Minor Wisdom

Online grammar & writing guide

Here is a handy resource for writers: the Guide to Grammar & Writing, brought to you by Capital Community College of Harford, CT.

What is love?

Below the fold is an excerpt from an email I got from Sean Johnson, yogi and proprietor of Wild Lotus Yoga in New Orleans. The piece is titled "What is Love?"; it begins:

A group of professional people posed this question to a group of 4 to 8 year olds, "What does love mean?" The answers they got were broader and deeper than anyone could have imagined. See what you think:

Fly guy

Want to fly, as you sometimes do in dreams? This site gives you a vicarious taste, with mood-soothing soundtrack.

Supreme Court clerks talk about Bush v. Gore

Vanity Fair's October 2004 issue gives a clerks' eye view of what happened inside the U.S. Supreme Court as it decided Bush v. Gore. The magazine doesn't have a web site, but it gave Goldstein & Howe's SCOTUSblog permission to post the article, which they've done here.

New words

Because English is a living language, it continually changes as new words are added and old words become archaic. Here are a couple of web sites that try to keep up with all the comings and goings.

The Word Spy "is devoted to lexpionage, the sleuthing of new words and phrases. These aren't 'stunt words' or 'sniglets,' but new terms that have appeared multiple times in newspapers, magazines, books, Web sites, and other recorded sources."

Double-Tongued Word Wrester "records words as they enter and leave the English language. It focuses upon slang, jargon, and other niche categories which include new, foreign, hybrid, archaic, obsolete, and rare words. Special attention is paid to the lending and borrowing of words between the various Englishes and other languages, even where a word is not a fully naturalized citizen in its new language."

What do you read?

I like this quote by Miami Herald columnist Leonard Pitts:

In recent years, we've seen more people abandon mainstream news outlets, choosing instead those fringe outlets that reliably validate a preferred world view. Nowadays, people want their opinions echoed, not questioned.

...

... Some of us still believe that in the search for truth, you have to be even more skeptical when dealing with things you're predisposed to believe.

Lion cut

Our Persian cat, Rocky, just got his last clip until Spring 2005.

Ashcroft being followed by a moonshadow

Or at least that's what Tom Burka says.

Active, kicking verbs

This quotation comes courtesy of Bryan Garner's Usage Tip of the Day:

If you go through any newspaper or magazine and look for active, kicking verbs in the sentences, you will realize that this lack of well used verbs is the main trouble with modern English writing. Almost all nonfiction nowadays is written in a sort of pale, colorless sauce of passives and infinitives, motionless and flat as paper.

Rudolf Flesch, The Art of Plain Talk 67 (1946).

Crime & Federalism

Federalist No. 84 has moved Crime & Federalism from Blogspot to TypePad. Fed.84 writes about criminal law, white-collar crime, constitutional law, government misconduct, and (of course) federalism.