there’s the actual writing. Then going to the post office– a joy all the time but especially so at the holidays– and spending half the week’s grocery budget on postage.
I spoke to my sister briefly on Saturday and she said, “Yeah, I don’t send cards. I just decided that that was a thing I wasn’t going to do.” I asked, “Don’t you feel guilty?” She said, “No. I just decided I wouldn’t.” And that works for me, too. I’ll write a couple letters to grandparents, but that’s about it.
I like writing letters. I like physical correspondence in this age of super-fast, ultra-ignorable email. I write one of my grandparents a letter on a weekly basis. I need to write to the other set as well. I like sending postcards to people. Doc has received his fair share. So has Philomel. Rachael and I used to send each other excessively florid correspondence on monogrammed stationery for silliness sake. I like pretending I’m in an Edith Wharton novel sometimes. Don’t judge.
In that spirit, I refer to you Eight or Nine Wise Words About Letter Writing. The first section, on stamp cases and arranging your stamps, is fascinating. Especially considering it’s getting nostalgic to think about stamps you actually had to lick. Remember that? But the rest is full of good advice for those of us who still write letters.
The first step to writing a letter is to address and stamp the envelope. Otherwise, you’ll run out of time and then everything will proceed downhill because your signature is hasty, then your writing on the envelope will run all over the place and you might screw it up and lastly, you could be struck by a car on the way to the post box. Although, in this particular article, I don’t think cars were so much a worry yet. Nevertheless, the stamping and addressing step is important, especially if you’re sending a postcard. There is such limited space that it’s best to block it off first so you can gauge how many words you can really get on the card.
Step two or three, depending on whether or not you’re counting the stamp case replenishment, is to write legibly! This is something I always worry about. I find it helpful to do a little warm-up writing on another sheet of paper, just the Firefly intro or song lyrics or whatever random words. Then, don’t apologize too much for not having written sooner. That you’re writing at all in this day and age is thoughtful, and sure to be appreciated, at least a little.
There are many rules after that, including how to reference past correspondence, how to disagree cordially, how to tease properly, and how to make sure you remember enclosures if you’re enclosing something.
Then, there are tips on how to close your letter. That is, what do you say to sign off? I am to this day very fond of “Your Friend.” At this point, it almost sounds silly and ironic and almost irritatingly hipster, but letter closures are a time for seriousness. If I am and wish to remain your friend, then I will sign, “Your Friend, Sarah.” I like many other variations, too. And I dearly love reading old correspondence where people signed, “Some Stuff, &c.” Ampersand C! Like me!
Finally, put the letter directly in the post box. Walk outside and put it right in there and pull the little flag up if you have to. If you set it aside, it will get lost.
Does anybody else still write the occasional letter? Do you like receiving letters? I think I’m planning to write quite a few letters in the near future to expiate my Christmas card guilt.