Ya think?, or You say cocky and we say cacky

Sometimes it seems that the U.K. and the U.S. don't speak the same language. I have identified several categories of differences for your consideration::

A. Some words that we spell alike we pronounce differently, such as neither (nye-ther/nee-ther), either (eye-ther/ee-ther), tomato (to-mah-to/to-may-to), potato (po-tah-to/po-tay-to), laughter (lahf-ter/laff-ter) and many others. This was famously demonstrated in 1937 when Fred Astaire and Ginger Rogers performed, on roller skates yet, George and Ira Gershwin's song "Let's Call thee Whole Thing Off" (5:12).

B. Some words that we pronounce alike we spell differently, such as tire/tyre, curb/kerb, theater/theatre, maneuver/manoeuvre, euthanize/euthanise, favorite/favourite, and many others.

C. We call some objects by entirely different words, such as truck/lorry, trunk/boot, hood/bonnet, cookie/biscuit, potato chips/crisps, French fries/chips, zucchini/courgette, eggplant/aubergine, cilantro/coriander, elevator/lift, apartment/flat, diaper/napkin, and many others

D. On some words that we spell alike we choose to stress the syllables differently, such as laboratory (LAB-ruh-tory/luh-BOR-uh-tree), debris (duh-BREE/DEB-ree), and many others.

There may be other categories and sub-categories, but I can't think of any just now. If you think of other exanples and want to cite them in a comment, please include whether they fall into category A, B, C, D, or a new one that you define, and I will agree or disagree.

It occurs to me, for example, that perhaps pajamas/pyjamas needs another category, E, words that are neither spelled alike nor pronounced alike but mean the same thing, because that particular pair do not fall into category A (spelled alike but pronounced differently) or category B (pronounced alike but spelled differently). That particlar pair of words is spelled differently (pajamas/pyjamas) and pronounced differently (puh-JAM-uhs/puh-JAHM-uhs).

It further occurs to me that zucchini is Italian and courgette is French, so neither side is speaking English on that pair.

Finally, I want to share a "Six Degrees of Separation" fact that you may find interesting. When Ginger Rogers was young she and her mother lived in Fort Worth, Texas. Ginger's vaudeville career was launched in 1926 after she was named Charleston Champion of Texas upon winning a statewide dancing competition. Her pianist was a young woman named Alyne Eagan, and from 1948 to 1956 Alyne Eagan was my piano teacher.

This, That, and The Other, or A Cornucopia Of Delights

1. THIS

While driving around town from store to store the other day, I heard a number on the car radio that I hadn't heard in a very long time. It took me back to the 1960s and my early involvement with the computer world. I'm not referring to a musical number, I'm referring to a literal number. Someone reporting on how the New York Stock Exchange was doing said that the Dow Jones Industrial Average had risen over 300 points to -- wait for it -- 32,768.

Why would I remember that particular number and why would it take me back to the early days of computing? I will tell tou why.

It equals 32K in computer-speak!

Let me explain for the uninitiated. In our physical world, K is an abbreviation for the Greek prefix kilo- and means 1,000 (as in a 10K race, 10 kilometers, 10,000 meters) but the world of computers deals internally with ones and zeroes only, 1 and 0, to indicate yes/no or off/on for each bit of information. This kind of arithmetic is called binary (base 2) because it has only two possibilities, 0 or 1. There is no 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, or 9 as in the decimal (base 10) system. In the computer world, the letter K does not mean 10 raised to the third power, it means 2 raised to the tenth power, which is 1,024 -- here's proof: 2 × 2 (or 2 squared) is 4; 2 × 2 × 2 (or 2 cubed) is 8; and so on, and the number doubles with each successive power, 16 (4th power); 32 (5th power); 64 (6th power); 128 (7th power); 256 (8th power); 512 (9th power); and voila!, 2 to the 10th power turns out to be 1,024 or 1K for short.

If you keep doing this, you find that 2K is 2,048 and 4K is 4,096 and if you keep going until you reach 2 to the 15th power you will reach 32,768 or 32K!

It seemed like old home week there for a second the other day while listening to the stock market report on the car radio!

To enlighten or confuse you further, in our physical world 1,000 × 1,000 equals 1,000,000 (one million, often abbreviated as 1M). In computer-speak, 1K × 1K is also 1M, which is an abbreviation of the Greek mega -- so far so good -- but 1M means 1,048,576 because it is 1,024 (1K, or 2 raised to the 10th power) × 1,024 (1K, or 2 raised to the 10th power). It is not 10 raised to the fourth power as in decimal, it is 2 raised to the 20th power. It is plain to see that the larger the number, the more it diverges from what our decimal-based minds may think. If we are not careful, a moon shot could miss the moon altogether.

Before we leave THIS, let me throw in two more pieces of information. After K (thousand) and M (million) come G (giga-, billion) and T (tera-, trillion). And if you go in the opposite direction, getting smaller instead of bigger, the prefixes are different: Take the unit of time called a second, for example. One-thousandth of a second is called a millisecond, one-millionth is called a microsecond, one-billionth is called a nanosecond, and one trillionth is called a picosecond. I will ignore for now the fact that billion in the U.S. is milliard in the U.K., and trillion in the U.S. is billion in the U.K.

Now that we are all completely confused, including me, let's move on to THAT.

2. THAT

Here is the latest crop of "nobody could answer but me" answers from Jeopardy! along with some of the clues:

Who is George Bernard Shaw? (the playwright who wrote Man And Superman)
What is the Bay of Fundy?
Who is Lord Snowden? (the husband of Princess Margaret)
What is the Colorado River?
What is bias?
What is the Newport Jazz Festival?
Who is Ralph Waldo Emerson?
What is 52? (the number of years between the two years the "city of angels" hosted the Olympics)

I thought that the last one, which was a Final Jeopardy category, was particularly obscure. Coming up with the answer was a three-step process. Step One was easy, knowing that Los Angeles is called the "city of angels". Step Two was harder, knowing that the Olympic Games were held in Los Angeles in 1932 and 1984. Whether you think Step Three was easy or hard depends on how well you can do subtraction in your head. Step Three, and it is essential, is the ability to subtract the first year from the second quickly without benefit of pencil and paper and coming up with the right answer, 52, in a few seconds while music is playing to mark the passage of time, and being careful to phrase it in the form of a question.

I don't want to leave the wrong impression. I am not a know-it-all, far from it. There are lots of categories on the show about which I know absolutely nothing, but I do enjoy playing Jeopardy!.

Which brings us to...

3. THE OTHER

To wrap up this fascinating post (I can hear you gagging out there in blogland), I thought we would take a look at some similes in Christian hymns. A simile, you may remember, is a comparison using the word "like" or "as". There are good ones and there are bad ones, and by "good" and "bad" I mean are they effective or not effective?

The first one is a good one, "Like A River Glorious" by Frances Ridley Havergal in 1876:

Like a river glorious is God’s perfect peace,
Over all victorious, in its bright increase;
Perfect, yet it floweth fuller every day,
Perfect, yet it groweth deeper all the way.

Refrain:
Stayed upon Jehovah, hearts are fully blest
Finding, as He promised, perfect peace and rest.

The verse is a simile likening God's peace to a river and the imagery is consistent. The refrain drops the river image and paraphrases Isaiah 26:3 instead, "Thou wilt keep him in perfect peace whose mind is stayed on Thee, because he trusteth in Thee" (KJV).

Our second example, "As The Deer", was written by Martin Nystrom in 1984 and is based on the first verse of Psalm 42:

As the deer panteth for the water
So my soul longeth after Thee
You alone are my heart's desire
And I long to worship Thee

You alone are my strength, my shield
To You alone may my spirit yield
You alone are my heart's desire
And I long to worship Thee

The simile is self-explanatory. Again, the imagery is consistent and effective. The song works.

In our third and last example, the imagery may be consistent but to my way of thinking it is not at all effective. If it was one of your granny's favorite gospel songs, I am sorry. Before we get to the song itself, here's part of what our favorite online encyclopedia says about it:

"In 1890, Charles Davis Tillman set to music a hymn by Baptist preacher M.E. Abbey, "Life's Railway to Heaven." (Abbey had drawn from an earlier poem, "The Faithful Engineer," by William Shakespeare Hays.

"Also known by its first line "Life is like a mountain railroad", the song has been recorded by Boxcar Willie, the Carter Family, the Chuck Wagon Gang, Mother Freddie J. Bell on YouTube, The Oak Ridge Boys, Tennessee Ernie Ford, Merle Haggard, Johnny Cash, Brad Paisley, Russ Taff, the Amazing Rhythm Aces, and many others. Tillman's tune is in 3/4 time, but a 4/4 version became widespread after Patsy Cline recorded it that way in 1959 as a solo; Willie Nelson later dubbed his voice into that version to form a duet. On January 14, 2012, Brad Paisley performed a 4/4 rendition as guest on Garrison Keillor's Prairie Home Companion radio program.

"Members of the Western Writers of America chose the song as one of the Top 100 Western songs of all time."

Even after such a build-up, "Life Is Like A Mountain Railroad" just doesn't work for me. Here it is:

Life is like a mountain railroad
With an engineer that's brave
We must make this run successful
From the cradle to the grave

Heed the curves and watch the tunnels
Never falter, never fail
Keep your hands upon the throttle
And your eye upon the rail

Blessed Saviour there to guide us
Till we reach that blissful shore
And the angels there to join us
In God's grace forevermore

As you roll across the trestle
Spanning Jordan's swelling tide
You will reach the Union Depot
Into which your train will ride

There you'll meet the superintendent
God the father, God the son
With a happy joyous greeting
Weary pilgrim, welcome home

Blessed Saviour there to guide us
Till we reach that blissful shore
And the angels there to join us
In God's grace forevermore

There are many Christian songs that liken death to crossing the Jordan River, but the idea of doing it in a train being pulled by a locomotive across a railroad trestle and pulling into the Union Station and being greeted by the superintendent (God the father, God the son, but no mention of God the Holy Spirit, and the last time I checked, Christianity is definitely Trinitarian) sets my teeth on edge.

Also, would that life were that simple, just remembering to keep one's hands upon the throttle and one's eye upon the rail. But let me tell you something, Gertrude, it definitely isn't.

I know this post has been extra long, and I hope you have not pulled all your hair out by the roots as you navigated your way through it. I will try to be shorter next time. I trust, as I said in the title, that it has been a cornucopia of delights.

Please try to refrain from throwing rotten tomatoes at your computer screen.

I am interested, however, in anything herein you may wish to talk about in the comments section.

Buddy, can you spare some time?

In a recent post, I quoted something my mother used to say, "You may not be able to keep the birds from flying overhead, but you can keep them from making a nest in your hair."

I thought it was pretty self-explanatory, but reader Emma Springfield said in a comment that my mother's quote left her with a big question mark.

So I'm going to give it the old college try and attmpt to explain what I think Mama meant.

I read a long time ago in a writing-industry magazine called Communication: The Transfer Of Meaning that the meaning of something is not determined by what the speaker or writer thinks is being transmitted but by how the hearer or reader interprets what is received. To the extent that noise can interfere or distraction can occur or a lack of understanding can exist, the message one intended to convey (meaning) may be altered. Somewhere else I read that every written sentence should have a single meaning, clearly understood at the first reading.

Which brings us back to Mama's quote about birds flying overhead and nests in one's hair. That quote failed the test where Emma was concerned, and the more I thought about Mama's quote the more meanings I found. Here are several possibilities to choose from:

A. Stay alert at all times to avoid unwanted consequences.
B. Comb your hair every day.
C. You can't control others, but you can control yourself.
D. Have the serenity to accept the things you cannot change, the courage to change the things you can, and the wisdom to know the difference.
E. Troubles may come, but don't let them take up permanent residence.
F. Always wear a hat.

What do you think? Is one of the preceding possibilities right? More than one? None? If none, what would your best answer look like?

I try to focus, really I do, but things keep changing

If he were still alive, today would be my grandfather Nathan Silberman's 146th birthday. Unfortunately, he left us just over 50 years ago in December 1970, three months before what would have been his 96th birthday.

All through his life my grandfather said he was born on the first day of Spring. I cannot remember when the vernal equinox somehow stopped occurring on March 21st and started occurring on March 20th, but I read this week that because of time zone differences between North America and the place our days begin (the International Date Line in the middle of the Pacific Ocean), Spring would not begin on March 21st in North America at all during the remainder of this century.

Grandpa would be so disappointed.

In Charlestonese, the type of English spoken in parts of coastal South Carolina, people say that buds wobble in the sprang (translation: birds warble in the Spring). Well, buds ain't the only thang that wobbles.

Did you know that Earth's axis also wobbles like a top? Well, it does. The North Pole won't always point to Polaris. The wobble takes something like 26,000 years to complete one circuit. It's called 'axial precession' and you can read all about it 'rat cheer' (translation: right here).

In other news, the answer nobody on Jeopardy! knew on Friday evening was "What is a hunter?". The category was Biblical Occupations and the clue mentioned the book of Genesis and Nimrod. At least someone knew that the answer to "_________ were abiding in the field keeping watch on the night Jesus was born" was "What are shepherds?" and the clue didn't even include "over their flocks".

Until next time, T.T.F.N.

I’ve been traumatized, you’ve been traumatized, all God’s chirren been traumatized

A cyberfriend named Linda (I don't know her last name) who blogs from Hueytown, Alabama, said earlier this week that her friend Tommy, who was in third grade during the Cuban Missile Crisis of 1962, remembers that his school gave out dog tags for all studemts to wear. Linda was horrified and asked Tommy what he had thought anout that. Tommy replied matter-of-factly that it was to identify the body.

Linda was a junior in high school in 1962 and renembers wanting dog tags to wear as jewelry, but she never got any, nor did her school give any out to students that she recalls.

I was 21 years old in 1962 and was in the Air Force, so I had dog tags, real ones given out by Uncle Sam himself, and Tommy is right, they are used to identify dead bodies after a military engagement. Dog tags are notched, and I remember being told during basic training that whenever the body of a soldier (airman, sailor, whatever) is found, the notch of the dog tag is placed between the dead person's two upper front teeth and his lower jaw, and the butt of a rifle is kicked or rammed against the lower jaw to close the mouth. This act drives the dog tag into the skull, under the nose, and the procedure ensures that the body and the dog tag stay together and do not become separated in transit. I distinctly remember the training instructor telling us this, and apparently it happened routinely during World Wars One and Two and the Korean Conflict. You don't forget being told something like that. The image is gruesome and haunting, as in indelibly imprinted in the mind.

Before the Cuban Missile Crisis, I had been stationed at an Air Force Base in Florida for more than a year, but in September 1962 I was transferred to Strategic Air Command Headquarters outside of Omaha, Nebraska, to receive training to become a computer programmer. Having received the training and then writing computer programs for three years for the Air Force helped me get hired by IBM when I left military service in 1965.

"Be glad you're not here," one of my Florida buddies wrote to me. "Everything here is chaos and madness and upheaval. Many more planes and personnel have been brought in, and all the barracks are full to overflowing. A lot of tents have been put up in the open areas between the barracks buildings to try to handle all the additional people."

I wrote him back, "What do you mean? I'm out here at Bull's Eye Air Force Base!" It seemed clear to me that any of the Soviet Union's Intercontinental Ballistic Missiles (ICBMs) launched out of Cuba -- fortunately none ever were -- would be aimed at key military targets like the Pentagon in Arlington, Virginia; NORAD (North American Air Defense Command) Headquarters under that mountain in Colorado; and yes, SAC Headquarters where I was in Nebraska, not a field in Central Florida or an elementary school in Alabama.

So Ob-La-Di, Ob-La-Da, life went on, and the crisis passed. But it rains on the just and on the unjust, into each life some rain must fall, life is what happens to you while you're making other plans, and other discouraging expressions. Crises come and crises go. As Rosanne Rosannadanna (Gilda Radner) used to say on Saturday Night Live, "It's always something."

Today is one of the good days. At 5:37 a.m. EDT, Spring arrived this morning. The vernal equinox occurred. Day and night are of approximately equal length. God's in His heaven; all's right with the world (except for a few million deaths here and there due to the ongoing pandemic and a few despots and tyrants who cannot be ignored).

You simply must celebrate the arrival of Spring by watching this (4:37) .

In conclusion, I would like to quote something my mother used to say. "You may not be able to keep the birds from flying overhead, but you can keep them from making a nest in your hair."

J'ai quatre-vingts ans (my regular readers will understand)

Here, as promised yesterday (the last day I was ever soixante-dix-neuf), is one "moon" song I completely overlooked when putting together my recent post about "moon" songs.

It was famously recorded by the guitar-playing husband-and-wife singing team of Les Paul and Mary Ford in 1951. Their version is notable for introducing over-dubbing to the world. There were 12 guitar tracks laid down by Les Paul and 12 vocal tracks laid down by Mary Ford.

There was also a very popular version of "How High The Moon" by Ella Fitzgerald, complete with her famous and unequalled "scat" choruses. Here is a transcription of her version, made by someone whose resumé undoubtedly said "pays close attention to details":

Somewhere there's music
How faint the tune
Somewhere there's heaven
How high the moon
There is no moon above
When love is far away too
Till it comes true
That you love me as I love you

Somewhere there's music
It's where you are
Somewhere there's heaven
How near, how far
The darkest night would shine
If you would come to me soon
Until you will, how still my heart
How high the moon

How high the moon
is the name of this song
How high the moon
Though the words may be wrong
We're singing it
Because you ask for it
So we're swinging it just for you

How high the moon
Does it touch the stars
How high the moon
Does it reach up to Mars
Though the words may be wrong
to this song
We're asking how high, high, high
high, high is the moon

Boo bi yoo bi
Bi yu di di ooh dun
dabba oohbee
Boo di yoo di
Di yu di dee dee doohdun
di di oohnbee
Bu di yu dan dan dan
Dee boognbee
Aheedee doo doo abbi woo do ee
Woah ba bee ba bap beya oh
Ein bap bap dein

Hey ohndalady deepbap
bumblebee
Deedeedeedeedee deedee
Doo doot doop antdoodly wah
Vebeeoopm dabba oohbayoum dabie
oohmbappa eupembappi ah

Baby ohm bap
Baby ooh bee bap bey
Oohtoo undn datley udnda da
Eun bu! eun bi! un ba! un bey!
un bey un bey in byron bay

Moody eetn deeby deepi ah ba
Beebeeoohdibap Da Bap! un boo bay
Deeoohdedootundap lah day
Oohtdee undeedoodee dootn

dadaploday
Beepbee oo'bapbee ootndap bobay
beepbee ootn da loday
a dooblydoobly dooblydoobly
dooblydoobly dooblydoobly
dooblydeetn deepdeedee eudabapoya

Beebeeum beep beebee bebop
Beebeeoohbebap dedap un boobay
Deeodeedoodee dap lady
Oohtdee undeedoodee dootn

dadaploday
Beepbee oo'bapbee ootndap bobay
beepbee ootn da loday

Deudedeu deun daudau baubau
bieubau badee beiu beiu ooh
Heee he a we ah
Heee he a eeah hah
Eeetdee eutandabbie utan
dooiedoodoon'lyba
Bieu bau bau n daisy ba

Beedeedee dedee deDee
Beedeedee ba-oi
Adoodlyoohtndo oohntdo oohntdo
Deedee oothndo baobaobao baeu

Beet-deet-dee doodly'ap'n'boobie
Bootbe up'n babba un baw baw ba-bey
Beedeedee yabadoreda bababo
Baya baba bobobo bi'yabeeba
Though the words may be wrong to this song
We hope to make high, high, high, high
High as the moon


If you don't believe me, go find the video on YouTube. I would have included it in this post but the computer kept crashing and I gave up. And while you're looking, check out the Les Paul & Mary Ford version as well.

When I grow too old to dream, I’ll have this blog to remember

This is the last day I will ever be 79 years old.

If I wake up tomorrow morning, I will be 80 years old, I will have been alive on planet Earth for 960 months. I will have been breathing air for 29,220 days.

I arrived at the latter figure by multiplying 80 by 365 (29,200) and then adding 20 more days for the 20 leap years through which I have lived, beginning with 1944. Your trivia fact for today is that no leap day is added in century years (1800 and 1900, for example), unless the century year is divisible by 400 (2000, for example), in which case a leap day is added. If I had been born in 1841 and today were 1921, I would have been alive for 29,219 days since 1900 did not have the extra day that 2000 did.

As my dad used to say, put that in your pipe and smoke it. I have no idea what that means.

In English we say, "I am eighty years old" but what the French say translates to "I have eighty years". I find that very interesting. I have [am in possession of] eighty years, or I have [accumulated] eighty years. The French counting system is unusual to English sensibilities. Everything matches until you get to 70. The French don't say 70, however. They say 60 10 (soixante-dix) instead, then 60 11 (soixante-onze) for 71, 60 12 (soixante-douze) for 72, and so forth up through 60 19 (soixante-dix-neuf) for 79. Eighty, my new identifier, is not 60 20 though, it's "four twenties" (quatre-vingts). So instead of saying "I am eighty years old" they say "I have four twenties years" (J'ai quatre-vingts ans) all the way up to 99 (quatre-vingts dix neuf, four twenties and nineteen). If you should be fortunate enough to live to be a hundred, things get simple again and you revert to a single syllable, cent.

Here endeth the French lesson for today.

Thanks be to God.

It is St. Patrick's Day today but I don't care.

I thought of another "moon" song. It completely slipped my mind when I made a list of moon songs a few posts back. I'm not going to tell you its name right now, though. I'm saving it for the first post of my 80th year.

In the meantime, here are 11 more unknown (except by me) Jeopardy! answers:

Who is Albrecht Dürer?
What is Grambling State University?
Who is Morticia Adams?
What are gophers?
What is Acapulco?
What is the House of Lancaster?
What are Quartets?
What is Earthrise?
What is Defender of the Faith?
Who is Henry Clay?
What is Carrara?

The last nine were in a single episode of the program (British, programme). Just so you won't think the contestants were complete idiots, Quartets was in reference to "Little Gidding" being a part of T.S. Eliot's "Four ________", not "what do you call four people singing together". The clue for Defender of the Faith, "a title conferred on Henry VIII by Pope Leo X", seemed fairly obvious to me, but one contestant who didn't know British history guessed Head of the Commonwealth.

Until next time, when I will have 80 years, au revoir, mes amis..