April 12, 2010 · 7:04 am

Blink and you’ll miss it

In order to compose today’s blog entry, I had to perform some computer forensics.

Used to learn what a victim or perpetrator was doing in the days or minutes before a crime, computer forensics help create a chronicle of events leading up to the time such crime occurred.  They tell investigators when the person in question was last online, what Web sites were visited, when e-mails were sent and to whom.

Following is what appears to have occurred on the morning of Friday, April 9th.

9:10 – Return rental car at Pittsburgh International Airport.

9:25 – Clear airport security.

9:30 – Arrive at Gate C51 for 10:21 flight to Washington Dulles.

9:31 – Experience passing amusement:  the Griswolds arriving at Wally World, “first ones here, first ones here!”

9:42 – Complete and save expense report for the trip.

9:50 – Older gentleman takes the seat next to me.

10:00 – Observe a few passers-by asking older gentleman for his autograph.  Listen in.

10:08 – Post the following on Facebook:  “Sitting in the Pittsburgh airport next to a hockey icon who, I’ve overheard from those lining up for his autograph, won the Stanley Cup in 1964.  Nice man but I don’t know his name.”

10:10 – Answer an e-mail while waiting for boarding announcement.

10:11 – Blink.

10:31 – Wake up.

10:32 – Ask older gentleman if flight to Dulles has begun boarding.  Older gentleman smiles and says, “You must be Monica Welch.  They paged you several times before your plane left.”

10:45 – Older gentleman boards his flight to Toronto, shaking his head and laughing with his fellow passengers.

10:47 – Call to ask client to deploy contingency plan for the 2 p.m. meeting on the narcolepsy drug—because I fell asleep. 

Postscript:  I still don’t know the name of that famous Stanley Cup winner, but he knows mine.

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April 10, 2010 · 8:50 am

Mattel me it isn’t so

I would have written an impassioned piece about Mattel’s plans to introduce a version of Scrabble that permits the use of proper nouns.  By the time my smelling salts took effect, all the good puns and analogies had already been played.

The story has gone viral, so there isn’t much to add.  All I have to share here are a few questions based narrowly on Mattel’s rationale. 

Reportedly, the company believes relaxing the rules will encourage younger consumers to play Scrabble.  Presumably, being able to turn ore into Oreo will attract kids to the board. 

If this is true:

Will Mattel next introduce a version that accepts the spelling conventions of instant messaging?  (That wouldn’t do much to boost a Triple Word Score.) 

What about the fact that many twenty-somethings, and young corporations for that matter, appear to have abandoned the upper case altogether, even in their own names?  Will those names be deemed legal in conventional Scrabble?

What about all those made-up names and inventive spellings?

For those who fear the invasion of this diluted version of their favorite word game, take comfort in knowing the so-called Scrabble Trickster won’t be sold in the United States any time soon.  Mattel does not own the rights to sell Scrabble in North America and will offer Trickster only in the United Kingdom for the time being; hence, you can play as you do now within U.S. borders.   But players hoping to turn mile into Miley here at home are out of luck.  Hasbro, which owns the Scrabble rights in the U.S. market, has no plans to legalize proper nouns in this country.

Consider this:  Perhaps proper nouns will be extinct before American Scrabble players ever face this scenario.

Note:  Word Nymph takes Sundays off.  Tomorrow she’ll be giving her Scrabble Deluxe Edition a little love.  See you Monday.

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April 9, 2010 · 6:18 am

Little old lady who?

“Deputies Kill a Fla. Grandmother Armed With Gun”

“Grandmother Defeats Home Invader”

“Slamming Granny: Grandmothers for Peace Get Hard Time”

“Australian Grandmother Fights Shark” 

These are just a few headlines from print and broadcast stories of late.  In addition, The Washington Post reported recently that “Donna M. George was a grandmother living in a gated community in Fredericksburg when she sold prescription drugs out of her kitchen — while babysitting for her three grandchildren.” 

I am not sure precisely what image the news media are trying to conjure by naming Grandmother in the headlines but I am pretty sure it’s not me or my peers. While I am not yet a grandmother, plenty of my friends in their 40s and 50s are.  If they did anything newsworthy, why would their grandmother-hood be of note? 

No, I suspect the image the media are after is the stooped over, gingham-clad lady with a gray bun atop her doddering little head.  You know, Tweety Bird’s Granny.  It’s that lady’s role in a crime or act of heroism that makes the story all the more sensational. 

I have news for headline writers.  Today’s Grandmother looks like I do.  No gingham shirt dress, no bun.  Today’s granny wears low rise jeans and a ponytail.  She listens to Christina Aguilera, pops her gum and says “I’m like” when she means “I said.”  While, admittedly, she may eat a few more prunes than she used to, she also runs marathons and goes to wine tastings.  She might even write a blog.

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April 8, 2010 · 5:23 am

Who gives a fig about an Oxford comma?

They say if you love something, set it free.  That’s what I am doing with the Oxford comma.

Just a refresher:  the Oxford comma, also called the series comma or the serial comma, is the comma used immediately before a grammatical conjunction—such as and or or—preceding the final item in a list of three or more items.  For example, a list of three fruits can be punctuated as either “apples, oranges, and bananas” (with the Oxford comma) or “apples, oranges and bananas” (without the Oxford comma).

I don’t know for certain, but I suspect the Oxford comma made its way into accepted practice around the mid-1960s.  At least that’s the time I began writing sentences.  I must have been right on the cusp, so I’ve always used the comma. 

I do know those older than I eschew it.  My father is horrified by an Oxford comma.  My brother, eight years my junior and an accomplished public relations executive, uses it.  The attitude of some much younger may best be expressed in a 2008 song by the group Vampire Weekend, called “Who Gives a F*** About an Oxford Comma?”  In general, older writers don’t like the comma, younger ones do and the youngest ones may not really care.  That’s a subject for another day (but let it be noted that I have some faithful readers who are under 25 and keenly attuned to such matters).

Whether or not an Oxford comma is correct truly depends upon which authority you consult.  Nevertheless, a wise wordmistress reminded me just recently that consistency is what’s more important.

Either way, this year I’ve made a definitive choice.  Perhaps it is a desire to return to a cleaner, simpler way of life.  I am making a conscious shift and ditching the Oxford comma.  No ifs, ands or buts.

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April 7, 2010 · 7:55 am

The girl with the red pen

A couple of years ago, before grownups were allowed on Facebook, I set about finding my childhood BFF.  More aptly Best Friends for Then, she and I lost touch after high school, much to my profound disappointment.  Thirty years after graduation, my search eventually led me to her.  She was living several states away.  I contacted her via e-mail and we arranged to speak by phone one evening.

We got the life updates out of the way, shared information about our parents and kids and quickly returned to the past.  She reminded me of something that brought me tremendous remorse.  It must have been equally painful for her but at the time I was unaware.   

She remembered that back in middle school, she’d pass me notes during class.  And she remembered (gasp!) that I would correct her spelling and grammatical mistakes with a red pen before passing the notes back. 

As we chatted on the phone that night, her daughter walked in and asked who was on the phone.  She said, “I am talking with Monica.”  Her daughter said, “oh, isn’t she the girl with the red pen who used to correct your notes?”  Ouch.

To my friend I offer my deepest apologies.  I give myself an F for my overzealous behavior and hope to some day earn back that second F in BFF.

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April 6, 2010 · 7:47 am

Frenzied New Yorker

One of my great indulgences is The New Yorker magazine.  For anyone who savors the delicacy of the written word, The New Yorker is the crème de la crème.

I’ve never subscribed to this weekly magazine.  That would be like having a case of dark chocolate truffles delivered to your home every week.  Instead, The New Yorker always been a special treat, reserved for rare times of prolonged quietude—a coast-to-coast plane ride, a long weekend at the beach.

A few years ago, a friend who was moving out of the country transferred his subscription to me.  I never would have chosen to order this frivolous subscription but I won’t lie, I was aquiver with anticipation. 

The first issue came.  I started with the first pages and read each Going on About Town, including the off-off-off-Broadway performances.  As if I’d have the chance to pop into one.  Each day, I enjoyed a bit of the week’s issue, savoring the essays, poems and cartoons.  But it was a challenge to get through each issue before the next one arrived.  I’d see the new one come in and I’d work to finish the last.  I wouldn’t even peek at one until I’d finished the last. 

I couldn’t do it.  I couldn’t appreciate the writing the way I always had because it had become a chore, a quest.  The weeks went by more and more quickly.  How could it be Monday already when I am only three-quarters finished with last week’s issue?  I was no longer savoring, I was binge reading.

Then it struck me – the image of Lucy Ricardo and Ethel Mertz, scoring their dream job at the candy factory.  They thought it would be enjoyable, even easy.  And it was, until the conveyer belt went into high gear.  The ladies struggled to wrap the truffles as the candies raced by, eating those there wasn’t time to wrap.  Not a bad assignment, enjoying chocolates while doing the job.  Then the shift supervisor shouted, “Speed it up!”  as the candies came at them at an impossible speed.  Cheeks and blouses were bulging with the chocolates that eventually made them ill.

And so it was with The New Yorker—too much of a good thing coming way too fast.  Mercifully, the subscription expired.

The New Yorker and I have made our peace.  We still meet every now and then, usually in an airport news stand in a city far away.  It is sweet.

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April 5, 2010 · 7:50 am

A Giant spelling error

Re-branding.  It’s going on all around us.  Giant Food, one of the Mid-Atlantic region’s largest grocery chains, has just completed a massive re-branding.  This year they rolled out new corporate colors and a very cool logo.  My local Giant has transformed the inside and revamped all the signage in accordance with the new brand.  As a consumer, I appreciate the added in-aisle signs pointing specifically to what’s on the shelves. 

Anyone who has worked for a large corporation knows the magnitude of re-branding and the sizeable price tag attached.  I presume there was extensive research leading up to the effort—focus groups, studies of consumer behavior and due diligence on the legal and intellectual property implications.  I suspect a beefy staff of compliance experts oversaw the rollout.  But they omitted an important function—the spellchecker.  

I try not to be too judgmental (most times) but I can’t roll my cart down the frozen food aisle without bristling at the sign pointing to the “Sherbert.”   This word is commonly mispronounced.  It’s tempting to want to make it rhyme with Herbert.  But it’s sherbet, people, not sherbert!  

At least half a dozen times now, I have approached the customer service desk, now cheerfully re-named the Solution Center, at the front of the store, to alert management to the slip, but chickened out as I got close.   If I drew their attention to the error, would I be perceived a snob?  I often operate under the skewed assumption that people are grateful for being made aware of their errors.  But they don’t usually accept this edification as the gift it is intended to be.  Would management be any less offended if I alerted them to an expired sell-by date on a product still on the shelf?  

Likely the signs come from a central warehouse anyway and the store managers have no direct control or concern over what comes down from corporate.  Still, this is a Giant mistake.

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April 3, 2010 · 8:00 am

Easter brisket

Julia Child, if you’re looking down from your celestial kitchen, look away, dear.  I’m making a brisket.

I’ve always wanted to say that, “I’m making a brisket.” 

I am a carniphobe, intimidated by meat.  Roast not, braise not.  Man versus meat?  Not a contender.  I love to eat it, when someone else cooks it.  But I don’t cook it.  Ever. 

So why the brisket?  I love the word.  Brisket.  It’s crisp, it’s fun to say (perhaps because it rhymes with biscuit?).  Brisket is home, it’s comfort, it’s a special occasion.  Women who make brisket are respected. 

When brisket comes up in conversation it is intimate and holy, “my mother’s brisket.”  Whispered at a Shiva, “she made a fabulous brisket.”

Just this week, The Big Bang Theory had the guys stranded in the woods without food.  As they were getting desperate, Howard Wolowitz exclaimed, “my mother put an I-love-you brisket in my backpack!”

The next day, coincidentally the first day of Passover, I was in front of the meat case hearing voices. I think it was Trader Joe himself, dream music in the background, “Brisket!”  “Monica, you can do it, you can be the woman behind the fabulous brisket.”

So I caved and there it sits, on the bottom shelf in the fridge, waiting to be prepared, fearing it will perish.  Better get out the, uh, what kind of pan do you use?

Note:  Word Nymph shalt not blog on Sundays.  Hope to see you Monday.

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April 2, 2010 · 7:47 am

One away from the No Fly list

I am a fairly composed person and behave appropriately in most situations.  I demonstrate good manners and a respect for decorum and diplomacy.  Unless something makes me laugh.

I regularly make a fool of myself on airplanes, letting out squeals and snorts while watching an in-flight Mr. Bean video short, or muffling howls during a hilarious scene from a Steve Carell movie.  Recently, while reading A.A. Gill’s tongue-in-cheek review of Kentucky’s Creation Museum in Vanity Fair, I came close to being restrained by federal marshals.

There is something about an airplane that, for me, turns ordinary amusement into a full-blown uncontrollable spectacle. Perhaps it’s that people are already on edge, inconvenienced by security checkpoints and constrained by seatbelts in close quarters.  An airline cabin is a place where howling and snorting just aren’t done.

Perhaps it’s the sanctity of a quiet space that pulls the pin on my explosive laughter.  And I know it’s the same stifling sanctity that prompted Mary Richards’ painful laughing attack at Chuckles the Clown’s funeral in 1975.  It was one of television’s most memorable scenes.   A little song, a little dance, a little seltzer down your pants.  Mary, I feel your pain.

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April 1, 2010 · 7:22 am

Monica and Erma

In the book-turned-movie Julie and Julia, the character played by Amy Adams blogged about her pursuits to model the work of her idol, Julia Child. She shared her joys and frustrations as she plunged fearlessly into the metaphoric bouillabaisse of gourmet French cooking.  In her daily blog entries, she assessed her own success or failure to meet each challenge.

My idols are good writers.  They range from Pulitzer Prize winning authors (John Kennedy Toole) and news journalists (Helen Thomas) to skilled story tellers (Craig Dees) and clever bloggers (Carla Curtsinger of The Sticky Egg).

I especially love humor writers.  Erma Bombeck is my Julia Child.  If I were to embark on a project à la Julie and Julia, it would be terribly humbling.  I dare not even try to model Erma’s artistry.  Even so, as I look back on my 50 years, it would be tempting to wonder whether I suffered as many pitfalls and pratfalls as I did just so I could amuse my friends with stories of my own foibles.

Even though I am the child of two very funny people, one a professional humorist, my true talent lies not in producing humor but rather in passionately appreciating it.  And while this blog may be a platform for evangelizing about delicious prose, I hope you’ll also allow me to also tell an occasional personal story in homage to this dear icon.

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