User talk:Ro Thorpe/Archive 2: Difference between revisions

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(→‎commas: what Oscar said, not Wildly)
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{{awelcome}} [[User:Aleksander Stos|Aleksander Stos]] 01:38, 5 October 2007 (CDT)
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== Re: thanks et al. ==
== commas ==
 
Since you tried I'll give you an approximation: it's something like un-j (accent on "un") -- but please keep it strictly confidential, I don't want my test to be too easy ;-) [[User:Aleksander Stos|Aleksander Stos]] 11:39, 5 October 2007 (CDT)
PS. I enjoy some differences too (on occasions I still edit enwiki/frwiki).
 
:1. Just like this :)
:2. Your infobox is pretty cool. I deleted something a few months ago as there was no working template, I guess. (I put the wikitext on the talk for possible future re-use.) It was  famous [[CZ:The Big Cleanup | Big Cleanup]] operation, we suppressed many unsupported links. Cheers, [[User:Aleksander Stos|Aleksander Stos]] 03:03, 6 October 2007 (CDT)


==User:Robert==
"I was working on the proof of one of my poems all the morning, and took out a comma. In the afternoon I put it back again." the Wild Oscar.... [[User:Hayford Peirce|Hayford Peirce]] 11:35, 12 June 2008 (CDT) - i won't be emulating oscar here - [[User:Ro Thorpe|Ro Thorpe]] 13:03, 12 June 2008 (CDT)
Your link from Wikipedia doesn't work properly because you forgot to replace the space between your names with an underscore. It should be <nowiki>[http://en.citizendium.org/wiki/User:Robert_Thorpe]</nowiki> but you have <nowiki>[http://en.citizendium.org/wiki/User:Robert Thorpe]</nowiki> so the software thinks that you're just naming  the link to "Thorpe". I almost just changed it there but I figured an anonymous IP channging your userpage would be a little suspicious. :-) [[User:Joe Quick|--Joe Quick]] ([[User talk:Joe Quick|Talk]]) 15:42, 9 October 2007 (CDT)


== Re:Plural ==
== Archive 1 ==
Hey, it works now! I guess I had to Save it again in order to activate the link. Oh well, hope this is OK with you Ro -- all of our dicussion pages get too long sometimes.... [[User:Hayford Peirce|Hayford Peirce]] 11:54, 12 June 2008 (CDT)
:Ah, I see -- John created "User talk:Ro Thorpe" -- I had forgotten to put "user talk" into the title of the new article. Geez.  Thanks, John!


I hope I haven't made the wrong impression--just that it's a benefit of the project to create its own article rather than to be a fork of WP.  I'm not implying that there is any kind of ownership here, we encourage everyone to contribute.  You're entirely welcome to develop the article as you see fit as well; I personally have a preference of not using material from WP. --[[User:Robert W King|Robert W King]] 18:18, 12 October 2007 (CDT)
::No problem. Doncha hate it when you miss the little things? [[User:John Dvorak|John Dvorak]] 11:58, 12 June 2008 (CDT)


== Hey ==
thanks for that, don't know how it was done, don't think i'll ask... [[User:Ro Thorpe|Ro Thorpe]] 13:03, 12 June 2008 (CDT)


Thanks for the greeting! I removed the comment, but what's happening again? I'm confused, sorry. Also thanks for revising the [[Jefferson Airplane]] article, it's one of 60s greatest bands. [[User:Yi Zhe Wu|Yi Zhe Wu]] 14:22, 14 October 2007 (CDT)
== Asterisks ==


== Abba ==
Sure, no problem. Do you want just the asterisks removed, or the words following them too? [[User:John Dvorak|John Dvorak]] 15:16, 9 July 2008 (CDT)


Hi Robert, thanks for your note re [[ABBA]]-- will dig a bit and look into it. Feel free to edit accordingly if you have not done so. You can always leave a note on the article talk page too (''later - just noticed you already did'') if you think someone else might see things differently of course. Sorry for my long absence on CZ - work, work, etc, etc... Your note perhaps makes some sense given the ubiquitous extent to which ABBA / Abba was around in pop culture back then (I grew up in Australia where it was unbelievable to witness).
:Alright, I got it. Apparently the schwa symbol is recognized by UTF-8 encoding, but not ANSI. It sure saved a bunch of work though. [[User:John Dvorak|John Dvorak]] 19:06, 9 July 2008 (CDT)


I guess the best approach might be to follow the most generally accepted approach in media that is out there from the time, and now too. If now is different to then I suppose we should go with what is most 'done' in reporting now as opposed to then. The whole topic makes me think back to those very different times quite nostalgically. Anyway, as with all at The Citizendium, 'rewrite away'. My editor expertise derives from the area of [[gay marketing]] not from [[music]], so the points you made about name vs acronym could well hold sway. --[[User:Ian Johnson|Ian Johnson]] 09:51, 22 October 2007 (CDT)
==Arm trouble==
I have just heard of Hayford's misadventures with a certain spinning blade, and discovered you also have some issues as well; I hope things are okay!  I am 75% over my little accident (now it's mostly strength building and flex range regaining). It seems there is an epidemic. --[[User:Robert W King|Robert W King]] 14:37, 19 July 2008 (CDT)


::Just checked the [http://www.abbasite.com/start/index.php?ret=/start/index.php&flash=yes official site] and they seem to go with ABBA rather than Abba, so I guess the all caps version is the current best option. Was good to revisit that site in any case. --[[User:Ian Johnson|Ian Johnson]] 10:03, 22 October 2007 (CDT)
== someone who doesn't get it ==
Hi, Rheaux! Could you do me a favor(our) and take a look at the history of  http://en.citizendium.org/wiki/Bruch_Violin_Concerto_Number_1.


== Spelling pronunciation ==
the guy who has made the entry keeps putting this non-CZ lede para in and I'm tired of fighting him. could you maybe write him a gentle note on his talk page to tell him (briefly) why this shouldn't be here? Many remerciements! [[User:Hayford Peirce|Hayford Peirce]] 15:51, 27 July 2008 (CDT)
Personally, I *hate* those international symbols since they're incomprehensible to me and look, I think, awful. On the other hand, they are, I suppose, useful to those who can understand them. In Wikipedia, for instance, we have this:


*'''Isaac Asimov''' ([[January 2]]?, [[1920]]?<ref name="birthday"/> &ndash; [[April 6]], [[1992]]), [[International Phonetic Alphabet|IPA]]: {{IPA| /ˈaɪzək ˈæzɪˌmɑv/}}<!-- please see talk page for audio link and previous discussions -->, originally Исаак Озимов but now transcribed into [[Russian language|Russian]] as Айзек Азимов [http://ru.wikipedia.org/wiki/Азимов,_Айзек]) was a [[Russia]]n-born [[United States|American]] [[author]] and
== Hola! ==


It looks awful to me but is, I guess, helpful. So I suppose that you should probably go ahead and add your stuff wherever you think it will be helpful. But telling people how to correctly pronounce salmon, often, February, and library is a fool's errand, hehe.... [[User:Hayford Peirce|Hayford Peirce]] 13:32, 25 October 2007 (CDT)
You're back! Saw your minor edit on [[greenhouse]]--oh, much betterer, why didn't I think of that?  Oh, how we missed Ro!  [[User:Aleta Curry|Aleta Curry]] 20:03, 13 August 2008 (CDT)


:I'm for anything that's helpful and not disruptive. Check out Wikipedia for Ken Rosewall and the various links to World No. 1 players etc. -- there were/are a couple of Europeans who have added 10 gazillion words about Muscles and his various records. I think a lot of their stuff is Original Research and heavily biased and I argued with them for a while but finally simply gave up and moved over to CZ. I saw him several times in the late 50s and early 60s, playing Gorgo, Rocket, etc. A great little player, and particularly so because of his long, long career. But nowhere near as good as Gorgo.  Or Sedge or Segura, I would say. But certainly a great gentleman, even if he had "short arms and deep pockets," hehe, like most of the Aussies.... [[User:Hayford Peirce|Hayford Peirce]] 14:10, 25 October 2007 (CDT)
== Friggin' computers and double-friggin' security systems ==


::I'm glad you got to see Gorgo -- he was terrific. I used to try to hit a two-handed forehand after watching Segoo but was baffled: I couldn't get the coordination right, so it was always softer than when I hit it one-handed.  Check out my [[Pancho Segura]] article: hopefully it will give you a good idea of what this guy was about.  Kramer says Rosewall was *maybe* better, but he doesn't sound very convinced about it. I'll take a look at the WP article -- it really needed cleaning up after Carlo C. and "German Friend" (I think) put in all their well-meaning but over-heated research. Maybe someday we could port it over to CZ and clean it up, which is what I've done with the [[Pancho Gonzales]] and [[Bill Tilden]] articles.  Of course, I had written 95% of them at WP, so it was easier to do. On the other hand, they had gotten somewhat mangled by so-called WP "editors". My (great-looking) "Siamese" is actually a mix of Siamese and something else -- in person she looks almost 100% like a pure-bred Tonkinese, a fairly new official classification. Tonks are like Siamese generally but a little heavier in structure. [[User:Hayford Peirce|Hayford Peirce]] 15:39, 25 October 2007 (CDT)
Tell me about it!


== Little Pancho and Big Bill ==
I've just uninstalled my new (two weeks) update of Trend Micro PC-Cillin, which is supposed to be one of the best security programs, because I couldn't stop it from running all the time and disrupting me. Now I'm trying to *re*-install it but am having difficulties. Grrrrrrrrrrrrr!
Thanks for the heads up on the "Open era of tennis" -- I had missed that, and have just added "the" to the article. And, yes, it was absolutely his forehand.  You've never seen anyone hit a better one.  There were a couple of Aussies in the '30s, Bromwich and McGrath, who had two-handed backhands, but I don't know of anyone even remotely famous who had a two-handed forehand before Segoo. And no one else has ever had one to equal it since then. Maybe I should put some more quotes from Kramer into the Segoo article. Also, I read somewhere recently that Segoo himself now says that he should have tried using a two-handed backhand also but that, for some reason, he had never considered doing so at the time. As far as I can recall from the matches in which I saw him play, he *always* used both hands for his forehand -- he was so *fast* that he could get to anything. He played a serve and volley game, came in behind his serve, and generally hit his low volleys and half-volleys with one hand, though. I can't remember if he used one or both hands when hitting the higher volleys, however. As Kramer says in the article, he was the most fun player to watch of all time.


:The Wikipedia pictures of the Tonks seem a little effete to me: I've seen other pictures in which they are more robust than that, and with deeper colors.  But the breed *does* have wide variation in colors....
Life was sure simpler before computers, when Bobby and I were out thumpin' the ball around!


::My old tennis coach, a tough old Irishman from San Francisco who was most definitely *not* gay, used to joke about Tilden being "the best mixed singles player of all time." In fact, check out my [[Ray Casey]] article in CZ. Also the WP article, which has a terrific cartoon from a 1925 London newspaper -- it still isn't in the CZ article because of copyright status. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ray_Casey Casey once had Tilden up one set in the only match they ever played but Big Bill pulled it out in the end.... [[User:Hayford Peirce|Hayford Peirce]] 17:48, 26 October 2007 (CDT)
Cheers!
:This dumb thing is driving me crazy! I couldn't reinstall PC-Cillin -- it keeps telling me it's already there.  But it isn't. Now I've done a System Restore. It's back -- but not working. Geez! I may end up uninstalling it again and paying for another entire program.  Norton is the pits.  McAfee is better, but not much.  That only leaves the one with the Russian name, which generally has pretty good reviews.... Grrrrrrrrrr again! [[User:Hayford Peirce|Hayford Peirce]] 18:48, 17 September 2008 (CDT)


== Cats ==
== back atcha ==
Yes, there are Tonkinese, Burmese (my sister had two for many years), and Birman, which is a *very* recent breed that I had never heard of until a couple of months ago: my dental hygenist has two of them. [[User:Hayford Peirce|Hayford Peirce]] 17:52, 26 October 2007 (CDT)
:Particularly since the French word for Burma is Birmanie.[[User:Hayford Peirce|Hayford Peirce]] 17:53, 26 October 2007 (CDT)


== Various stuff ==
Gave a (probably too long) reply at [[user talk:Aleta Curry#Perfidy|'''my space''']] Ciao! [[User:Aleta Curry|Aleta Curry]] 03:21, 5 October 2008 (CDT)


Yes, Segoo had a 2-handed forehand & a 1-handed backhand. Go here for the pic that I want to put into various articles: http://www.autographedtoyou.com/celebpics/pancho_segura5.jpg I will add some more Kramer quotes. When I lived in London in 1968 I rented a telly just to watch Wimbledon. Kramer did the commentary on one channel, and [[Fred Perry]], a guy Kramer detested, did it on the other. Check out the Perry article for some of Kramer's opinions. Kramer talked about "Poncho", the way it's pronounced in the States, and Perry and the other Brits talked about "Pan- (like a frying pan) Cho".
== ahem ==


I will look at the WP Muscles article later today and get back to you.
Yup, I've been following the drama. I also have a couple of comments towards the end of this Forum argument, strongly supporting Larry: http://forum.citizendium.org/index.php/topic,2389.0.html [[User:Hayford Peirce|Hayford Peirce]] 20:36, 1 November 2008 (UTC)


Yes, Tucson is Mountain Standard Time, BUT without observing Daylight Savings Time. So right now there's two hours difference with CDT, but when the winter hours return, there will only be 1 hour difference.  It's maddening. I'll have to look at your World Alphabetical Time for the arithmetically challenged. I have a couple of daughters in Tahiti, 1 in Australia, friends in Europe, and for 4 years a girlfriend who was from American Samoa, just across the dateline.  More intellectual madness.
::As far as em-dashes go, I didn't have enough space to write clearly in the Subject box.  I meant to say that the word "Insert" was on the left of the "Special Characters" line, and that the em-dash was to the *right* of the word "Insert".  Or at least such is the case on my own screen at the moment. [[User:Hayford Peirce|Hayford Peirce]] 20:36, 1 November 2008 (UTC)


Who *is* the mysterious & departed Duncharris that you say I edited out? I don't catch the reference.
== Thanks ==


''Science fiction as done by Evelyn Waugh'', sounds good -- if only I could! ''The ending of A Handful of Dust, that’s rather sci-fi'' -- and pretty chilling.
for clearing up those points. Of course you are absolutely right about Larry. Never understood the 1st thing about economics myself, though! [[User:Ro Thorpe|Ro Thorpe]] 00:37, 2 November 2008 (UTC)


''Ray Casey – nice article, had never heard of him.'' No one else has either, except me.
== Your testimony ==
Please [[CZ:Why I contribute to CZ|let us have it]]! --[[User:Larry Sanger|Larry Sanger]] 20:59, 3 November 2008 (UTC)


In American schools and colleges, beginning at least with High School, maybe earler, an athlete who is on the Varsity team in any given sport is given a so-called Letter, which is actually (or it used to be) a physical cloth letter in the shape of B, for, let's say, the team's name, the Badgers, or maybe A, for Arizona, I dunno which.  This letter could then be sewn onto the athlete's sweater for him to walk about in around campus. In a four-year high school or college, generally divided into 3 terms, a 9-letter man would be a tremendous athlete, one who had been on, say, the fall football team, the winter basketball team, and the spring baseball team for all three years -- the freshman, or first year, sometimes allowed athletes on the varsity teams, sometimes not.  A 12-letter man would therefore be a *really* stupendous athlete, one who either had been on varsity teams as a freshman also, or who had managed to get letters in two sports simulataneously for at least three terms.  Ray Casey, I believe, got letters in Rugby (the real thing, not American Football), tennis, basketball, and baseball. So he was a fine athlete. I could swot up the Letter situtation, I suppose, and write an article about it, but the tedium of doing so would be overpowering.
== Sovranty ==


''Presumably ‘Birman’ is pronounced like ‘Burman’?'' - You know, now that you're made me stop and think about it, I'm no longer sure. I *think* so: if we said "beer-man" that would be sorta Frenchy. So Burman is almost certainly correct. [[User:Hayford Peirce|Hayford Peirce]] 16:28, 27 October 2007 (CDT)
Hi, thank you for the rephrasing in [[Cyprus]]. As you can see, I'm not a native English speaker. It's not important for me, but do you really consider ''sovran, sovranty'' as incorrect spellings? They are fully accepţed in Webster's dictionary.--[[User:Domergue Sumien|Domergue Sumien]] 11:00, 4 November 2008 (UTC)


== WP Rosewall article ==
:I fear Webster's has rather misled you there. I don't have a copy, but the online version introduces that spelling with 'also...', while my Oxford dictionary is more to the point: 'Var. (poet.) of 'sovereign'. So as a retired teacher of English as a foreign language I strongly advise you to save that spelling for your poetry!


I see that Carlo has made some revisions to *your* last edits. One of the first lines now reads "He had a renowned backhand who enjoyed an exceptionally long career at the very highest levels from the early 1950s to the early 1970s". Hehe. That's an *extremely* long article with a ton of info. What would be your intentions regarding this article should we bring it in? A complete rewrite, ie, into English English? A rewrite plus enormous condensation and editing? Or should we leave in all of the (fantastic) research that Carlo and the other Little Master fans have conducted? A shame to discard it, I suppose. Another, more minor point, do we do it in British English or 'Merkin English?  Or do we compromise with 'Strine English, as befits its subject? [[User:Hayford Peirce|Hayford Peirce]] 16:41, 27 October 2007 (CDT)
:Salut, à la prochaine (how do you say that in Occitan?) - [[User:Ro Thorpe|Ro Thorpe]] 13:49, 4 November 2008 (UTC)
::All right, thank you for the explanation. "Adieu, al còp que ven" :)--[[User:Domergue Sumien|Domergue Sumien]] 14:04, 4 November 2008 (UTC)
:De nada - [[User:Ro Thorpe|Ro Thorpe]] 14:16, 4 November 2008 (UTC)


== Poncho Segoo ==
::My print edition of Merriam-Webster's Collegiate Dictionary, 11th Edition, doesn't list sovran or sovranty even as a variant. I myself never recall having seen it that way.  It must be a very old variant. [[User:Hayford Peirce|Hayford Peirce]] 15:44, 4 November 2008 (UTC)
:That's how it struck me. I don't think I'd seen it either. [[User:Ro Thorpe|Ro Thorpe]] 16:26, 4 November 2008 (UTC)
::The Oxford English Dictionary does include "sovran" and derivatives, but cites no use of them any more recently than 1887, and says that these spellings are now "chiefly poetic."  (There was a "Sovran Bank" in the southeastern U.S. in the 1980s, at the beginning of the period during which banks became enamored of renaming themselves with meaningless and nonexistent words. Sovran Bank was later gobbled up by NCNB, which then merged with the Borg of America.) [[User:Bruce M.Tindall|Bruce M.Tindall]] 19:40, 17 November 2008 (UTC)


''I have a gut hatred of Brits using American words (eg, truck for lorry - as on BBC World all the time) but that’s just my age.'' I would feel the same way about 'Merkins using Brit-talk on NBC, say. And I don't think age has anything to do with it.
== Greek letter articles ==


''Very soon, all usage is going to be acceptable all over (or, er, forgotten)'' Well, acceptable, yes, but I guess what I meant was "standardized". For instance, in the Rosewall article do we use double quotes (" ") for quotations or single (' ') etc. etc. "Center line" vs. "centre line"? Etc. etc. Just so we don't squabble over this later.  ''in the fall of 1969… and autumn 1972'' I use both, interchangeably. Is one Brit and the other 'Merkin?  ''No need for too much of a rewrite, condense it a bit of course, but some people will love all that detail, and fix it away from Carlo,'' Oh, okay.
Ro, since you're the hardworking "letter guy" for the Roman alphabet, I wanted to ask what articles about letters in other alphabets should be called.  I noticed that there is a small but potentially complicated mess involving links to "Gamma" -- some of these are intended to go to an article about the Greek letter; some to an article about "Gamma rays" (which exists); and some to an article about the Gamma programming language (which exists at plain ol' "Gamma").


''That reminds me, have you come across Veropedia?'' I've read the discussion about it in one of the Forum sections -- it seems to be some people at WP trying to cover their ass, er, arse. From what I've read, it seems to be a pretty negligeable product.
I assume that we want to do something along the lines of having "Gamma" be a disambig page, with actual articles at "Gamma ray", "Gamma (letter)" or "Gamma (Greek letter)", and "Gamma (programming language)". Does this strike you as desirable?  And if so, how should the "letter" articles be affixed -- with "(Greek letter)" or just "(letter)"? 


''you removed a large amount of stuff about your books & stories.  I wonder why.'' I just checked on this, and you have it 100% backwards -- '''he''' removed a lot of the stuff that '''I''' had originally put in. Since I was a newbie to WP at the time, I didn't protest.
I suppose it might be a good thing to pre-empt future confusion by (1) creating stub articles with "(Greek letter)" or whatever for each letter of the Greek alphabet; (2) creating disambig pages at plain ol' "Alpha", "Beta", etc., for each letter; and (3) systematically seeing what links to "Alpha", what links to "Beta", etc., and going into each of those pages and making sure that the link goes to the correct disambiguation such as "Alpha particle" or "Gamma (programming language)" or whatever.  But I don't want to undertake something like that unless I'm sure that I wouldn't have to go back and undo it and re-do it a different way if somebody came up with a better idea. So what do you think, and who else should be asked? [[User:Bruce M.Tindall|Bruce M.Tindall]] 19:49, 17 November 2008 (UTC)


''I remember the first Open Wimbledon: professionals like Gimeno were seeded high & there was a lot of excitement when they were knocked out, at least from Dan Maskell (oh, how shocking) who was Kramer’s sidekick on the BBC.'' I well remember, and I was shocked also.  There was a photo of Gimeno lying on the grass in The Times with a caption: "Gimeno Can't Take Any Moore" -- it was (Ray?) Moore who had ousted him.
:Thanks for your response. OK, I'll get started on that soon.  [[User:Bruce M.Tindall|Bruce M.Tindall]] 03:44, 18 November 2008 (UTC)


''I don’t recall Perry or the ITV coverage at all.'' I only watched them v. briefly.  Like all (?) Brit commentators, they didn't *say* anything. Maybe two words per game. "Game's over, Hoad served four aces." Long silence. "My, a nice game, Laver won all four points." "Yus."
:Answer to why I used "(''Greek'' letter)" instead of "(Letter)" -- hmm, because Hayford suggested it in the forum, and, uh, I'd forgotten that you'd suggested plain "(Letter)".  The answer to whether anybody else has a gamma besides the Greeks is, I never heard of one, but I don't know for a fact that there isn't one, either. I'll just let this set of changes settle down for a day or so and see what other comments show up. Your point about making less work is a good one, though! [[User:Bruce M.Tindall|Bruce M.Tindall]] 01:03, 19 November 2008 (UTC)


''our ‘fast’ presumably sounding to you like ‘fost’; or fóst'' Yes. After a number of months in London I used to joke that I could, if I wanted to, learn to talk Brit English.  But that I would never be able to bring myself to say "Shoffsbry Ahvenue", hehe.
== The ref ==


''I can’t get my head round how there will only be 1 hour’s difference between CDT & MST instead of 2.  I’ll be putting the clock back tonight and presumably so will you.'' Nope, not me. Us'uns in Arizona never touch the damn thing -- we stay the same all year wrong. Right now we're the same time as California. Tomorrow we'll be one hour ahead.
Perhaps you were after the one described [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Epimenides_paradox here]? --[[User:Daniel Mietchen|Daniel Mietchen]] 12:29, 18 November 2008 (UTC)


== O apostrophe, where is thy sting? ==


''With WAT it’s the same time all the time everywhere.  Except maybe on [[Ceres]].'' I think that my "Stockbroker in Orbit" stories take place on (in the interior of) Ceres....
Ro, would you mind if I renamed your "apostrophe" article to "apostrophe (punctuation mark)" or something similar, to make room for a disambig page and a new article on "apostrophe (figure of speech)"?  Or if you have other ideas on how this could be done, please let me know. Thanks. [[User:Bruce M.Tindall|Bruce M.Tindall]] 00:22, 25 November 2008 (UTC)


''Thanks for explaining about those four-letters; I really hadn’t come across that before.'' They've been around practically forever, at least most of the 20th century, I think.... [[User:Hayford Peirce|Hayford Peirce]] 10:33, 28 October 2007 (CDT)
== Yet more punctuation: Dr(.) No ==


== The Mysterious Affair at Hayford Peirce ==
And now for something completely different:  In a revision to "Dr. No" you commented, "nothing specifically American about 'Dr'".  Actually, I think what the orignal author (John Stephenson) might have meant was that the <i>period after "Dr"</i> in the movie's title was peculiarly American. I can only assume that the British, never having gotten over the trauma of the severe punctuation-rationing situation after WWII, are still very frugal about putting periods after "Mr", "Dr", and the like, whereas we Yanks, with our infinite resources!!! and our most excellent economic situation!!!, are quite conspicuous consumers of same. (See???!!!) So perhaps "Dr. No" looks more American than "Dr No"?  Now I promise to stop bugging you about punctuation.  [[User:Bruce M.Tindall|Bruce M.Tindall]] 00:36, 25 November 2008 (UTC)
Yes, I could well have done that. In any case, I was coming under fire at some point for having created the article in the first place, and I may have been trying to cut it down to a shorter, more business-like style. At the time, I didn't have any idea about how much info to include. At one point the article was up for deletion but was retained because it really was pretty objectively written.


:''I’ve put some links in the article. So your name must now go on my user page, between Edward Albee & Immanuel Kant.'' I don't see them, only Ivy and Marcel.
== [[Doctor Who]] ==


:''Let me know when you think it’s ready to import here.'' Geez, I hadn't realized that I had written so much at WP! And pretty good stuff too, hehe. I think it's really a pretty dispassionate article. If you feel like taking the trouble, yes, I would say that it's ready to bring in. I don't think I was going to do much more to the WP article, maybe another paragraph or two.  I'll think about that....
(coincidence) This is the global article, covering all media, so I've restored primarily. There's only a brief mention of other media in the lead at present, but a fair amount in the body. [[User:Peter Jackson|Peter Jackson]] 16:35, 1 December 2008 (UTC)


:''I must ask my mother to see if she can find any of your novels. What’s your favourite?'' It's like asking a mother about her favorite child, hehe. "Flickerman" is pretty serious, about the only one I ever wrote, lotsa weird sex and violence in Polynesia. "The Burr in the Garden of Eden" is about the most *fun* book -- I just *love* the epigraphs that begin each chapter. (It's a sequel to "Napoleon", but reads entirely separately.) "Phylum Monsters" is seriously zany. If you like [[Jack Vance]], "Dinosaur Park" is worth looking at. "The Spark of Life" is a terrific late 1940s-1950s sort of S.F. -- I would have been a big success if I had started writing 30 years earlier, sigh. "Blood on the Hibiscus" is a pretty decent hard-boiled thriller set in Tahiti, with lotsa twists. "The Gauguin Murders" isn't as accomplished a book, but it gives a nice picture of some aspects of life in Tahiti circa 1965 or so. All 18 books can be found at Amazon, here, with synopses by me, also, I believe, available cheap, used copies: http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/tg/listmania/list-browse/-/24T8V2KW0SB5T/qid%3D994444296/sr%3D5-3/ref%3Dlm%5Fb%5F1/104-4034002-4119945
== [[Natural stress relaxation meditation]] ==


:''As for KRR, it seems to be double quotes,'' I specified AE in the port-over, since I'm the one who started it, hehe. Maybe we could find an Aussie editor to do the rest and change it all to 'Strine.
As I understand, the term is trademarked, so it is a proper name and should be capitalized, just as is Transcendental Meditation. Is there a specific reason you moved it to lower case? 


:''Brits (still) don’t say ‘fall’ for autumn.'' I'll be darned, I didn't know that.  In the States I would say that they are 100% interchangeable.
[[User:Howard C. Berkowitz|Howard C. Berkowitz]] 03:08, 13 December 2008 (UTC)


:''I like CZ because I can make it all up.'' Me too, although I feel a little guilty about it sometimes, after years of WP "citation" baloney.
:Could I ask you to hold off? Matt Innis and I are working with the original author, who originally wrote something that I thought was advertising/self-promotion, but he's been very responsive to suggestions. He has asked for help in making the article more appopriate for CZ, and, since he has been agreeable, I'm hesitant to have additional people changing things while we work with him.  


:''Portuguese commentators talk all the time, usually about past and possible future opponents. Surely the American ones don’t do that?'' American ones are *terrible* -- they babble meaninglessly all the time.  I *never* watch *any* sporting event (rare enough that I do in any event) with the sound on. Sound off, New York Times in hand, that's my viewing mode.
:We are both doing enough substantive rewrites, and asking him to make changes, that I'd much rather stay focused on content now rather than what, frankly, are fairly minor issues of style. The article title may change, as may metadata, as a result of work on the article.  


:''Jack Kramer was a very measured commentator, but presumably he feared being court-martial(l)ed by Maskell.'' Yes, that's quite possible. But he was very chatty compared to Fred Perry et al.  
:If you do want to make changes, could you first mention them on the article talk page? Again, we are working with a new editor, and he won't know how to follow side discussions on user pages. [[User:Howard C. Berkowitz|Howard C. Berkowitz]] 03:25, 13 December 2008 (UTC)


:''Very wise policy of Arizona: half past six here & already dark.'' They tried it here once in the '60s for about 1 year.  In Phoenix and Tucson, the two major cities, it would be light at 9:30 at night, the temp would be 109 in Phoenix and 106 in Tucson and people would be waiting in their cars for darkness so that they could watch the drive-in movies. It was repealed the next year.... [[User:Hayford Peirce|Hayford Peirce]] 16:01, 28 October 2007 (CDT)
== Huygens ==


== A Perfect Day for Bananafish ==
Thank you for copyediting Huygens. Prepositions are one of my weak points in English, good that you correct them. --[[User:Paul Wormer|Paul Wormer]] 15:12, 14 December 2008 (UTC)
Ah, I see now that you put my name between those two really heavy hitters on your *WP* page. I was forced to read Perfect Day a couple of times in 1958-59, 60, when I was taking writing courses and asking myself what the *hell* New Yorker stories could possibly mean, why anyone would want to write one, and, even more, why anyone would possibly want to *read* one. Now, almost 50 years later, I'm glad to finally learn what the damn story is actually about. I still wouldn't bother to read it again, but at least I now why *other* people are apparently so taken by Salinger.  I guess. I did learn at the time that the reason we were *supposed* to read this stuff and to be blown away by it was the "revelation of character." To which, I guess, I always said, and still say, "I say it's spinach, and I say the hell with it." I'd still rather read any 1950s story by a Brit named [[Eric Frank Russell]].... They had a beginning, a middle, and an end, and I could actually understand each separate sequence. And I knew why he wrote the story: to put a couple of quid in his pocket....
:By the way, there's a key sentence in the WP article about Bananafish that seems to be repeated twice, word for word. Probably done by some typical WP "editor".... [[User:Hayford Peirce|Hayford Peirce]] 18:16, 28 October 2007 (CDT)


== Ro Thorpe ==
== More apostrophes ==
Hi Robert, as a user page, this won't work.  "Ro Thorpe" isn't actually recognized in the system as a user page.  So if someone wants to e-mail you via the system, they'd have to know to click on the tiny [[User:Robert Thorpe]] link at the top of the page.  We could create a new [[User:Ro Thorpe]] account for you, and block [[User:Robert Thorpe]]... --[[User:Larry Sanger|Larry Sanger]] 10:26, 29 October 2007 (CDT)


== Various stuff ==
Here's an issue only a bored copyeditor could love.  (And I do.)  The apostrophe article refers to Toys'R'Us®, but at least according to the store's website, the company uses double quotes, not apostrophes, around the "R": Toys"R"Us.  (And in the logo in which the "R" is reversed, there seems to be no punctuation at all.)  [[User:Bruce M.Tindall|Bruce M.Tindall]] 19:03, 10 January 2009 (UTC)


''Read Vonnegut in my 20s & loved it, & Heinlein some time after, quite interesting, but a poor style, I seem to recall.'' Compared to Vonnegut, yes, of course. But he wrote straightforward, competent stuff, some of it fairly lively, particularly when in first-person mode. Also, we have to remember the context of when he appeared like a bomb burst in 1940. As someone wrote the other day, "Heinlein was like an adult who suddenly walked into a room of unruly children." Within a couple of years everyone in the field except a few such as Vonnegut, Sturgeon, Vance, were trying to emulate his style, tone, attitude, and, of course, success. A remarkable career, although one that doesn't resonate much in GB apparently.
== How could this happen?  Even on a wiki??? ==


''As for Amazon, I’ve never used it, so I’ll talk to Eva.'' I dunno about overseas, but it sure works well in the USA. The few books I buy I generally get from them, ditto music CDs, and even my brandnew Canon S3 SI camera.  ''(Contrary to what you might think from my page, I haven’t read a book in years'' I myself read very very few, mostly the occasional biography or non-fiction. Once in a great while some fiction that I'm rereading for the nth time.
I am sure as sure could be that you fixed some wording R Jensen had placed at [[terrier]. I would attribute my confusion to the heat, but I have evidence. I wrote:


''By the way, on Americanisms: age does have something to do with it, because it’s the young who regard the Americanisms as cool'' Oh, I hadn't thought of it that way. Yes, cool appears to have made a reappearance, although it never went entirely away, unlike 99.99% of most slang.
http://en.citizendium.org/wiki/User_talk:Ro_Thorpe/Archive_1#Fuzziness removed


''I discovered your nice list of famous players, and adjusted a near-namesake of yours, la Pierce française.'' Yes, I saw a lot of new info and links. I may fill in a couple more older players, but aside from that I'm pretty much finished with it.
and you replied at my page.


''On your bio, the external link doesn’t work, so it must be a different system in CZ.'' Yeah, for some reason the port over from WP inserted a couple of squiggly {{ brackets, I dunno why. When you get rid of those it works.  I also added some real [[ brackets to make it look better. In any case, thanks for bringing that other stuff in.
The text at [[terrier]] is back to the original, and there's no record of your edit in the history. [Hums [[The Twilight Zone]] theme.


''So American commentators are as bad as the Ports, how shocking.'' Offhand, I would think they would be 1000% worse, particularly since they can be heard here on 60 gazillion channels. After breaking up with my latest GF, who had about 500 channels working, I switched back to much cheaper "basic" mode -- now I only have 15 or so, but it only costs $15 per month via cable.
So, for any of the tekkie legends reading this, how is the possible, and for Ro, do you remember what you changed 'fuzzy dogs' to?


''How do you manage to watch the tennis & read the NYT at the same time?'' I've got a TV mounted on a swivel arm up on the wall of my bedroom, so I can lie in bed, drink in hand (or at least on a tray), the Times on my chest, and by raising my eyes over the top of the paper, see the screen whenever I'm so inclined. Since most sports except soccer and basketball consist mostly of pauses occasionally interrupted by a few seconds of action, I find that I don't miss much. In any case, I could live happily the rest of my life with no TV....
[[User:Aleta Curry|Aleta Curry]] 23:30, 27 January 2009 (UTC)


''That's funny about the drive-in movies in sweltering Arizona...'' I guess it couldn't have been any hotter in the cars than it was in the non-A/Ced houses of those days.
== recent move ==


''I’ve begun work on the body, but there’s only so much one can take at any given time...'' That's for sure! Terminal tedium sets in very quickly! I hope that "obsessive" isn't too uncharitable a word to apply to le brave Carlo. Geez!
When you moved it the first time you did not select the box for 'move all associated subpages' (which is a very useful option). I reverted it back so I could use that option rather than doing each subpage individually. [[User:Chris Day|Chris Day]] 18:16, 5 February 2009 (UTC)


''By the way, how do you pronounce 'Ceres'?'' Not very often, hehe. Actually, the few times I've ever said it aloud, as opposed to merely writing it, I think I've always said "Seer-Reeze". I *think* that's more or less how I've heard a couple of much more knowledgeable S.F. types pronounce it, but I could be wrong. Do they say "See-Reeze"? Why not just change the name to Kellogg's? [[User:Hayford Peirce|Hayford Peirce]] 13:06, 29 October 2007 (CDT)
== The mysterious violinist ==


== Good to see you back! ==
Remember back in August when you deleted the reference to "Sarah Zhang" from the article on [[Bruch Violin Concerto Number 1]]? I assume it just a typo for Sarah <i>Chang</i>, who is in fact a big-deal contemporary violin soloist.  Not that she necessarily needs to go back into that specific article, since her name was used just as an example of who had recorded the piece, but I thought you might want to know there's a solution to the mystery. [[User:Bruce M.Tindall|Bruce M.Tindall]] 23:55, 7 February 2009 (UTC)
:Ah, I had forgotten about it, but I do remember that there was some back and forth about this at the time. Always nice to have mysteries solved! [[User:Hayford Peirce|Hayford Peirce]] 00:10, 8 February 2009 (UTC)
::Indeed it is. Thanks, Bruce, I might as well put it back in. [[User:Ro Thorpe|Ro Thorpe]] 00:21, 8 February 2009 (UTC)


Let's not go through that again ;-)  At least you know nobody else can get your account!  --[[User:D. Matt Innis|Matt Innis]] [[User talk:D. Matt Innis|(Talk)]] 20:13, 31 October 2007 (CDT)
== moving retro ==
:Ditto! I think Little Pancho was somewhat darker than Big Pancho, but certainly not in mood. He was light and festive. As the excellent Sports Illustrated article about Big Pancho starts out: "Las Vegas and Pancho Gonzales were a perfect match for each other: both were big, dangerous, and mean." Or some such. I've got two more suspects to add to the [[Famous tennis players]] tables, the Brit Bunny Austin being one, and then I'll return to Muscles.  I see that you have really weeded out the Muscles and all except one Little Master, which I got. At some point, I will *add* a sentence or so explicating "Little Master", however, as a sometime nickname. I'm sure no one on the tour ever called him that. [[User:Hayford Peirce|Hayford Peirce]] 20:21, 31 October 2007 (CDT)
{{Image|Alphabet Nav tool.jpg|right|350px|Diagram to illustrate the four different views used by the experimental alphabet navigation tool. '''A''' shows the view on the main article and the catalog page. '''B''' shows the view on the alphabetically sorted subsubpage. '''C''' shows the view on the retroalphabetically listed subsubpage. '''D''' shows the view on one of the letter aticle pages.}}
I had cut and pasted the A section in the main article to the new subsubpage. However, since it was a test page, i didn't delete it from the main page. So two A sections currently exist for A.  Otherwise you did it correctly. [[User:Chris Day|Chris Day]] 22:00, 5 March 2009 (UTC)


== leitão assado ==
:Ro, this is what it looks like on my screen. As I say the colors and look can be changed easily.  What worries me is that from your description it is not working at all. Note that in the diagram the current page is indicated by the black square.  Whether on a letter page, alphabetical or retroalphabetical type page is indicated by the respective row being darker. [[User:Chris Day|Chris Day]] 18:01, 8 March 2009 (UTC)
Why don't you do an article about this when you have a moment? As written up in today's NYT it sounds delicious! (Except maybe for the red bell peppers, but I suppose they're necessary, sigh.) I'm gonna try it.


http://www.nytimes.com/2007/10/31/dining/31pari.html?_r=1&oref=slogin
::Ro, I made a few test edits to see if i can get it working. Can you check it again. I made the changes for A-B, so that should be where you see a difference, if any. [[User:Chris Day|Chris Day]] 03:57, 9 March 2009 (UTC)
{{-}}
Also how does this template look?


I guess the recipe is here:
{{tl|English_spellings}} gives:
{{English_spellings}}


http://www.nytimes.com/2007/10/31/dining/311prex.html?ref=dining
i moved this version from the namespace to the template domain.  Possibly that is the reason it is not working correctly? [[User:Chris Day|Chris Day]] 04:10, 9 March 2009 (UTC)


And we can serve it with any left-over Macons that you might have brought with you -- lucky you! How many years did you spend there, drinking those wonderful wines? [[User:Hayford Peirce|Hayford Peirce]] 21:54, 31 October 2007 (CDT)
Some more experiments on my behalf.  On the susubpages themselves I have removed most of the navigation aids it is just a static table now.  I just want to see if each cell is now clickable, at least. Also, are the cells coloured now? [[User:Chris Day|Chris Day]] 17:53, 9 March 2009 (UTC)


==Seasoning==
See Discussion at the new article.[[User:Hayford Peirce|Hayford Peirce]] 17:34, 4 November 2007 (CST)


== name change ==
Also see the following examples:
Don't you think I should move this article to [[Portuguese roast suckling pig (leitão assado a Barrida)]], so that the main term is in English?  Then I would do about 16 different kinds of redirects with and without accent marks, so that all queries will end up at this article? Just replied to your email. [[User:Hayford Peirce|Hayford Peirce]] 11:21, 5 November 2007 (CST)


== à ==
<nowiki>{{English_spellings|class=alpha|name=D}}</nowiki> gives:
I'm not clear about what the '''à''' is in '''leitão assado à Bairrida'''. Is it Portuguese, with the same meaning as '''à''' in French? That is to say, "in the manner of".  I take it that it is just plain '''à''' and not '''à la'''....
{{English_spellings|class=alpha|name=D}}


== WP infobox ==
<nowiki>{{English_spellings|class=retro|name=E}}</nowiki> gives:
"Do you know how to get the WP template stuff out of the infobox?" -- Not a clue.  Can't it just be copied?  I know that *someone* here has been doing it, as I saw a discussion of it somewhere fairly recently.  Why don't you ask [[User:Stephen Ewen]] -- he's an all-purpose guru.
{{English_spellings|class=retro|name=E}}


Am feeling frustrated -- just visited three different stores with *large* selections of wine. A gazillion Australian. A billion French. A million Italian. Half a million Spanish. A hundred thousand German. Thousands of South American. Some South African.  A few New Zealand.  NO Portuguese!  Except, of course, the ubiquitous Port, which ain't what I want.  I don't think even Lancer's Sparkling is sold any more.... And the store to which I made a special trip in order to buy two cases of rose has stopped selling it.... Grrrrrrrrr! [[User:Hayford Peirce|Hayford Peirce]] 17:07, 6 November 2007 (CST)
<nowiki>{{English_spellings|class=letter|name=F}}</nowiki> gives:
{{English_spellings|class=letter|name=F}}


== just as long as you spell my name right, hehe ==
Do you see any colors?  Are the cells clickable? [[User:Chris Day|Chris Day]] 19:21, 9 March 2009 (UTC)
No hoohah, cobber! [[User:Hayford Peirce|Hayford Peirce]] 13:49, 7 November 2007 (CST)


== Cricket infobox ==
:Glad it's working now. What about the "look" immediately above.  Would that help with navigation?  If so, I'll try and add that functionality back, hopefully with out breaking it again. [[User:Chris Day|Chris Day]] 22:50, 9 March 2009 (UTC)


If you want an infobox, I'll make you one.  Tell me what you want in it though.
::I just made another change.  Is it still working for you? [[User:Chris Day|Chris Day]] 12:50, 10 March 2009 (UTC)
--[[User:Robert W King|Robert W King]] 21:20, 7 November 2007 (CST)


== Tchaikovsky  ==
:::The change is that it should have the black square to identify the current page as well as highlighting one of the three rows. Can you see that? If so we're done. [[User:Chris Day|Chris Day]] 17:30, 10 March 2009 (UTC)


Tchaikovsky had some relations with a Russian nationalist group of composers known as The Five and was asked to join, but turned them down. --[[User:Charles Sandberg|Charles Sandberg]] 19:03, 10 November 2007 (CST)
::::Great, one last question.  Would you prefer the bottom row cells to be linking to the article page or the appropriate subsection?  For example, [[E_%28letter%29]] or [[E_%28letter%29#Use_in_English]]. [[User:Chris Day|Chris Day]] 17:44, 10 March 2009 (UTC)


:I know that.  I was referring to when the article read: 'Yet Russian critics called him nationalistic...'  I was asking where you got that, considering they already had Balakirev & co to have a go at for that. [[User:Ro Thorpe|Ro Thorpe]] 19:21, 10 November 2007 (CST)
== Reports of my disappearance ==


Oh yes. That sentence ''should'' read: Russian critics called him insufficiently nationalistic. --[[User:Charles Sandberg|Charles Sandberg]] 19:32, 10 November 2007 (CST)
Are somewhat exaggerated... but only slightly! I'm still very positive about CZ, I've just been very busy with a couple of other projects (the LISP project for the Internet, and [http://www.yoshitoshi.net a catalog raisonne for [[Yoshitoshi]]]), and those along with stuff at home have left me no cycles for CZ. As the Yoshitoshi project gets more and more up, and as I get some stuff around here dealt with, I hope to have more time for CZ in the future. [[User:J. Noel Chiappa|J. Noel Chiappa]] 16:46, 19 March 2009 (UTC)


== Ptolemy ==
: Hey, I didn't say I'd be back ''now''! :-) [[User:J. Noel Chiappa|J. Noel Chiappa]] 22:28, 20 March 2009 (UTC)


Thank you for correcting my English, I took good note of your corrections.  I spent less time on this article than on most of my articles, because I entered it as (a somewhat longish) stub during "stub week". But even when I spend more time my English is not perfect, so I appreciate your checking my work.--[[User:Paul Wormer|Paul Wormer]] 10:11, 25 November 2007 (CST)
::Well, you've been missed.  Thanks for the glimmer of hope ;) Hurry back! [[User:D. Matt Innis|D. Matt Innis]] 01:36, 23 March 2009 (UTC)


== Champagne ==
== ''[[McGuffey Readers]]'' article: capitalization ==
Hi Ro, I'm on the road for another week, without access to some of my research stuff, but at least in 'Merkin English, Champagne is absolutely, always, 100% of the time, capitalized when used by educated ppl such as De New Yoik Times and me.... Trust me on this.... [[User:Hayford Peirce|Hayford Peirce]] 18:04, 26 November 2007 (CST)


== list of states ==
In a revision by yourself of 21 March 2009, several capitalizations were changed by yourself to lower case (Readers -> readers) in the introductory paragraphs to the article in question. I think at least some of these should be capitalized.  
Don't take me wrong, but... it was superseded by what? Why deleting is better than redirecting? [[User:Aleksander Stos|Aleksander Stos]] 11:59, 27 November 2007 (CST)
:Done. A bientot :) [[User:Aleksander Stos|Aleksander Stos]] 13:25, 27 November 2007 (CST)


== quotations ==
Relying on my copy of ''Harvey's Grammer'' (the 1880 edition), it seems the relevant distinction is that between a common noun ("a name which may be applied to any one of a class of objects") and a proper noun ("the name of some particular . . ."). Thus, it seems to me that when the word ''readers'' refers to the ''McGuffey Readers'' specifically (even if not by full title), it should be capitalized, but when it refers to the general class of readers (of which there were many competing textbook series), then it should be rendered lower case.
No, 'Merkin typewriters have the double quotes at the top of the key also. We're taught in the States that all quotations, etc., have the double marks around them, with secondary quotations within having a single quote mark, et ainsi de suite. But I've seen that in *some* Brit sources, this order is reversed.... [[User:Hayford Peirce|Hayford Peirce]] 17:06, 30 November 2007 (CST)


== Buffalo Springfield ==
Note also the quotations from Henry Steele Commager in the section on ''Criticisms of the McGuffey Readers''. These quotes were rendered exactly as they appeared in the Signet Books reprint of 1962. Thus, we read:


Thanks Ro, I don't know much about the people in that band, but I love their song For What It's Worth, it is one of the best political songs we ever had and probably the bestest First Amendment song. [[User:Yi Zhe Wu|Yi Zhe Wu]] 19:28, 30 November 2007 (CST)
:"Yet for all its preoccupation with religion, the morality of the Readers was materialistic and worldly. It taught a simple system of rewards and punishments. Virtue was rarely its own reward. . ." (Commager, ''Foreward'' to 1862 reprint)


== Party!  You're invited! ==
where, as you can see, the word ''Readers'' is capitalized.


Come on!  Get up!  It's been Wednesday in London for eight whole hours already!  Your friendly neighbourhood Mistress of Ceremonies here, reminding you about the December [[CZ:Monthly Write-a-Thon|write-a-thon]]!  Please drop by and add yourself to the list of partiers--or non party-goers--as the case may be. You can leave a comment, question or excuse there, too--or [[user_talk: Aleta_Curry|talk to me]] [[User:Aleta Curry|Aleta Curry]] 02:09, 5 December 2007 (CST)
[[User:James F. Perry|James F. Perry]] 17:33, 4 April 2009 (UTC)


== You deserve to be credited... ==
:Change them back if you wish, but, as I said in my edit summary, 'better style without caps, agreed?' I find it rather heavy, a bit like mentioning Columbia Records and then discussing 'their Records'. I left the caps in cases where the book titles were clearly being referred to. [[User:Ro Thorpe|Ro Thorpe]] 19:58, 4 April 2009 (UTC)


Well, I see you were working away on party day, which makes you one of the [[CZ:Monthly Write-a-Thon#Shy Boys|shy boys]].  I’ll have to come and drag you in next month!  [[User:Aleta Curry|Aleta Curry]] 23:35, 9 December 2007 (CST)
== Home schooling article ==


== Cats ==
I just deleted it under the pretty clear guidelines about Bobbies being able to delete articles if: "it was copied from Wikipedia or some other online source (where it can still be read) over one week earlier, and no one has made any substantive revisions to it then or since then, regardless of whether it was marked "CZ Live" or not;"
Hi, Ro, glad to see that someone finally rewrote the start of the [[Cat]] article! About the first thing I did upon joining CZ was to write a note at the Cat place expressing my astonishment at the folksy, informal tone. Which got me slapped down by Nancy or whoever it was who was writing all of that stuff.  She knew her cats, I suppose, but it was sure a weird way to write an encyl. article! Cheerio for the Holidays! Wish I wuz there to chow down on some Port. pork and/or clams or whatnot.... [[User:Hayford Peirce|Hayford Peirce]] 12:55, 17 December 2007 (CST)


== weather, footnotes, and things ==
I checked out the author who brought this article in from WP -- she did a whole bunch of other articles about home schooling -- do any of those fall into the same category? Thanks! [[User:Hayford Peirce|Hayford Peirce]] 03:48, 6 April 2009 (UTC)
No, Ms MD wasn’t exactly helpful, was she? Anyway, she has ‘since left the project’, but to discover exactly why would require a private eye...
::I think, like Professor Potter, she was one of the "my way or the highway" people. They were arguing about biology nomenclature or some such thing, as I recall....


Pat Boone started out posing as a rocker, actually - I'll see if I can find the details tomorrow.
:Okie, thanks for checking! Ossifer Pup. [[User:Hayford Peirce|Hayford Peirce]] 19:06, 6 April 2009 (UTC)
::I'll be darned -- a very laid-back one, I would say....


I don’t know about Portuguese pork or clams but we had some very nice fried prawns & beef in oyster sauce at the Restaurante Chinês Li in Póvoa de Varzim tonight.
== Out of the something or other and into the fire ==
::I *love* beef in oyster sauce -- it's a standard American-Chinese thingee. Depends on how tender they make the beef, however.  In Tahiti, all the restaurants served *pork* in oyster sauce, and never beef. On the other hand, they didn't have sweet and sour pork, either. Most of the Chinese were descended from Hakka, not Cantonese.... I make beef oyster sometimes, also using hamburger if I feel like it....


It’s unusually cold here. What’s it like in sun-kissed Arizona? Has the snow crept across to the west yet? I think not.
Just checked MW11th -- they spell "frying pan" without the hyphen. I myself don't know why there *would* be one....
::Cold, cold, cold, and I'm still not used to it after 14 years here. Low 40s, high 30s at night, but generally sunny during the day, 60 to 70. I could see snow at the tops of the mountains from my windows for a couple of days after a storm about 5 days ago. Today's paper says it has snowed 4 times in 112 years on Xmas day, the last time (and biggest)being 4 inches in 1987, before I got here. It snowed on Easter Day, April 4, 1999, however -- my girlfriend had to run out to cover up the tomato plants that were already about 4 feet tall....
:Indeed, I was surprised to see it there, but I've looked in the Concise & it has it too, so at least they're consistent.
- Ro Thorpe 18:43, 17 December 2007 (CST)  
::Yup, it's in my 5th Edition Concise also. Verra fey, oo wotiver our Schottish friends say.... [[User:Hayford Peirce|Hayford Peirce]] 21:52, 10 April 2009 (UTC)


- By the way, do you know how to edit footnotes?
In parts of New England, and maybe other parts of the States, old-timers may still refer to an iron skillet as a "spider".  I myself grew up calling them that until I was 20 or so.  Originally they had three or four long legs on them so that they could be set over a fire or coals, hence the name.  But for many people, even after the legs vanished, the name lived on.  As [[Casey Stengel]] [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Casey_Stengel] famously said, "You could look it up." [[User:Hayford Peirce|Hayford Peirce]] 19:04, 10 April 2009 (UTC)
::I *think* so.  You just find the text of the footnote buried in the main text (between the <refx</refX marks, then Edit them the way you would any other text. Although I see that some *new* people have recently been importing some other weird way of linking footnotes to websites or some such. I was gonna change one of them, but finally said, "Why bother?" If this info doesn't work, point me to the footnote that you want to edit....[[User:Hayford Peirce|Hayford Peirce]] 11:50, 18 December 2007 (CST)
:Yes, the dictionary has that meaning too; I didn't see the need to put it in, but whatever changes you wanna make... [[User:Ro Thorpe|Ro Thorpe]] 20:45, 10 April 2009 (UTC)
::Nah, I wuz just tellin' ya 'cause I thought it wuz innaresting.... [[User:Hayford Peirce|Hayford Peirce]] 21:52, 10 April 2009 (UTC)


== e-mail? ==
== Wheat streak ==


Hi Ro,
This is one of those Eduzendium projects run by Professor Denning. I think that you're supposed to leave these alone, even if all you're doing is correcting a little grammar etc. If one of the students *actively* asks for your help, in formatting, say, or trouble-shooting, by all means. Otherwise don't try to fix things up. Or so I think....
:Yes, there was a notice. I'll put it back.


I need to drop you a line.  You don't have e-mail enabled, so would you be kind enough to go to my [[user_talk:Aleta_Curry|TALK PAGE]] and use "e-mail this user" under toolbox (last box in the column all the way to the left), so I can send you a note?  Thanks. [[User:Aleta Curry|Aleta Curry]] 16:37, 28 December 2007 (CST)
There was a case yesterday where someone started rewriting a [[CZ:Nomenclature]] article or some such, don't ask me how she got there. I reverted it, told her she was in the wrong spot, and asked her to think carefully about what she was doing. Seems to be doing a decent article today in the right spot....  
:Replied at [[user_talk:Aleta_Curry|my talk]]. Thanks again! [[User:Aleta Curry|Aleta Curry]] 18:01, 28 December 2007 (CST)
[[User:Hayford Peirce|Hayford Peirce]] 23:03, 21 April 2009 (UTC)
:Yes, very strange, I saw that. [[User:Ro Thorpe|Ro Thorpe]] 23:14, 21 April 2009 (UTC)


== Fuzziness removed ==
== At least I didn't write.... ==


Good one at [[terrier]], Ro, thanks! [[User:Aleta Curry|Aleta Curry]] 19:32, 2 January 2008 (CST)
...Dirk Van Dyke, hehe.... Thanks for the good eye! [[User:Hayford Peirce|Hayford Peirce]] 23:04, 22 April 2009 (UTC)
==Getting my word in first==
A Happy Wednesday, everyone. I am recovering from a bout of pneumonia, and, while it hasn't kept me away from the computer, it's only copyediting, nothing energetic, on the wiki for the time being. Thanks for reading me - [[User:Ro Thorpe|Ro Thorpe]] 15:24, 8 January 2008 (CST)
:Sorry to hear about your illness -- you obviously don't drink enough ''gros rouge''!  Guys our age gotta take care of ourselves! I'll drink a toast to your newfound good health tonight! [[User:Hayford Peirce|Hayford Peirce]] 17:36, 8 January 2008 (CST)


== two famous old Odgen Nash poems that are now totally forgotten ==
== Thanks ==
Thanks for the edit. The entire article needs a rewrite when I have time to do it. I noticed you contributed to the [[Radio Caroline]] article. Maybe some mention should be made over the new film ''The Boat That Rocked''. [[User:Meg Ireland|Meg Ireland]] 04:52, 24 April 2009 (UTC)


*Candy is dandy, But liquor is quicker.
:Mr. Thorpe, thank you very much for your corrections on [[South Korea]] article! !!! :) ([[User:Chunbum Park|Chunbum Park]] 03:10, 30 April 2009 (UTC))
*The trouble with a kitten is that, Eventually it becomes a cat.


He is sometimes credited with: Men don't make passes at women who wear glasses, but I'm fairly sure that is someone else, probably Dorothy Parker.
== Chiswick ==


I think Nash ought to be removed from the wordplay article, but I could easily be wrong. There was a WP article about him several years ago that might shed some light on his worthiness....
Yes, Chiswick is in the text. I did a Google Map search and there are a ton of Chiswick Lanes, Alleys, Avenues, etc. in London, but no Street. And all the others are in W, not SW.... [[User:Hayford Peirce|Hayford Peirce]] 23:17, 26 April 2009 (UTC)


: The "Candy is dandy" one reminds me of the famous Dorothy Parker poem about suicide - is it a play on that? Any idea which was written first? [[User:J. Noel Chiappa|J. Noel Chiappa]] 22:10, 27 February 2008 (CST)
== verb preposition pairs ==


::I dunno the Parker poem. It ought to be easy enough to research if hers is as famous as his? [[User:Hayford Peirce|Hayford Peirce]] 22:24, 27 February 2008 (CST)
I can't tell you how often I have this problem - I pick the less strong / wrong preposition to go with certain verbs. For example, is it correct to say, "shocked by something" or "shocked at something."  I am shocked at the number of people that have TB in LA.  Or shocked by.  I think shocked by is correct but I wondered if you had a list of verbs and then prepositions that match those verbs.  And then the common mistakes of the "wrong" preposition. [[User:Tom Kelly|Tom Kelly]] 20:07, 3 May 2009 (UTC)
:The difference is that 'by' is the neutral one: Tom threw the ball, the ball was thrown by Tom, the picture (was painted) by Picasso, etc. So if you day 'shocked at' you are, as you suggest, expressing your shock a little more strongly, & here you instinctively say 'I am shocked at' - because you really are shocked! So that's what you mean to say, and it's not a matter of 'correct' or not: you would never say 'I am shocked on...' Hope that's clear. Sorry I don't have a list or anything... [[User:Ro Thorpe|Ro Thorpe]] 20:31, 3 May 2009 (UTC)


: Here it is:
== Question grammer ==
: '' Razors pain you; Rivers are damp;
: '' Acids stain you; And drugs cause cramp.
: '' Guns aren't lawful; Nooses give;
: '' Gas smells awful; You might as well live.
: It's from a collection published in 1926. My favourite DP quip is the one about martinis, though! :-) [[User:J. Noel Chiappa|J. Noel Chiappa]] 23:17, 27 February 2008 (CST)


:: Oh, yes, I remember it now. Thanks! In that case, No, I don't think the Candy is dandy poem is a play on the DJ poem. Au contraire, it's about how to seduce women.... Re the martini bon mot, is that hers or Robert Benchley's? [[User:Hayford Peirce|Hayford Peirce]] 08:59, 28 February 2008 (CST)
So the expressions
"so here's the deal about..." and "so here's the thing about..."
Is it proper English to have the only verb in a sentence be a contraction? I think yes because I hear too many sentences with it's. [[User:Tom Kelly|Tom Kelly]] 23:18, 4 May 2009 (UTC)


: <Smacks forehead!> Duhh - why didn't I realize that? I guess I was thinking candy->obesity->heart-attack, or something.
:No, no, no. And in proper French, non, non, non! Never, never, never, at least not in formal writing. Such as in an encyclopedia. [[User:Hayford Peirce|Hayford Peirce]] 23:43, 4 May 2009 (UTC)
: The martini one I was thinking of is:
: '' I like to have a martini, two at the very most.
: '' After three I'm under the table, after four I'm under the host!
: Definitely hers (from the words alone :-). Bit risqué for back then, actually!
: How droll that we're having a chat on Ro's talk: page. Hope Ro doesn't mind! :-) Sorry, Ro! [[User:J. Noel Chiappa|J. Noel Chiappa]] 16:11, 28 February 2008 (CST)
:::Au contraire, most interesting. More Portuguese plonk, anyone? [[User:Ro Thorpe|Ro Thorpe]] 16:26, 28 February 2008 (CST)


::::Ah, yes, I remember the other martini one now. I've been making martinis for myself lately, after not having tasted them for about 40 years, and I gotta say that if *I* drank four them, the host would be performing necrophilia! But I remember going out for dinner in the 60s and 70s with people who would drink six or seven of them, before and during the eats. Ugh! They're like IVs straight to the brain.... And, yes, these communications keep Ro in touch with the wider world from his little enclave in Iberia.... [[User:Hayford Peirce|Hayford Peirce]] 16:30, 28 February 2008 (CST)
== Catalan Countries ==


==Grammer n'stuff==
Hi Ro. Please have a look at this discussion: [[User talk:Hayford Peirce#Catalan Countries]].--[[User:Domergue Sumien|Domergue Sumien]] 20:34, 5 May 2009 (UTC)


Hey, thanks for getting in that little punctuation on the Troubles article! I seem to find it more difficult that most to keep up with conventional punctuation, spelling and grammar. Its a combination of laziness and well, laziness. Cheers! [[User:Denis Cavanagh|Denis Cavanagh]] 07:31, 21 January 2008 (CST)
:No use, mon pote, I moved it to [[Talk:Catalan countries]]. [[User:Hayford Peirce|Hayford Peirce]] 20:51, 5 May 2009 (UTC)


== Question on word usage ==
== WP vandal ==


Hi Ro,
Thanks Ro!


You appear to be the resident English expert on wiki, so I've got a question for you. :) Could you shed some light on the usage of [http://en.citizendium.org/wiki?title=Depersonalization_disorder&diff=100259126&oldid=100258894 evince and evidence]? Thanks in advance. --[[User:Richard Pettitt|Richard Pettitt]] 10:20, 27 January 2008 (CST)\
Guess who the vandal is? None other than Ryan O'Hara, Rocky Zeckoski, Steve Fontanes, or whatever he's calling himself this week!
::Having already had my edit reverted once, I'd appreciate if you would make the change. Thanks again! --[[User:Richard Pettitt|Richard Pettitt]] 10:52, 27 January 2008 (CST)


:::See [http://en.citizendium.org/wiki/User_talk:Richard_Pettitt#Evincing_evidence]
== One of the oddest words in the English language ==


::::Ro: That's what I was clumsily attempting to get at...evidence is not a verb except in its specific clincial usage.  Since I personally take issue with repeating words too closely together, and you are the English expert, perhaps you could come up with something that would convey the intention of the (clincial) evidence, avoid the repition of demonstrate, and avoid the mainfestation implication of evince...that ought to keep you up this evening...  Blessings... --[[User:Michael J. Formica|Michael J. Formica]] 17:35, 27 January 2008 (CST)
It's spelled either Saguaro or Sahuaro and pronounced Sah-wah-rheaux.
== Maigret un farani? Bien sur! ==
Yup. Or, I guess, Ouais! [[User:Hayford Peirce|Hayford Peirce]] 12:06, 9 February 2008 (CST)


== Internationalisation ==
Here's a letter I wrote to the local newspaper about 13 years ago (they didn't publish it):


Hi! I’m just letting people who have expressed an interest in CZ International know that there is now a proposal on the table.
My wife and I have enjoyed our two years in Tucson since moving here from the Bay Area. We have, however, one question that no one seems able to answer.  Why do half the entries in the local phonebook refer to Saguaro Widgets Inc. and the other half to Sahuaro Widgets Inc.?  In San Francisco we didn't call our local trees redwoods -- but also read-a-woods.  None of my reference books have an answer to this vexing question; perhaps you do.


Please discuss its feasibility at: [[CZ:Proposals/Internationalisation sandbox]] in the Discussion area.
I still don't know the answer....


Feel free to help develop the proposal, as well.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sahuaro [[User:Hayford Peirce|Hayford Peirce]] 23:19, 8 May 2009 (UTC)


We'll also need "drivers".
== More British eats ==


If you've got no idea what I'm talking about, please refer to: [[CZ:Proposals/New]] and [[CZ:Proposals]]
In my latest John Brock, his yokel neighbor in the Cotwolds tells him she's putting a nice "griskin" into a stewpot to cook for 4 hours.  Here's an old Beeton mention of it (skim down the page a little): http://images.google.com/imgres?imgurl=http://www.exclassics.com/beeton/beet207.gif&imgrefurl=http://www.exclassics.com/beeton/beet17.htm&usg=__MWDvcynRXcUe1jKI79OxIQNa6Po=&h=167&w=275&sz=4&hl=en&start=13&sig2=vTxE5Wx9q1V4To1S1cJpXg&tbnid=vWMrEQWgO3ipqM:&tbnh=69&tbnw=114&prev=/images%3Fq%3Dgriskin%26gbv%3D2%26hl%3Den%26sa%3DG&ei=svkKSvSeJ5OytAPB5aXVCA


[[User:Aleta Curry|Aleta Curry]] 17:49, 14 February 2008 (CST)
It's hard to tell if it's a *cut* of pork (say, a shoulder) or a cut of *any* kind of meat, or just another word for "pork".


And remember that about a year ago you and I and some others were discussing "corned beef", "salt beef", and "salted beef", to no firm conclusions? In the Brock book he wanders through Soho, past the place where he can get a "salt beef sandwich with a big Jewish grin".... As I said before, my local butcher in London used to sell me "salt beef" with a big British grin and, since I definitely bought pork at his shop, I'm sure the place wasn't Jewish. [[User:Hayford Peirce|Hayford Peirce]] 16:56, 13 May 2009 (UTC)


== Thanks, re Postal Abbrev. ==
== another apostrophe question for our resident "expert dialectian and grammarian".... ==
Ro, thanks for pointing that out. It didn't even occur to me. [[User:David E. Volk|David E. Volk]] 08:41, 19 February 2008 (CST)


== Caliphate ==
do we say, as in the [[John Brock]] article, "after a few hours sleep" or "after a few hour's sleep", or even "after a few hours' sleep". Yeah, I *know* we could say "after a few hours of sleep", but now I'm curious.... (and not even Yellow) [[User:Hayford Peirce|Hayford Peirce]] 04:29, 14 May 2009 (UTC)


Thanks for the message on my user talk page.  (Should I reply there, or here?)  Actually, it wasn't the difference of the terminal "h" that made me ask the question, but rather, the reversal of the "a" and "i" vowels. The very little I know about Arabic includes the fact that it inflects words by altering them internally, so "khilafah" might be some inflected form of the same word given by the OED as the etymon, but the first two vowels are in the opposite order. (And the terminal "h" is a difference too.) [[User:Bruce M.Tindall|Bruce M.Tindall]] 12:19, 25 February 2008 (CST)
== All right versus Alright ==
Ro, being the resident grammarian, what is the acceptable usage regarding "all right" as opposed to "alright"? Interestingly, Wikipedia uses "alright" but I've seen debates on the matter suggesting "all right" is the correct usage. What's your opinion on the matter? [[User:Meg Ireland|Meg Ireland]] 01:22, 15 May 2009 (UTC)
:Rheaux is one of the '''two''' resident "expert dialecticians and grammarians". Before he agrees with me, I will tell you this: "alright" is never, ever, not even once, right, correct, acceptable, or anything at all except wrong. Maybe in comic books -- nowhere else. Trust me. [[User:Hayford Peirce|Hayford Peirce]] 01:35, 15 May 2009 (UTC)
::Then Wikipedia is in trouble. They have an article on "alright" but no "all right", and many of their articles contain "alright". Nice of you to chip in Hayford :) [[User:Meg Ireland|Meg Ireland]] 01:45, 15 May 2009 (UTC)


== Gresham's Law ==
:::Geez, if WP is using it, then you *know* it's wrong. Here's what the online Merriam-Webster's Collegiate says: '''usage''' The one-word spelling alright appeared some 75 years after all right itself had reappeared from a 400-year-long absence. Since the early 20th century some critics have insisted alright is wrong, but it has its defenders and its users. It is less frequent than all right but remains in common use especially in journalistic and business publications. It is quite common in fictional dialogue, and is used occasionally in other writing <the first two years of medical school were alright — Gertrude Stein>. I could look it up in my 1940 MW Second Edition Unabridged, but that's a *very* prescriptive work, and I *know* what *they* would say. If they even include it among their 625,000 words.... [[User:Hayford Peirce|Hayford Peirce]] 02:12, 15 May 2009 (UTC)
Hi, Rhau, I had forgotten about my little bon mot. And what it was in relation to. If you can find some place to stick it in where it might be appropriate, sure, go ahead! The funny thing is, it's actually *true*! [[User:Hayford Peirce|Hayford Peirce]] 10:20, 27 February 2008 (CST)


== "Too much of anything is bad..." ==
Yes, that's good stuff from MW. And from Wiktionary: Alternative spelling of all right. Considered by most to be an incorrect spelling...It is common practice for some to use "alright" for the meaning "fine, good" and "all right" to mean "all correct". However, the former word is considered nonstandard.
"But too much whiskey is just enough." It's a great quote and is *attributed* to Mark Twain, but, like many of his zingers, no one can quite track down *exactly* where he said or wrote it....


You shoulda seen me in the late 50s when I could hit a serve about as hard as anyone AND wore (sometimes) white flannel shorts and ALWAYS wore Fred Perry laurel wreath shirts -- in the good old days the wreath was *stitched* into the shirt, like a thick monogram. Later, when they cheapened them by just gluing the damn things on, I gave up wearing them. ''Tant pis pour toi'', Fred Perry! [[User:Hayford Peirce|Hayford Peirce]] 19:58, 28 February 2008 (CST)
Concise Oxford omits it; Oxford Advanced Learners lists it an an exact synonym.


== e & E ==
You can see how it arose by analogy with already & always, which do not mean all ready & all ways. It would always be wrong in: they got the answers alright, meaning: they got all the answers right - but why not use the latter order anyway?
I suspect it should be more like "e (exponential base)", but we should ask the math editors for their preference. [[User:David E. Volk|David E. Volk]] 13:22, 29 February 2008 (CST)


I made the move the [[e (math)]], created the disambiguation page at [[E (disambiguation)]], and started [[E (letter)]] with subpages. Have at it! [[User:David E. Volk|David E. Volk]] 16:39, 29 February 2008 (CST)
Like Hayford, I don't like it and I don't use it - so I was surprised to find I had included it in [[English spellings]] - presumably because I decided it wasn't going to go away. Time to add a bit to that... [[User:Ro Thorpe|Ro Thorpe]] 16:21, 15 May 2009 (UTC)


== conflict ==
== kippered Kiplings ==
I replied to your stuff on my page, but it got conflicted with your addition, then I forgot to label the subject line. [[User:Hayford Peirce|Hayford Peirce]] 16:02, 29 February 2008 (CST)


== tables ==
O Noble Rheaux, did you catch my Recent Changes exhortation to look at the [[John Brock]] section about popular culture for the witty Rudyard Kipling verse? [[User:Hayford Peirce|Hayford Peirce]] 04:20, 16 May 2009 (UTC)
I can drive a car (was a teenager in L.A., hehe) but tables are a mystery to me except for that functional thingee upon which goodies are placed from time to time. The tennis table was Larry's suggestion (order, was more like it) and [[User:Robert W King]] and/or [[User:Chris Day]] conjured it up magically. I don't have a *clue* as to how it's done. I could just barely figure out how to use the one they created, at that was only by trial and error.... They're both friendly chaps, so I suggest you throw yourself on their mercy.... [[User:Hayford Peirce|Hayford Peirce]] 12:07, 1 March 2008 (CST)


== All testimonials.... ==
== Means of transport ==
...glady accepted, as they used to say in 'Merkin adverts, hehe! Danke! [[User:Hayford Peirce|Hayford Peirce]] 16:04, 2 March 2008 (CST)


== input requested on naming convention proposal ==
Remember, a long while ago in the Brit/Merkin English section, I said that in the 20s and 30s Hercule Poirot would get in his "motor" and go to an "aerodrome" to take the "aeroplane" to France? In the second [[John Brock]] book, published around 1967, me reading a U.S. paperback publication that changes the single quotes to doubles but retains the Brit spellings, he mostly speaks of his "car", sometimes of his "motorcar", and at least once of his "motor". Skirrow, the author, was born about 1923 -- do you think he's consciously being old-fashioned, or arch, or indifferent? He's a skilled writer and knows what words mean (also being an advertising man, of course). [[User:Hayford Peirce|Hayford Peirce]] 17:07, 17 May 2009 (UTC)


Please check out [[CZ:Proposals/Naming Conventions for Biographies#Final review?]] and respond there; if there is agreement, this proposal will move on to the next stage of adoption. Thanks,  [[User:Anthony Argyriou|Anthony Argyriou]] 13:51, 3 March 2008 (CST)
== finishing up my first Brock novel article, but.... ==


There's been a significant suggestion for a change to the proposed policy.  Please look at [[CZ:Proposals/Naming Conventions for Biographies#Poll regarding suggested change]] and respond there. [[User:Anthony Argyriou|Anthony Argyriou]] 14:04, 12 March 2008 (CDT)
Hi, O Rheaux, would you take a look at the second paragraph of the Observations section at http://en.citizendium.org/wiki/It_Won't_Get_You_Anywhere#Observations and tell me what you think. It's certainly no big part of the book, and we *do* have to keep in mind the context of the times, but I'm not quite sure how I ought to handle this. Any thoughts and/or editing by you would be welcome. Thanks! [[User:Hayford Peirce|Hayford Peirce]] 23:10, 18 May 2009 (UTC)


== Rho, Reaux, Ro...we're already partying! ==
== Thanks ==
Thanks Ro. I was cut off from editing last night so I couldn't get back on to finish. :/ [[User:Meg Ireland|Meg Ireland]] 00:23, 21 May 2009 (UTC)


...and when you Euro kids wake, Ro, it'll be Wednesday.
== Further to the great Motor/Motorcar conundrum ==


So join us!
I'm holding in my hands the 1968 Bodley Head hardback edition of Skirrow's third and final John Brock novel, so there's no question of it being messed up by American editors.  On page 6 a tiny, golden girl drives up in a vast old silver automobile that is probably an RR. It blasts "a great silver sound," "the first two phrases of Colonel Bogey". "I'd like to park this motor-car," she says, with the hyphen between the two words. In the next paragraph "the great car rolled silently into the kerb." On page 8, "I looked again at the beautiful white motor." So we've got all three usages within a couple of hundred words. I don't think he ever uses "auto" or "automobile" though.... [[User:Hayford Peirce|Hayford Peirce]] 02:42, 22 May 2009 (UTC)


It should be our usual [[CZ:monthly write-a-thon|madcap affair.]]
== let's us now speak of languages, O Rheaux! ==


This month, our special theme is "Something you absolutely ''love''".
Did you know there was/is an article language called, wait for it, http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ro_(language)? We live and learn.... [[User:Hayford Peirce|Hayford Peirce]] 22:33, 25 May 2009 (UTC)


Be there or be square!
== Chip, Chips, Potato Chips, Crisps, etc. ==


[[User:Aleta Curry|Aleta Curry]] 16:24, 4 March 2008 (CST)
Heaux, Eaux Noble Rheaux!


== Spanish Translation ==
I'm in Oakland, screwing around on a friend's computer that drives me crazy. I have a NYT from Monday that has a lighthearted Editorial page article about a Lord Justice finally deciding the weighty question of Pringles and crisps or chips or whatever.  I was gonna add this to our article about [[Potato chip]] or [[Crisp]] or whatever, but it doesn't exist!  Just two articles about [[Chip (food)]] and [[French fry]]. If you start one about chips or whatever, I'll at least add the NYT stuff....


I see that you can speak Spanish.  On top of that, you seem to be one of the resident copyediting gurus.  If you could take a peak at [[Calcidius]], and the talk page, I'm thinking we might have a need for a translator, if you're up to the task. --[[User:Todd Coles|Todd Coles]] 21:46, 6 March 2008 (CST)
http://www.nytimes.com/2009/06/01/opinion/01mon4.html?scp=1&sq=potato%20chips%20Pringle&st=cse
: He has a link in the article to the original Spanish version, I believe.  I figured you might be able to look at that and get a clearer picture, since you understand the language. --[[User:Todd Coles|Todd Coles]] 12:55, 7 March 2008 (CST)
:: I think this is it. [http://www.antiquos.com/La-Atlantida-de-Platon/modules.php?name=News&file=article&sid=10]  But of course I can't read it so I don't know. :) --[[User:Todd Coles|Todd Coles]] 14:28, 7 March 2008 (CST)


== An important message in Calcidius discussion page... ==
== Further to the Heelah Monster story ==


Please, I made an important message in the [http://en.citizendium.org/wiki/Talk:Calcidius#Please.2C_kindly_ask_everyone_to_please_not_change_my_translations_of_the_texts_in_Latin_and_Greek.2C_without_first_consulting_my_views_on_the_matter. discussion page] from article of [[Calcidius]], I believe that it would be interesting if you read, because it is aimed at all those who are assisting in the editing of the article. Kind regards, --[[User:Georgeos Díaz-Montexano|Georgeos Díaz-Montexano]] 22:16, 7 March 2008 (CST)
Heaux agayne!


== Mr. Sanger has forbidden me the moral right to be recognized as the intellectual author ==
On my way to Oakland, about 70 miles north of Tucson I drove through the wilderness of the Gila River Indian Reservation, crossing over, at one point, on a bridge about 10 feet over the Gila River itself, which at that point is probably 100 or 150 yards wide, about 8 feet deep, and totally flat and dry, just a sandy riverbed with small trees and brush growing in it. I imagine that water probably flows in it a dozen days a year or so....


Mr. Sanger has forbidden me the moral right to be recognized as the intellectual author, and I have been denied the simple right to a link to my original article (see [http://en.citizendium.org/wiki/Talk:Calcidius discussion page]). I'm sorry, but abandoned the project. I am very disappointed. I wish the best for everyone, and having great success. My most sincere greetings and respect for all. Kind Regards, --[[User:Georgeos Díaz-Montexano|Georgeos Díaz-Montexano]] 16:42, 9 March 2008 (CDT)
:Would an amphibian version of a Gila Monster breathe through hills? [[User:Howard C. Berkowitz|Howard C. Berkowitz]] 18:28, 3 June 2009 (UTC)


==That that==
::Gege! [[User:Ro Thorpe|Ro Thorpe]] 18:33, 3 June 2009 (UTC)
Yeah, I know, I just threw that in for laughs because it popped up in my memory thingee....


And, yes, I just caught up with the drama. Another one of the standard nuts who turn up from time to time and always end up leaving. There was the crop circle guy, who I think also did some interminable other Original Research thingee, and the Aussie guy with the obsession about a downunder massacre.  Sigh.... [[User:Hayford Peirce|Hayford Peirce]] 18:07, 9 March 2008 (CDT)
== Presidents of vice ==


== See... ==
Much sought-after skill in Las Vegas. [[User:Howard C. Berkowitz|Howard C. Berkowitz]] 21:06, 12 June 2009 (UTC)


http://en.citizendium.org/wiki/Talk:S [[User:Stephen Ewen|Stephen Ewen]] 23:09, 10 March 2008 (CDT)
== I'd rather fight than switch ==


==Recording==
I'm rereading a fine British thriller about [[John Craig]], a just-as-tough but far more believable version of [[John Brock]], written at just about exactly the same time, and on the second page his ne'er do well brother-in-law gets into Craig's shiny Bristol and, after fantasizing for a bit that it is his, "Then he switched on."


Ro, what do you want me to make a recording of?  I can likely do it this Sunday.  --[[User:Robert W King|Robert W King]] 11:57, 14 March 2008 (CDT)
Exit brother-in-law in a tremendous explosion.
:Ro, I've spent a few hours trying to read and record these, but they're not written for dialogue at all. --[[User:Robert W King|Robert W King]] 21:10, 16 March 2008 (CDT)


==French words==
In Merkin-talk he would "turn on the ignition." "turn it on," "turn the key," "turn on the motor," or '''something''', but never, I'm pretty sure, simply "switch on." '''Possibly''' "switched it on...."
*What about ''frottage'', or is that too risqué or outré?[[User:Hayford Peirce|Hayford Peirce]] 13:44, 16 March 2008 (CDT)
*What about that number that precedes seventy?[[User:Hayford Peirce|Hayford Peirce]] 13:44, 16 March 2008 (CDT)


*Would ''puisne'' count, or is that too specialised as a law word? [[User:Louise Valmoria|Louise Valmoria]] 13:50, 16 March 2008 (CDT)
Both first novels written around 1966, Brock's boss on the Addison Road is the Fat Man. Craig's boss in Queen Anne's Gate is Loomis, a vast fat man with snow-speckled red hair and pale, manic eyes. Musta been something in the water around that time.... [[User:Hayford Peirce|Hayford Peirce]] 17:11, 13 June 2009 (UTC)
:It's in my dictionary sans italics. [[User:Ro Thorpe|Ro Thorpe]] 13:59, 16 March 2008 (CDT)
*Or ''menagerie''? (Admittedly, Hayford made me think of ''ménage-à-trois'', but while we're on similar word patterns ...)[[User:Louise Valmoria|Louise Valmoria]] 13:54, 16 March 2008 (CDT)
::You've come up with some great ones (& I've just thought of 'madame', whatever happened to my chaste list?) - [[User:Ro Thorpe|Ro Thorpe]] 13:59, 16 March 2008 (CDT)
:::Mademoiselle. Mondemoiseau, I think, I'm safe in saying, doesn't seem to have entered English....[[User:Hayford Peirce|Hayford Peirce]] 14:03, 16 March 2008 (CDT)
::::But seriously, I think we better put in ''double entendre'', even if the Faranis use ''sous entendre'' for the meme chose.[[User:Hayford Peirce|Hayford Peirce]] 14:03, 16 March 2008 (CDT)
::Yes, you had me fuled there. Le Monde Moiseau, the Guardian's new fashion supplement... [[User:Ro Thorpe|Ro Thorpe]] 15:02, 16 March 2008 (CDT)
Yes, but I've never heard of mondemoiseau, & it's not in my pocket dictionary, nor moiseau, so translation, please. It  does have monde, in the Henry James sense, but that just makes me think of the newspaper. Menagerie, I think, is too well-known: pace puisne, we're thinking italicised words here. [[User:Ro Thorpe|Ro Thorpe]] 14:12, 16 March 2008 (CDT)
::Ah, italics, gotcha. As for ''mondemoiseau'', as an exercise for the student, as I'm sure Prof. Thorpe exhorts his young troops from time to time, we've got "ma demoiselle" for addressing a jeune fille. Cartesian symmetry demands, therefore, that we have "mon demoiseau" for addressing a well-bred jeune homme.  Or so I believe -- it really is an old French word. After this, I'll go to the other discussion page.[[User:Hayford Peirce|Hayford Peirce]] 14:31, 16 March 2008 (CDT)
:Hmm, how about ''laissez-faire''? Although I've just run a search on this one and it seems to be used without italics nowadays too.[[User:Louise Valmoria|Louise Valmoria]] 14:20, 16 March 2008 (CDT)
::It is sufficiently daunting-looking (I'm thinking of kids who have never heard these words pronounced) to go in, and it seems we have to relax our strict italic rule here, as puisne must go in. I've started the article's discussion page, by the way (though I like getting all these messages...) - [[User:Ro Thorpe|Ro Thorpe]] 14:26, 16 March 2008 (CDT)
:::It's just as easy to be edit-conflicted here as in the other one. Rule One, Preview your edit so that it's saved at least *somewhere*. Rule Two, repeat Rule One. If you're really paranoid, highlight your new edit, Copy it, and Paste it into WordPad.... [[User:Hayford Peirce|Hayford Peirce]] 14:53, 16 March 2008 (CDT)
::::Of course. Anyway, you've been editing the article & I invite Louise to do the same. I've decided to be inclusive now, but I've added a bit to the text above. [[User:Ro Thorpe|Ro Thorpe]] 14:58, 16 March 2008 (CDT)


==Varieties of English==
:They sure were strange times. Maybe readers are supposed to think he turned on the ignition, but what it actually means is that he lit a '''very strong cigarette''', Capstan Full Strength, for example, hence the explosion. [[User:Ro Thorpe|Ro Thorpe]] 17:25, 13 June 2009 (UTC)
Hi. Re: your query on my Talk. I have created a page called [[varieties of English]] which is just a bunch of definitions. It is actually similar to part of the subpage [[English language/Related Articles]]. So what you could do is a) replace my 'varieties of English' altogether (''if'' you include more than just British and American, 'cos 'varieties' obviously means more than two); (b) incorporate your text into that page (e.g. under the existing headings); (c) start a new page called [[differences between British and American English]] or some-such. I'm not sure what to do; it depends on the nature of your work, I suppose. I think a new page would be welcome on this specific topic... people talk a lot about UK/US differences but not much about Canadian/Australian differences, for instance. [[User:John Stephenson|John Stephenson]] 23:10, 16 March 2008 (CDT)


: [[Differences between British and American English]] sounds good to me. (I thought about [[Differences between American and British English]], but I decided that it's proper to put 'British' first, because that's the origin of the language. Do put a redirect there, though.) [[User:J. Noel Chiappa|J. Noel Chiappa]] 21:11, 17 March 2008 (CDT)
::Hehe, at least it wasn't an unfiltered Bastos, circa that era! You ever tried to smoke onna '''those'''?! [[User:Hayford Peirce|Hayford Peirce]] 17:33, 13 June 2009 (UTC)


:: Hi, the missing discussion is on [[User_talk:Hayford_Peirce#Autre_hot_potato|Hayford's talk page]].
:You bet. But I plumbed the depths with Sax and Alfa in Italy. They used to come in paper packets ''without any cellophane''. [[User:Ro Thorpe|Ro Thorpe]] 17:38, 13 June 2009 (UTC)
:: As to [[English: transatlantic differences]] (isn't it 'trans-Atlantic', anyway?), I don't like that as much as I like [[Differences between British and American English]], but I would be OK with any of them, it's not that big a deal. Well, maybe it's not that non-significant, now that I think about it - I mean, trans-Atlantic is not definitive - is that UK-Canada, UK-Caribbean, what? So I think explicitly mentioning both varieties in the title may be necessary. [[User:J. Noel Chiappa|J. Noel Chiappa]] 12:00, 18 March 2008 (CDT)


::: Glad I could be useful! [[User:J. Noel Chiappa|J. Noel Chiappa]] 12:41, 18 March 2008 (CDT)
::I don't think Bastos had cellophane either. Not the old blue packs. An edit conflict wiped this out: PS, they really knew how to advertise ciggies in the old days! http://cgi.ebay.com/RARE-c1927-ALBUM-BASTOS-MELIA-LE-NIL-288-photos_W0QQitemZ270404778518QQihZ017QQcategoryZ1507QQcmdZViewItem [[User:Hayford Peirce|Hayford Peirce]] 17:41, 13 June 2009 (UTC)


==Getting around edit conflicts==
:Charmantes! Tous nos seins sont sélectionnés! They speak by themselves! [[User:Ro Thorpe|Ro Thorpe]] 17:54, 13 June 2009 (UTC)


Hey Ro--I discovered when you and I and Hayford were getting edit conflicted yesterday that if you scroll to the bottom of the page your saved text is there--so it doesn't have to be copied and pasted if you're worried about losing it, you can just grab it from the bottom of the edit conflict page ... although maybe I should be telling Hayford this? Hmm. [[User:Louise Valmoria|Louise Valmoria]] 17:19, 17 March 2008 (CDT)
::Ooh, la, la! Zeez crazee Frahrench peepuls! [[User:Hayford Peirce|Hayford Peirce]] 18:24, 13 June 2009 (UTC)
:Hayford's right here! Thanks for the tip, Louise, I will certainly try looking there the next time it happens! [[User:Hayford Peirce|Hayford Peirce]] 17:38, 17 March 2008 (CDT)
::Thanks, Louise, I've forgotten whether or not I used to know that... [[User:Ro Thorpe|Ro Thorpe]] 17:48, 17 March 2008 (CDT)


==Lost==
:::Hmmm. A cigarette, with matches, can be used as an improvised delay detonation system, but usually not by the smoker. Admittedly, back in my days as a chemistry major, we helped one of the professors with his bizarre way to stop smoking: sneak away his packs, open them, drop saturated potassium chlorate at various lengths down the cigarettes, let them dry, return the packs. His idea is that he would develop an aversion to smoking when a sufficient number of cigarettes exploded, at random intervals, and burned off his eyebrows. [[User:Howard C. Berkowitz|Howard C. Berkowitz]] 20:40, 13 June 2009 (UTC)
The changes i made to the subpages template were meant to make you less lost. I corrected the status from 0 to 3. Re: your edit summary, what made you lost? Is there any change that could be made the error templates that would make it even more explicit what needs to be done? Or less confusing? [[User:Chris Day|Chris Day]] [[User talk:Chris Day|(talk)]] 17:38, 19 March 2008 (CDT)
:Sounds good. I just had a bit of fun adding some of the really confusing anglo-american incompatabilities. Rubber and condom would be good too not to mention house plants vs pot plants!. [[User:Chris Day|Chris Day]] [[User talk:Chris Day|(talk)]] 17:53, 19 March 2008 (CDT)
::I guess house plant is american, or potted plant? When I told my friends here I had pot plants they thought I was growing marijuana. [[User:Chris Day|Chris Day]] [[User talk:Chris Day|(talk)]] 18:09, 19 March 2008 (CDT)
:::Brit in the states. One I remember to be confusing was the differences between rent and hire. The obvious car ones, boot/trunk, bonnet/hood, mud guard/fender. The ones that lead to hilarity, rubber/eraser I touched on above, also arse/fanny. [[User:Chris Day|Chris Day]] [[User talk:Chris Day|(talk)]] 18:29, 19 March 2008 (CDT)
I just realised I undid one of your edits.  I had incorporated that into the table, but it might well be better as prose.  I'll stop formatting the table so you can get it the way you like. [[User:Chris Day|Chris Day]] [[User talk:Chris Day|(talk)]] 14:22, 20 March 2008 (CDT)
:Yes, we've finished with the suffixes, so it has to be a separate subsection. [[User:Ro Thorpe|Ro Thorpe]] 14:24, 20 March 2008 (CDT)
::I was in brain dead mode. :) [[User:Chris Day|Chris Day]] [[User talk:Chris Day|(talk)]] 14:32, 20 March 2008 (CDT)
:Hehe. But no, I don't blame you for missing that. There's loads more to come by the way... [[User:Ro Thorpe|Ro Thorpe]] 14:36, 20 March 2008 (CDT)
:Also, did you put all your vocab items in (as outlined above)?
::I think they have been put in independently by Hayford. Is your goal an exhaustive list or illustrations? [[User:Chris Day|Chris Day]] [[User talk:Chris Day|(talk)]] 14:40, 20 March 2008 (CDT)
:Good question, I had to go and check - I wrote it a long time ago. I reckon those we've done are illustrations, but what follows is a sort of 'everything else' section. [[User:Ro Thorpe|Ro Thorpe]] 14:45, 20 March 2008 (CDT)


==Telescope==
:Now it might work if you burned off a person's hands... [[User:Ro Thorpe|Ro Thorpe]] 21:10, 13 June 2009 (UTC)


Hi Ro. In the article [[Telescope]] you edited "tele" saying that it is a word in its own right. We have looked and need a reference for this. I can not come up with any. I have reinserted telo (τηλó) but let me know if you come up with the exact word and we'll change it to tele.--[[User:Thomas Simmons|Thomas Simmons]] 01:02, 23 March 2008 (CDT)
== Page moves & metadata ==


Hi Ro,
Hi Ro,
I noticed that Christian Liem moved [[Measles virus]] to [[Measles]] but left [[Template:Measles_virus/Metadata]] untouched (which should have been moved too), which prompted you  to create [[Template:Measles/Metadata]]. This way, the edit history in the metadata gets lost. Please keep this in mind when moving pages or creating metadata pages next time. Thanks & cheers, --[[User:Daniel Mietchen|Daniel Mietchen]] 10:43, 1 July 2009 (UTC)


Just a note to let you know I do take your input seriously. I am determined to get a good source that corroborates your input and will let you know. I have seen these little things get picked up and repeated till no one knows where it came from and would just simply like to make a definitive statement here.--[[User:Thomas Simmons|Thomas Simmons]] 16:42, 24 March 2008 (CDT)
:I believe that if the metadata page is moved first, then everything goes smoothly... sort of. [[User:D. Matt Innis|D. Matt Innis]] 17:15, 1 July 2009 (UTC)
 
== Agreement in number ==


Jeez, how did I miss that extra "s" (or whatever it was)? Thanks for catching that (says Noel the grammar particularist, blushing). [[User:J. Noel Chiappa|J. Noel Chiappa]] 19:58, 10 April 2008 (CDT)
::OK, I shall consult here should I ever decide to do that again. Thanks - [[User:Ro Thorpe|Ro Thorpe]] 17:50, 1 July 2009 (UTC)


== Are you available for a read through? ==
== I would like to nominate [[The Canterbury Tales]] for Article of the Week but .... ==


Hi Ro,
Ro, I would like to nominate [[The Canterbury Tales]] for Article of the Week but I rather firmly believe that a Developed Article (Status 1) should have a populated "Related Links" subpage. Would you have the time to develop such a Related Articles subpage? Thanks, [[User:Milton Beychok|Milton Beychok]] 01:40, 4 July 2009 (UTC)


You're an elegant proofer and I could use a reader.  [[Miniature Fox Terrier]].  It shouldn't be too heavy a read.  Thanks.  [[User:Aleta Curry|Aleta Curry]] 18:40, 11 April 2008 (CDT)
== check out this new website ==
:10-Q! [[User:Aleta Curry|Aleta Curry]] 03:01, 13 April 2008 (CDT)


== Deapostrophising ==
http://www.wordnik.com


Thanks for deapostrophising me where appropriate. Next time I find a blackboard I will upbraid myself for it. It's completely subconscious. I'm off to slap myself on the wrists with a grammar book. Thanks again. --[[User:Tom Morris|Tom Morris]] 18:35, 28 April 2008 (CDT)
type in some horrible word like "nous" or "paradigm" (neither of which I have ever consciously used) and see what you get. looks like it might be useful.... [[User:Hayford Peirce|Hayford Peirce]] 02:19, 22 July 2009 (UTC)


== The Long Adieu, or Adieu My Lovely ==
==PJ Proby==
We don't have "adieu"? Mon dieu! And Mon bleu! Bizarre, bizarre. Yeah, sure, send me the list if he doesn't pop up. What's difficult to decide, as I flip through the MW, is what qualifies and what doesn't. For instance, "ignoble" and "image" and "intelligence" all exist in both languages as do hundreds, maybe thousands of others, in which the derivation in English is NOT shown to be clearly "F", but a more round-about route. Whaddaya think?
Why did you move this to P.J. Proby? Style guides recommend that title with initials no longer use full stops. It's PJ Proby not P.J. Proby. [[User:Meg Ireland|Meg Ireland]] 22:38, 22 July 2009 (UTC)
:I think we're innocent right now of putting in words like "intelligence" - I think everything we've put in is *clearly* a French word, or at least clearly derived from the French, or has a somewhat exotic meaning or usage. If you think some of them fall into the "intelligence" category, however, zap 'em. I think we argued about "aileron" a long time ago, but that, to me, is *still* ''exotique''.... [[User:Hayford Peirce|Hayford Peirce]] 17:53, 4 May 2008 (CDT)
*PS: Archive your Talk page please. It's too long. [[User:Meg Ireland|Meg Ireland]] 22:41, 22 July 2009 (UTC)


ok, ça va bien - [[User:Ro Thorpe|Ro Thorpe]] 18:00, 4 May 2008 (CDT)
:I think that must be referring to initals like ABC, CBS, PVC, initials only. People's names must have the stops.


Glad to hear the shoulders are feeling better. Have you tried any prescription anti-inflammitories? Bextra worked wonders with my knee a couple of years ago with just 4 pills -- then they took it off the market two days later as being too dangerous! So I had, oh, 26 pills left, to keep for emergencies. Then my friggin' GF found them while rummaging through the house for pain pills and took 'em all. Grrrrrrr! I've got a bad case of "tennis elbow" at the moment, from hammering in my office, I think, as I rebuilt it, and I'm *sure* a couple Bextra would fix it. But I'm too lazy to go to the Doc before my annual checkup next month. Hope you're 100 percent one of these days! [[User:Hayford Peirce|Hayford Peirce]] 17:27, 4 May 2008 (CDT)
:I don't know how to archive, but you're welcome to do it, or tell me how. [[User:Ro Thorpe|Ro Thorpe]] 22:50, 22 July 2009 (UTC)
:I'm not really "suffering", just a little sore and stiff from time to time. Strangely enough, it sometimes bothers me the most while I'm just lying bed, half asleep, more than when I'm being active. It's leached a lot of strength from my arm, however, when I try lift things at certain angles. Other times I can lift normally -- just depends on how I'm doing it. About 15 years ago I suddenly discovered one day to my astonishment that I couldn't lift my left arm above my shoulder to put on a shirt or throw the ball up for a tennis serve -- it had come on so gradually that I wasn't aware of it. And I was only playing tennis wif me trouble and strife so I wasn't aware of the limitation on the tennis court. And no pain at all. Took about 4 months to clear up: 6 treatments of heavy hot towels and massage chez an hand/arm specialty center of the Univ. med. people; daily workouts chez moi with a giant rubber band attached to things that I had to pull on in various ways; and daily anti-inflam. pills. At the end of four months I was back to normal and playing tennis again with *real* players. Have never had a problem with it since. Very strange how it just crept up on me at the time, however.... [[User:Hayford Peirce|Hayford Peirce]] 17:48, 4 May 2008 (CDT)
::No, they list people's names as examples. [[User:Meg Ireland|Meg Ireland]] 22:58, 22 July 2009 (UTC)
:::Ro, can I ask what system you are using? I've always used BE with the New Oxford Style Guide as my source. The OSG states: "no dots and no spaces in initials". [[User:Meg Ireland|Meg Ireland]] 23:26, 22 July 2009 (UTC)


yes, something similar happened to a friend of mine. looking forward to my massage tomorrow... [[User:Ro Thorpe|Ro Thorpe]] 18:00, 4 May 2008 (CDT)
::::I'm about 99% certain that CZ style is to use '''A.J. Leibling''', '''A.E. Housman''', but '''ABC''', '''NATO''' etc. I'll try to find some examples. [[User:Hayford Peirce|Hayford Peirce]] 23:36, 22 July 2009 (UTC)
::Anti-inflamitories are really sorta miracle drugs for lotsa things.... Hope you get some that help out.... [[User:Hayford Peirce|Hayford Peirce]] 14:56, 5 May 2008 (CDT)


== Missing note ==
(Unindent). A *very* quick search found [[P.G. Wodehouse]], [[C.S. Lewis]], [[C.S. Forester]], and [[B. P. Koirala of Nepal]]. So I'm sure that there are many others. And that this is the accepted CZ style. Therefore Ro was correct to move the article to [[P.J. Proby]]. [[User:Hayford Peirce|Hayford Peirce]] 23:44, 22 July 2009 (UTC)
You musta forgotten to Save it -- I can't find anything there (or anywhere else by you recently). Cheers quand meme! [[User:Hayford Peirce|Hayford Peirce]] 18:39, 19 May 2008 (CDT)
:Thanks, Hayford. Hope that's OK/O.K. with you, Meg. [[User:Ro Thorpe|Ro Thorpe]] 23:50, 22 July 2009 (UTC)


== the tit for tat problem ==
::Rheaux tried to wipe me out with an edit conflict, but I managed to recover the following:
Hey, Rheaux mon vieux (or mon jeune, if you prefer!) you haven't addressed the great tit-teat question that I raised on the English spelling discussion page.... [[User:Hayford Peirce|Hayford Peirce]] 17:49, 28 May 2008 (CDT)


== Letters ==
:::In Article Mechanics, we find:
<blockquote>Grammar, spelling, punctuation, and usage [edit] <br/> <br/>


What do you think about moving the specific alphabet articles to more disambiguated pages? As in, [[Foo (letter)]] instead of [[Foo]]? I saw the talk about [[G (letter)]], and I assume there are going to be plenty more where that came from. Instead of moving the pages on a term-by-term basis, I'd think that it would be simpler (and more standardized) if we do all of them. I'd be happy to do the actual moving, but would like your input. [[User:John Dvorak|John Dvorak]] 12:40, 1 June 2008 (CDT)
Strunk and White's Elements of Style is useful; the first edition is available here. <br/> <br/>


thanks. having read the discussion on the talk page, i'm quite happy with whatever you + noel decide - [[User:Ro Thorpe|Ro Thorpe]] 13:02, 1 June 2008 (CDT)
For American English, please consult The Chicago Manual of Style for matters of formatting, punctuation, etc. and Garner's Dictionary of American English Usage for issues of usage. <br/> <br/>


:So, is that a go-ahead to move all the letters? It will probably break a bunch of links, but I'll be sure to pick up after myself like a good boy :) [[User:John Dvorak|John Dvorak]] 16:17, 1 June 2008 (CDT)
For British English, consult Fowler's Modern English Usage. </blockquote>


== a long one ==
:::I have just consulted my own copy of Fowler's, and throughout he uses the periods when giving people's names. So CZ is telling us to use Fowlers, and Fowlers tells us to use the period. [[User:Hayford Peirce|Hayford Peirce]] 23:57, 22 July 2009 (UTC)
Absence? I spent an 11-hour day beginning at 6:30 in the morning on Sunday with a carpenter hanging molding in my office rebuilding project, without even a bathroom or lunch break. I'm still recovering from the disruption to my normal routine and playing catch-up.... [[User:Hayford Peirce|Hayford Peirce]] 19:25, 3 June 2008 (CDT)


== commas ==
::::More examples: [[G.K. Chesterton]], [[G.W.F. Hegel]], and R. James Woolsey . In Wikipedia, all names have the periods, including the quinessential British historian A.J.P. Taylor. [[User:Hayford Peirce|Hayford Peirce]] 00:09, 23 July 2009 (UTC)


"I was working on the proof of one of my poems all the morning, and took out a comma. In the afternoon I put it back again." the Wild Oscar.... [[User:Hayford Peirce|Hayford Peirce]] 11:35, 12 June 2008 (CDT)
:I have to say I'm mighty relieved, even if I'm wiping you out again (cue surfing music...) [[User:Ro Thorpe|Ro Thorpe]] 00:16, 23 July 2009 (UTC)
::Is there a reason Hayford when I talk to someone on CZ you always butt in? It's becoming exceedingly annoying. If I wanted to talk to you I would have left a message on your Talk page, not Ro's. [[User:Meg Ireland|Meg Ireland]] 01:59, 23 July 2009 (UTC)

Latest revision as of 06:36, 26 May 2024


commas

"I was working on the proof of one of my poems all the morning, and took out a comma. In the afternoon I put it back again." the Wild Oscar.... Hayford Peirce 11:35, 12 June 2008 (CDT) - i won't be emulating oscar here - Ro Thorpe 13:03, 12 June 2008 (CDT)

Archive 1

Hey, it works now! I guess I had to Save it again in order to activate the link. Oh well, hope this is OK with you Ro -- all of our dicussion pages get too long sometimes.... Hayford Peirce 11:54, 12 June 2008 (CDT)

Ah, I see -- John created "User talk:Ro Thorpe" -- I had forgotten to put "user talk" into the title of the new article. Geez. Thanks, John!
No problem. Doncha hate it when you miss the little things? John Dvorak 11:58, 12 June 2008 (CDT)

thanks for that, don't know how it was done, don't think i'll ask... Ro Thorpe 13:03, 12 June 2008 (CDT)

Asterisks

Sure, no problem. Do you want just the asterisks removed, or the words following them too? John Dvorak 15:16, 9 July 2008 (CDT)

Alright, I got it. Apparently the schwa symbol is recognized by UTF-8 encoding, but not ANSI. It sure saved a bunch of work though. John Dvorak 19:06, 9 July 2008 (CDT)

Arm trouble

I have just heard of Hayford's misadventures with a certain spinning blade, and discovered you also have some issues as well; I hope things are okay! I am 75% over my little accident (now it's mostly strength building and flex range regaining). It seems there is an epidemic. --Robert W King 14:37, 19 July 2008 (CDT)

someone who doesn't get it

Hi, Rheaux! Could you do me a favor(our) and take a look at the history of http://en.citizendium.org/wiki/Bruch_Violin_Concerto_Number_1.

the guy who has made the entry keeps putting this non-CZ lede para in and I'm tired of fighting him. could you maybe write him a gentle note on his talk page to tell him (briefly) why this shouldn't be here? Many remerciements! Hayford Peirce 15:51, 27 July 2008 (CDT)

Hola!

You're back! Saw your minor edit on greenhouse--oh, much betterer, why didn't I think of that? Oh, how we missed Ro! Aleta Curry 20:03, 13 August 2008 (CDT)

Friggin' computers and double-friggin' security systems

Tell me about it!

I've just uninstalled my new (two weeks) update of Trend Micro PC-Cillin, which is supposed to be one of the best security programs, because I couldn't stop it from running all the time and disrupting me. Now I'm trying to *re*-install it but am having difficulties. Grrrrrrrrrrrrr!

Life was sure simpler before computers, when Bobby and I were out thumpin' the ball around!

Cheers!

This dumb thing is driving me crazy! I couldn't reinstall PC-Cillin -- it keeps telling me it's already there. But it isn't. Now I've done a System Restore. It's back -- but not working. Geez! I may end up uninstalling it again and paying for another entire program. Norton is the pits. McAfee is better, but not much. That only leaves the one with the Russian name, which generally has pretty good reviews.... Grrrrrrrrrr again! Hayford Peirce 18:48, 17 September 2008 (CDT)

back atcha

Gave a (probably too long) reply at my space Ciao! Aleta Curry 03:21, 5 October 2008 (CDT)

ahem

Yup, I've been following the drama. I also have a couple of comments towards the end of this Forum argument, strongly supporting Larry: http://forum.citizendium.org/index.php/topic,2389.0.html Hayford Peirce 20:36, 1 November 2008 (UTC)

As far as em-dashes go, I didn't have enough space to write clearly in the Subject box. I meant to say that the word "Insert" was on the left of the "Special Characters" line, and that the em-dash was to the *right* of the word "Insert". Or at least such is the case on my own screen at the moment. Hayford Peirce 20:36, 1 November 2008 (UTC)

Thanks

for clearing up those points. Of course you are absolutely right about Larry. Never understood the 1st thing about economics myself, though! Ro Thorpe 00:37, 2 November 2008 (UTC)

Your testimony

Please let us have it! --Larry Sanger 20:59, 3 November 2008 (UTC)

Sovranty

Hi, thank you for the rephrasing in Cyprus. As you can see, I'm not a native English speaker. It's not important for me, but do you really consider sovran, sovranty as incorrect spellings? They are fully accepţed in Webster's dictionary.--Domergue Sumien 11:00, 4 November 2008 (UTC)

I fear Webster's has rather misled you there. I don't have a copy, but the online version introduces that spelling with 'also...', while my Oxford dictionary is more to the point: 'Var. (poet.) of 'sovereign'. So as a retired teacher of English as a foreign language I strongly advise you to save that spelling for your poetry!
Salut, à la prochaine (how do you say that in Occitan?) - Ro Thorpe 13:49, 4 November 2008 (UTC)
All right, thank you for the explanation. "Adieu, al còp que ven" :)--Domergue Sumien 14:04, 4 November 2008 (UTC)
De nada - Ro Thorpe 14:16, 4 November 2008 (UTC)
My print edition of Merriam-Webster's Collegiate Dictionary, 11th Edition, doesn't list sovran or sovranty even as a variant. I myself never recall having seen it that way. It must be a very old variant. Hayford Peirce 15:44, 4 November 2008 (UTC)
That's how it struck me. I don't think I'd seen it either. Ro Thorpe 16:26, 4 November 2008 (UTC)
The Oxford English Dictionary does include "sovran" and derivatives, but cites no use of them any more recently than 1887, and says that these spellings are now "chiefly poetic." (There was a "Sovran Bank" in the southeastern U.S. in the 1980s, at the beginning of the period during which banks became enamored of renaming themselves with meaningless and nonexistent words. Sovran Bank was later gobbled up by NCNB, which then merged with the Borg of America.) Bruce M.Tindall 19:40, 17 November 2008 (UTC)

Greek letter articles

Ro, since you're the hardworking "letter guy" for the Roman alphabet, I wanted to ask what articles about letters in other alphabets should be called. I noticed that there is a small but potentially complicated mess involving links to "Gamma" -- some of these are intended to go to an article about the Greek letter; some to an article about "Gamma rays" (which exists); and some to an article about the Gamma programming language (which exists at plain ol' "Gamma").

I assume that we want to do something along the lines of having "Gamma" be a disambig page, with actual articles at "Gamma ray", "Gamma (letter)" or "Gamma (Greek letter)", and "Gamma (programming language)". Does this strike you as desirable? And if so, how should the "letter" articles be affixed -- with "(Greek letter)" or just "(letter)"?

I suppose it might be a good thing to pre-empt future confusion by (1) creating stub articles with "(Greek letter)" or whatever for each letter of the Greek alphabet; (2) creating disambig pages at plain ol' "Alpha", "Beta", etc., for each letter; and (3) systematically seeing what links to "Alpha", what links to "Beta", etc., and going into each of those pages and making sure that the link goes to the correct disambiguation such as "Alpha particle" or "Gamma (programming language)" or whatever. But I don't want to undertake something like that unless I'm sure that I wouldn't have to go back and undo it and re-do it a different way if somebody came up with a better idea. So what do you think, and who else should be asked? Bruce M.Tindall 19:49, 17 November 2008 (UTC)

Thanks for your response. OK, I'll get started on that soon. Bruce M.Tindall 03:44, 18 November 2008 (UTC)
Answer to why I used "(Greek letter)" instead of "(Letter)" -- hmm, because Hayford suggested it in the forum, and, uh, I'd forgotten that you'd suggested plain "(Letter)". The answer to whether anybody else has a gamma besides the Greeks is, I never heard of one, but I don't know for a fact that there isn't one, either. I'll just let this set of changes settle down for a day or so and see what other comments show up. Your point about making less work is a good one, though! Bruce M.Tindall 01:03, 19 November 2008 (UTC)

The ref

Perhaps you were after the one described here? --Daniel Mietchen 12:29, 18 November 2008 (UTC)

O apostrophe, where is thy sting?

Ro, would you mind if I renamed your "apostrophe" article to "apostrophe (punctuation mark)" or something similar, to make room for a disambig page and a new article on "apostrophe (figure of speech)"? Or if you have other ideas on how this could be done, please let me know. Thanks. Bruce M.Tindall 00:22, 25 November 2008 (UTC)

Yet more punctuation: Dr(.) No

And now for something completely different: In a revision to "Dr. No" you commented, "nothing specifically American about 'Dr'". Actually, I think what the orignal author (John Stephenson) might have meant was that the period after "Dr" in the movie's title was peculiarly American. I can only assume that the British, never having gotten over the trauma of the severe punctuation-rationing situation after WWII, are still very frugal about putting periods after "Mr", "Dr", and the like, whereas we Yanks, with our infinite resources!!! and our most excellent economic situation!!!, are quite conspicuous consumers of same. (See???!!!) So perhaps "Dr. No" looks more American than "Dr No"? Now I promise to stop bugging you about punctuation. Bruce M.Tindall 00:36, 25 November 2008 (UTC)

Doctor Who

(coincidence) This is the global article, covering all media, so I've restored primarily. There's only a brief mention of other media in the lead at present, but a fair amount in the body. Peter Jackson 16:35, 1 December 2008 (UTC)

Natural stress relaxation meditation

As I understand, the term is trademarked, so it is a proper name and should be capitalized, just as is Transcendental Meditation. Is there a specific reason you moved it to lower case?

Howard C. Berkowitz 03:08, 13 December 2008 (UTC)

Could I ask you to hold off? Matt Innis and I are working with the original author, who originally wrote something that I thought was advertising/self-promotion, but he's been very responsive to suggestions. He has asked for help in making the article more appopriate for CZ, and, since he has been agreeable, I'm hesitant to have additional people changing things while we work with him.
We are both doing enough substantive rewrites, and asking him to make changes, that I'd much rather stay focused on content now rather than what, frankly, are fairly minor issues of style. The article title may change, as may metadata, as a result of work on the article.
If you do want to make changes, could you first mention them on the article talk page? Again, we are working with a new editor, and he won't know how to follow side discussions on user pages. Howard C. Berkowitz 03:25, 13 December 2008 (UTC)

Huygens

Thank you for copyediting Huygens. Prepositions are one of my weak points in English, good that you correct them. --Paul Wormer 15:12, 14 December 2008 (UTC)

More apostrophes

Here's an issue only a bored copyeditor could love. (And I do.) The apostrophe article refers to Toys'R'Us®, but at least according to the store's website, the company uses double quotes, not apostrophes, around the "R": Toys"R"Us. (And in the logo in which the "R" is reversed, there seems to be no punctuation at all.) Bruce M.Tindall 19:03, 10 January 2009 (UTC)

How could this happen? Even on a wiki???

I am sure as sure could be that you fixed some wording R Jensen had placed at [[terrier]. I would attribute my confusion to the heat, but I have evidence. I wrote:

http://en.citizendium.org/wiki/User_talk:Ro_Thorpe/Archive_1#Fuzziness removed

and you replied at my page.

The text at terrier is back to the original, and there's no record of your edit in the history. [Hums The Twilight Zone theme.

So, for any of the tekkie legends reading this, how is the possible, and for Ro, do you remember what you changed 'fuzzy dogs' to?

Aleta Curry 23:30, 27 January 2009 (UTC)

recent move

When you moved it the first time you did not select the box for 'move all associated subpages' (which is a very useful option). I reverted it back so I could use that option rather than doing each subpage individually. Chris Day 18:16, 5 February 2009 (UTC)

The mysterious violinist

Remember back in August when you deleted the reference to "Sarah Zhang" from the article on Bruch Violin Concerto Number 1? I assume it just a typo for Sarah Chang, who is in fact a big-deal contemporary violin soloist. Not that she necessarily needs to go back into that specific article, since her name was used just as an example of who had recorded the piece, but I thought you might want to know there's a solution to the mystery. Bruce M.Tindall 23:55, 7 February 2009 (UTC)

Ah, I had forgotten about it, but I do remember that there was some back and forth about this at the time. Always nice to have mysteries solved! Hayford Peirce 00:10, 8 February 2009 (UTC)
Indeed it is. Thanks, Bruce, I might as well put it back in. Ro Thorpe 00:21, 8 February 2009 (UTC)

moving retro

Diagram to illustrate the four different views used by the experimental alphabet navigation tool. A shows the view on the main article and the catalog page. B shows the view on the alphabetically sorted subsubpage. C shows the view on the retroalphabetically listed subsubpage. D shows the view on one of the letter aticle pages.

I had cut and pasted the A section in the main article to the new subsubpage. However, since it was a test page, i didn't delete it from the main page. So two A sections currently exist for A. Otherwise you did it correctly. Chris Day 22:00, 5 March 2009 (UTC)

Ro, this is what it looks like on my screen. As I say the colors and look can be changed easily. What worries me is that from your description it is not working at all. Note that in the diagram the current page is indicated by the black square. Whether on a letter page, alphabetical or retroalphabetical type page is indicated by the respective row being darker. Chris Day 18:01, 8 March 2009 (UTC)
Ro, I made a few test edits to see if i can get it working. Can you check it again. I made the changes for A-B, so that should be where you see a difference, if any. Chris Day 03:57, 9 March 2009 (UTC)


Also how does this template look?

{{English_spellings}} gives:

A B C D E F G H I J K L M N O P Q R S T U V W X Y Z
Use in English
Alphabetical word list
Retroalphabetical list  
Common misspellings  

i moved this version from the namespace to the template domain. Possibly that is the reason it is not working correctly? Chris Day 04:10, 9 March 2009 (UTC)

Some more experiments on my behalf. On the susubpages themselves I have removed most of the navigation aids it is just a static table now. I just want to see if each cell is now clickable, at least. Also, are the cells coloured now? Chris Day 17:53, 9 March 2009 (UTC)


Also see the following examples:

{{English_spellings|class=alpha|name=D}} gives:

A B C D E F G H I J K L M N O P Q R S T U V W X Y Z
Use in English
Alphabetical word list
Retroalphabetical list  
Common misspellings  


This page lists pronunciations of English words that begin with D. To see a different letter navigate with the table above. The apostrophe is treated as the last letter of the alphabet, after Z.

For a pronunciation key, click on the blue "Catalogs" link below the article title.[e]

{{English_spellings|class=retro|name=E}} gives:

A B C D E F G H I J K L M N O P Q R S T U V W X Y Z
Use in English
Alphabetical word list
Retroalphabetical list  
Common misspellings  


This page lists pronunciations of English words that end in E. The list is in retroalphabetical order, that is, alphabetically beginning with the final letter of the word (in this case E) and continuing backwards through it.

The apostrophe is treated as the last letter of the alphabet, after Z. Click on the blue "Catalogs" link below the article title for a pronunciation key.[e]

{{English_spellings|class=letter|name=F}} gives:

A B C D E F G H I J K L M N O P Q R S T U V W X Y Z
Use in English
Alphabetical word list
Retroalphabetical list  
Common misspellings  

Do you see any colors? Are the cells clickable? Chris Day 19:21, 9 March 2009 (UTC)

Glad it's working now. What about the "look" immediately above. Would that help with navigation? If so, I'll try and add that functionality back, hopefully with out breaking it again. Chris Day 22:50, 9 March 2009 (UTC)
I just made another change. Is it still working for you? Chris Day 12:50, 10 March 2009 (UTC)
The change is that it should have the black square to identify the current page as well as highlighting one of the three rows. Can you see that? If so we're done. Chris Day 17:30, 10 March 2009 (UTC)
Great, one last question. Would you prefer the bottom row cells to be linking to the article page or the appropriate subsection? For example, E_(letter) or E_(letter)#Use_in_English. Chris Day 17:44, 10 March 2009 (UTC)

Reports of my disappearance

Are somewhat exaggerated... but only slightly! I'm still very positive about CZ, I've just been very busy with a couple of other projects (the LISP project for the Internet, and a catalog raisonne for Yoshitoshi), and those along with stuff at home have left me no cycles for CZ. As the Yoshitoshi project gets more and more up, and as I get some stuff around here dealt with, I hope to have more time for CZ in the future. J. Noel Chiappa 16:46, 19 March 2009 (UTC)

Hey, I didn't say I'd be back now! :-) J. Noel Chiappa 22:28, 20 March 2009 (UTC)
Well, you've been missed. Thanks for the glimmer of hope ;) Hurry back! D. Matt Innis 01:36, 23 March 2009 (UTC)

McGuffey Readers article: capitalization

In a revision by yourself of 21 March 2009, several capitalizations were changed by yourself to lower case (Readers -> readers) in the introductory paragraphs to the article in question. I think at least some of these should be capitalized.

Relying on my copy of Harvey's Grammer (the 1880 edition), it seems the relevant distinction is that between a common noun ("a name which may be applied to any one of a class of objects") and a proper noun ("the name of some particular . . ."). Thus, it seems to me that when the word readers refers to the McGuffey Readers specifically (even if not by full title), it should be capitalized, but when it refers to the general class of readers (of which there were many competing textbook series), then it should be rendered lower case.

Note also the quotations from Henry Steele Commager in the section on Criticisms of the McGuffey Readers. These quotes were rendered exactly as they appeared in the Signet Books reprint of 1962. Thus, we read:

"Yet for all its preoccupation with religion, the morality of the Readers was materialistic and worldly. It taught a simple system of rewards and punishments. Virtue was rarely its own reward. . ." (Commager, Foreward to 1862 reprint)

where, as you can see, the word Readers is capitalized.

James F. Perry 17:33, 4 April 2009 (UTC)

Change them back if you wish, but, as I said in my edit summary, 'better style without caps, agreed?' I find it rather heavy, a bit like mentioning Columbia Records and then discussing 'their Records'. I left the caps in cases where the book titles were clearly being referred to. Ro Thorpe 19:58, 4 April 2009 (UTC)

Home schooling article

I just deleted it under the pretty clear guidelines about Bobbies being able to delete articles if: "it was copied from Wikipedia or some other online source (where it can still be read) over one week earlier, and no one has made any substantive revisions to it then or since then, regardless of whether it was marked "CZ Live" or not;"

I checked out the author who brought this article in from WP -- she did a whole bunch of other articles about home schooling -- do any of those fall into the same category? Thanks! Hayford Peirce 03:48, 6 April 2009 (UTC)

Okie, thanks for checking! Ossifer Pup. Hayford Peirce 19:06, 6 April 2009 (UTC)

Out of the something or other and into the fire

Just checked MW11th -- they spell "frying pan" without the hyphen. I myself don't know why there *would* be one....

Indeed, I was surprised to see it there, but I've looked in the Concise & it has it too, so at least they're consistent.
Yup, it's in my 5th Edition Concise also. Verra fey, oo wotiver our Schottish friends say.... Hayford Peirce 21:52, 10 April 2009 (UTC)

In parts of New England, and maybe other parts of the States, old-timers may still refer to an iron skillet as a "spider". I myself grew up calling them that until I was 20 or so. Originally they had three or four long legs on them so that they could be set over a fire or coals, hence the name. But for many people, even after the legs vanished, the name lived on. As Casey Stengel [1] famously said, "You could look it up." Hayford Peirce 19:04, 10 April 2009 (UTC)

Yes, the dictionary has that meaning too; I didn't see the need to put it in, but whatever changes you wanna make... Ro Thorpe 20:45, 10 April 2009 (UTC)
Nah, I wuz just tellin' ya 'cause I thought it wuz innaresting.... Hayford Peirce 21:52, 10 April 2009 (UTC)

Wheat streak

This is one of those Eduzendium projects run by Professor Denning. I think that you're supposed to leave these alone, even if all you're doing is correcting a little grammar etc. If one of the students *actively* asks for your help, in formatting, say, or trouble-shooting, by all means. Otherwise don't try to fix things up. Or so I think....

Yes, there was a notice. I'll put it back.

There was a case yesterday where someone started rewriting a CZ:Nomenclature article or some such, don't ask me how she got there. I reverted it, told her she was in the wrong spot, and asked her to think carefully about what she was doing. Seems to be doing a decent article today in the right spot.... Hayford Peirce 23:03, 21 April 2009 (UTC)

Yes, very strange, I saw that. Ro Thorpe 23:14, 21 April 2009 (UTC)

At least I didn't write....

...Dirk Van Dyke, hehe.... Thanks for the good eye! Hayford Peirce 23:04, 22 April 2009 (UTC)

Thanks

Thanks for the edit. The entire article needs a rewrite when I have time to do it. I noticed you contributed to the Radio Caroline article. Maybe some mention should be made over the new film The Boat That Rocked. Meg Ireland 04:52, 24 April 2009 (UTC)

Mr. Thorpe, thank you very much for your corrections on South Korea article! !!! :) (Chunbum Park 03:10, 30 April 2009 (UTC))

Chiswick

Yes, Chiswick is in the text. I did a Google Map search and there are a ton of Chiswick Lanes, Alleys, Avenues, etc. in London, but no Street. And all the others are in W, not SW.... Hayford Peirce 23:17, 26 April 2009 (UTC)

verb preposition pairs

I can't tell you how often I have this problem - I pick the less strong / wrong preposition to go with certain verbs. For example, is it correct to say, "shocked by something" or "shocked at something." I am shocked at the number of people that have TB in LA. Or shocked by. I think shocked by is correct but I wondered if you had a list of verbs and then prepositions that match those verbs. And then the common mistakes of the "wrong" preposition. Tom Kelly 20:07, 3 May 2009 (UTC)

The difference is that 'by' is the neutral one: Tom threw the ball, the ball was thrown by Tom, the picture (was painted) by Picasso, etc. So if you day 'shocked at' you are, as you suggest, expressing your shock a little more strongly, & here you instinctively say 'I am shocked at' - because you really are shocked! So that's what you mean to say, and it's not a matter of 'correct' or not: you would never say 'I am shocked on...' Hope that's clear. Sorry I don't have a list or anything... Ro Thorpe 20:31, 3 May 2009 (UTC)

Question grammer

So the expressions "so here's the deal about..." and "so here's the thing about..." Is it proper English to have the only verb in a sentence be a contraction? I think yes because I hear too many sentences with it's. Tom Kelly 23:18, 4 May 2009 (UTC)

No, no, no. And in proper French, non, non, non! Never, never, never, at least not in formal writing. Such as in an encyclopedia. Hayford Peirce 23:43, 4 May 2009 (UTC)

Catalan Countries

Hi Ro. Please have a look at this discussion: User talk:Hayford Peirce#Catalan Countries.--Domergue Sumien 20:34, 5 May 2009 (UTC)

No use, mon pote, I moved it to Talk:Catalan countries. Hayford Peirce 20:51, 5 May 2009 (UTC)

WP vandal

Thanks Ro!

Guess who the vandal is? None other than Ryan O'Hara, Rocky Zeckoski, Steve Fontanes, or whatever he's calling himself this week!

One of the oddest words in the English language

It's spelled either Saguaro or Sahuaro and pronounced Sah-wah-rheaux.

Here's a letter I wrote to the local newspaper about 13 years ago (they didn't publish it):

My wife and I have enjoyed our two years in Tucson since moving here from the Bay Area. We have, however, one question that no one seems able to answer. Why do half the entries in the local phonebook refer to Saguaro Widgets Inc. and the other half to Sahuaro Widgets Inc.? In San Francisco we didn't call our local trees redwoods -- but also read-a-woods. None of my reference books have an answer to this vexing question; perhaps you do.

I still don't know the answer....

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sahuaro Hayford Peirce 23:19, 8 May 2009 (UTC)

More British eats

In my latest John Brock, his yokel neighbor in the Cotwolds tells him she's putting a nice "griskin" into a stewpot to cook for 4 hours. Here's an old Beeton mention of it (skim down the page a little): http://images.google.com/imgres?imgurl=http://www.exclassics.com/beeton/beet207.gif&imgrefurl=http://www.exclassics.com/beeton/beet17.htm&usg=__MWDvcynRXcUe1jKI79OxIQNa6Po=&h=167&w=275&sz=4&hl=en&start=13&sig2=vTxE5Wx9q1V4To1S1cJpXg&tbnid=vWMrEQWgO3ipqM:&tbnh=69&tbnw=114&prev=/images%3Fq%3Dgriskin%26gbv%3D2%26hl%3Den%26sa%3DG&ei=svkKSvSeJ5OytAPB5aXVCA

It's hard to tell if it's a *cut* of pork (say, a shoulder) or a cut of *any* kind of meat, or just another word for "pork".

And remember that about a year ago you and I and some others were discussing "corned beef", "salt beef", and "salted beef", to no firm conclusions? In the Brock book he wanders through Soho, past the place where he can get a "salt beef sandwich with a big Jewish grin".... As I said before, my local butcher in London used to sell me "salt beef" with a big British grin and, since I definitely bought pork at his shop, I'm sure the place wasn't Jewish. Hayford Peirce 16:56, 13 May 2009 (UTC)

another apostrophe question for our resident "expert dialectian and grammarian"....

do we say, as in the John Brock article, "after a few hours sleep" or "after a few hour's sleep", or even "after a few hours' sleep". Yeah, I *know* we could say "after a few hours of sleep", but now I'm curious.... (and not even Yellow) Hayford Peirce 04:29, 14 May 2009 (UTC)

All right versus Alright

Ro, being the resident grammarian, what is the acceptable usage regarding "all right" as opposed to "alright"? Interestingly, Wikipedia uses "alright" but I've seen debates on the matter suggesting "all right" is the correct usage. What's your opinion on the matter? Meg Ireland 01:22, 15 May 2009 (UTC)

Rheaux is one of the two resident "expert dialecticians and grammarians". Before he agrees with me, I will tell you this: "alright" is never, ever, not even once, right, correct, acceptable, or anything at all except wrong. Maybe in comic books -- nowhere else. Trust me. Hayford Peirce 01:35, 15 May 2009 (UTC)
Then Wikipedia is in trouble. They have an article on "alright" but no "all right", and many of their articles contain "alright". Nice of you to chip in Hayford :) Meg Ireland 01:45, 15 May 2009 (UTC)
Geez, if WP is using it, then you *know* it's wrong. Here's what the online Merriam-Webster's Collegiate says: usage The one-word spelling alright appeared some 75 years after all right itself had reappeared from a 400-year-long absence. Since the early 20th century some critics have insisted alright is wrong, but it has its defenders and its users. It is less frequent than all right but remains in common use especially in journalistic and business publications. It is quite common in fictional dialogue, and is used occasionally in other writing <the first two years of medical school were alright — Gertrude Stein>. I could look it up in my 1940 MW Second Edition Unabridged, but that's a *very* prescriptive work, and I *know* what *they* would say. If they even include it among their 625,000 words.... Hayford Peirce 02:12, 15 May 2009 (UTC)

Yes, that's good stuff from MW. And from Wiktionary: Alternative spelling of all right. Considered by most to be an incorrect spelling...It is common practice for some to use "alright" for the meaning "fine, good" and "all right" to mean "all correct". However, the former word is considered nonstandard.

Concise Oxford omits it; Oxford Advanced Learners lists it an an exact synonym.

You can see how it arose by analogy with already & always, which do not mean all ready & all ways. It would always be wrong in: they got the answers alright, meaning: they got all the answers right - but why not use the latter order anyway?

Like Hayford, I don't like it and I don't use it - so I was surprised to find I had included it in English spellings - presumably because I decided it wasn't going to go away. Time to add a bit to that... Ro Thorpe 16:21, 15 May 2009 (UTC)

kippered Kiplings

O Noble Rheaux, did you catch my Recent Changes exhortation to look at the John Brock section about popular culture for the witty Rudyard Kipling verse? Hayford Peirce 04:20, 16 May 2009 (UTC)

Means of transport

Remember, a long while ago in the Brit/Merkin English section, I said that in the 20s and 30s Hercule Poirot would get in his "motor" and go to an "aerodrome" to take the "aeroplane" to France? In the second John Brock book, published around 1967, me reading a U.S. paperback publication that changes the single quotes to doubles but retains the Brit spellings, he mostly speaks of his "car", sometimes of his "motorcar", and at least once of his "motor". Skirrow, the author, was born about 1923 -- do you think he's consciously being old-fashioned, or arch, or indifferent? He's a skilled writer and knows what words mean (also being an advertising man, of course). Hayford Peirce 17:07, 17 May 2009 (UTC)

finishing up my first Brock novel article, but....

Hi, O Rheaux, would you take a look at the second paragraph of the Observations section at http://en.citizendium.org/wiki/It_Won't_Get_You_Anywhere#Observations and tell me what you think. It's certainly no big part of the book, and we *do* have to keep in mind the context of the times, but I'm not quite sure how I ought to handle this. Any thoughts and/or editing by you would be welcome. Thanks! Hayford Peirce 23:10, 18 May 2009 (UTC)

Thanks

Thanks Ro. I was cut off from editing last night so I couldn't get back on to finish. :/ Meg Ireland 00:23, 21 May 2009 (UTC)

Further to the great Motor/Motorcar conundrum

I'm holding in my hands the 1968 Bodley Head hardback edition of Skirrow's third and final John Brock novel, so there's no question of it being messed up by American editors. On page 6 a tiny, golden girl drives up in a vast old silver automobile that is probably an RR. It blasts "a great silver sound," "the first two phrases of Colonel Bogey". "I'd like to park this motor-car," she says, with the hyphen between the two words. In the next paragraph "the great car rolled silently into the kerb." On page 8, "I looked again at the beautiful white motor." So we've got all three usages within a couple of hundred words. I don't think he ever uses "auto" or "automobile" though.... Hayford Peirce 02:42, 22 May 2009 (UTC)

let's us now speak of languages, O Rheaux!

Did you know there was/is an article language called, wait for it, http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ro_(language)? We live and learn.... Hayford Peirce 22:33, 25 May 2009 (UTC)

Chip, Chips, Potato Chips, Crisps, etc.

Heaux, Eaux Noble Rheaux!

I'm in Oakland, screwing around on a friend's computer that drives me crazy. I have a NYT from Monday that has a lighthearted Editorial page article about a Lord Justice finally deciding the weighty question of Pringles and crisps or chips or whatever. I was gonna add this to our article about Potato chip or Crisp or whatever, but it doesn't exist! Just two articles about Chip (food) and French fry. If you start one about chips or whatever, I'll at least add the NYT stuff....

http://www.nytimes.com/2009/06/01/opinion/01mon4.html?scp=1&sq=potato%20chips%20Pringle&st=cse

Further to the Heelah Monster story

Heaux agayne!

On my way to Oakland, about 70 miles north of Tucson I drove through the wilderness of the Gila River Indian Reservation, crossing over, at one point, on a bridge about 10 feet over the Gila River itself, which at that point is probably 100 or 150 yards wide, about 8 feet deep, and totally flat and dry, just a sandy riverbed with small trees and brush growing in it. I imagine that water probably flows in it a dozen days a year or so....

Would an amphibian version of a Gila Monster breathe through hills? Howard C. Berkowitz 18:28, 3 June 2009 (UTC)
Gege! Ro Thorpe 18:33, 3 June 2009 (UTC)

Presidents of vice

Much sought-after skill in Las Vegas. Howard C. Berkowitz 21:06, 12 June 2009 (UTC)

I'd rather fight than switch

I'm rereading a fine British thriller about John Craig, a just-as-tough but far more believable version of John Brock, written at just about exactly the same time, and on the second page his ne'er do well brother-in-law gets into Craig's shiny Bristol and, after fantasizing for a bit that it is his, "Then he switched on."

Exit brother-in-law in a tremendous explosion.

In Merkin-talk he would "turn on the ignition." "turn it on," "turn the key," "turn on the motor," or something, but never, I'm pretty sure, simply "switch on." Possibly "switched it on...."

Both first novels written around 1966, Brock's boss on the Addison Road is the Fat Man. Craig's boss in Queen Anne's Gate is Loomis, a vast fat man with snow-speckled red hair and pale, manic eyes. Musta been something in the water around that time.... Hayford Peirce 17:11, 13 June 2009 (UTC)

They sure were strange times. Maybe readers are supposed to think he turned on the ignition, but what it actually means is that he lit a very strong cigarette, Capstan Full Strength, for example, hence the explosion. Ro Thorpe 17:25, 13 June 2009 (UTC)
Hehe, at least it wasn't an unfiltered Bastos, circa that era! You ever tried to smoke onna those?! Hayford Peirce 17:33, 13 June 2009 (UTC)
You bet. But I plumbed the depths with Sax and Alfa in Italy. They used to come in paper packets without any cellophane. Ro Thorpe 17:38, 13 June 2009 (UTC)
I don't think Bastos had cellophane either. Not the old blue packs. An edit conflict wiped this out: PS, they really knew how to advertise ciggies in the old days! http://cgi.ebay.com/RARE-c1927-ALBUM-BASTOS-MELIA-LE-NIL-288-photos_W0QQitemZ270404778518QQihZ017QQcategoryZ1507QQcmdZViewItem Hayford Peirce 17:41, 13 June 2009 (UTC)
Charmantes! Tous nos seins sont sélectionnés! They speak by themselves! Ro Thorpe 17:54, 13 June 2009 (UTC)
Ooh, la, la! Zeez crazee Frahrench peepuls! Hayford Peirce 18:24, 13 June 2009 (UTC)
Hmmm. A cigarette, with matches, can be used as an improvised delay detonation system, but usually not by the smoker. Admittedly, back in my days as a chemistry major, we helped one of the professors with his bizarre way to stop smoking: sneak away his packs, open them, drop saturated potassium chlorate at various lengths down the cigarettes, let them dry, return the packs. His idea is that he would develop an aversion to smoking when a sufficient number of cigarettes exploded, at random intervals, and burned off his eyebrows. Howard C. Berkowitz 20:40, 13 June 2009 (UTC)
Now it might work if you burned off a person's hands... Ro Thorpe 21:10, 13 June 2009 (UTC)

Page moves & metadata

Hi Ro, I noticed that Christian Liem moved Measles virus to Measles but left Template:Measles_virus/Metadata untouched (which should have been moved too), which prompted you to create Template:Measles/Metadata. This way, the edit history in the metadata gets lost. Please keep this in mind when moving pages or creating metadata pages next time. Thanks & cheers, --Daniel Mietchen 10:43, 1 July 2009 (UTC)

I believe that if the metadata page is moved first, then everything goes smoothly... sort of. D. Matt Innis 17:15, 1 July 2009 (UTC)
OK, I shall consult here should I ever decide to do that again. Thanks - Ro Thorpe 17:50, 1 July 2009 (UTC)

I would like to nominate The Canterbury Tales for Article of the Week but ....

Ro, I would like to nominate The Canterbury Tales for Article of the Week but I rather firmly believe that a Developed Article (Status 1) should have a populated "Related Links" subpage. Would you have the time to develop such a Related Articles subpage? Thanks, Milton Beychok 01:40, 4 July 2009 (UTC)

check out this new website

http://www.wordnik.com

type in some horrible word like "nous" or "paradigm" (neither of which I have ever consciously used) and see what you get. looks like it might be useful.... Hayford Peirce 02:19, 22 July 2009 (UTC)

PJ Proby

Why did you move this to P.J. Proby? Style guides recommend that title with initials no longer use full stops. It's PJ Proby not P.J. Proby. Meg Ireland 22:38, 22 July 2009 (UTC)

  • PS: Archive your Talk page please. It's too long. Meg Ireland 22:41, 22 July 2009 (UTC)
I think that must be referring to initals like ABC, CBS, PVC, initials only. People's names must have the stops.
I don't know how to archive, but you're welcome to do it, or tell me how. Ro Thorpe 22:50, 22 July 2009 (UTC)
No, they list people's names as examples. Meg Ireland 22:58, 22 July 2009 (UTC)
Ro, can I ask what system you are using? I've always used BE with the New Oxford Style Guide as my source. The OSG states: "no dots and no spaces in initials". Meg Ireland 23:26, 22 July 2009 (UTC)
I'm about 99% certain that CZ style is to use A.J. Leibling, A.E. Housman, but ABC, NATO etc. I'll try to find some examples. Hayford Peirce 23:36, 22 July 2009 (UTC)

(Unindent). A *very* quick search found P.G. Wodehouse, C.S. Lewis, C.S. Forester, and B. P. Koirala of Nepal. So I'm sure that there are many others. And that this is the accepted CZ style. Therefore Ro was correct to move the article to P.J. Proby. Hayford Peirce 23:44, 22 July 2009 (UTC)

Thanks, Hayford. Hope that's OK/O.K. with you, Meg. Ro Thorpe 23:50, 22 July 2009 (UTC)
Rheaux tried to wipe me out with an edit conflict, but I managed to recover the following:
In Article Mechanics, we find:

Grammar, spelling, punctuation, and usage [edit]

Strunk and White's Elements of Style is useful; the first edition is available here.

For American English, please consult The Chicago Manual of Style for matters of formatting, punctuation, etc. and Garner's Dictionary of American English Usage for issues of usage.

For British English, consult Fowler's Modern English Usage.

I have just consulted my own copy of Fowler's, and throughout he uses the periods when giving people's names. So CZ is telling us to use Fowlers, and Fowlers tells us to use the period. Hayford Peirce 23:57, 22 July 2009 (UTC)
More examples: G.K. Chesterton, G.W.F. Hegel, and R. James Woolsey . In Wikipedia, all names have the periods, including the quinessential British historian A.J.P. Taylor. Hayford Peirce 00:09, 23 July 2009 (UTC)
I have to say I'm mighty relieved, even if I'm wiping you out again (cue surfing music...) Ro Thorpe 00:16, 23 July 2009 (UTC)
Is there a reason Hayford when I talk to someone on CZ you always butt in? It's becoming exceedingly annoying. If I wanted to talk to you I would have left a message on your Talk page, not Ro's. Meg Ireland 01:59, 23 July 2009 (UTC)
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