Mandated Vocabulary

 

I recently read an interesting article* in Mental Floss titled 8 Extraordinary Examples of Constrained Writing. "Constrained writing" refers to a set of writing techniques that impose specific rules on word usage and style. The article examines eight different techniques and all are fascinating, but one stuck out for me: Mandated Vocabulary.

When using mandated vocabulary, the writer may be prohibited from using certain words, allowed to use only certain words, limited only to a certain number of words, or permitted to use only words that fit within a particular set of guidelines.

Mandated vocabulary has had a long and interesting history during my lifetime, such as the push to use gender-neutral terms (think mail carrier for mailman** or flight attendant for stewardess), all-purpose pronouns (they for he or she or theirs for his or hers), and the execrable Latinx for Latino or Latina. But mandated vocabulary has reached new heights under the reign of Der Furor, where every government database and library is being scrubbed of words considered objectionable by hard-right conservatives and their radical evangelical followers, and non-objectionable words are turned on their semantic heads to meet the needs of the political moment. As an example of the latter, consider the term patriot applied (with a straight face) to the violent rioters of January 6th, 2021.

Pen America has compiled an ever-growing list of words banned by various federal government agencies. The list contains more than 350 words and phrases, including such linguistic horrors as:

abortion;

affordable housing;

bias;

carbon footprint;

cultural sensitivity;

diversity;

disparity;

gender;

green;

hate speech;

indigenous;

marginalized;

pollution;

privilege;

racism;

science-based;

trauma;

underrepresented;

water quality; and, of course,

white privilege

Mandated vocabulary is similar in a political context to the famous Newspeak invented by George Orwell for his classic novel 1984. Newspeak was developed to help the government of Big Brother*** control people's minds by simplifying the language to channel conversation in approved directions and discourage free thought. In Newspeak, all the banned words on the government's pre-approved list would be considered doubleplus ungood. 

Constrained writing is not necessarily a bad thing but, as with just about anything, it can be used for ill purposes. Be on the linguistic lookout.

Have a good day and don't let the constrained thought of the MAGA movement limit your expression. Big Brother does not have your best interests at heart.

More thoughts coming.

Bilbo

* Interesting to a guy with a degree in Linguistics, anyhow.

** A classic example of the push for gender-neutral language was the joke about the very politically correct mother who told her child to "go out to the personbox and see if the personperson has left us any person."

** The 1984 version of Der Furor.

Hostile Punctuation

I read an interesting Time Magazine article the other day titled "Are You a Hostile Punctuator?" With a title like that, I just had to read on.

Author Angela Haupt wrote in a concise, one-word summary, "As digital communication has evolved, punctuation’s job description has gotten more demanding." 

E-mails, texts, tweets, and other forms of digital communication can deliver the basics of the message we want to get across, but they lack the social context, verbal cues, and body language that provide the subtle (or not so subtle) additional layers of meaning we may wish to convey. As Dr. Anne Curzan, a professor of English, linguistics, and education at the University of Michigan quoted in the article explains,

“'You don't have facial expressions, you don't have tone, you don't have the shared context of a physical space and gestures.' Is the person you’re talking to happy? Are they joking? Are they angry? Are they drop-dead serious? If you were face-to-face, 'You’d have all of this context to be able to figure it out, [but] in texting, you have very little—so what young people in particular have done is repurpose punctuation.'”

Modern digital communicators have replaced visual and tonal cues with that "repurposed punctuation." As an example, when you're preparing to leave for a dinner engagement, you might send a text message to your partner asking, "Are you ready yet?", but if you write the same message as "Are you ready yet???", the use of multiple question marks implies a degree of impatience the words alone don't give. 

The use of multiple exclamation points can likewise be used to imply anger or disbelief, as in "You've got to be kidding me!!!"

A third example is the presence, absence, or strategic use of the period. In ordinary usage, it symbolizes the end of a sentence, but when used after every word of a sentence, it can indicate an angry or threatening response, as in "You. Have. Got. To. Be. Kidding. Me."

These are all examples of what is sometimes called hostile punctuation.

Emojis enter the mix, too. There are now thousands of emojis out there which convey various shades of meaning, to most of which I am clueless. A few years ago, we watched a report on the German TV show Galileo in which a pair of the show's reporters tried to guess the meaning of a series of emojis that were all variations on the classic "smiley face," but which represented a wide range of subtle differences of meaning. Neither of them accurately interpreted the meanings. So, what happens when you respond with an emoji that carries a meaning you didn't intend? Are you Hostile emoji-ing?

And, moving beyond punctuation and emojis, using excessive capitalization in digital communication is the equivalent of shouting or attempting to dominate the conversation. When combined with multiple punctuation marks or serial periods, it can emphasize anger and threats. Der Furor is, of course, a master of this, using capitalization as a form of alpha male verbal chest thumping, as in this "Truth Social" post (shared on Twitter/X) about his massive tariff broadside:

"THE OPERATION IS OVER! THE PATIENT LIVED, AND IS HEALING. THE PROGNOSIS IS THAT THE PATIENT WILL BE FAR STRONGER, BIGGER, BETTER, AND MORE RESILIENT THAN EVER BEFORE. MAKE AMERICA GREAT AGAIN!!!"

One of the funniest (and completely clean!) comedy pieces ever belongs to the wonderful Danish comic Victor Borge and his routine on "Phonetic Punctuation." If you haven't seen it, it's worth your while to take a few minutes and watch ...

So the lesson, if there is one in all this, is to be careful with your punctuation, capitalization, and use of emojis in digital communications. It's a whole new digital world out there, and we're not always speaking the same language.

Have a good day. More thoughts coming.

Bilbo

Phoning It In ... Or Not

A few weeks ago, in the run-up to the most recent phone call between President Biden and Russian President Putin, NPR host Scott Simon commented that it almost seems unusual for people to make phone calls any more ... with the advent of smart phones, they text or send typed messages using any number of communication apps that dispense with the need actually to talk to someone.

It used to be said that nobody wrote letters any more, they made phone calls. Now, we've come ... well, maybe not full-circle, but at least part circle ... people still use their phones, they just use them to  ... write.

As many of you have cause to know, I enjoy writing personal letters to my friends. I like the immediacy of phone calls, too (as many of you also know), but there's a relative permanence to a letter that goes beyond the few minutes of the phone call. A letter can be tucked away to be read again later, a physical reminder of the depth of friendship and love that inspired someone to organize their thoughts, turn them into permanent marks on a page, and then pay the going first-class mail rate (58 cents per ounce as of today*) to send them. In the words of comedian Paula Poundstone,

“I enjoy writing letters to people that I love. I choose the stamps carefully. I put the envelope, or postcard, in the mailbox myself, so I can actually feel a little piece of my heart go with it."

People love to receive letters, although very few people love to actually write them. Our friend Marcel in Switzerland wrote back in his response to my Christmas letter, 

Die Schreiebkunst von Bill, die werde ich nie erreichen, dazu fehlen mir die Ausdauer und die Ideen. ("I'll never reach Bill's level of writing ... I lack both the endurance and the ideas.")

Over the course of the last month, I sent out more than 30 Christmas letters to family and selected friends. These letters, because of their sheer number, are the only personal letters I routinely type. I begin with a letter to my long-time friend Toni**, who always wants to know absolutely everything that has happened, then edit that master letter for each other recipient, depending on what I think they'd be interested in. I also write a version of the letter for our German-speaking friends (which is dutifully edited by Agnes to clean up my errors of grammar, spelling, and expression). In response, we received two letters which were actually original (from Marcel in Switzerland and from our friend Martina in Germany), as opposed to the generic Christmas letter most people send. Several other friends sent generic letters, but added hand-written extra comments.

Now, I'm not complaining, even though it may sound like it. I enjoy writing more than most people, and - being retired - I have the time to indulge it. If I write to you and you don't write back, that's okay ... I accept phone calls and e-mails and SMS's, if with a sigh. But I enjoy getting something other than bulk mail in the old mailbox, too.

Someday, my great-grandchildren and their children and grandchildren may want to learn more about that old guy named Bilbo who lived through interesting times*** and had a good life full of luck, fun, friends, and adventure. I like to think that the letters and the journals I leave behind will let them know about me, warts and all.

Have a good day. If you would like to have a personal, handwritten letter to liven up your mailbox, e-mail or PM me your mailing address. If nothing else, we can raise a paper finger together to Louis DeJoy before he finishes dismantling the postal system.

More thoughts coming. 

Bilbo

* Which is actually not a bad deal when you think about it ... how much would it cost you to travel there yourself to deliver 58 cents worth of information?

** We met 42 years ago at the baggage carousel in the Montgomery, Alabama, airport as we arrived to attend the Air Force's Squadron Officers' School. We have not laid eyes on each other a single time since the early 1980s, but keep our friendship alive via the annual Christmas letters.

*** That's supposed to be a Chinese curse, although it really isn't. 

Poetry Sunday

I don't do New Year's Resolutions any more, having decades of experience with not following through on them, but to the extent that I have good intentions, my big one for 2021 is to write more letters. I wrote 99 of them in 2020, including 25 to my three members of Congress, and I intend to write more to family, friends, and elected officials in the coming year. I think of it not only as doing more to stay in contact with the world, but also as my small part of helping to fix the damage deliberately inflicted on the Postal Service by Der Furor and his horrendous Postmaster General, Louis DeJoy.

For today, my first Poetry Sunday of 2012, I thought this poem on the subject of letters by Carrie Shipers would be appropriate ...

In your next letter,

by Carrie Shipers

                                           please describe

the weather in great detail. If possible,

enclose a fist of snow or mud,

everything you know about the soil,

how tomato leaves rub green against

your skin and make you itch, how slow

the corn is growing on the hill.

Thank you for the photographs

of where the chicken coop once stood,

clouds that did not become tornadoes.

When I try to explain where I’m from,

people imagine corn bread, cast-iron,

cows drifting across grass. I interrupt

with barbed wire, wind, harvest air

that reeks of wheat and diesel.

I hope your sleep comes easy now

that you’ve surrendered the upstairs,

hope the sun still lets you drink

one bitter cup before its rise. I don’t miss

flannel shirts, radios with only

AM stations, but there’s a certain kind

of star I can’t see from where I am—

bright, clear, unconcerned. I need

your recipes for gravy, pie crust,

canned green beans. I’m sending you

the buttons I can’t sew back on.

Please put them in the jar beside your bed.

In your next letter, please send seeds

and feathers, a piece of bone or china

you plowed up last spring. Please

promise I’m missing the right things.

Have a good day, and resolve to write a more letters this year ... to your elected reprehensives, your family and friends, and me. It will make that daily trek out to the mailbox more enjoyable.

Happy New Year; more thoughts coming.

Bilbo

National Novel Writing Month

I learned in the last few days, from various Facebook posts by my friends and from John's musings on his blog, that November is National Novel Writing Month.

I guess that means I should get my backside in gear and start writing. As I've noted here before, one of the things on my bucket list is to publish at least one book ... it's embarrassing after all these years to have several friends who are published authors while all I've gotten into print are two letters to the editor of different newspapers (one of which was so heavily edited before publication that it ended up saying pretty much the opposite of what I'd intended). Now that I'm retired, I'm sort of out of excuses about lack of time*, and I've got all these notebooks I've been keeping that are full of notes on plots and characters, so I guess it's time to settle down to work.

I tell you this so you won't worry if I miss a post here and there through the month ... my creative glands may start secreting unexpectedly, causing me to work on other than my blog (gasp!).

Okay, John, the game's afoot! Good luck!

Have a good day. Come back tomorrow for the announcement of our Right-Cheek Ass Clown for November. More thoughts then.

Bilbo

* Although I sometimes feel like I'm busier now than I ever was, go figure.

Very Respectfully (with Crossed Fingers), Bilbo

As you all well know, Dear Readers, I enjoy writing letters. Many of you have received (and, hopefully, enjoyed) my lengthy and meandering handwritten epistles. It's a win-win!

We all enjoy receiving letters, but very few people actually enjoy writing them. I think that's a large part of the reason so many people have embraced e-mail and, especially, Twitter, which allows you to give the appearance of communicating within the limitations of 140 characters. With either one, you can just sit down at a keyboard and bang out a quick note without too much need to worry about annoying things like composition, good grammar, proper spelling, and correct use of punctuation.

There are other differences between e-mail and traditional letter writing, too. Consider this article by Matthew J. X. Malady - "You Say 'Best.' I Say No: It's Time to Kill the E-Mail Signoff."

You may recall, if you are as old as I am, learning that the parts of a letter include the salutation, the body, the complimentary close, and the signature. Briefly*, a basic letter looks like this:

(Salutation) Dear Recipient,

(Body) Blah, blah, blah, blah**.

(Complimentary Close) Yours Truly,

(Signature) Your Name

An e-mail or tweet, however, might look like this:

"Yo! IMHO we should LOL at the GOP and the Dems."

You will note that there's no complimentary close or signature, because everyone knows from the electronic header of the e-mail or the tweet handle (I don't really know what it's called, since I don't tweet) who the message is coming from, and why do we need old-fashioned pleasantries like a complimentary close in a modern electronic communication?

That's Mr Malady's point in his article - there's no longer a need for an artificial complimentary close (or "signoff") in an e-mail. As he more-or-less eloquently writes,

"Email signoffs are holdovers from a bygone era when letter writing—the kind that required ink and paper—was a major means of communication. The handwritten letters people sent included information of great import and sometimes functioned as the only communication with family members and other loved ones for months. In that case, it made sense to go to town, to get flowery with it. Then, a formal signoff was entirely called for."

It's sad, but probably accurate.

As an example, when I write an official e-mail from my desk at the Pentagon, I always use the standard signoff: "v/r," which is e-shorthand for "very respectfully." Sometimes, depending on the level of respect to be accorded to the recipient, it might even read just "r" - "respectfully." After all, it  just wouldn't do for a general to send an e-mail from his lofty perch to a lower-level peon and sign off "very respectfully." Sometimes, the recipient might be someone for whom you actually have little or no respect, making the "v/r" or the simple "r" a hypocritical exercise in format ...

So ...

Should we eliminate the e-mail signoff? I think the answer is "yes," unless you are going to be sincere about it. And as long as we're at it, why not eliminate the "Dear" in the salutation? Unless I'm writing to my family or very close friends, chances are that I don't consider the recipient to be "dear."

But you, Dear Readers, will always still merit a dear from me, whether electronically or on paper.

Have a good day. Want a hand-written letter of your own? Send your snail-mail address to der_blogmeister(at)yahoo(dot)com and I'll send you one. I'll even start it with "Dear."*** 

Come back for Cartoon Saturday.

v/r (for real),

Bilbo

* For those of you who speak German, consider this an unintended, but clever pun ... the word for "letter" in German is "Brief."

** This is the standard body for a letter received from your elected reprehensives in response to a communication from you.

*** Except for Mike, who gets a "Yo, Bro!"

Saturday Mail

Well, the big news yesterday (aside from the fact that Congress still has its head up it's doopa) was that the US Postal Service wants to save billions of dollars a year by eliminating Saturday first-class mail deliveries, starting in August.

This is sad.

At one time, the Post Office was one of the crown jewels of our government, delivering fast and reliable service for a nominal fee. Its history goes back to the year 1775, when Benjamin Franklin was appointed the first Postmaster General, and it is one of the few federal agencies specifically authorized by The Constitution*. I remember when I was in college and - for the princely sum of six cents (eight by the time I graduated) - I could get a representative of a trusted and respected federal government agency** to come to my house, pick up a letter, and deliver it in a matter of days to someone on the other side of the country. As the old saying proudly reminded us,

Neither snow nor rain nor heat nor gloom of night stays these couriers from the swift completion of their appointed rounds.***

Nowadays, a representative of a quasi-independent-sort-of-but-not-quite government agency will charge me 46 cents pick up that same letter, one less day per week. Still a bargain, when you think about it, but quite a bit more than the eight cents I paid in 1973.

The Post Office didn't have to end up in this ignominious state, but a lot of factors helped to turn it into a money-hemorrhaging butt of late-night TV jokes, including ...

- Congressional meddling and micromanagement;

- The rise of the Internet and fast, "free" communication;

- The general decline and devaluation of writing skills among Americans; and,

- A faster pace of life that values speed of communication over thoughtfulness and elegance of expression.

There have been some ideas for helping the Postal Service get back on its feet, including ...

and ...

And it isn't just people who regret the decline of the Post Office ...

As many of you know, I love writing letters****. I'm not quite as prolific as I used to be, but I still enjoy sitting down and crafting a long, chatty, and (hopefully) interesting and entertaining letter. Everyone enjoys getting personal letters, but nobody wants to actually write them any more ... and that's one of the big reasons the Postal Service is going belly up.

So, what are the other things that happen if the Postal Service eventually hangs up its mail bag?

Young boys and girls won't be able to sneak kisses by "playing post office." Playing "e-mail server" doesn't quite have the same ring to it.

Many old songs won't have the same impact, and new ones won't have the same effect. For example, consider the 1967 hit song by The Box Tops called "The Letter" ...

"Gimme a ticket for an aeroplane

Ain't got time to take a fast train - 

Lonely days are gone

I'm a-goin' home:

My baby wrote me a letter"

It just doesn't sound the same if it goes ...

"Gimme a ticket for an aeroplane

Ain't got time to take a fast train - 

Lonely days are gone

I'm a-goin' home:

My baby sent me a tweet"

And would Pat Boone's classic song "Love Letters in the Sand" have the same impact as "Sending E-Mails from the Beach?"

Why not take a minor vow today to write even just one letter a month?⁺  You'll give someone the thrill of receiving a real, ink-on-paper letter, exercise your dormant writing skills, and do your part to help rescue the good old US Mail US Post Office US Postal Service.

Do it now!

Have a good day. Write someone a letter. And then come back for Cartoon Saturday.

Bilbo

* Article 1, Section 8, Clause 7. You probably never noticed it because you were obsessing about the Second Amendment.

** You didn't know that we used to have those, did you?

*** Contrary to popular belief, this is not the official motto of the Postal Service, but an inscription found on the General Post Office at 8th Avenue and 33rd Street in New York City. It's a translation from the works of Herodotus that describes the faithful service of mounted couriers used by the Persian empire ... you know, the place where Iran is now.

**** I'll write one to you, too ... just send your snail-mail address to der_blogmeister(at)yahoo(dot)com and I'll send you your own, personal, handwritten letter, which may well be the only one you get this year. The only catch is that you have to promise to write back.

+ Mike, no fair subcontracting it to Claudia!

A Sign(ature) of the Times

You may be aware of some of the consternation that has arisen over the appointment by President Obama of Jack Lew to be his new Treasury Secretary. Republicans are outraged by the appointment because ... well ... they're reflexively outraged about pretty much anything Mr Obama does. On the other hand, others with a more practical approach to governance are concerned because Mr Lew has a completely illegible signature which will not look very good on US currency ...

Compare this to some other famous signatures from American history, like John Hancock ...

Or George Washington ...

Or even the current President, Barack Obama ...

There was a time when a person's signature was considered a reflection of their character and importance, and a good, strong, legible signature was an asset. A person's signature on a letter, a contract, or an agreement was a symbol of their honor and trustworthiness, and so the idea of signing is woven into our language, much as is the language of guns (as we discussed in this post). We put our John Hancock on a contract, sign on the dotted line when we agree to something important, sign up to an idea or concept, and depart by signing out or signing off (after we've signed in, of course). On the Air Staff at the Pentagon, we consider a task complete when get the boss's ink on our staff package.

Nowadays, of course, a strong signature is not quite as important as it once was. We still occasionally sign paperwork of course (just try buying a house without signing your name enough times to cause your hand to fall off the end of your arm), but for most common purposes we've gone digital. At the end of each workday I fill out my timesheet and sign it by typing in a login and a password. If you use a charge card, you often sign a tiny digital screen that may or may not accurately capture what you wrote.

Electronic verification of one's identity is rapidly replacing the traditional ink on paper signature. We don't use a wet signature any more when a digital one will do. We click on an AGREE icon instead of signing a 7500-page paper agreement to use some piece of software, or scan our thumbprint or our retina to prove who we are.

The evolving meaning and importance of the traditional signature was discussed in this fascinating NPR article by Linton Weeks - The Great American Signature Fades Away. Mr Weeks writes

"The signature has become a rushed and atavistic formality. We haphazardly scrawl our ways through checkout lines and mortgage refinancings. We don't write — or sign — as many handwritten notes as we once did because we send emails and e-messages. We don't write — or sign — as many checks because we pay bills online … And no one seems to care anymore if our signature is legible or consistent or even our signature. We might as well all be a doctor dashing off an unreadable prescription."

Yes, I'm a traditionalist. I still prefer ink and paper to electrons on ... well ... whatever electrons are arranged on. I'm proud of my signature, and when I put it on a paper of importance I like to think it means more than the simple act of clicking agree at the bottom of a flickering screen.

And you can sign up to that philosophy or not, as you choose.

Have a good day. More thoughts on Thursday.

Bilbo

My Sixth Blogoversary!

Yes, Dear Readers, it was on this date in 2006 that I hit the Publish Post button on my very first entry in Bilbo's Random Thought Collection. It was a pretty meager, "why am I doing this?" sort of post, and you can read it here if you're so inclined.

I got my first comment five days later, and since then I've received 8404 more (that were reported to me at my e-mail account), or 8720 more (as recorded by Blogger) ... the difference is that sometimes I don't get e-mail notification of comments as they come in. I average about four comments per post, not counting comments received on my Facebook page, which links to the blog each day.

Today is my 1,986th post. Over the years, I've developed a system by which I post almost every morning, usually on a topic I pick either the day before, or as I sit down at the desk and look at the headlines. I try to keep it topical, but I have a huge "Blog Fodder" file of links to things I think are interesting and worth writing about, so I seldom have a problem finding something on which to base a post.

I started labeling posts fairly late in the process, and have found it an interesting way to keep track of the general sorts of things I've blogged about ... for instance, I've done 180 Cartoon Saturdays and eight Ass Clown of the Week/Month/Year awards.

I've collected a group of online fellow bloggers whose blogs I regularly read, and who are frequent commenters - some of my oldest (and I use the term loosely, for the most part) blogging friends are Mike, John, Amanda, Craziequeen, Captain Picard, and Andrea; newer, but equally valued virtual friends are Angelique, Heidi, Elvis, Peg, Duckbutt, and Banana Oil. Some of my friends don't blog much any more, like Gilahi (although he still lurks and comments occasionally, and we still get together for a few drinks every couple of months), Fiona, and Buggie. In addition to Gilahi and Buggie, I've also met and enjoyed the company of Kathy and her husband, and met other interesting people at various bloggers' happy hours and get-togethers in the local area.

Blogging is my creative outlet and (aside from ballroom dancing) my favorite pastime. I enjoy the writing, the commenting, and the ability to make new ... if virtual ... friends.

And so, Dear Readers, I hope you'll stick with me for the next six years ... or however long I can keep this space fresh and interesting.

Thanks for taking this journey with me. I appreciate all of you.

Have a good day. More thoughts tomorrow.

Bilbo

Not Just Sans Serif, Sans the Whole #@$! Letter

I am in a quandry, suffering from a problem that I do not often face: a world-class case of writer's block.

Yes, Dear Readers, ol' Bilbo, he of the enormous and overflowing fountain of verbiage, is having trouble writing a letter.

Most of you probably still know what the expression writing a letter means, except for Mike, but perhaps someone can explain it to him.

Anyhow, the situation is this: each year at this time, I write a Christmas letter that goes out to our closest friends to bring them up to date on what's been going on at Chez Bilbo. I begin by writing the basic letter to my friend Toni ... this letter is very long, because Toni and I haven't actually seen each other since her wedding in about 1980, and she always wants to know everything that's been going on. After writing the letter to Toni, I then word-process it to create individualized letters for all our other friends who may not need or want that much detail, or who are only interested in certain aspects of our adventures (family, travel, dancing, blogging, world domination, etc).

Generally, I don't have a problem cranking out the basic letter, but this year is different. I can't get it together. I have plenty of notes, lots of existing documentation in the form of the blog, my travel journal, and the 7500 exabytes of photographs I've taken over the year ... but I just can't seem to get it all down on paper (or in properly-aligned electrons on a hard disk) in a coherent letter. Or as coherent a letter as I usually write.

I'd say this is driving me crazy, but - as my mother would probably have said - that's not really a drive, it's just a putt, ha, ha.

So ...

Toni and everyone else who looks forward to receiving Bilbo's Extravagant Holiday Epistle, hang in there. I'll get it together sooner or later. Hopefully sooner. If you are not on the mailing list but would like to get a real letter (not handwritten, unfortunately ... because of the volume, this is the one letter each year that I prepare with the word processor) to keep all your junk mail company, send your snail mail address to der_blogmeister(at)yahoo(dot)com, and I will add you to the list.

In the meantime, for those of you who didn't get the title of this post, a serif is a small addition to a font that helps to set each letter apart from those around it and make it more legible. A letter that is sans serif is one that does not use serifs (the word sans in French means without). Here's an illustration:

This, of course, lends itself to todays terrible pun (sorry, Eric Clapton) ...

There's also a great riff on serifs offered up today by Miss Cellania ... you can read it here.

That's all for now. I need to hook up my mental jumper cables and get that letter written, serifs or no.

After all, somebody's got to support the Postal Service.

Have a good day. More thoughts tomorrow.

Bilbo

In Brief ... Not

A week or so ago my old high school friend Ed (Ed the attorney, not Ed the Professor Emeritus of Microbiology) posted a link to this article from the American Bar Association Journal on his Facebook page: 7th Circuit Slaps Lawyer for 345-Word Sentence and Briefs Full of ‘Gibberish.’

The synopsis of the article said simply that a federal appeals court was so aggravated by the quality of an Illinois lawyer’s legal writing that it ordered him to show cause why he should not be barred from practicing before the court. The court said the hapless lawyer was "unable to file an intelligible complaint,” even given three tries to do so. At least 23 sentences in the brief were over 100 words long, and the court decision included as an example a single sentence consisting of 345 words. You expect that in German, but in English, not so much.

To quote from the actual decision (which you can read in its entirety here),

“Each iteration of the complaint was generally incomprehensible and riddled with errors, making it impossible for the defendants to know what wrongs they were accused of committing ... Though the complaint was far longer than it needed to be, prolixity was not its chief deficiency. Rather, its rampant grammatical, syntactical, and typographical errors contributed to an overall sense of unintelligibility. This was compounded by a vague, confusing, and conclusory articulation of the factual and legal basis for the claims and a general 'kitchen sink' approach to pleading the case.”

Well, I guess they told him.

In his defense, the attorney claimed he was suffering from problems related to cancer treatments. Now, I'm all in favor of giving someone the benefit of the doubt, but churning out something utterly unintelligible even after three tries seems to say more about the quality of education than it does about the side effects of medical treatments. I don't claim to be the reincarnation of William Shakespeare, but I think I manage to spell correctly (even without spell-check) and write more or less clearly most of the time.

When ... and perhaps more importantly, why ... did we stop placing a premium on good written expression? I've seen lots of reasons cited: the decline in writing journals and personal letters, the advent of the telephone for immediate verbal communication, and the proliferation of e-mail and text messaging to name a few. But whatever the reason, I think it's sad that we have people in positions of responsibility and authority who can charge hundreds of dollars an hour for their services, but can't write a clear and grammatical English sentence.

Of course, if you're a member of Congress, it doesn't matter if you can write well because you can't agree with anyone on what to write, anyway.

And that's really sad.

Have a good day. Write something (and yes, allenwoodhaven, I still owe you the letter I promised you ... it's coming).

More thoughts tomorrow.

Bilbo

Post Office, RIP (... almost)

Along with all the other parts of the economy that are going belly-up, we now have one of the nation's most venerable institutions - the Post Office.

For many reasons - economic, managerial, and political - the US Postal Service is teetering on the edge of bankruptcy. This article by Phillip Rubio discusses why the Postal Service remains a necessary part of American life, tying people together, offering an employment bridge by which people could aspire to reach what's left of the middle class, and providing essential communications service to some of the nation's most remote and underserved locations.

As you might suspect, I have some thoughts on the subject.

One reason the Postal Service is on the ropes is the decline in the writing of personal letters. In a world of e-mail, text messaging, and ubiquitous cell phones, who needs to invest the time and energy needed to sit down and compose a real letter? Those of you with whom I have corresponded by snail mail know that I love to write long and chatty letters ... but even I suffer from the simple fact that writing that kind of letter takes time that I don't always have any more. And it isn't just a matter of time - because our schools no longer teach people to actually compose and write, many of those younger than my generation actually have no real idea of how to write a letter - personal or official. I could tell you horror stories about the abysmal level of writing skill I have seen from people who have college degrees hanging on their walls, but it's just too depressing.

Another reason the Postal Service is in trouble is that it is a major provider of entry- and lower-level government jobs ... the sort of jobs that are in the crosshairs of economic conservatives who would cut government at every level to the absolute bone and shift many services now provided by government agencies to the private sector. If you don't think the Postal Service will be gutted, if not demolished, under a Republican administration, you're more optimistic than I am.

The Post Office is one of the original agencies of the federal government, founded on July 26, 1775 by the nation's first Postmaster General - Benjamin Franklin. It represents many things and has many problems, but I think it is one of the most important and iconic agencies of the government, providing services that touch every one of us. The US Postal Service's 2001 Comprehensive Statement on Postal Operations contained this variation on the classic (if unofficial) post office motto: neither snow, nor rain, nor heat, nor gloom of night, nor the winds of change, nor a nation challenged, will stay us from the swift completion of our appointed rounds.

Sadly, it isn't rain, or heat, or gloom, or winds that have brought the post office to the edge of ruin. It's politics, economic pressures, and the decline in writing.

And that's a real shame.

Want a hand-written personal letter? Send your snail mail address to bilbo_the_blogger (at symbol) yahoo (dot) com, and I'll send you one. It may be one of the only ones you ever get. Offer not available to Mike, who still owes me replies to the letters I've already written to him. So there.

Have a good day. Write something. More thoughts tomorrow.

Bilbo

Yet More Great Moments in Editing

What with helicopter crashes in Afghanistan, terrible economic news, an inept and useless Congress, and general personal crankiness, I need something funny to start out another week. How about some more Great Moments in Editing?

You can't be too careful ...

I certainly hope they have fresh breasts ...

I'm sure the owner was happy to get it back in one ... uh ... never mind ...

And after the trial is over, he's going to run for Congress ...

I'm not sure I'd want anyone who was willing to volunteer for this one ...

I guess they don't need to know geography as long as they can cook ...

I wonder why they're not meeting in the 5-H building ...

Maybe this is why the ladies at the dance party Saturday night at Forever Dancing were looking at me oddly ...

I guess sometimes you just forget things in the ... uh ... heat of the moment ...

And we're off to start yet another week. I can hardly wait.

Have a good day. More thoughts (hopefully, properly-edited ones) tomorrow.

Bilbo

Still More Great Moments in Editing

Businesses are cutting back on expenses wherever they can, and the print media are no different from any other businesses. Unfortunately, furloughing your editor isn't always the best move you can make. Here, for your entertainment, is the latest in my continuing series of great moments in editing. Well, in not editing, actually. Whatever. Enjoy ...

It must have fallen off the truck ...

Oops ...

Stop the presses!! ...

Must have been donated by Congress ...

Alto? Soprano? Bass, even? ...

I don't know if this makes me feel better about flying, or not ...

This one surely doesn't ...

Perhaps this is why it took so long to track down and get rid of Osama bin Laden ...

It was probably just the surprise of the whole thing ...

We've known for a long time that stupidity can be an inherited trait, but ...

Good editing. Just one more victim of the false economy of saving money by cutting back on school funding.

Have a good day. Spell it correctly. More thoughts tomorrow.

Bilbo

They Said WHAT???

Yesterday, while I was at work struggling to craft a document that would be agreeable to three different, opinionated, and eternally-squabbling organizations, I received an e-mail from my daughter with a link to this wonderfully optimistic article: Feds Must Stop Writing Gibberish Under New Law.

Yes, Dear Readers, according to the Plain Writing Act of 2010 (a mere three pages!) and the Federal Plain Language Guidelines (all 117 pages of them) which offer helpful information on how Federal agencies can implement it, you should actually be able to understand the laws, regulations, and other information issued by your government.

What a concept!

For those of you who have struggled for years to learn Old Church Slavonic, the official language of the Federal Government, this will be welcome news. It should also be of great interest not only to teachers of English such as Kathy and Melissa, but to everyone who desperately yearns to know just what the hell those instructions on your Form 1040 - or the Federal standards for almost anything - actually mean.

A long time ago I had a heated, yet friendly discussion about legal gobbledygook with a friend who is a lawyer. He strongly objected to the negative image of tortured legalese because, in his opinion, such language was important for its precision and legal clarity - because every letter of every word had been endlessly litigated over many years until its meaning was crystal clear.

At least to lawyers, as we saw in the famous parsing of the definition of the word "is" by former President Clinton. As George Will once commented, "Creative semantics is the key to contemporary government; it consists of talking in strange tongues lest the public learn the inevitable inconveniently early."

So check out the Center for Plain Language and encourage your elected reprehensives (and their appointed officials) to use the Language of Real People instead of strange tongues.

There's no telling what we might learn if we could actually understand the arcane language of government.

Have a good day. Cartoon Saturday is coming! More thoughts then.

Bilbo

All Ranted Out

After the last two days, my ranting gland has stopped secreting. It's not that I don't have anything to rant about (as long as there are Republicans, Democrats, and similar wingnuts available, I'll never run out of material) ... it's just that I don't feel like ranting this morning. I'll do it tomorrow.

Today, let's talk about pencils*.

I learned this morning that today is the anniversary of the day in 1858 when a Philadelphia gentleman named Hyman Lipman patented one of the most amazingly useful things ever: the pencil with an attached eraser. Before that time (and in Europe still today), pencils were just ... well ... pencils, and you needed to search for a rubber eraser each time you made a mistake. Mr Lipman's brilliant idea was to attach the eraser to the pencil, so that you could erase your mistakes on the fly. Here are a few other factoids about pencils of which you may not be aware:

- A common #2 (medium soft) pencil can write an unbroken line about 35 miles long, or the equivalent of about 45,000 words (more if they're short).

- While we often refer to the "lead" in a pencil, the actual filler has been not poisonous lead but non-toxic graphite since the mid-1500's. Pencils were first mass-produced in Nuremberg, Germany, in 1662 (great writers, those Germans). The German word for pencil is Bleistift, or "lead stick."

- Speaking of what pencils are called in other languages, the Russian word for pencil is karandash, from the Turkish word karadash ("black stone"). The French satirist and political cartoonist Emmanuel Poire took his nickname - Caran d'Ache - from that noble Russian word.

- The average pencil in the US is machined into a hexagonal shape so that it won't roll away when you lay it down, and it's yellow because (according to one version of the history) yellow was the traditional color of Chinese royalty, and the best graphite for pencils was mined in China. Another theory is that pencils are yellow to make them easier to see in the clutter on your desk (I like that one).

- One of my favorite quotes about writing is from author John Steinbeck, who once said that "I have owed you this letter for a very long time, but my fingers have avoided the pencil as if it were an old and poisoned tool." Mr Steinbeck didn't really avoid many pencils, though ... he wrote the drafts of his books in pencil, and started every day with 24 freshly sharpened ones lined up on his desk; he was said to have used 300 pencils to write East of Eden, and 60 a day while writing The Grapes of Wrath and Cannery Row.

- Need pencils? Every pencil your heart could ever desire can be found at Pencils.com.

But that's enough about pencils. It's time for me to get the lead out (as pencils did back in the 1500's) and get ready to go to work.

Have a good day. Raise a glass to Hyman Lipman when you have to erase that line. More thoughts tomorrow.

Bilbo

* In the government, we call them "graphite-filled, wood-encased data transcription instruments with attached extraneous data eradicator."

The Importance of Handwriting

If you are one of the select group of readers of this blog with whom I've exchanged handwritten letters, you are already familiar with my style of handwriting...it's sort of a mutated version of the elegant Palmer Method script drilled into me by the nuns at my grade school many years ago:
Nice, isn't it? Of course, my handwriting today doesn't always look too much like that, at least not after the first few lines of a letter when I tend to rush more and get sloppy. Of my fellow bloggers with whom I have exchanged letters, the neatest (or, at least, most elegant) cursive writing belongs to the Green Canary, with Amanda not far behind. Andrea and Fiona have nice cursive writing also. John's handwriting is perfectly legible, but not as neat and tidy as that of the ladies, and Mike's ... well ... since Mike writes in invisible ink, it's hard to tell just how legible his handwriting is.

Okay, I wrote all that so that I could set up this topic about whether or not cursive writing should be taught in schools.

In the September issue of the Costco Connection magazine (which you receive if you are one of those folks like us who purchase things in huge bulk at the Costco warehouse stores), there is an interesting discussion in the "Informed Debate" section titled "Should Students Still Be Taught Cursive Writing?" You can read it online here, and there are also links to other articles on the topic.

The arguments against teaching cursive seem to center on these: it's a useless skill at a time when everything is typed on a keyboard, the skills of fine motor control that come with cursive writing can be taught in more efficient ways, and time spent in learning cursive can be better applied to improving reading skills. Arguments in favor of teaching cursive include: teaching focus and attention to detail, improving fine motor skills, and helping connect the written word to the spoken via phonics.

Who's right?

As you all already know, I'm a great fan of the written word. I love sending and receiving handwritten letters (although I don't send as many as I used to because it takes so long to write the sort of letters I enjoy writing and receiving). There is nothing quite like the thrill of holding a handwritten letter in your hand and knowing as you read that the same document was held in the hand of your correspondent ... there's a personal connection there that an e-mail, a tweet, or a typewritten letter just can't match.

And knowing cursive writing is more important than just for the ability to write letters, too. Although I am able to poke out short reminders and shopping lists on my trusty iPhone, I find it faster and easier to just write them down in good old ink on whatever paper is available. I have piles of notebooks and scratch pads to catch random doodles and thoughts. If nothing else, I'll still be able to read those handwritten notes if the electricity goes out or the batteries die.

I personally think it would be a tragedy to stop teaching cursive writing in schools. While it's true that keyboarding skills are important in an age when everything is done electronically, there's a lot to be said for having the skill to sit down and thoughtfully compose and write by hand. Even allowing for the fact that I'm a traditionalist, I think that elegant (or, at least, legible) cursive writing is a skill that says a lot about us and the things we value.

So join me in resisting the move to eliminate the teaching of cursive in our schools. And if you want to see just what ol' Bilbo's handwriting looks like, e-mail me your snail mail address and I will write you your own personal letter to compete with all the bills and junk mail that fill your unhappy mailbox every day.

Have a good day. Write someone a letter. More thoughts tomorrow.

Bilbo

Men of Letters

I recently finished reading the Millenium Trilogy by the late Swedish author Stieg Larsson (The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo, The Girl Who Played with Fire, and The Girl Who Kicked the Hornet's Nest) and strongly recommend them ... Lisbeth Salander (The Girl) is one of the most interesting and enjoyable characters I've run across in a long time. I'm now re-reading one of my all-time favorite books: The Groucho Letters: Letters From and To Groucho Marx.

Groucho Marx, the leader of the famous vaudeville, radio, and movie team The Marx Brothers, was not only a very funny performer, but a very literate and funny person. The Groucho Letters contains a wide range of letters from Groucho to his many friends and admirers, as well as letters written to him, and is guaranteed to bring a smile to your lips and a laugh to your heart, no matter how bad the day. Reading this book reminds me of why I enjoy writing (and receiving) letters ... and, sadly, why writing letters is a dying art in this era of e-mail, emoticons, Twitter, and text messaging.

I have enjoyed an occasional exchange of letters with some of you who responded to my original offer of a personal handwritten letter made two years ago. My second offer elicited only a single request for a letter: said letter is still owed to my old friend Ed, who waits patiently by his mailbox with his feet taking root and pachysandra curling around his aging legs.

But I digress. Here are a few examples of the sort of wonderful wit from the pages of The Groucho Letters ...

"I would have answered your letter sooner, but you didn't write one." (Goodman Ace to Groucho)

"I have a little matter to discuss with my fans in the internal revenue office. It seems they would like my autograph - on a small check."

In response to Groucho's complaint that he was receiving too much junk mail (and this was in 1951) and not enough fan mail, Fred Allen wrote, "If you are going to eliminate mail you cannot hope to do it through closing up the post office and the postal department. Without the post office, politicians would have no places to put their brothers-in-law. You can only stop this avalanche of fan mail through lowering your standards and going after the illiterate crowd."

An 11-year old autograph seeker wrote that Groucho's brother Gummo told her father that if she wrote to Groucho he would happily send her an autograph. Groucho wrote, "Confidentially, this Gummo comes from a long line of Romanian Gypsies; he was deposited at our doorstep at the age of fifty, and there's nothing we can do about it. Here is the autograph. I would send you a lock of my hair, but it's at the barbershop getting washed."

For a good time, read The Groucho Letters. And then sit down and write a letter to ol' Bilbo. Yes, Mike, I'm talking to you.

And don't give up, Ed ... you will get your letter.

Have a good day. Write to someone. I would be a good choice. More thoughts tomorrow.

Bilbo

P.S. - If you would like to receive a personal, handwritten letter, you too can join Ed in his hopeful vigil at the mailbox by sending your snail mail address to me: bilbo_the_blogger (at) yahoo (dot) com. I will not share your address, and you'll get your letter. Eventually.

B.

More Pens, Quickly

This is one of those mornings when I've got to get myself off to work early, so it'll be a short post. It's actually part two of yesterday's discussion of pens.

There are two pictures from my pen collection I didn't share with you yesterday. First is this one, which is a closeup of one of the dip pen nibs:

As you can see, it's in the shape of a pointing index finger, which I think is rather cool. I have another which is in the shape of a different pointing finger...but this is a family blog.

This is the pen and pencil set that Agnes made for me a few months back at a pen-turning class she took at a local woodworking shop...

She's very talented that way. It's a good division of labor: she makes the pens, and I write with them.

I'm afraid that's going to be it for today...I have to drive to the Metro station and leave the car so that I can pick it up later and go to an afternoon meeting across town. That means getting to the Metro garage in time to actually get a parking place, so...

Gotta run. Have a good day. More thoughts tomorrow.

Bilbo

Ode to the Humble Pen

As you know, my dear and long-suffering readers, I like to write as much as I like to read. Those who like to read always look for book stores and libraries, while those of us who like to write always know where the stationery stores are...where to buy the writing paper, notepads, envelopes, and other tools of the writer's trade, like pens.

This past Sunday the Washington Post ran a front-page article that paid homage to one of the most widely-known and used, and yet most invisible symbols of the US government: the humble, durable, Skilcraft ballpoint pen:Those of you who live outside the US may not recognize or appreciate it, but if you have ever been in a US government office, mailed a letter at a post office, or served in the military, chances are you have used the iconic, blind-made, Skilcraft ballpoint pen. Being made for the government, the pen is designed to a very detailed set of specifications, which are summarized in this chart from the Post article:

The amazing Skilcraft ballpoint pen is like a Christmas fruitcake: indestructible and long-lasting.

For my writing taste, though, this pen is just a bit too short for comfortable writing. For day-to-day use, I prefer the Pilot G2 fine-point rolling ball pen with blue ink and rubber grip:

I buy them in boxes of 12 at the local office supply store.

For writing personal letters, though, I enjoy writing with a nice dip pen. Here are a few of the dip pens from my collection:

These pens, except for the blue glass Murano pen (second from the top), are characterized by a body which can accommodate various nibs to produce various styles or qualities of lines. I prefer a fine-point nib for most of my writing. Here are a few close-ups of some of the nibs in my collection...

This one is called, for obvious reasons, an "Eiffel Tower" nib. Also shown is one of the spiffy pen holders I use to keep the ink-loaded pen off the desktop. I found this particular holder in a stationery store in Montreal during our trip there for our 20th anniversary...

This is a closeup of the nib of my Murano glass pen...

This is an absolutely beautiful pen, but I don't use it quite as much because the point is a little too large, and it produces a fatter line than I usually like.

Of course, if you use a dip pen, you need ink...

As you see, I keep three colors of ink in my nifty bottle holder, but I prefer to use blue for my writing.

I also have a fountain pen that uses ink cartridges...

This is a nice pen, but the barrel is a little too fat for comfortable writing...it's best for writing signatures (when you don't have to press to make 16 copies, which is death on the nib).

So...

Everything you ever wanted to know about my pen collection. If you would like to have a personal letter, written with a genuine dip pen and bottled ink, send your snail mail address to bilbo_the_blogger (at symbol) yahoo dot com, and I'll send you your very own letter. There's just something about getting a nice, handwritten, personal letter in the mailbox that e-mail and text messages just can't match.

Such a deal! Act now...because of the amount of time it takes to write a long letter with a dip pen, only the first five respondents can be accommodated.

Pens. They're low-tech, simple to operate, and will always work when the power goes out. Don't leave home without them.

Have a good day. Write more. More thoughts tomorrow.

Bilbo