ATTN: Copyeditors and Grammar Fiends

catch some z's

That apostrophe is contentious

Catch some Zzzs

Yes, that's how I had it - I think I got it from comic strips

http://www.comicbookfx.com/images/12-1.jpg

I'm guessing the entire shorthand started with comic strips

it just occurred to me that non-Americans might pronounce it "catch some zeds"?????

that's fucked up, nigel

yup, that's what we say

(i mean if we say it at all, which is like nearly never)

"in Japanese manga… the usual symbol for sleep is a large bubble coming out of the character's nose"

apparently it's the centenary of the earliest recognised ref for zzz as snoring = the 1919 boy scouts handbook, as the cross-hed to a poor gag about sleeping

a possible source is an earlier symbol for snoring = a little pic of a log being sawn, and "zzz" beside the log bvz it's the sound of sawing (and snoring)

source: https://english.stackexchange.com/questions/27045/how-did-the-letter-z-come-to-be-associated-with-sleeping-snoring

when yr editing a transcription and the interviewee says "there's tons of examples" and the transcriber writes this up as "there's tonnes of examples"

but technically a tonne = 1 x metric fvckton

so which is correct

I think you need to get in touch with the interviewee again to clarify what the examples weighed.

I suppose it's only an issue if there are between 1.81437 and 2 tonnes of them. Otherwise, it's fine either way.

https://grammarist.com/spelling/ton-tonne/

"British, Canadian, and Australian publications generally reserve tonne for very narrow uses (i.e., in reference to the metric ton) ... All use ton (or tons) in contexts unrelated to measurement"

seems fair.

http://1.bp.blogspot.com/_5d-Xp-MJumg/TI5l3x6dA2I/AAAAAAAAAhI/ugKIlcvVY8M/s1600/Mash+Tun+MA.JPG

Let us learn to call people by their name, as the Lord does with us, and to give up using adjectives.

— Pope Francis (@Pontifex) September 24, 2019

Good Lord

Not using adjectives is very difficultly.

pontifex otm, adverbs can also eff off

Seriously I think this may be my favourite ever papal statement about anything, not just because of its high bathos but because HE'S RIGHT

I think you mean HE IS

i do

There are no nouns in Tlön's conjectural Ursprache, from which the "present" languages and the dialects are derived: there are impersonal verbs, modified by monosyllabic suffixes (or prefixes) with an adverbial value. For example: there is no word corresponding to the word "moon,", but there is a verb which in English would be "to moon" or "to moonate." "The moon rose above the river" is hlor u fang axaxaxas mlo, or literally: "upward behind the onstreaming it mooned."

The preceding applies to the languages of the southern hemisphere. In those of the northern hemisphere (on whose Ursprache there is very little data in the Eleventh Volume) the prime unit is not the verb, but the monosyllabic adjective. The noun is formed by an accumulation of adjectives. They do not say "moon," but rather "round airy-light on dark" or "pale-orange-of-the-sky" or any other such combination. In the example selected the mass of adjectives refers to a real object, but this is purely fortuitous. The literature of this hemisphere (like Meinong's subsistent world) abounds in ideal objects, which are convoked and dissolved in a moment, according to poetic needs. At times they are determined by mere simultaneity. There are objects composed of two terms, one of visual and another of auditory character: the color of the rising sun and the faraway cry of a bird. There are objects of many terms: the sun and the water on a swimmer's chest, the vague tremulous rose color we see with our eyes closed, the sensation of being carried along by a river and also by sleep. These second-degree objects can be combined with others; through the use of certain abbreviations, the process is practically infinite. There are famous poems made up of one enormous word. This word forms a poetic object created by the author. The fact that no one believes in the reality of nouns paradoxically causes their number to be unending. The languages of Tlön's northern hemisphere contain all the nouns of the Indo-European languages - and many others as well.

<3

whatever you say LIddle' Pope Francis

Saw this headline in this morning's London Metro, it's wrong, seriously wrong, but I can't get to the bottom of why:

BRAWL BREAKS OUT ON HOL JET AS PASSENGER IS SPAT IN FACE

it needs the preposition 'at' I think, because this form is transitive, but I got lost in the undergrowth. as it is it sounds like some unnamed entity has gobbed a passenger out into some other unnamed entity's face.

'hol jet' is a trying construction

What's a hol jet?

this solves any word-length issue (53 characters to the original's 57):
BRAWL ON HOLIDAY JET AFTER PASSENGER’S FACE SPAT IN

Beautiful scansion and internal assonance though. I'm chanting that headline to the tune of the chorus of "The Human Beings" till somebody makes me stop as PASSenger is SPAT in face

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JipPo-tb5wg

xp You want your face spat in? I've a mind to spit your face in!

SPIT HAPPENS

SPIT SPAT SPARKS JET BRAWL

SPIT SPAT SPARKS FLIGHT FIGHT

A+ the both of yous.

teamwork!

hol jet gob scrap

SKY SALIVA SHENANIGANS

as a verb spit can be transitive and intransitive, so i think the issue is simply that the object of the transitive form is what gets spat (the ejecta if you will) rather than the target of the spitting

yes, that makes sense.

SPIT SPAT IN FACE IN FACE SPIT SPAT

The same problem as with "Queen Elizabeth to be evacuated in case of Brexit unrest".

looking all this up i got distracted by the fact that ejecta and object have the same latin root (jaceo, I throw)

ejecta comes from ejicio, also meaning throw or cast (but i think in a more urgent way)
object come from objaceo, which means "i lie at the mercy or "i lie blocking the way" (of whatever, in each case) -- so a object is a thing chucked down in front of you blocking yr way which is at yr mercy, good work everyone

DE SPUTUS DISPUTANDUM EST

de sputo, but yes

Thank you

shuttle spittle battle

fox in socks, my game is done, sir

CABIN JABBIN' AFTER SPEW STEW

this just arrived through our front door and inflicted grievous internal injuries upon me, please send an ambulance

https://i.imgur.com/9yeCgug.jpg