"With no notice, the man stepped forward, grabbed the headband off of Dexter's head and threw it to the bottom of our shopping cart."

"He then cuffed Dexter around the side of his head (not hard, but that is not the point) and said with a big laugh, 'You'll thank me later, little man!'"

At the same time as I stepped forward, Dexter grabbed his head where the man had smacked him and threw his other hand forward, stomping his foot and shouting, "NO!" I got between my son and this man and said very firmly, "If you touch my son again, I will cut your damn hands off."

The guy snarled at me, looked at Dexter with disgust and said, "Your son is a f*cking fa***t." He then started sauntering out, but not before he threw over his shoulder, "He'll get shot for it one day."

That spiraled out of control quickly!

The things that happen to HuffPo mombloggers when they happen to go to WalMart with their 2-year-old sons wearing mommy's pink lace flower headband.

Here's the blogger Katie Vyktoriah's description of the horrible homophobe who was, I take it, monitoring WalMart shoppers for insufficiently instilling gender norms in toddlers:

The man was overly large with a bushy beard and a camouflage shirt with the arms cut off. He had tattered shorts and lace-up work boots with no laces. I could smell the fug of cigarette smoke surrounding him, and there was a definite pong of beer on him.

Smoking and shorts. And overly large. When are men overly large? Don't they know when they are taking up too much space? A camouflage shirt with the arms cut off... talk about the right to "bare" arms. And the "pong of beer"... Pong?



Pong, meaning "A strong smell, usually unpleasant; a stink" is a Britishism. OED examples:

1925 E. Fraser & J. Gibbons Soldier & Sailor Words 226 Pong, a stink.
1936 F. Clune Roaming round Darling xxiv. 257 Avoid the smell of camel. They were complete with permanent, pyramid, and perfume, commonly called pong....
1991 D. Coupland Generation X i. i. 4 Smelling the cinnamon nighttime pong of snapdragons and efficient whiffs of swimming pool chlorine.

There's a blast from the past. Not the old Atari game (whoever forgot that?) but "Generation X." Remember when everyone was reading "Generation X: Tales for an Accelerated Culture"? I'd buy that right now and blog it for its poignant, pungent, pong-ent, obsolescences, but it's not available in Kindle? Not in Kindle! Oh! How the times pass! How the cutting edge dulls!

But, what say you? There's a lumbering, overly large man in shorts, a jack-booted thug with no shoelaces, and he's come to snatch the pink headband off your little boy. Threaten him with hand amputation, that might bridge the culture gap. Or, since he's a stinking smoker, a beer drinker, it might incite him to splutter out some warning about future bullying that will be so badly worded that in print it's good enough to make the HuffPo crowd gasp: Oh, noooooo! Homophobia rages... at WalMart. That's why I NEVER go there. That guy is always there, in his over-largeness, blocking the aisles, shuffling around, graceless... and laceless.

Read More

"Smitten by his love."

"The cross of Christ invites us also to allow ourselves to be smitten by his love, teaching us always to always look upon others with mercy and tenderness," said Pope Francis, in Brazil. I don't think he was speaking English. But... smitten.

It's just the past participle of "smite," which is a strange old word that we associate with God striking someone dead. We think of it used comically, affecting an old-time locution.

Here are some uses of "smitten" I found in the (unlinkable) OED:

1819 Shelley Lines Castlereagh Admin. ii, The abortion with which she travaileth Is Liberty, smitten to death.

1671 Milton Paradise Regain'd iv. 559 But Satan smitten with amazement fell.

1848 Thackeray Vanity Fair xvii. 149 Young..Lieutenant Spatterdash..was evidently and quickly smitten by Mrs. Crawley.

Here's the Shelley poem in full:

Lines Written During The Castlereagh Administration.

1.
Corpses are cold in the tomb;
Stones on the pavement are dumb;
Abortions are dead in the womb,
And their mothers look pale--like the death-white shore
Of Albion, free no more.                                   5

2.
Her sons are as stones in the way--
They are masses of senseless clay--
They are trodden, and move not away,--
The abortion with which SHE travaileth
Is Liberty, smitten to death.                              10

3.
Then trample and dance, thou Oppressor!
For thy victim is no redresser;
Thou art sole lord and possessor
Of her corpses, and clods, and abortions--they pave
Thy path to the grave.                                     15

4.
Hearest thou the festival din
Of Death, and Destruction, and Sin,
And Wealth crying "Havoc!" within?
'Tis the bacchanal triumph that makes Truth dumb,
Thine Epithalamium.                                        20

5.
Ay, marry thy ghastly wife!
Let Fear and Disquiet and Strife
Spread thy couch in the chamber of Life!
Marry Ruin, thou Tyrant! and Hell be thy guide
To the bed of the bride! 

ADDED: After receiving email about the Spanish words spoken by the Pope, I wrote another post.

Read More

"Is this really the message we want to send to the rest of the world? That this is Wisconsin? A place where people can’t come and express themselves in their state capitol? That’s bologna."

So said state senator Bob Jauch, about the arrest of 22 of the "Solidarity Singers," for singing in the Wisconsin Capitol building without a permit. This singing has been a regular event since the big protests in 2011. The arrests followed a singalong that defied the police chief's message — posted on a sign — "I have determined that your group does not have the required permits. I am declaring this an unlawful event. Please either move outside or disperse immediately. If you do not, each participant is subject to arrest."

By the way, I think it's funny to write "That’s bologna." Normally, one sees the spelling "baloney," when the reference is to humbug/nonsense. My authority is the (unlinkable) Oxford English Dictionary, which gives the alternative "boloney."

1928   Sat. Evening Post 28 Nov. 21   Gee, that's a long shot. Boloney! That's not the ball—it's the divot.
1935   Discovery Dec. 378/2   He even suggests that much of modern psychiatry is ‘hooey’ and ‘baloney’.
1935   E. Weekley Something about Words 64   Boloney must surely be for Bologna sausage (whence also the English polony, dating from the 18th century), influenced perhaps by the contemptuous sense associated with the German wurst.

"Bologna" is the spelling for the sausage, which is notable for its large size. Here are the OED's historical examples:

1596   T. Nashe Haue with you to Saffron-Walden sig. R2,   As big as a Bolognian sawcedge.
1833   ‘M. Dods’ Cook & Housewife's Man. (ed. 5) iii. i. 267 (note) ,   Real Bologna sausages labour under the imputation of being made of asses' flesh.
1850   Knickerbocker XXXV. 23   Relishing ‘Bolognas’, will he plead that a jelly-eyed roaster is disgusting?
1916   C. Sandburg Chicago Poems 24   The dago shovelman finishes the dry bread and bologna.

First, I love the spelling "sawcedge." Second, dago shovelman?

The dago shovelman sits by the railroad track
Eating a noon meal of bread and bologna.
     A train whirls by, and men and women at tables
     Alive with red roses and yellow jonquils,
     Eat steaks running with brown gravy,
     Strawberries and cream, eclaires and coffee.
The dago shovelman finishes the dry bread and bologna,
Washes it down with a dipper from the water-boy,
And goes back to the second half of a ten-hour day's work
Keeping the road-bed so the roses and jonquils
Shake hardly at all in the cut glass vases
Standing slender on the tables in the dining cars.

I love the way Sandberg empathizes with the worker, all the while calling him a "dago."

"Dago" is in the OED, in case you're wondering. It's defined as "A name originally given in the south-western section of the United States to a man of Spanish parentage; now extended to include Spanish, Portuguese, and Italian people in general, or as a disparaging term for any foreigner." The word is a corruption of the proper name Diego. Some historical examples:

[1723   Bumstead in New-Eng. Historical & Geneal. Reg. (1861) XV. 199   The negro Dago hanged for fiering Mr Powell's house.]
1832   E. C. Wines Two Years in Navy (1833) I. vi. 145   These Dagos [of Minorca], as they are pleasantly called by our people, were always a great pest...
1904   T. Roosevelt Let. 2 Sept. in H. F. Pringle T. Roosevelt (1931) 294   It will show these Dagos that they will have to behave decently....
1909 H. G. Wells Tono-Bungay iii. iv. 406 'E's a foreigner... That's what E is—a Dago!

Read More

The verb "opt."

I like it... and used it in the previous post. ("[O]bviously if you have a single-parent household, you'll need some kind of income stream to opt to say at home." I liked the "obv... opt" combo.) But Meade sniffed at this usage. Is it as off as using "impact" as a verb? (Which I don't do.)

The (unlinkable) OED has the earliest usage of "opt" as a verb coming in 1853 — which is relatively recent — and written by Frederick Douglass:

1853   Frederick Douglass Paper (Rochester, N.Y.) (Electronic text) 16 Sept.,   This course will not suit a discriminating public. They must opt for something more than long winded and rapid declamations.

There are 3 other 19th century examples, and both put "opt" in quotes. ("1899... The two boys 'opted'  for the Navy.") By contrast, the word "option" goes back to the 1500s. So I guess it's like "enthuse," which the OED comes right out and calls "an ignorant back-formation" (from "enthusiasm"). But why isn't "opt" called "an ignorant back-formation"? What makes a new usage "ignorant"? Or does it make more sense to say: There's one thing that makes it not ignorant: when the first use appears in the writings of the revered former slave Frederick Douglass.
Speaking of earlier posts and things Meade has said about my writing, he recently chided me for aiming the word "ignorant" at a black person. He maintained that there is great sensitivity about that word. WaPo columnist Eugene Robinson had made an assumption about the George Zimmerman case that I called "either ignorant or shamefully deceptive." At the time, I said I had thought carefully about word choice, and I thought "ignorant" was the right word because it focuses on the lack of information, not intelligence, and anyway, in my 2 alternatives — ignorant/deceptive — the hurtful accusation is deceit, and ignorance was a gracious offer of an out. And why should I coddle Eugene Robinson? He's one of the elite. It would be patronizing.

So, now, googling, I did find this: "Is the word 'ignorant' a racial slur?" I think the answer is no, but I do see some evidence of sensitivity around the word, depending on the way you attach it to a noun, notably when you call someone "an ignorant [blank]," especially when the blank is a nasty word, as in "Jane, you ignorant slut."

Read More

"Hey, you two... I'm looking to buy a Kindle version of the OED."

"I'm not sure which one to order. If you want to send me a portal link to a recommended version, I would both appreciate and use it."

A reader writes. There's no Kindle version, but if you buy the full-scale 20-volume print set, you get a CD ROM, which would give you the ability to do searches.

ADDED: Here's the CD-ROM version alone... and much cheaper. And there's this "upgrade" to it. (Thanks to the reader who pointed that out.)

AND: A reader writes: "And, the OED online people are very comfortable to deal with — I pay the thirty bucks a month for two or three months and then cancel because I need the money elsewhere and then start up again when I can afford to. Always a simple process, cancelling and then beginning again."

Read More

This is a post about the shade of meaning between "laconic" and "taciturn."

There really was a place called Laconia. It's where Sparta was. The OED says "laconic" means, first,  "Characteristic of the Laconians; Spartan-like" and quotes John Adams:

1787   J. Adams Def. Constit. Govt. U.S. Pref., in Wks. (1851) IV. 287   The latest revolution that we read of, was conducted..in the Grecian style, with laconic energy.

But that's not the meaning we want. We want definition #2, from the (unlinkable) OED: "Following the Laconian manner, esp. in speech and writing; brief, concise, sententious. Of persons: Affecting a brief style of speech." Example:

1888   A. K. Green Behind Closed Doors iii. 28   ‘Trust me’ was his laconic rejoinder.

Now, "taciturn" — an adjective based on "tacit" (silent) — has only one meaning: "Characterized by silence or disinclination to conversation; reserved in speech; saying little; uncommunicative." Examples:

1771   T. Smollett Humphry Clinker II. 107   Grieve..was very submissive, respectful, and remarkably taciturn.
1816   Remarks Eng. Mann. 61   The people in Europe who partake most with us in this taciturn propensity, are the Dutch.
1849   T. B. Macaulay Hist. Eng. II. vi. 68   Godolphin, cautious and taciturn, did his best to preserve neutrality.
1876   J. S. Bristowe Treat. Theory & Pract. Med. ii. vi. 852   The patient becomes apathetic, morose or taciturn, or irritable.

So if someone is laconic, he's not against communicating. He's about a certain style of communication: concision. But if someone is taciturn, he's avoiding communication. Taciturn speaks more of a personality type, and not in a good way.

Read More

"As a dogge that turneth aȝen to his spuyng, so is an vnprudent man that rehersith his fooli."

1. So said Wycliffe's Bible, in Middle English, around 1382, translating a proverb that can be more easily understood in the King James form, from 1611: "As a dog returneth to his vomit, so a fool returneth to his folly." No need to get more modern than that.

2. "Returneth" is nice (and helpful to those who lisp). The double "returneth" may seem more poetic than "turneth... rehersith." But you've got to love "fooli" for "folly." The older form is more accessible. And "spuyng" for "vomit"... surely, we lost something there.

3. "Dog" is a very old word of unknown etymology, according to the (unlinkable) OED, which proceeds to explain this particular unknown at great length. Do you prefer the older form "dogge"? (Which I presume was pronounced "doggie.")

4. I'm rummaging around in the OED under "dog" after writing that first post of the day, about the dog vomit fungus, which was the first post today because it's something that came up on the front lawn overnight. (Some things come up in conversation, and other things come up on the front lawn.) The OED has no entry for the fungus, but I tumbled upon the old aphorism, and thought you might find some use for it.

5. I, of course, was returning to my old fooli, having blogged about dog vomit fungus in 2006, and, in fact, I was inclined to return to another old fooli: dog's breakfast, which sounds like something you could order at The Slime Mold Café, which could have been the name of that first post (since it fits the Althouse blog model of a "café" post, having a photograph and an open-ended invitation to talk).

6. The OED says:

dog's breakfast n. slang (orig. U.S.) a confused mess; = dog's dinner n.

1915   New Castle (Pa.) News 13 Feb. 2/5   They abandoned the plan, went ahead in their own way, and have gotten their side all messed up, like a dog's breakfast.
1959   Times 29 Apr. 10/4   He can't make head or tail of it... It's a complete dog's breakfast.
2004   Classic Rock Oct. 102/3   The 1974 record..is either the furthest-reaching concept album ever made, or the biggest dog's breakfast in the entire history of the state of California.

7. What 1974 record? Can you guess without Googling? I'll give you another excerpt:

Here, no longer held back by the leashes of a mere rock band, Ray wastes no time wading right into a carnival of jazz and samba, synth and rumba, rock-opera and boogie-woogie, all the while wearing golden Tutankhamun facepaint and global new-age influences on his sleeve.

8. Ray was not returning to his old fooli, but moving on to new fooli. How about you?

Read More