Subterfuge

A while back, Language Log mentioned a book called The Big Penis Book. Before moving on to the morphosyntax of the title, the author says "I realize I don't have to defend my interest in the book...". And while he does go on to defend his interest in the book, when I was reading that for the first time back in 2008, it struck me for the first time in my life: you don't actually have to defend your interest in that book. We're all adults here, we can read The Big Penis Book if we are interested in doing so.

It does seem odd that it would take me until the age of 27 to realize that we don't need to defend our interest in whatever thing we might be interested in, but you have to remember that for the vast majority of my life, I was a child. And when you're a child, these things work differently. If you want The Big Penis Book when you're under 18, you have to justify it to your parents. Even if you can acquire it without their permission, they're probably going to ask you to explain yourself when they find it in your room. And even if your parents do allow you to keep it, your teachers at school might take it away and call your parents and try to get you in trouble. And even if you can get past all these grownups, if your classmates find out, they're probably going to call you gay and make your life a living hell. All in all, when you're a child, it really is best and easiest to resort to subterfuge.

The subterfuge becomes a habit - after all, you've never known anything else - and it does take some time and perhaps a bit of external revelation like I got from that Language Log post to realize that in adult life, if you just quietly do your thing, no one's going to judge you or try to stop you. People simply don't care if you're reading The Big Penis Book.

And that's where Adam Giambrone made his mistake.

We're an open-minded lot here in Toronto. No one would care if Adam Giambrone didn't have a partner by his side. How many people can recognize, or even name without googling, David Miller's wife or George Smitherman's husband? The only people were actually interested in Adam Giambrone's relationship status were those who think he's pretty. In any case, especially when you eliminate the demographic who wouldn't consider voting for him because of his age and/or politics, no one would care if he didn't have a partner. No one would care if he was single and enjoying "casual encounters" as they say on Craigslist. A 19-year-old girlfriend would have briefly raise a few eyebrows, but ultimately we'd shrug and go "Meh, they're all adults." No one would especially care if he were poly or in an open relationship with honesty and consent by all parties. Even if he danced down Yonge St. during Pride in a leather harness and fishnets, we'd just applaud and wolf-whistle and gloat about it when comparing ourselves to other more uptight cities in the world. But the fact that he had a long-term relationship, publicly presented himself as part of a long-term relationship - and this in a context where no one would have batted an eye if he didn't have a partner beside him - and then ended up being a cheater was the nail in his coffin.

It's like if he had announced, a propos of nothing, that he's working his way through the complete works of Tolstoy. The press never asked what he's reading, the only people who've asked what he's reading are people who are trying to flirt with him, but he tells people he's working his way through the complete works of Tolstoy. He also makes it known that he keeps a copy of War and Peace in his briefcase, perhaps seeing to it that he's photographed reading War and Peace on the subway. Then someone discovers that, inside the War and Peace cover is not Tolstoy's masterwork, but rather The Big Penis Book.

No one would have expected him to be reading War and Peace in the first place, it would never have occurred to anyone to think less of him for not reading Tolstoy right this minute, and no one would have particularly cared if he was seen overtly reading The Big Penis Book. But the subterfuge is the problem. It's what teenagers do when they don't want to get caught reading The Big Penis Book, and it's unbecoming an adult who would presume to be mayor of a city of millions, especially when the major barrier to his candidacy is seen as his relative youth.

It isn't about lying per se and it isn't exactly about the adultery (although I, personally, do find that distasteful and it is a large mark in the minus column). It's more about the choice to have an elaborate cover-up (i.e. camera-ready long-term partner brought into the spotlight as part of the campaign) of something that doesn't need covering up (i.e. multiple casual relationships).

All of which is terribly unfortunate, because this campaign is already skewing further right than I'm comfortable with.

Question Ugly Betty needs to answer

What happens to Hilda's fetus?

They had an ultrasound that found the baby didn't have a heartbeat. So no baby for Hilda. But there's still a dead fetus in her uterus. What happens then? Does it come out by itself? Do they need to D&C it out? Even if they don't show this on screen, they should at least mention it in passing, because it's a great big question mark for people like me who have no experience with pregnancy.

(Also, Betty, Ignacio, and Babydaddy (I forget his name) were all in the ultrasound with Hilda, and the ultrasound technician makes some comment to the effect that she's never seen that many people in the ultrasound room before. Surely it's not THAT uncommon for a patient to bring in her babydaddy and her own parents (and maybe babydaddy's parents too) to get a first look at the baby? Or for the patient to bring the baby's biological father and the baby's future adoptive parents? Or her spouse and children? I mean, I'm sure in most cases it's just the baby's bio-parents, but I seriously doubt three support people is so uncommon that a tech would never have seen it before and would feel the need to common on it.)

Worst. Poll. Ever

Today's Globe and Mail poll question:

Is this the worst U.S. Congress ever, or is the system working as intended?

I haven't been following US politics especially closely, but surely there's a strong possibility that the correct answer is somewhere between the two extremes?

"Not a real sport"

Some people like to accuse various sports of not being a "real sport".

Why does it matter? Spaghetti isn't a real sport and I still enjoy it.

Outstanding customer service from Beddington's

A week ago last weekend, I bought a beautiful new duvet and duvet cover from Beddington's (Yonge & Eg location). I love them! The duvet is fluffy and warm and I feel secure like a swaddled baby wrapped in it, and the duvet cover feels good to the touch and is high thread count and matches my existing sheets perfectly.

Unfortunately, last weekend - only a week after I bought it - the zipper on the duvet cover broke. Part of the actual slidey thing broke off, so the teeth of the zipper would no longer stay inside the slidey thing. This had the unfortunate effect of rendering the entire duvet cover useless, because with the zipper open the duvet slides right out in the night and I wake up covered in basically a sheet with the duvet on the floor.

However, I am very happy to report that, despite the fact that this was a final sale item and linens are as a rule non-returnable (understandably - no one would want to buy used sheets!) Beddington's promptly, cheerfully and without drama allowed me to exchange my duvet cover for another one. Furthermore (and important to a shy and insecure person like me), I didn't need to be assertive or negotiate or anything. I just walked in, asked politely, and got the best possible outcome, being treated like my request was eminently reasonable and no imposition whatsoever the entire time.

It is very refreshing to see a retailer (especially one at a reasonable price point!) stand behind the quality and workmanship of their products. I originally went to Beddington's because they're geographically convenient, but they've just won themselves a loyal customer.

Perhaps I've been reading The Onion too much

Actual Newspaper Story or the Onion Headline? Score: 100% (12 out of 12)

In the great tradition of blogging about why I haven't been blogging

One of the boilers in one of the hot water tanks in my building is broken, so hot water has been sporadic these past few days (and I'm just not fit for human consumption without a hot shower in the morning). Property management was very responsive (I sent a WTF email right after I got out of the shower, and by the time I got home in the evening there was signage explaining the problem and with an ETA for fixing it), but it doesn't negate the crankiness caused by unreliable hot water.

The zipper on the beautiful new cover for my beautiful new duvet completely broke, rendering it useless only one week after I bought it, so I have to go back to the store and convince them to do something for me about that even though linens are (understandably) non-returnable. I will be blogging about the customer service I receive, either way.

In the process of dumping my coffee grounds in the garbage like I've done every day for the past decade, I somehow managed to throw the whole filter basket in the garbage (rather than just inverting it and dumping the filter). Without noticing or realizing I did it. And I threw the garbage bag down the chute. And didn't notice until the next morning when I went to make coffee and the filter basket just wasn't there. So now I have to replace my coffee maker. Anyone know where I can get a small (4ish cup) coffee maker with a timer?

I just found out that RRSP deadline is March 1. I thought it was March 31. I'm scheduled to diversify this year, so now I have to educate myself and set up a whole new RRSP within just a couple of weeks.

The writers are consistently under-estimating how long it will take them to finish the texts. The printer deadline is inflexible. Guess who has to do frantic, panicked overtime? I can't produce work that I can be proud of under these conditions, but it's more important to the client to have something suboptimal by deadline than something perfect after deadline. So I braindump as fast as I can type, turning around an hour's worth of work in 10 minutes, and come out of it sounding like a total n00b who hasn't yet mastered when to depart from the source text. In print and readily googleable. I am SO glad my name isn't on it!

I spilled pickle brine all over my kitchen floor yesterday. Now my floor needs hardcore scrubbing.

Plus I hate all my clothes, the rate at which new wrinkles are appearing on my face is faster than the rate at which I can adapt to and gracefully accept them, and my fridge smells and I don't know why.

And Mercury isn't even in retrograde!

The smile's returning to the faces

Today, for the first time this year, there was one last hopeful pink ray of sunlight still peeking over the western horizon when I left work.

How to end Ugly Betty

1. Betty hooks up with Claire Mead's adopted-out son
2. Claire Mead hooks up with Betty's father
3. Connor Owens is Amanda's biological father
4. Marc and Cliff get back together
5. Justin becomes Daniel's new assistant.

Add your own!

Things They We Should Invent: Union of Post-Boomer Workers

Conventional wisdom is that there's going to be a talent shortage after the baby boomers all retire. I'm not sure whether I believe this, but in case it is true, we, the workers who will remain, need to think about how we're going to leverage this. If it's going to be a workers' market, it would be the perfect opportunity to restore labour standards to pre-90s-recession levels. Job security. Pensions. Benefits. No contract hell unless you're really into that sort of thing. My grandparents could take an unskilled or semi-skilled job, work hard for decades, make enough to support their family, and retire in their 60s. We should take this upcoming opportunity to create a world where we (and future generations) can enjoy the same quality of life. I have no idea how to do it, but it has to get done.

(Added bonus conspiracy theory: what if the powers that be created the current economic crisis in anticipation of this very worker's market, to create an environment where Good Jobs are seen as asking too much?)

This must be an analogy for something, I just haven't figured out what yet

I'm currently reading the official biography of the Queen Mother. It seems when the UK was working on creating their National Health Service in the late 1940s, the Queen Mother (who was at that time the actual Queen of England) was opposed to it. Why? Apparently before the National Health came in many hospitals were charity-run, and Her Majesty felt that if the government provides this essential service to everyone who needs it, British subjects might not feel that it's as morally imperative to exercise the Christian virtue of charity.

Overall and in general, she seems very much full of noblesse oblige and not at all an upper-class twit. There have only been two things in the book that made me go WTF (which isn't so bad because it's a big fat book in a completely Other setting and so far all the action has taken place in the first half of the 20th century, when values and attitudes and practices were much different.) But that one just came a slapped me in the face and made me do a triple take.

It must be a useful analogy for something, I just haven't figured out what yet.

"helped me alot in my college assignement"

In a recent post about the Star's apparent inconsistency between print and online as to standards for what constitutes graphic content, I received the following comment:

Anonymous said...

Good fill someone in on and this enter helped me alot in my college assignement. Gratefulness you on your information.

"Interesting," I thought, "that must be why every college program I've ever looked at has a mandatory English communications course." I then proceeded to continue going about my life normally.

Then, a bit later, on a post containing nothing but an inconsequential analogy, I received the following comment:

Anonymous said...

Nice dispatch and this enter helped me alot in my college assignement. Thanks you as your information.

"That's odd," I thought, "there's no possible way that post helped anyone with a college assignment." Then I realized that that comment sounded kind of familiar. So I went a-googling, and found 155,000 hits for "helped me alot in my college assignement."

Based on the first few I clicked on, all of them are anonymous comments, none of them link to anything. What kind of spam is this?

Question I wish I could ask my parents

When I was a kid, my parents often said to me "Life isn't fair," as though that's somehow reassuring.

Here's what I don't get, and I wish it was possible to have a frank and honest conversation with my parents to figure it out: If you don't think life is fair, why would you bring a child into life? As in, what redeeming qualities do you think life has to so counterbalance this inherent lack of fairness to the extent that it's worth making a specific effort to bring in more and innocent people?

A depressing post to start off February

The year is some point in the 90s. The place is my parents' house. The doorbell rings. For some reason, I answer. An impossibly tiny little boy is standing there, his mother a safe distance behind him. He looks up at me with terrified eyes and asks (in a voice that's almost incomprehensible for it's frightened shyness and childish lisp) if he can go into our backyard to retrieve his ball.

Remember how scared I was when I had to ring next door's doorbell and ask them the same thing, I tell him of course he can, and next time he doesn't have to ask, he can just go get it. I then inform my parents that Mr. & Mrs. Next Door's grandkids hereby officially have permission to retrieve a ball from our backyard whenever necessary. Since homeowners aren't actually the big scary monsters that small children with lost balls imagine they are, my parents shrug and continue about their lives.

I just learned that a couple of years ago, that boy, who had since grown into a teenager, died of a sudden and unexpected medical complication. The information I have suggests he was in no pain and just quietly passed in his sleep, but his life was cut short far too soon.

I didn't know him at all. My only interaction with him was that one time he rang our doorbell. But I am strongly, inexplicably, disproportionately grieving for that little boy who was scared to ask a stranger if he could get his ball back.

Edited to add: I've been trying to figure out why this saddens me so much, and I think I've worked it out. I identified with the little boy who rang our doorbell. The world was full of big, scary grownups who had unpredictable and unspoken rules. You were completely at their mercy and sometimes they might get mad at you even when your actions were completely innocent (like if your ball went in their yard). Even if they didn't actually get mad at you that often, it felt like they could at any point. The little boy did grow into a handsome and accomplished young man, but he died at an age when, for me at least, the grownup world was still big and scary and unpredictable. I'm mourning for the fact that that impossibly tiny little boy may never have gotten to enjoy the feeling of safety and security that comes with adulthood.

The one pedestrian law that needs changing

Via Traffic Services:

The only time you are allowed to enter onto the road way at a signalized intersection is when the pedestrian control facing the direction you want to travel indicates a walk symbol. If there is no pedestrian control, you can only enter the roadway when the green light is on for the direction you want to travel.

If the don't walk symbol is illuminated either flashing or solid, you can not enter onto the roadway. You must remain off the roadway until a walk symbol is on.

If there is a countdown timer with the don't walk symbol you can not enter the roadway.

The flashing don't walk symbol, solid don't walk symbol and countdown timer are only indications that the lights are about to change and if you are on the roadway, you better get off before cross traffic commences.

We need to get this rule changed. It's illogical, unreasonable, and vaguely insulting. The countdown timer tells us exactly how much time we have. We can therefore use it to make certain that we have enough time to get across the street. For example, I cross Yonge St. several times a day, and I know with absolute certainty that it takes me 11 seconds to do so at my normal walking pace. Therefore, if there are 15 seconds left on the timer, I have time to get across safely. (You might be thinking "But that's only 4 seconds leeway!" Yes, but it's 36% more time than I need, plus I still do have the option of speeding up from my normal walking pace.) I've seen a 30-second timer on a 2-lane street. What's the point of that? What is gained by keeping people on the sidewalk for a whole nother light cycle when the timer is clearly showing they have far more time than they'll ever need?

Before the timers were installed, I'd occasionally take my chances with the flashing hand, and sometimes I'd end up still in the crosswalk when the light turned red. When the timers were installed, I started timing myself and soon gained a good sense of how many seconds it takes me to cross any given street. Because of that, I enter the crosswalk when the hand is flashing far more often, but I have never - not once - found myself caught in the crosswalk on red on a timed light. The timers give me the information I need, so I'm not gambling.

Ticketing someone for entering a timed crosswalk where they clearly have enough time just because the hand is flashing is akin to ticketing someone for doing 80 in an 80 zone just because there's a 50 zone further up the road. I would very much like to know exactly which piece of legislation this falls under so I know which elected representative I should write to to get it changed. Until we can make that happen, I hope the Toronto Police will use their professional judgement and discretion and only issue tickets on flashing timed crosswalks when the pedestrian hasn't made good use of the timer and has ended up still in the crosswalk on red.

Multi-purpose analogy

This is an analogy for a) people who insist that they should be able to use offensive language (as opposed to "politically correct" language) without people taking offence, and b) people who insist that they shouldn't have to edit their translations to eliminate double entendres that aren't present in the source text. (And, as usual, I'm not referring to any of my co-workers here.)

It's like meeting a guy name Richard and insisting, despite his protests, on calling him Dick.

My bad idea radar

Several times in my life, I've heard an idea that was really verging on too complicated or too outside my expertise for me to understand, but my brain and my guts and my instinct just rebel against it, certain that it must be wrong. "Wait," I cry out, "How does that possibly make any sense???" The problem is these things are truly beyond anything I'm remotely qualified to have a knowledgeable opinion on. Often, I know so little about them that I can't even articulate why they seem like bad ideas to me. If this world is at all logical, the people who came up with the idea should very much know exactly what they're doing, and it just isn't making sense to me because I'm not smart enough or knowledgeable enough to understand it. And, in fact, if I mention to a subject-matter expert that it doesn't make any sense to me, they get all condescending and treat me like I'm an ignorant fool.

Here are some ideas that have triggered this reaction:

- The kinds of investments that caused the current economic crisis
- The idea of buying a house as an investment with the assumption that housing prices have nowhere to go but up
- The dot-com boom
- NATO's military presence in Afghanistan
- The US military presence in Iraq
- World War I*

I know very little about economics or real estate or investing or international relations or warfare. By all rights, anyone who actually does these things should know exponentially more than me. But in all these cases, years after my instincts rebelled against the idea and I spent days' worth of showers trying to wrap my brain around them to little success, it became apparent and/or generally socially accepted that they were bad ideas.

Now you're asking "But surely sometimes something seems like a bad idea to you and ends up being a good idea?"

I can think of one such case:

When I first moved into my current apartment building, I asked if the whole building switches over between heating and air conditioning, or if we can switch our suites individually. It often gets hot outside during the period where the landlord is still legally obligated to provide heat. So if it gets hot in April, can I turn on my A/C? "No, you can't turn on your A/C in the winter," the rental agent said, "But you can turn on the heat in the summer!" Yeah, like that really helps!

Turns out it does help. The law requires the landlord to maintain a temperature above a certain threshold from September to June, which functionally means that they have to have heating available. But because we can have the heat on in our individual suites even when the building as a whole is switched to air conditioning, that means the landlord is free to switch the building to A/C whenever the weather gets hot, regardless of date, because their legal requirement to provide heating is still fulfilled.

So that is the only case I can think of where my bad idea radar has led me astray. Every other time it worked. So now I tend to trust it.

So why am I blogging this? So that next time something triggers my bad idea radar, I can just link to this explanation without having to go off on a whole tangent about why I trust this gut instinct even though it's illogical.

*You're thinking "Um, WWI kind of already finished well before you got here." In this case, this reaction was triggered when I learned in history class that the war was caused by the assassination of Archduke Ferdinand. I could not imagine at all how that would trigger a war, but my history class just proceeded merrily along as though that made perfect sense. It took me several years and a lot of hard-core research to determine that it did in fact make as little sense as I thought.

Question for non-Canadians

I'm asking non-Canadians because you're more likely to be able to give an objective opinion without any explicit or subconscious partisan bias, but Canadians can answer too if you want. Anonymous comments are welcome, but please indicate if you're Canadian or not.

Faced with the Haitian catastrophe, [Canadian Prime Minister Stephen] Harper directed traffic in an impressive, speedy and efficient fashion. He got right on the file, sent the appropriate ministers and departments into overdrive, and pushed international buttons – as in Canada playing host yesterday to a hastily assembled international conference on Haiti. Those who have been critical of a certain lassitude in Canadian foreign policy should take note and give credit.

Mr. Harper announced that the government, over and beyond its own aid commitment, would match Canadians' contributions up to $50-million. When Canadians donated more than the government anticipated, he scrapped the matching limit. The result, thus far, is that Canada has made the largest per capita commitment to Haiti. And the military was dispatched there, despite repeated claims that it had already been “overstretched” by Afghanistan.

On orphans and refugees, his government walked the appropriate line between additional humanitarian efforts (as in expediting the arrival of orphans) while not creating a dangerous precedent by throwing open the country to every Haitian who might want to emigrate.

So when a grim humanitarian crisis arose, in Canada's part of the world, with a sizable Haitian diaspora already here, Mr. Harper produced a pitch-perfect response backed by swift and serious action.

My question: objectively speaking, is that actually an impressive achievement for a leader of a country? Because I've been interpreting it as just doing the job properly without messing anything up. I assumed such a response was well within the reach of anyone with the leadership skills to be the leader of a country, and the resources of a whole country at their disposal.

It's like how if a rocket scientist successfully launches a rocket, it isn't a particularly impressive achievement. Most of us can't do that, but basically they're just doing their job right without messing up.

Is effective international crisis response similarly routine, or is it more impressive than I think it is? If the leader of your country responded similarly (and they may well have in fact done just that - I haven't been tallying crisis response by nation) would you be impressed, or would you just consider it basic competence?

Why your translator is asking you all those questions

The second item in the Reverso English-French dictionary entry for "outsider":

(without links to company) personne f recrutée à l'extérieur
Fiorina is the first true outsider to run the company.
Fiorina est la première PDG de la société recrutée à l'extérieur.

A literal translation of the French sentence is "Fiorina is the first CEO of the company recruited from outside." Not exactly the same as the English sentence, but a smooth, natural, and easily-understandable way to express the concept, which is what you're looking for when using that dictionary.

But you'll also notice that the translator who wrote the French sentence knows more information than is given in the English sentence. They know that Fiorina's title is CEO. They know that the reason she is considered an outsider is specifically that she was recruited from outside the company (as opposed to, say, not being a member of the Stonecutters). Oh, and they also know that she's a woman, as evidenced by "la première PDG" (if it were a man, it would say "le premier PDG").

As you can see by the Reverso entry, the English word outsider doesn't have one single equivalent concept in French. None of the other words given would communicate the right idea. (étrangère would imply that she's from another country; tiers implies third-party, which makes no sense because as CEO she's no longer a third party; and le outsider is specific to an athletic context, implying that she's a poor shot to win.) So to accurately communicate the message of the sentence, the translator needs information about the overall context.

So this is why your translator might call you up one day and ask about the genders of various people mentioned in the text, or how one thing mentioned relates to another, or a bit of background information on the situation. They want to be able to construct a text that will effortlessly tell the target-language audience exactly what the source text tells the source-language audience. If you don't answer their questions they'll have to guess, and the translation might not end up meaning what you want it to mean.