RA-Blog regrets the division of the compound word Gelassenheitsdemonstrationsf-loskel.
I thought I’d seen the equivalent in Munich last Friday, but it was obviously deliberate:
I also saw Einkaufst-asche. More examples here – my favourite is Katzens-treu. And there’s a rubbish sorting game that’s a bit less fun than Space Invaders (click beside the three bins).
This is not a description of my desk but the title of the seminar for translators I went to in Munich on Saturday. It was about keeping your desk tidy. Of course, an untidy desk is a symptom rather than a disease.
Here is a picture of a translator’s desk that looks a bit tidier than its title suggests. It’s probably the desk of someone who’s already attended such a seminar. In an ordinary office, we learnt, this pencil stand (Stiftbehälter) would be full of bent paperclips, rusty nails and pencils that no longer write. But I can’t see anything really extraneous, although the wall looks promising.
The trainer was Gunter Meier, who has a company website (more E+E – details there of his book on dealing with email too). People who work in offices have more chance to hear about this kind of thing. It’s a shame so few people attended – apparently there were 30 in Aschaffenburg. Probably there’s just too much else to do in Munich.
There was a list of common reasons why it’s hard to throw stuff away, from trivial to neurotic. I found these interesting for reasons I won’t go into. Also: need for archives; analysis of usual use of office space; how to avoid using post-it notes.
There was a reference to the way that old stuff carries old associations and you can only think new thoughts if you get rid of these ‘anchors’: the same old pictures, objects on desk, cuddly toys and so on. I saw these 10 seriously cool workplaces last week, and this reminded me. I particularly liked the slide to go from floor to floor, but I suppose that wouldn’t make me more productive.
St. Isidore is the patron saint of the Internet, according to an entry in h2g2 (the BBC’s pre-Wikipedia Wikipedia) on Cool patron saints.
Catholic Online has written a prayer for those using the Internet, asking for St Isidore’s intercession:
Almighty and eternal God,
who has created us in Thy image
and bade us to seek after all that is good, true and beautiful,
especially in the divine person
of Thy only-begotten Son, our Lord Jesus Christ,
grant we beseech Thee that,
through the intercession of Saint Isidore, bishop and doctor,
during our journeys through the Internet
we will direct our hands and eyes
only to that which is pleasing to Thee
and treat with charity and patience
all those souls whom we encounter.
Through Christ our Lord. Amen.
And St. Clare is apparently the patron saint of television:
Before she died in 1253, she became too ill to attend daily mass. As she lay in her bed, she would see visions of the mass on the wall of her cell, just like there was a TV. Pretty cool, huh?
Yes, I’m researching terminology on a Cistercian church.
(Warnung: vereinfachte Darstellung – der Rest lässt sich ergoogeln!).
In England wurde die Ehescheidung früher modernisiert (1969) als in Deutschland (1977), und daher wirkt es etwas merkwürdig. Eine Ehe wird geschieden, wenn sie zerrüttet ist – der einzige Grund – aber dieser Grund muss durch eine von fünf Tatsachen bewiesen werden.
1. Ehebruch – adultery (must be intolerable for other spouse)
2. Unzumutbares Benehmen “unreasonable” behaviour
3. Böswilliges Verlassen – desertion
4. 2-jährige Trennung und Einwilligung des Antragsgegners – separation and consent
5. 5-jährige Trennung
Da 2 Jahre eine lange Zeit ist (bei Trennung), ist es üblich, sich auf Grund von Ehebruch oder unzumutbares Benehmen zu scheiden. Das kann auch fast alles per Post und ohne Anwalt gemacht werden, solange es keine minderjährige Kinder gibt. Der “schuldige” soll nicht finanziell oder im Zuspruch des Sorgerechts benachteiligt werden. Trotzdem kommt es in schlimmen Fällen vor, dass ein richtiger Streit anfängt.
The Daily Mail and other papers got hold of what are apparently Heather Mills McCartney’s divorce papers – more specifically, it looks as if Paul petitioned for unreasonable behaviour and Heather decided to defend the divorce, cross-petitioning for unreasonable behaviour too. The papers are full of her accusations (and of self-questioning as to whether they should have published), but we don’t know what he accused her of. This reminds me of my time as an articled clerk. It’s really a waste of the court’s time to cross-petition, but no doubt we only see the tip of the iceberg.
Here’s the end of the document quoted:
THE RESPONDENT THEREFORE PRAYS:
1. That the prayer of the Petition may be rejected.
2. That the marriage may be dissolved.
3. That she may be granted such ancillary relief by way of maintenance pending suit, periodical payments, secured periodical payments, lump sum or sums, property adjustment orders and pension sharing orders for herself and/or for the said child of the family Beatrice Milly McCartney as may be just.
4. That the Petitioner may be ordered to pay the costs of this suit.
The lawyers.
LATER NOTE: The Sunday Times later established that this leaked document was an earlier draft of the cross petition later filed at court.
Youtube video of Der billige Jakob
at the Michaeliskirchweih in Fürth.
His jokes are usually better. There’s another video of the Kirchweih where I can’t even understand the punchline.
Where a noun ends in s and needs a possessive s, I used to tell students they could write/say either Prince Charles’ ears or Prince Charles’s ears – some people think the latter sounds ugly.
At LegalTimes.com, Jonathan Starble comments on a Supreme Court case, Kansas v. Marsh.
Majority opinion (ThomaS, RobertS, Alito, Kennedy, Scalia): Kansas’ statute
Dissenting opinion (Souter, Breyer, Ginsburg and StevenS): Kansas’s statute
Souter boldly began his Marsh dissent as follows: Kansass capital sentencing statute provides . . . This dramatic and gratuitous use of the possessive was an obvious attack on Thomas, who, as one of three s-ending members of the Court, is viewed as a role model for the millions of children who grow up with the stigma of grammatical ambiguity attached to their names.
What I don’t understand is why they didn’t just say the Kansas statute. But there is more:
Yet in other parts of the opinion, Scalia added only an apostrophe to form the words Stevens, Adams, and Tibbs. Based on this, it would seem that he believes the extra s should be omitted if the existing s is preceded by a hard consonant sound.
Who actually does the final polishing to these decisions? I can’t believe the Bundesverfassungsgericht would allow such discrepancies through.
Finally, Starble concludes that the only proper form, at least in American English, is Kansas’s:
By a margin of 7-2, the strict anti-s view appears to be the clear preference of the lands highest court. Yet experts on American usage overwhelmingly agree that Souters approach is the only one that is proper. As explained by Bryan Garner, author of A Dictionary of Modern American Usage, most authorities on the subject recognize only two types of singular nouns for which it is acceptable to omit the additional s: biblical or classical names, such as Jesus, Moses, or Aristophanes, and nouns formed from plurals, such as General Motors or Legal Times. (Journalists are often more liberal in excluding the additional s, but that is typically based on the pragmatic goal of conserving print space rather than on any ideological grounds.)
I really find that odd. I would avoid Kansas’s for euphony, unless it would be ambiguous. And on top of this, the issue is actually one of spoken English too: what did the justices actually say? And Starble does have a subheading ‘What about Arkansas?’ – since the last S in Arkansas is not pronounced, the problem doesn’t arise.
(Thanks to the Forensic Linguistics mailing list)