Saturday, December 01, 2007

Saturday Odds and Ends

It's 9:15 on a clear and cold Saturday morning here in Northern Virginia. Agnes is at work, our granddog Punky is keeping sleepy watch near the front door, and I'm putting off starting on the long list of honey-do's that await my attention.

I'd rather blog.

But because I'm partially down for maintenance with a cold and so unable to think as clearly as I might, here are just a few placeholders for future posts:

Yesterday's post on the difference between 1967 and 2007 in how we approach problems netted lots of great comments, including one from zero_zero_one, who wrote, "If there are enough of us out there who know about 'common sense,' how come laws and rules come into place that completely fly in the face of 'common sense?' How can people who set these rules get into positions of authority if their thinking is so contrary to rational thought?" That's a great question, and it's so obvious I can't believe I didn't think of it myself - the people in positions of authority in 2007 grew up in the (apocryphal?) Era of Common Sense, so they (we!) are the ones now making the stupid decisions. What happened? I'm still thinking about it. If anyone else has any ideas, I'd be glad to hear them.

I've had a very nice e-mail exchange with Amanda on the subject of how children learn multiple languages. As you may have read in her blog, she's watching little Aaron absorb English, Chinese, and Indonesian at the same time, and working through the amazement that he can absorb them and keep them straight. As I told her, it's nice to be asked for my opinion on a linguistics-related topic, as people with degrees in Linguistics are as likely to be found waiting tables as responding to questions related to arcane topics in psycholinguistics.

The Christmas Party on board the Enterprise over at Captain Picard's Journal begins on Monday. I sent in my proposed entry a few weeks ago, and am waiting anxiously to see if it makes the cut for inclusion in the week-long series of party posts. Check it out...it ought to be fun!

Well, I guess all this laundry won't wash and fold itself, the vacuum cleaner won't get rid of all the dog hair in the carpet on its own, and the great heaps of leaves in the yard won't magically leap back into the air and reattach themselves to the trees...so I guess I'd better get my pasty white backside into gear and do something before My Very Best Beloved comes home and glares disapprovingly at me.

A fate worse than death.

Have a good day. More thoughts coming.

Bilbo

4 comments:

John A Hill said...

I've had some experience with that glare myself (from Chris, not Agnes).

Hope that you conquer that cold quickly.

The Mistress of the Dark said...

I try to put off laundry day myself...but I find its easier to just do it than suffer the slings and arrow of "the look." And I'm not even married. I get the look from the other people in my house that want clean clothes.

Sue said...

I never give Josh the honey-do list... I have trouble keeping track of things I don't want him to do. hehehe. He has a way of doing things.. and I have a different way.

So he mainly does his 'own' manly chores (you know, the outside dirty stuff).

Amanda said...

Colds are horrible when you have housework to do. On the upside, after dragging yourself around doing everything, you sometimes feel better and less congested for getting your blood circulating.

Hope you'll be over the cold soon.