AWADmail Issue 253
March 18, 2007
A Compendium of Feedback on the Words in A.Word.A.Day
and Other Interesting Tidbits about Words and Languages
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From: Anu Garg (words wordsmith.org)
Subject: Interesting stories from the net
A Tour of the Oxford English Dictionary:
http://www.ft.com/cms/s/008ffd12-c6fd-11db-8078-000b5df10621.html
Punning May Be Injurious to Your Health:
http://hosted.ap.org/dynamic/stories/I/INDONESIA_SLEEPING_POLICEMEN?SITE=AP
Poetry in Motion:
http://seattletimes.nwsource.com/html/localnews/2003592946_here28m.html
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From: Fausto Zapata (faustozapata themediatech.com)
Subject: Re: A.Word.A.Day--tridecennary
Refer: http://wordsmith.org/words/tridecennary.html
Happy Anniversary!
I want to express my gratitude for your invaluable, intelligent and highly
enjoyable information. I read your pages daily. It is, I must tell you, a
very addictive habit. Tonight my family and I will celebrate your first
tridecennary with a glass of wine and a renewing of our love for words.
Fausto Zapata
Mexico
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From: Dann (mrm mrmuster.com)
Subject: 13 years of AWAD, 4 millennia of celebration
The AWAD anniversary is quite an auspicious occasion! Not only is it a
cause for celebration for linguaphiles the world over, but it is also one
of the High Holidays within the wonderful world of Mathematics! On this
day each year, acolytes and neophytes gather at the temples of Mathematics
to assist their professors in conducting observances commemorating the
awesome power of the number we now call pi. It's known as Pi Day and is
cause for much geekish joy and officially sanctioned overindulgence of
sugar (typically consumed in the form of pies, be they round or square).
Viva la 3.14!
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From: Mary Elizabeth McIlvane (maryelizmc atlantic.net)
Subject: What do you know? (13 letters)
H A P P Y B I R T H D A Y
1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13!
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From: Ewa Nartowska (ewanarto krk.pl)
Subject: Happy Birthday!
It has been probably for about ten years now that I've received A.Word.A.Day
having been subscribed to it by my former student while she was in America.
I do not remember the exact day and my previous hard disk was dead one day
alas.
Anyway, I just want to send you my warmest wishes of happy birthday and MANY
happy returns of the day!
It was in AWADmail Issue 22, December 24, 2000, that you posted a poem
"Psalm" by Polish female Nobel Prize winner Szymborska sent by me. Twenty
people wrote to me then. And one of them, a woman from Nantucket, has been
my very good friend up to today. Seven years of friendship.
I also kept exchanging emails with several other people met at AWAD from
the USA, Canada, and India. We became 'sisters' with another woman from
Seattle one day.
Perhaps you might ask AWAD-people to share their experiences of magic
meetings and friendship thanks to AWAD? Are there any married couples
who met from reading AWAD? It might be an interesting topic.
Ewa Nartowska,
Krakow, Poland
Thanks for your kind words and thank you to all who wrote.
I know of at least one instance where two people who met on
http://wordsmith.org/board married. If there are more,
drop us a line.
-Anu Garg
(words at wordsmith.org)
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From: Sally Boyson (email withheld.com)
Subject: Tridecennary
In making the observation that there "is" only one Google entry for the
word tridecennary, you have demonstrated beautifully the scientific
principle that you cannot measure a thing without changing it in some
way. Now there are six entries (or eight, if you count the redundancies).
Google, at 4:10 pm Mountain Daylight Time (USA) on March 12, 2007.
----------------------------
From: Bob Harrison (bob quailcroft.com)
Subject: RE: All things 13
Many years ago when I was in seminary, my wife and I decided that we wanted
to have a party -- but when you're a seminary student with responsibilities
on Sunday morning, Saturday night is not the best choice for partying. So
we decided to have our party on a Friday night instead, and noting that a
Friday the 13th was coming up, we decided it would be fun (and somewhat
theologically appropriate!) to have a party on that night. From that
original occasion, a tradition was born: for some 30+ years now, through
changes of careers (and wives), I have had a party every Friday the 13th (at
least one every year, no more than three in any one year). Except that now,
having learned the right word, instead of simply a "Friday the 13th party"
we have meetings of the Antitriskaidecaphobic Society!
----------------------------
From: Stuart Feild (thestuartemail gmail.com)
Subject: Re: A.Word.A.Day--triskaidekaphobia
Refer: http://wordsmith.org/words/triskaidekaphobia.html
In Russia, it's Monday the 13th that they dread.
----------------------------
From: Yigal Levin (leviny1 mail.biu.ac.il)
Subject: Re: tridecennary
For Jews worldwide, a boy's thirteenth birthday is a particularly
significant rite of passage - his Bar Mitzvah, at which time he becomes
a full member of the community and liable for his own conduct under
Jewish law. For girls, who as any parent knows grow up faster, the
equivalent Bat Mitzvah is celebrated at the age of twelve.
----------------------------
From: Giuseppe Scozzafava (g.scozzafava well.ox.ac.uk)
Subject: Re: A.Word.A.Day--tridecennary
In Italy 13 is a considered a lucky number as it is connected with winning
the pools! To win you have to predict the correct outcome of 13 football
matches picked from the fixtures of Serie A, Serie B and even Serie C
(i.e. almost unheard of teams): not an easy task! And if you are the only
one to get it right, you scoop the jackpot!
On the other hand, it is the number 17 which is thought to be unlucky, to
the point that you will not find an address in Italy with the number 17 on
it: it will be 16A instead....
Giuseppe Scozzafava
(An Italian living in England, because as someone pointed out, the food,
the wine and the weather is so much better here...)
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From: Angie (veryvenus13 aol.com)
Subject: This week's words
I was surprised to see this week's theme is on the number 13. It is my
favorite number. And today I am closing a condo I'm buying. It's on 13
Mile Rd! When I was 13 years old, I won $13 on WKNR 13. So, this morning,
I was lifted up to see the word theme as 13 on the same day I'm closing.
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From: Dar Churcher (darch telus.net)
Subject: tridecennary
Regarding the beautiful word, tridecennary - my mother happened to give
birth to me on the 13th day of November which was incidentally also a
Friday. It's probably no surprise that I hold both the number 13 and
Fridays that fall on the 13th in very high regard and consider them both
very lucky. I always feel jilted when I'm riding in an elevator that has
labeled the 13th floor of a building as the 14th. The poor number 13
suffers discrimination with every elevator ride taken!
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From: David Jones (ddj44 comcast.net)
Subject: triskaidekaphobia
I recollect from Ripley's Believe It or Not, from many many decades ago, that
the 13th of the month falls on Friday more often than on any other day of
the week. http://scienceworld.wolfram.com/astronomy/FridaytheThirteenth.html
----------------------------
From: Alexis Melteff (aapm52 yahoo.com)
Subject: Re: A.Word.A.Day--baker's dozen
Refer: http://wordsmith.org/words/bakers_dozen.html
In Russian, 13 is called a devil's dozen (chertova dyuzhyna)
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From: Robin Carpenter (analytix valley.net)
Subject: Baker's Dozen
Through his professional life, my father Murray Carpenter wore, and used,
a gold signet ring inscribed simply "13" on its face. A correspondent
receiving a letter sealed with a dollop of sealing wax pressed with the
enigmatic "13" could hardly help asking what it meant. The answer, both a
little hokey and deeply sincere, was that it stood for his baker's dozen
policy; Always deliver all that was promised... and a little more.
----------------------------
From: Beth Storheim (beth.storheim gmail.com)
Subject: Re: A.Word.A.Day--baker's dozen
As an employee at Safeway, I'm well-acquainted with the term "baker's dozen".
Except that at Safeway, someone higher up thought to change the definition
of that term for the company's purposes, so that OUR "baker's dozen" is 14,
not 13. More bagels for your buck, I suppose.
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From: Susan Gluck (susanjgluck earthlink.net)
Subject: Re: A.Word.A.Day--rondeau
Refer: http://wordsmith.org/words/rondeau.html
At the French Culinary Institute, we were taught that a rondeau is
a medium-sized, round pot good for using on the stove or in the oven.
Many a tasty dish has come from the bon rondeau!
----------------------------
From: Ross Miller (boatmiller snet.net)
Subject: Evolution of a Quotation
"My country, right or wrong" is how we hear it most often these days. It
originated with Stephen Decatur, who said, in an 1816 toast to his victory
over the Barbary pirates, "Our country! In her intercourse with foreign
nations, may she always be in the right; but our country, right or wrong."
Half a century later Carl Schurz refined it to "Our country, right or wrong.
When right, to be kept right; when wrong, to be put right." G.K. Chesterton
put a further point on it with "'My country, right or wrong' is a thing no
patriot would ever think of saying except in a desperate case. It is like
saying 'My mother, drunk or sober.'" These days it seems my mother is drunk.
----------------------------
From: Roger Bullard (rogabullard earthlink.net)
Subject: Quotation for March 14
"Tomatoes and oregano make it Italian; wine and tarragon make it French.
Sour cream makes it Russian; lemon and cinnamon make it Greek. Soy sauce
makes it Chinese; garlic makes it good." -Alice May Brock, author (1941- )
And high fructose corn syrup makes it American
............................................................................
Words are things; and a small drop of ink / Falling like dew upon a thought,
produces / That which makes thousands, perhaps millions, think. -Lord Byron,
(1788-1824)
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