PARVUM OPUS

 

Number 163

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NEXT TIME

 

When is next Sunday? The answer should be March 5 (I'm sending this PO very early on Friday, March 3). But maybe you're thinking next Sunday is March 12.

 

Dave DaBee wrote:

 

Hey, a friend at work has a marital dispute about what I suspect is a regionalism, probably derived from some other language's idiom.

When she says "next Tuesday" she means "the Tuesday after this coming one." ....

This reminds me of a long-ago "Tuesday week," though I may have it mixed up with something else.

What say you?

The classic Minnesota example is "You wanna come with?" which I suspect derives from Norwegian from the German "kommen Zie mit," which is how they say "come along," even though "mit" is literally "with."  I think.

 

Dave really has three different issues. The first one is not just a marital or regional problem. When "next Saturday" is as close as tomorrow, for some reason most of us jump ahead mentally to the next week. Thus we're always having to clarify exactly what we mean, because most people won't believe "next Saturday" is actually tomorrow ~ although that's what "next" means ~ the closest one in time. I looked in three real books for this usage and did not find an entry, which must mean that the simple dictionary meaning pertains. But I see no way out of the necessity of having to explain exactly what you mean by "next Saturday" because people understand different things by it. The same applies to "last Saturday." Now, "last Saturday" would be February 25. But on Sunday, March 5, will you think of "last Saturday" as March 4? Probably not, but it is (or was or will be or will have been). People try to get around this problem in various ways: the Sunday after this one, the Sunday after next, next Sunday but one. There's no rule about how close the Sunday has to be in order to be "next", but next means next. If you're waiting in line somewhere and somebody yells "Next", there's no discussion about whether the next number is being called or the one after that.

 

I have read the expression "Tuesday week" (for some reason I don't think I've heard or read this expression with another day of the week). It's either archaic or British or both. I'm not exactly sure what it means ~ a week from Tuesday, or a week ago Tuesday (i.e. next Tuesday or last Tuesday)?

 

Yeah, "mit" is "with." The Minnesota example is pretty clear. And as I wrote once before (PO 45), in Cincinnati, people say "Please" instead of "Excuse me" or "Pardon me" when they don't understand what you're saying. This comes from the early German settlers who said (as I think German still do) "Bitte" for "Come again?" or "What?" or "Whut?"

 

SCOTCH, ROCKS, AND TREES

 

Bill R. responded to curling and haggis:

 

However, they did invent Scotch whiskey, and .333 is a respectable batting average. From experience in Scotland, I conclude that single malt improves the taste of haggis immensely. Don't know what single malt would do to curling.

            (On a modestly related note, what is it the Scots like so much about throwing heavy things? In addition to curling, they also toss the caber.)

 

As Bill says, the whiskey makes it all palatable. A friend of mine with Scottish in-laws told me, after visiting them, that they just sipped a little bit all day.

 

As for throwing heavy things, again, I guess they used what they had, rocks and tree trunks ~ or the first thing their eyes lit on. Golf, of course, is about hitting a little rock out of sight. Who thought up the little hole? Someone with a sense of humor who'd been sipping for a while.

 

OHM MHO

 

Remember "WHO OHM"? Dan E. Boy wrote:

 

You might be interested in knowing that the unit on measure for electrical conductivity, the inverse of electrical resistance, is the Mho, which is of course Ohm spelled backwards. Who said physicists don't have a sense of humor?

Ohm's Law states the R=E/I. I don't think Ohm had the right to impose this law; perhaps he was legislating from the work bench. OK, that really wasn't funny. I guess it's amateur physicists that don't have a sense of humor.

Shorthand for Ohm is the Greek capital omega, Ù.

 

Physicists do have a sense of humor, Dan, it's just that the rest of us don't always get it.

 

OLD PAINT AGAIN

 

Is there a reason "Old Paint" keeps coming up in my life? After our discussion about the Old Dan of the song, I heard a line from "Old Paint" sung by a savant in a TV documentary called Brainman about Daniel Tammet. Tammet met another savant, Kim Peek, who was the original Rain Man of the Dustin Hoffman movie, and it was Peek who sang a bit of "Old Paint."

 

WICKEDPEDIA

 

I was looking up Elinor Glyn in Wikipedia ~ and I did have a purpose, like Ambrose Bierce, who "in 1913, at the age of 71, ... crossed the border into Mexico, with a pretty definite purpose, which, however, is not at present disclosable. He was never heard from again."

 

Well, let me start again. Elinor Glyn was a writer of trashy novels in the 1920s, known for coining the term "It" to mean sex appeal (actress/flapper Clara Bow was the "It" girl). But the Wikipedia entry has only the word "Pornographer" alongside a quite beautiful photograph of Glyn. A little browsing on the site shows that there was an article about her (click the History tab), but recently some "editor" from the public has replaced it with that one word. Whatever Glyn wrote would hardly be considered pornography today, unless it would be something along the lines of the soft porn of romance novels. In any case, this encyclopedia of the people is subject to gross censorship. However, when I Googled Glyn, the brief copy that appears in the list of URLs included this:

 

Would you sin:

With Elinor Glyn:

On a tiger skin:

Or perhaps you'd prefer:

To err with her:

On some other fur?

 

This catch-phrase was inspired by a scene in ...

 

I'm waiting for one of her books from the library. I'm not sure, but I think Glyn must have been the model for a writer Agatha Christie lampooned in the character of Salome Otterbourne in Death on the Nile.

 

DEDICATED TOWARDS THE ONE I LOVE

 

Advertisement: "...dedicated towards helping you get out of credit card debt." We don't say "dedicated towards," we say "dedicated to." And "towards" sounds so unconvincing. If you're dedicated "to" something, you sound committed. But "towards" is only leaning in that direction.

 

Which reminds me, why are there so many scholarly articles that start, "Towards a ..."? Google "towards a" and you'll find a list of titles from all kinds of places, fake science, Buddhist psychotherapy, a healthier Scotland, evolution, socialism.... I suppose the "towards" is meant to suggest that the writer is being modest in presenting his or her ideas ~ he or she doesn't expect to arrive anywhere definite soon. But how and why did this get to be a standard naming device?

 

Think about rewriting that great song, "I'm goin' to Kansas City" ~ "I'm goin' towards Kansas City" has a completely different meaning. You couldn't possibly get any of the "crazy little women there" unless you actually go to the city.

 

KIDS TODAY

 

One of my students has a 12-year-old daughter who wants to dress "sporty, not fancy or sassy." Sassy is a girl's fashion magazine, but I have the impression that she wasn't referring to the magazine or its styles. It must be a look. I know what sporty is, and I know what fancy must be, but I'm not sure what sassy clothes are to a 12-year-old. Jes, can you help?

 

 

 

 

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