March 20, 2006

It is sort of what it sounds like

Is it just me, or is "logorrhea" not just the best word ever?

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November 24, 2005

A Boyfriend Who Looked Like a Girlfriend I Had in February of Last Year

Is it still your alma mater, if it was an all-boys prep school?

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January 2, 2005

Resolute

See, here's the thing: asking a blogger to write more often is a difficult thing. More often than not, the blogger in question wants to write more, more often, and better. Although the requests are directly in line with what they want to do, other things, other responsibilities, other distractions often intervene. Particularly if the blogger in question doesn't consider themselves writers. I would love to consider myself a writer. But I don't. I don't think that it's my calling anymore than going to the gym is a calling. I go to the gym regularly because I know that it's crucial to my mental and physical health. Yet while I believe that writing is a good form of catharsis, a good way of flexing my literary ability, and a way of keeping some people I care deeply about happy--including myself--I don't think that I need the writing the way I need the gym. And since I don't call myself a fitness enthusiast, I can't very likely call myself a writer. In fact, I don't call myself a lawyer. Not simply because I haven't yet been admitted to the bar, a qualification that drives everyone, including S, absolutely batty. Actually, it's because that's what I do, and in some ways, it will undoubtedly be who I become, I know that I've got aspirations beyond being a lawyer. Maybe it will come when I get married, or when I have a child--then maybe the first words of self-description will be: I'm a husband; I'm a father. The closest I can come to something resembling such a thing is to say that I'm a New Yorker, but even that is something I've wrestled with. My heart has always been here, but my body spent a good bit of time in Texas, and sometimes it's advantageous to tell people I'm from there.#[jimmy] But the truth is that I am from here, I percieve my career to be here, and my family homes in on this city like boomerangs. [jimmy]: Like when I go to Brother Jimmy's here in the City, and they have discounts for Southerners, or where it helps in rapport with someone else. Sometimes a day burns in my head, forces me out of bed and over to the computer; sometimes I am walking on the street, swearing I'll remember some jaunty little piece for later and don't; sometimes I find myself wanting to write so desperately that it burns a bit in my mind, but I can't find the time. Sadly, these days, sleep is too precious a commodity, work too strong a whip, and my desire to see S too powerful a compulsion to sit in front of the computer and pontificate on something meaningful or meaningless. But what that all means is that to call myself a writer would be a step beyond what would be politely described as stretching the definition. I am a blogger, and a hardly-prodigious one at that. That said, I do enjoy writing, and I do enjoy getting readers, and I know that for better or worse, this is a hobby I don't intend to lose soon. Maybe I'll carve out an hour each weekend day, maybe I'll start keeping a scrapbook of ideas for rough publication, maybe I'll just start emailing tidbits each day, but this is my new resolution: I will do whatever I can to keep writing regularly. No promises on quality or quantity, but I recognize that I need this outlet every little once in a while, and I do so enjoy it.

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December 13, 2004

Troublesome

On the heels of my own rant about people whose phrases I don't care for (well, not really on the heels of, but certainly following behind in exactly the same footsteps), I received a fine book as a gift. Bill Bryson's Dictionary of Troublesome Words. Clearly my friends know me. But although I'd meant to write about it since Friday, when I received this fine piece of literature, I was spurred to action by another fine piece on epistemology by the learned Doctor WittandWisdom.

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October 25, 2004

Well, Good, StrongBad

Okay, so I'm fairly familiar with the people who try to pass off that there is a difference between "I am good" and "I am well" when responding to the common politesse "How are you?" I take some umbrage as a grammar geek, since "good" is an adjective and it describes the speaker, "I", while "well" is an adverb modifying "am". Of course, my problem is that the second is both arrogant ("I am particularly talented at being") and doesn't really respond to the question, the main intent of which is to inquire after health and happiness; in other words, the question is about the inner state of the questionee, not about how gifted they are at living life. Nevertheless, taking that as a given, I had a further question: if you attempt to strip away the hubris with a little bit of self-deprecation, modesty, or understatement and choose to say "not too bad", you clearly violate the Good/Well Conundrum of Grammmatical Etiquette. "Bad" is an adjective, like "good". But no one ever says "I am not too badly", do they? Naturally, "I am doing badly" makes sense--everyone understands that you can "do well" and "do good", but only one asks for your status, while the other demands donning tights, cape, and mask. But the point is that no one--even those gross, self-centered misanthropes who insist on sharing misery with everyone--says "I am badly." So how come the grammar/etiquette folks aren't after us for this one?

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How Novel!

In a fit of self-deluded idiocy, I'm considering doing this starting next week. Not that I'll ever be Brad Meltzer or anything. Yeah, because I don't have a job already. Yet, even though I wrote this and emailed it to myself from work, that didn't stop me from coming up with a couple of possible vignettes for it. Ugh. I'm going to be addicted.

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October 17, 2004

Upsicle

I misread a word that is probably “upside” and decided that this was a mission from the powers that be, or at least the powers that be infiltrating my mind: to introduce the word “upsicle” into the vernacular.

This brings with it a pretty weighty responsibility. A couple, really. The first: What does it mean? Because honestly, you don’t want to go mouthing off about how great a word is about to be and what changes it will wreak upon the face of the mother tongue. Is it a caffeinated treat for those who can’t stand their coffee hot or their beverage the tiniest bit warmed? Is it just the opposite of a standard icicle? Is it simply “the state of being up?” For that matter, is it a noun, an adjective, a subjunctive tense change?

Assuming, however, that upsicle is a noun, and that it simply means “a word, phrase, or event that makes you feel good”, you realize you’re not that much closer to being a trendsetter if you can’t figure out how to convince others to use this bon mot. However, I’ve got vocabulary on my side: everyone loves Schadenfreude. And you know you need the opposite of something to fully appreciate the something.

And as much as I would like to believe that this blog can do it, I must beg you to start using “upsicle” in your everyday speech. It is much to much to ask of a simple Shoe to change the world. But you, Internet, you can do so much!

After all, “upsicle” is, in fact, its own upsicle.

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