Merrily goes the donkey...
Jan. 14th, 2004 01:42 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
ventaA round up of minor arcanities:
Today's word from the calendar is assishness. So far the calendar has produced around half-and-half words which could feasibly be slotted into conversations - this is one such, meaning (unsurprisingly) "asinine quality, stupidity". So off you go: use it today three times in conversation, and once in your LJ.
Having now finished reading Eats, Shoots and Leaves, I can report that I am a fan of the Oxford comma. Which is apparently the correct name for the controversial comma inserted after the penultimate item in a list. So: our main weapons are surprise, our nice red uniforms, and a fanatical dedication to the Pope. See the comma after uniforms ? That's an Oxford comma, that is. I've got no idea why it's so named. And while I don't always put it in lists, sometimes it's very handy. Everyone with an interest in writing should read Eats, Shoots and Leaves, by the way. It manages to steer a pleasingly sane course between the extremes of "punctuation is set in stone" and "punctuation doesn't matter at all".
And, looking for something else, I found this website. Which contains all sorts of odd facts about how to splice tape and create different effects thereby. I don't believe I'm likely to do this, but it interested me none-the-less. Reminded me of the day a schoolfriend and I discovered that you could turn tape inside out to play songs backwards, and spent an educational afternoon looking for hidden messages in songs. We didn't find any.
Today's word from the calendar is assishness. So far the calendar has produced around half-and-half words which could feasibly be slotted into conversations - this is one such, meaning (unsurprisingly) "asinine quality, stupidity". So off you go: use it today three times in conversation, and once in your LJ.
Having now finished reading Eats, Shoots and Leaves, I can report that I am a fan of the Oxford comma. Which is apparently the correct name for the controversial comma inserted after the penultimate item in a list. So: our main weapons are surprise, our nice red uniforms, and a fanatical dedication to the Pope. See the comma after uniforms ? That's an Oxford comma, that is. I've got no idea why it's so named. And while I don't always put it in lists, sometimes it's very handy. Everyone with an interest in writing should read Eats, Shoots and Leaves, by the way. It manages to steer a pleasingly sane course between the extremes of "punctuation is set in stone" and "punctuation doesn't matter at all".
And, looking for something else, I found this website. Which contains all sorts of odd facts about how to splice tape and create different effects thereby. I don't believe I'm likely to do this, but it interested me none-the-less. Reminded me of the day a schoolfriend and I discovered that you could turn tape inside out to play songs backwards, and spent an educational afternoon looking for hidden messages in songs. We didn't find any.
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no subject
Date: 2004-01-14 06:20 am (UTC)Did you get that for christmas also? I wonder how much our christmas lists overlapped!
no subject
Date: 2004-01-14 06:53 am (UTC)Did you get a can of WD40, a set of African Witch-Doctor's Bones[*], and a Thermarest (http://www.cascadedesigns.com/thermarest/) as well ?
[*] I mean, of course, the kind of bones you cast. Not the poor Witch-Doctor's own bones. That'd be far too risky.
no subject
Date: 2004-01-14 07:05 am (UTC)After that, my christmas list included a gift set containing deoderant and a radio (who thinks of these things!), the (auto)biography of the Pythons (as in the Monte variety), a Go board, and loads of clothes.