Archive for November 14th, 2006

At least it’s not a kitchen table

Published by
jessi
at November 14, 2006 in Writer's Block. 1 Comment

See, there are times when I read fic and just gush and laugh and wish I could write.

From a fic that I actually really like:

After another hour of sitting by the pool, I made the announcement that I was going inside to make myself even more sexually appealing to her. Well what I actually said was:

“I think I’ll start getting ready.”

Straight. To. Hell.

Developing lingusitic feature

Published by
jessi
at November 14, 2006 in On Teaching and Writer's Block. 2 Comments

Written in response to Mark’s post nu zlnd ed sux

Lynne Truss, author of the humorous punctuation book Eats, Shoots, and Leaves had a similar grievance about text-speak in one of her chapters. At the time, I agreed wholeheartedly.

However, after some thought, I cannot help but remember this is just another development in language. I may not like or agree with it, but as those of us brainwashed — I mean educated by Dr. Aaron Smith of Illinois State University, we have a healthy schizophrenia about this. I recognize this as a linguistic feature, but as an English teacher (or faux-English teacher) I am generally apalled.

This isn’t necessarily my generation, however. I don’t always like this short hand system of writing, but I have been known to use it. When I read it in fic, it’s generally an indication to me that the story isn’t worth my time if the author couldn’t find the time to write out the whole word.

I cannot help but wonder, however, if during the advent of contractions, philiogists and other die-hard grammarians were feeling the same thing we are about SMS in formal writing.

So, backformation? How would we classify this? My linguistic knowledge seems to be atrophying.

Neighborhood watch

Published by
jessi
at November 14, 2006 in Random Reading. 1 Comment

Actually, “friendly neighborhood parking guy” is part of the neighborhood watch. That would explain the glowing baton thing.

I saw him tonight for the first time in like two weeks. He spotted me a good ways away and waited until I was a little closer. I actually saw him wave off his friends to wait just so he could give me a high five and tell me, “Kiotsukete!”

So maybe the Avon lady doesn’t think much of us, but at least the neighborhood watch thinks I’m five-by-five.