Saipan is a linguistic crossroads, and I maintain a vigil for important developments so we can maintain our international leadership in this scholarly field. So here are a few items from my notebook, or at least the items I\u2019d list in my notebook if I really had one:<\/p>\n
1) Mind the \u201cnoughty\u201d bits<\/strong><\/p>\n Well, the British have one-upped us yet again. They’ve come up with a snazzy word to reference the last decade, by which I mean the years 2000 through 2009. <\/p>\n The BBC calls it the \u201cnoughties.\u201d This presumably comes from \u201cnought,\u201d meaning \u201czero.\u201d I think \u201cnaught\u201d is the more familiar spelling to Americans, but I\u2019m the last guy to ask about spelling. Actually, I\u2019m the last guy to ask about anything, but you knew that already. <\/p>\n Anyway, so far, so good, but what will we call our current decade? The \u201cteens\u201d won\u2019t cut it, since the term would presumably exclude 2010 through 2012. Ideas, anyone?<\/p>\n 2) Way!<\/strong><\/p>\n Here\u2019s a word that has taken on a new life: \u201cway.\u201d<\/p>\n It\u2019s often used these days to mean \u201cextremely\u201d or \u201ca lot.” <\/p>\n Some examples: \u201cWe were way lost.\u201d \u201cThis car is way better.\u201d \u201cSmoking is way unhealthy.\u201d<\/p>\n The first time I heard this usage was at a California fraternity party. Afterwards, as my age group floated up the working hierarchy, this frat-rat term went along for the ride. It seems to have stayed for the entire trip. It has, in a word, arrived.<\/p>\n I recently caught a news clip of a ranking military officer saying words of great importance. I was way surprised when he used \u201cway\u201d this way. I\u2019ve heard doctors, dentists, and lawyers, all of them about my age, likewise using the \u201cway\u201d word.<\/p>\n As we used to say: \u201cThat\u2019s way cool!\u201d<\/p>\n Hey, wait a minute; I guess we still say that. <\/p>\n 3) Pimsleur tips<\/strong><\/p>\n The Pimsleur language courses, which are audio-based, are offered in about 50 languages now. My wife and I have bought Pimsleur materials for three languages. <\/p>\n I have found that downloading MP3s directly from Pimsleur.com saves money compared to buying the CDs and, of course, it saves time. Their website often features a discount code that can pare down the price even further. The downloaded MP3s don\u2019t require any special software or technical mojo to get working. The audio quality is solid so there\u2019s no lost ground there. <\/p>\n Meanwhile, I\u2019ve found that there are always a few lessons (\u201cunits,\u201d as Pimsleur calls them) that bear repeating a number of times. It is very difficult, if not impossible, to maintain a mental list of these lessons. So it\u2019s worthwhile to make a \u201crepeat\u201d folder and transfer these lessons to it for easy reference. Believe me, it\u2019s really easy to wriggle out of repeating these things when there\u2019s some available time at hand, so unless they\u2019re easy to find and play, they will probably not get the attention they deserve. <\/p>\n The courses I\u2019ve used have included extra little lessons in addition to the standard fare of the main, half-hour lessons. The extras are usually concerned with cultural insights. Some, however, contain important grammar tips. So this realm is like a box of chocolates\u2014you never know what you\u2019re going to get but it\u2019s worth digging through it. <\/p>\n 4) One, the man says<\/strong><\/p>\n Back in the day, in typing class, we were taught to put two spaces after a period. Alas, modern times specify one space, not two spaces, after a period. <\/p>\n As hard as I try, however, I just can\u2019t break the two-space habit. I\u2019m not trying to flout convention. I\u2019m just unable to backfill the brain-to-fingers channel that has the depth of decades etched into it. <\/p>\n The thing about typing is that it\u2019s supposed to become second nature. And it does. That\u2019s the blessing. It\u2019s also the curse.<\/p>\n 5) What’s a serif? <\/strong><\/p>\n A serif is the miniscule line or barb that’s on the tip of a written character. Examples of serif fonts are Times, Times New Roman, and Courier. Serif fonts have a traditional, old-school look. <\/p>\n By contrast, “sans serif” fonts lack serifs and have a more streamlined and modern appearance. The \u201csans\u201d in that handle comes from French, where \u201csans\u201d means \u201cwithout.\u201d <\/p>\n I think the sans serif fonts became popular when people started reading text on computer screens. Some examples of the breed are Arial, Microsoft Sans Serif, and Tahoma. <\/p>\n Pros often debate about which fonts are better for various situations. I’ve got nothing to say on that note. I just wanted to point out what “serif” meant because somebody asked me. <\/p>\n Actually, that question came my way about a year ago. Then I forgot all about it. <\/p>\n I should have written it down in my notebook, but, uh, you know how that goes.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" Saipan is a linguistic crossroads, and I maintain a vigil for important developments so we…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":42,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[6],"tags":[314,200,223,67],"class_list":["post-38691","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-opinion","tag-computer","tag-military","tag-party","tag-people"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.saipantribune.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/38691","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.saipantribune.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.saipantribune.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.saipantribune.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/42"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.saipantribune.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=38691"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.saipantribune.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/38691\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.saipantribune.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=38691"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.saipantribune.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=38691"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.saipantribune.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=38691"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}