The headline news yesterday (8/8) was about a Jetstar plane nearly colliding with a Qatar Airlines plane at the Sydney airport. But what I heard from my tv was about, omigod, a Death Star plane. Death stalks Sydney.
Well, jet and death are in fact quite similar phonologically and so are easily confused. Meanwhile, the Australian economy airline is fresh news for me, while I’ve been steeped in Star Wars stuff since 1977. So everything tips my perceptions towards death.
(all about sex between men, described largely in street language, and utterly inappropriate for kids and the sexually modest)
Two engaging images of faces, both conveying pleasure, during man-on-man sex. What is it that these guys are so satisfied about?
Stephan Pastis’s Pearls Before Swine comic strip for 8/5:
Dating tip: avoid crazed lunatics; and while we’re on the subject, ax murderers too — when on offer in the sexual marketplace, let caution be your watchword
A few days ago I suddenly developed an impressive case of laryngitis — utterly painless, but incredibly annoying — which I attributed to a change in my medications (a huge increase in the dosage of the steroid prednisone). And so it might have been.
Then after breakfast this morning (around 4:30 am) I was visited by the unmistakable intestinal symptoms of cryptosporidiosis, crypto for short — notably uncontrollable watery diarrhea, dammit. Some days earlier, when a widespread US outbreak of the infection was reported, I had put great mounds of possibly infected greens down the garbage disposal, but apparently I had already eaten enough of them that the parasite was just lying in wait, gathering in strength to wreck havoc on my guts. Fortunately, I have weapons of my own, and have been able to do a pretty good job of wrestling crypto to some kind of standstill. But let me tell you, it’s no fucking picnic.
It’s incredibly tiring — I’ve had two long naps today — and requires me to consume mass quantities of rehydrating liquid. Meanwhile, it seems likely that my laryngitis is a respiratory symptom of crypto; my breathing is now often uncomfortable (though not disabling).
Sing out, Louise! Flamin’ Hot Cheetos Corn Dogs, Flamin’ Hot Cheetos Corn Dogs; it’s a mantra, in trochaic (Strong + Weak feet) tetrameter (4 feet per line ) —
Strong Weak . Strong Rest | Strong Weak . Strong Weak
(There’s a Page on this blog about my postings on chants, cheers, mantras, and onomatomania)
But it’s all about the food, and that’s appropriate for August in the US; it’s a variant of the American State Fair staple, the corn dog. From NOAD on the basic object:
compound noun corn dog: North American English a hot dog covered in cornmeal batter, fried, and served on a stick.
And then the corn-puff variant, which popped up on my Facebook page yesterday:
Manalee [AMZ: accent on the middle syllable] Shukla, Director of Programs at Avant, gave a presentation at 1 on Friday 7/31, to an audience of most of the residents at Avant, where I now live: “Traveler’s Quest: Discover India with Manalee” (about her home and family, and about the culture and traditions of the India she grew up in — in Bhopal, in Madhya Pradesh (‘central province’, smack in the middle of the country), before she embarked on a new American life, with two kids and a professional job).
I got some standing with the residents when Manalee introduced me as her special guest, saying I was a linguist who speaks many languages — not really true, but that was sweet of her — and adding that I wrote a PhD dissertation in Sanskrit (a slip: it was on Sanskrit, not in it, and it was about phonology, using Sanskrit data; also, that was 1965, 61 years ago, and I’ve mostly forgotten my Sanskrit — I don’t want to take credit for marvels that I’m entirely incapable of).
Obviously, MS and I were acquaintances, and I’ll tell the story of how we came to meet (but not in this posting). I also intend to tell you more about what she had to say, and show, about her India (but, again, not in this posting; there’s just too much here).
Instead, I’ll start with the glottonym Sanskrit (for a collection of language varieties, the oldest of which goes back to about 1500 years before the Christian era) and use it to riff on common descent with modification, a truly great idea of the 18th century that then became a core principle of Darwinian evolution.
Very briefly noted:
double lucky: Eleanor Severin Houck, the youngest of the 12 grandchildren of Melchior Arnold and Bertha Waelti Zwicky (hence the youngest of my cousin cohort), is 77 tomorrow
Eleanor’s older siblings, Wilma and Ted, served as stand-in older siblings for me when I was a child. In particular, despite the fact that Ted and I had almost no interests in common, he was a good man and a thoughtful and supportive brother-equivalent. Then, eventually, Eleanor came along, and we became adult friends; for years now, still back in the Pennsylvania Dutch farm country, she has borne the burden of being related to someone as outlandish as I am, with grace, good will, concern, and a healthy sense of humor. She also, significantly, keeps track of the family news.
I am pleased to be related to her, though still surprised at 77. On the other hand, the 9-year difference in our ages that was so enormous when we were kids is just a wrinkle now.
One inspired by Aaron Broadwell, one by Steven Levine; I get a little help from my friends.
(talk on bodily functions and the vocabulary for them, sometimes in street language, so not to everyone’s taste; also more than you might want to hear about Arnold’s Wonderful Whizz World)
About my current medical regimen, which involves significantly large doses of the steroid prednisone, intended to treat serious kidney problems (resulting in fluid accumulations in several parts of my body, quite visibly in my feet and legs) while staying under the dosage that, historically, makes me (to put this in the plainest terms) crazy. It’s a balancing act.
Yesterday, when I was overloaded with household revisions (including a new computer and printer) and had little time to sip my green tea pleasantly, the tide turned: I began, as we say, pissing like a racehorse, really quite remarkable amounts (also, I have to say, enormously pleasurable). For years now, I’ve lived with urinals scattered everywhere, so I can take quick whizzes without disrupting whatever I’m working on (if I’m laser-focused on what I’m doing, I can go for an hour without a whizz, but that’s pretty much my limit).
🐇🐇🐇 rabbit rabbit rabbit to inaugurate August, with a leporine shout-out to remember 1291, the traditional date of the formation of the Swiss federation: Hail, Helvetia!
Now to dive into today’s topic in medias res, with this 7/30 Facebook greeting from Pietro Giovanni to Aaron Broadwell on the occasion of AB’s 64th birthday, somewhere around that time:
Many returns of the day to my favorite linguist
AB is George Aaron Broadwell (known as Aaron Broadwell), Elling Eide Professor of Anthropology at the Univ. of Florida (Gainesville). PG is AB’s husband Peter Marino under the pseudonym Pietro Giovanni. For further complexity, since there are a regrettably large number of men named Peter Marino, some of them famous in their fields, Peter Marino uses the nickname Piet as his professional name; Piet Marino is the author of young adult novels (Dough Boy and Magic and Misery):
(#1) The Piet Marino logo
