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July 24
Twenty-five dollars per month. That was all. It wasn’t an inconsequential sum; that provided a measure of reassurance. But now it was 1895, which made him 33 years old, and he was sure his friends would say to him “Bill! Bill Porter! You’re a family man now, and you’ve just moved to Houston. Will $25… Continue reading
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Don’t worry, be….
One of the bewilderingly many ways to form words in English is by prepending “be-.” That is, the syllable “be” is put in front of another word, which then becomes a new word. If English was read top to bottom instead of left to right, of course, the modified, bespoke word would be beneath the… Continue reading
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July 23
The New Jersey Turnpike isn’t just a single road; it’s a combination of toll highways running throughout the state. It took two years to build the 117-mile-long main part of the road, including rest areas. Each area is named after someone with some identifiable connection with New Jersey. The names on the rest areas are… Continue reading
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The waif waived
Here’s a pair of words that are occasionally confused: “waive” (to voluntarily give up the right to something) and “waif” (an orphaned child — this one is a bit archaic at this point). The interesting thing about this pair of words is that although their meanings are quite distinct, ithey’re pretty closely related. The words… Continue reading
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’tis but a puddle!
One thing about English is that the number of words it includes has gotten completely out of hand. Although there isn’t any way to figure out what the actual total is (it’s not that easy to decide what counts as a word), there are probably at least 250,000. There are even estimates as high as… Continue reading
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July, approximately π
As everybody knows, March 14 is Pi Day, because in month/day format the third month and fourteenth day make 3.14, the first three digits of pi. What not everybody knows is that today, July 22, is Pi Approximation Day, because in day/month format (which is used everywhere but the US) it’s 22/7, and that’s the… Continue reading
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Oh nonsense
Dictionaries are biased toward words they can find in print. When a word is in use, but mostly spoken rather than printed, it can fly under the dictionary radar. One such word is blatherskite, an “informal” word (in dictionary-speak that means it’s mostly spoken) that’s a regional Americanism. “Blatherskite” means both nonsense and a person… Continue reading
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July 21
I’ll make this fast — because it’s July 21, after all, the day Louis Rigolly became the first person to drive a car faster than 100 mph. He did it in 1904, on a beach in Belgium (a good choice; today is Belgium National Day there). He drove a French Gobron-Brillié racing car. Gobron-Brillié made… Continue reading
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Getting organized…not
Amid the chaos of everyday life, it’s common to mistake one word for another, or to think that two words might be related even though they aren’t. And the way English works, if enough people make the same mistake, it’s not really a mistake any more and ends up memorialized in the dictionary. “Chaos” is… Continue reading
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July 20
The Ford Model T was famous for being the car the general public could afford, for being pretty reliable for its day, and for being available in “any color you wanted, as long as it was black.” On July 20, 1903, when the very first Ford was offered for sale, things were slightly different. The… Continue reading
About Me
I’m Pete Harbeson, a writer (among other things) located near Boston, Massachusetts. In addition to writing my own content, I’ve learned to translate for my loquacious and opinionated pup Chocolate Bossypaws. No surprise, she mostly speaks in doggerel. You can find her contributions tagged with Chocolatiana.
Check out my other blog, Techlimitics, where I’m grappling with the nature of simplicity. You can also find some of my minor software projects at GitHub. Nothing very impressive. I mostly write tiny utilities in Python.
I find myself suddenly de-corporatized (their choice, not mine). To help keep the lights on, buy me a coffee!
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