Anarthrousness in the comic strips

February 16, 2026

The Pearls Before Swine strip by Stephan Pastis, for 1/9/26:


A difference between British English and American English over constructions with the definite article (arthrous) or without it (anarthrous) — putting aside British Bob’s touching belief in the primacy of BrE over AmE

(There is a Page on this blog with links to postings on Language Log and this blog on arthrousness)

Now for some scholarly observations on BrE vs. AmE practices in arthrousness with various prepositional objects, among them hospital and university. Here I take you to Lynne Murphy’s blog “Separated by a Common Language: Observations on British and American English by an American linguist in the US” — in her posting “(the) menopause, (the) flu, (the) hospital” from 4/17/2007:

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Posted in Articles, Dialects, Language and medicine, Linguistics in the comics, Variation | 2 Comments »

You know it’s good, because it’s free

February 13, 2026

A step into greater complexity in my blog posting, after re-entry in two brief postings yesterday: “Zichichi” (here) and “Calvin Tompkins (here): two separate subjects, united by being cleverly stitched together in The Bob newsletters (from writer and cartoonist Bob Eckstein), about the 2026 Winter Olympics on television, with this cartoon from 2/7:


(Toon) The Bob at the Winter Olympics; BE says “The bob is here”, with this tag about the Olympics on tv:

You know it’s good, because it’s free

This is subject 1, the excellent tag, which I would like to apply to this very blog of mine: you know it’s good because it’s free (and I have gone to some trouble to make it so; applaud here for me)

Meanwhile, Toon is BE’s wiener dog race version of the Olympics, in which the racing dogs are in hotdog buns, observed by an array of condiment bottles. On Facebook on 2/8:

BE: “I’m I’m watching the Puppy Bowl. It’s not the same. Gambling has ruined it, even though I’m admittedly part of the problem.

BE’s eccentric Puppy Bowl is subject 2, and it has nothing to do with the the tag.

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Posted in Formulaic language, Language and animals, Language and sports, Linguistics in the comics, Slogans | Leave a Comment »

Calvin Tompkins

February 12, 2026

A note about a moving diary of unsparing self-reflection by the American writer Calvin Tomkins as he struggles through the year to the age of 100: in print in the New Yorker issue of 12/22/25: “Centenarian: A diary of a hundredth year”.

Tomkins (born 12/17/1925, graduated from Princeton in 1948; I am 9/6/1940 and Princeton 1962 — merely stumbling through towards the age of 86, but we swim similarly against the chill tides of decline and loss) has been a writer for the magazine since 1958. Casuals, interview pieces, and so on, but preeminently as the magazine’s art critic.

His piece is characteristically direct and spare, traversing a wrenching jagged route through his life, without drama or pleading. His story obviously speaks to my condition, but more generally serves as a model of how to deal with nasty, messy mortality with grace and humanity. And, if you can bear it, should be read along with Tatiana Schlossberg’s remarkable “A Battle with my Blood”, in print in the 12/8/25 issue of the New Yorker under the head “A Further Shore”, about her last days as a 34-year-old woman dying of leukemia.

 

 

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Zichichi

February 12, 2026

This is a brief return to posting on my blog, an experiment in re-learning how to use my computer, after a couple of months in a vale of great sicknesses (about which, more eventually); I am seriously damaged, but plucky.

This is in memory of the excellent Antonino Zichichi, who died on 2/9. First of all, for having a wonderful Z name, even more entertaining than Zwicky. For his groundbreaking research in nuclear physics. And for a lifetime devoted to causes benefitting the common good.

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Posted in Death notices, Names, Physics | 2 Comments »

Bad times, go away

December 26, 2025

A brief note to tell you I’m still alive, but in great misery, and doing the minimum just to get through the days. I’m sleeping about 16 hours a day, in 1-hour naps, mostly sitting up in a chair. Much of the time when I’m awake, my hands are shaking so badly I can’t do much of anything, but then that passes away and for a while I can at least type in messages — great tissues of typos, which I then labor to correct. My current state is a considerable improvement from the disasters of 12/23 through 25; I was finally able to eat my Christmas dinner for lunch today, and it was a pleasure, but I’m a long way from getting back to my pre-Yuletide level of mere chronic sickness.

I will do my best to report on what’s happened and is happening, but you have to appreciate how difficult it is to endure all this while describing it and trying to make some sense of it.

The good news is that my neighborhood experienced neither overwhelming floods nor tornados.

 

Posted in My life | 2 Comments »

Reptilian fruit couplet

December 24, 2025

Accompanying this hazy snapshot posted on Facebook on 12/22 by John Wells —


Juicy scavenging on the green slopes of (I assume) Montserrat, in the Leeward Islands; the fully ripe fruits fall to the ground and ferment there, where the local iguanas can feed on them

— was his caption, the donée for a poem in trochaic tetrameter (with a couple leading unaccented syllables), the most common meter for folk poetry of all kinds in English:

An iguana feasts on fallen mangoes

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Posted in Homosexuality, Language and animals, Language and food, Linguists, Photography, Poetic form, Poetry | 2 Comments »

Kinky Beavers and their kin

December 22, 2025

Today’s Zits comic strip sets up a baffling list of ridiculous and raunchy-sounding things Jeremy’s father wants for Christmas — a Wiggly Pickle! Kinky Beavers! — and resolves the puzzle in the final panel.


(#1) Fishing lures, kids, fishing lures; apparently all from the Reaction Innovations fishing lure supply company, and so known to a substantial number of fishing enthusiasts

I suspected what was going on when spinners and crickets turned up in the second panel. But it’s still a sweet set-up.

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Posted in Jokes, Language and animals, Language and sports, Linguistics in the comics, Names | Leave a Comment »

Finishing my groom

December 21, 2025

(This posting devolves fairly fast into oral sex between men, so it is, alas, entirely unsuitable for kids and the sexually modest.)

Musical overture: the chorus and verse 2 of the 1960s song “Chapel of Love”:

[chorus]
Goin’ to the chapel
And we’re gonna get married
Goin’ to the chapel
And we’re gonna get married
Gee, I really love you
And we’re gonna get married
Goin’ to the chapel of love

[verse 2]
Bells will ring, the sun will shine,
I’ll be his and he’ll be mine
We’ll love until the end of time
And we’ll never be lonely anymore

Save this thought. In the original, written for a girl group, the narrator is a woman writing about her man. A later version was performed by a guy group; the narrator is a man writing about his woman. Finally, we get performances by Elton John singing to his husband David Furnish (they got a civil partnership in 2005, were married in 2014).

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Posted in Etymology, Homosexuality, Language and the body, Language of sex, Marriage, Music | Leave a Comment »

Two DEC-20 cartoons

December 20, 2025

I am reminded by Amanda Walker that today is DEC-20 Day — it’s the date, kids —  causing me to recall times working at research labs that used DEC-20s as their shared workhorse machines. This DEC-20 brought me two cartoons, the first a Zippy glancingly related to Christmas, the second a Bizarro directly about Christmas in popular culture.

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Posted in Alliteration, Comic conventions, Diners, Events and occasions, Linguistics in the comics, Nonsense, Onomatopoeia, Pop culture, Technology | 1 Comment »

Ad-talk: your morning groom

December 19, 2025

Caught on tv this morning, one version of a Titanium Edge tv spot ad “Any Hair Anywhere”, released 7/31/25 (details on the iSpot site here); from this ad:


Titanium Edge, the “2-in-one nose and ear groomer that goes wherever razors can’t … to finish my groom” — with a noun groom, a nouning of the verb groom, to denote a regular routine of grooming, here specifically for men and in fact specifically for shaving; this nouning would appear to be a commercial invention by Titanium Edge’s ad agency

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Posted in Conversion, Innovations, Language and the body, Language of advertising, Nouning | Leave a Comment »

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