In the paper

/// "Why do you shop stores over online?" This could be a typo, but it could also be a squishing of "shop online" and "shop over the Internet". The latter is an acceptable variant on "shop on the Internet".

/// Cincinnati Enquirer columnist Peter Bronson responded to Lake Superior State University's annual list of words to be banished with his own list, in "What words would you nominate to 'go missing' in 2007?" LSSU doesn't like awesome and boasts ("as in 'master bedroom boasts his-and-her fireplaces' ~ never 'bathroom apologizes for cracked linoleum,' or 'kitchen laments pathetic placement of electrical outlets'"). They also list undocumented alien: "If they haven't followed the law to get here, they are by definition 'illegal.' It's like saying a drug dealer is an 'undocumented pharmacist.'" Bronson has his own pet peeves, and a reader (Richard Engelmann) added issue, used to mean problem. He rightly points out that "an issue may or may not be a problem.... Example: The Allies in world War II had to decide the following issue, 'Shall we invade at Calais or in Normandy.' No problem, simply the decision as to which way to go."

I can't agree entirely with Bronson about this one, though, when he says: "Anyone who says 'back in the day' deserves a beat-down for trying way too hard to be hip." It's hard to recognize the difference between trying too hard to be hip, and just absorbing a new phrase because you hear it all the time. In PO 74, I said that a former friend, a black woman, told me that she resented white people saying "back in the day", because they were purloining something that belonged to black people. Trying too hard to be hip is its own punishment, but trying on slang you like the sound of is perfectly fair. Should black people stop speaking English because white people had it first? This is not the reason our friendship is former, however. (Note the verbal facetiousness: we generally do not use "former" in this position. The Botswana characters in Alexander McCall Smith's books use "late" this way, as in, "Mr. Smith is late," meaning he's dead, not tardy.)

INTELLIGENCE TRANSLATION

Sue B. works for a translation company, and sent this in response to article about the difficulties some native speakers of Arabic in the U.S. have getting work as translators for our government:

In order to do intelligence translation, a company has to have a "secure" room. The translators also have to pass a couple of FBI translation exams. The company I work for does no intelligence translation, because we don't have the necessary facility, i.e. a secure place for a translator to do the work. I believe that is why the people who are complaining are not getting the work. You can't freelance at home or via the internet.

I have a friend who has passed the FBI translation exam. From what I hear, he seldom gets any work. He isn't translating into Farsi or Pashto or Iraqi Arabic or any of the "war" languages though.

Nevertheless, considering that there are mounds of untranslated data, I wonder why more people haven't been pressed into service. Just after 9/11, I met a man in Boston whose secretary was from some Middle Eastern country. He said that she had been asked to do some translation for the government, but she refused because she was afraid for her life. And a few years in Cincinnati, Fred and I met a woman from Iran who'd been here 18 years. She said her husband had been approached about translating, but he refused because he still has family back there and was afraid of being found out.

ANNE'S BOG

Anne DaBee explained what she meant by The Bog:

Thought perhaps I had mentioned this before ~ I didn't mean to be obscure. Did you think I had some wonderful, secret source for naughty rhymes? Sorry!

The Bog is my fond term for my aging mind ~ everything I REALLY need to know is in there, but, like the contents of a bog, sometimes things take a while to bubble to the top. Obviously, sometimes things I really DON'T need to know bubble up as well ~ i.e. naughty limericks. I remember about instant recall, and it was wonderful, but now the Bog serves me fairly well, as long as I can wait a few hours (or days) for the answer. Patience is not only a virtue, I've been told, but also a fairly acceptable excuse for inaction, at least in this case. At work, the Bog is sometimes relied upon as a source for what might otherwise pass for "institutional knowledge" and/or experience.

Or as a "Farside" character said, raising his hand in class, "Can I go now? My brain is full." Actually, when I was in fourth grade I learned to use my tiny youthful bog to my advantage. My teacher gave the class a blackboard full of arithmetic exercises every afternoon, and although I knew arithmetic, I had a hard time remembering all the multiplication tables. When I got stuck on something, like 7 times 8, I'd say to myself slowly, "Seven times eight is ..." and the answer would pop into my mind.* Something about reading the problem verbally to myself triggered the answer. I don't do that anymore, I have my own little systems for figuring out the answers that I don't remember easily.

*56. But I had to do it this way: 7 times 7 is 49, then add another 7. Squared numbers are easy to remember.

Here's a case where verbalizing the problem does not help. On the radio, British astronomer John Gribbin explained the "expanding universe" as the infinite universe stretching into more infinity. I literally can't argue with him, since I know nothing about the subject, but verbally it's illogical. Infinity by definition would include all infinity, in space or time. A future larger infinity doesn't make sense, if you think of time as part of infinity, or of time as a mental construct.

APOSTASY

In Hirsi Ali: the empowered apostate,* Dr. Andrew G. Bostom says:

... Hirsi Ali's declaration elicited murderous threats in the Netherlands ~ in the heart of Western Europe ~ where, as Warraq notes, "...one talks of being a 'lapsed Catholic' or 'nonpracticing Christian' rather than an 'apostate.'"

(*Note: If you have any doubts about the importance of the difference in the lengths of the hyphen, the en dash, and the em dash, check out the Bostom article.)

That is, for Muslims, changing religion is a hanging ~ or beheading ~ offense.

As is humor. Julie Larson did something we don't see much of in her cartoon The Dinette Set: she joked about Islam. Her January 27 cartoon is set in a video store, with a section labeled "Middle Eastern Musicals," which include Fiddler on the Roof (about Jews), Showboat (about a mixed-race love affair), and Cabaret (about pre-WWII Germany).

NEW! SHORT ORDER

Short Order is a new series of my short stories in 5 1/2" x 8 1/2" booklet format. The first two are available now for $5 each (includes mailing).

In Carl Kriegbaum Sleeps with the Corn, a young computer guy who dreams of becoming a big-time gambler sets up web sites for his role model, a real big-time gambler, Stockyard Stan of Kansas City. But when Carl comes up short on his gambling debts, he finds himself wearing concrete boots in the middle of a Kansas cornfield. 26 pages.

Still Ridge is about what happens when the old-time moonshine business meets up with a predatory modern bottled water corporation. How far will Kate, a newcomer to the mountains, go to protect the water supply? 22 pages.

______________________________________________

THIS IS REALLY NEW! For women who get massage or chiropractic treatment, who sleep on their stomachs, or have implants, try Rhonda's original Breast Cushion to take the pressure off. Go to www.keithops.us/cushion.

WHEN SONNY GETS BLUE! Check out the video clips of Sonny Robertson and the Howard Street Blues Band at www.sonnyrobertson.com and www.youtube.com/rondaria.

Check out the new "Someone went to Heaven and all I got was this lousy T-shirt" shirts in the Parvum Opus CafePress shop, plus a new Parvum Opus mouse pad! Now you can buy neat products with the Parvum Opus / KeithOps Catti logo at CafePress.com/parvumopus.

SEARCH IT OUT ON AMAZON : It is the glory of God to conceal a thing: but the honour of kings is to search out a matter. Proverbs 25:2

The poet Muriel Rukeyser said the universe is not composed of atoms, but stories.

The physicist Werner Heisenberg said the universe is not made of matter, but music.

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