June Goals

Well, May felt shorter than April, but not by much. Still felt a few years long. I know I was supposed to do something last month but I can’t remember what…

May Goals

1. Get to 50K on the new WIP. Since I’m already at 10K and I just started a week ago, this shouldn’t be a problem.

Yeah, this was easy. I’m almost at 60K. So yeah. Pretty successful.

2. If I have the time, keep working on my old projects that I really shouldn’t abandon.

Was not successful here. I know I should, I just had no energy to work on anything else.

3. AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA. This really isn’t a goal. Just something I needed to get out.

AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA!

Honestly, it was a pretty good month. In spite of, you know, everything.

June Goals

1. Finish new WIP. Not thinking this will be any problem.

2. Actually work on one of my old projects this month! The exclamation point means I’m serious!

3. Update the etymology page. I keep forgetting to do this!

It’s June, and summer is due to start here (and feels like it already has). What are you doing this month?

Coffee Table

More adventures of “My Mom Actually Did This”.

This is like eighty percent of my interactions with her.

Language Of Confusion: Fish, Part III

This should be the last part. Unless I find some that I missed.

Eel

Eel comes from the Old English ael, which is just eel, not surprisingly. It comes from the Proto Germanic aelaz, but no one knows where it came from before that as there are no similar words in non-Germanic languages. It’s still more of an explanation than we’ve had for some of these words.

Carp

Carp—as in the fish, not like you’d carp about something orally, which is not related—showed up in the late fourteenth century from the Old French carpe and Vulgar Latin carpa. That’s actually thought to also be Germanic in origin, as there is a Gothic word, karpa, that’s a word for a fish. Pretty much the only thing they’re sure about is that it’s not related to the talk/speak version of the word.

Mackerel

Mackerel showed up in the fourteenth century from the Old French maquerel, yet another word with an unknown origin. Some people think that it’s from the classical Latin word macula, which means spot, because of the spots on the fish, but they aren’t sure, and weirdly enough there’s actually another Old French definition for maquerel where it means agent, broker, or pimp. That one might just be a homophone, but there’s also a theory that people named the fish because of its spawning habits or something.

Guppy

Guppy is a relatively recent word, having shown up in 1918, when it became popular as an aquarium fish. It’s actually called that based off the man it was named for, Robert John Lechmere Guppy. So because that’s his name, that’s why we call it Guppy.

Perch

Now, perch has more than one definition, but a perch that something sits on or to perch on something is not related. The word for the fish first showed up in the fourteenth century as perche, from the Old French perche—and since a perch that something sits on is also spelled that way, the word confusion goes back at least that far. But that perch is from a Latin word for pole (pertica), while the fish is from the classical Latin perca, their word for the fish, and it’s not related to pertica in the slightest. It’s actually from the Greek perke, their word for perch, from perknos, spotted, from the Proto Indo European perk-, speckled or spotted. Definitely nothing to do with poles.

Sources

Online Etymology Dictionary

Google Translate

Omniglot

University of Texas at Austin Linguistic Research Center

University of Texas at San Antonio’s page on Proto Indo European language

Tony Jebson’s page on the Origins of Old English

Old English-English Dictionary

Encyclopaedia Britannica

Current Biology

From The Spamfiles

It’s spam day!

YOU ARE EVEN MORE BLESS WHEN YOU DO IT IN ALL CAPS.

What does “Lend Flare” even mean? Like, the lend part I get, it’s a loan, but flare??? Are the loans on fire????????

Ah, yes, Pornhub with a 0 instead of an o and two u’s. That’s the proper spelling. Anyone who says otherwise about this million dollar company everyone has heard of is a liar.

😲😨😱

I shoved the gas credit card into the tank but it didn’t make the car go. Help.

International monetary! Get your international monetary here! You want international monetary, you’ll get no better deal!

Sometimes I just feel like being nonsensical back at the spam.

Model Behavior

Seriously, this took place over about five seconds.

Language Of Confusion: Fish, Part II

There are a lot of fish out there. I’m not even getting to all of them, just the ones I’ve heard of.

Shark

Shark showed up in the mid sixteenth century, but the first thing it says after that is it’s of “uncertain origin”. Apparently the word came about when a sixteenth century ship captain brought a shark back to London—go check out the link to the Etymology page and you’ll see an excerpt from a handbill where it’s referred to as a “sharke” in Olde English Speake. While shark as someone who preys on others is first noted at the very end of the sixteenth century, one theory is that it actually appeared first and then the fish was named so, while another theory is that it was taken from a Mayan word, xoc, which may have been their word for it. Now, sharks did have a name in English before then, but it was tiburon, from the Spanish word for shark, tiburón. And these days it’s also a town in California.

Trout

Trout comes from the Old English truht, which of course just means trout. It’s thought to be from the Old French truite and Late Latin tructa, which is then thought to be from the Greek word troktes, a word for a kind of fish. It’s actually from the word trogein, to gnaw or eat, and that can be traced to the Proto Indo European tro-, from tere-, to rub or turn. A word we’ve gone over before. Extensively.

Pike

I was going to look at angler here, but then I found out it’s just angle with an R at the end. How boring. So, pike. This one isn’t terribly strange either, but it’s still amusing. It showed up in the earlyfourteenth century, and it’s named for the polearm people use as weapons. See, the fish has a long, pointed jaw. It’s also influenced by the French word for pike, brochet. Yeah, nothing too crazy here.

Cod

Cod is fairly old, having shown up in the mid fourteenth century (it actually appeared as part of a last name a century before that), and is another one from an unknown origin. This one is kind of weird because there is another cod, and that’s part of cod piece, but there’s no known link between the words. That word is from the Old English codd, which meant bag or pouch (and yes, it referred to a certain part of the male anatomy), and while there have been weird etymology links before, that doesn’t seem to be where the fish came from.

Bass

Speaking of words that have more than one meaning and aren’t related at all, we have bass. The word for the fish showed up in the fifteenth century as a corruption of the Middle English baers. That’s from the Old English baers, a fish, from the Proto Germanic bars-, sharp and Proto Indo European bhar-, point or bristle. Apparently the fish’s dorsal fins look like bristles. And of course the musical bass is not related. That’s a whole other kettle of fish.

Ahem. So to speak.

Sources

Online Etymology Dictionary

Google Translate

University of Texas at Austin Linguistic Research Center

University of Texas at San Antonio’s page on Proto Indo European language

University of Texas at Arlington

Tony Jebson’s page on the Origins of Old English

Old English-English Dictionary

Orbis Latinus

From The Spamfiles

Spam time, yo.

Sometimes spam comments really do make you feel better. I found you with the treasure I was looking for.

Look, it’s the local flirt. If I was to pick an emoji reaction for this it would be 😬

Frankly, even if it was from the real Federal Reserve Bank, I’d be noping out hard. I feel dirty even having it in my spam box.

Okay, there’s so much to enjoy here. First of all, “Good Morning My Dear”, such an excellent way to start what’s supposed to be an official notification. Next is the fact that they call it both a winning prize and an inheritance fund. Like, make up your mind! Third is just the fact that they make “overdue” into two words. I guess they don’t have a grammar check on their computers.

“respond to this offer”?!! Don’t you boss me!

Mrs. Mary Susan. Such a perfectly real name. Why, I know every member of the Susan family. At least, the Boston Susans. I know nothing of the Westchester Susans.