Chief Justice William Rehnquist wurde Samstag wegen Schilddrüsenkrebs operiert. Er soll am 1. November wieder im Gericht sein. Es wird natürlich besprochen, wie es angesichts der kommenden Wahl um einen eventuellen Nachfolger bestellt werden könnte.

bq. Rehnquist Hospitalized for Treatment of Thyroid Cancer
(Tony Mauro, Legal Times, 10-25-2004)

bq. Chief Justice William Rehnquist expects to be on the bench when the Supreme Court convenes again Nov. 1, in spite of surgery on Saturday in connection with a recently diagnosed case of thyroid cancer.

bq. The surprise announcement of Rehnquist’s illness and surgery came just before noon today, and raised in a concrete way an issue that has been an abstraction during the presidential campaign: the possibility of a departure from the Supreme Court in the near future.

LATER NOTE: Q & A on the situation at SCOTUSBlog; also report of illness.

Here are some photos of ravens at the Tower of London, taken in June. They would rather be frightened off a mountain by Trevor, I’m sure. You’re not supposed to feed them, but they don’t know that.
That’s a juvenile starling in the top picture.
They are called an unkindness of ravens (as opposed to a murder of crows), as we learnt at junior school.

LATER NOTE: In the comments, Abnu informs me of a post on the subject of collective nouns with further links.

Wortfeld gibt die Auswahlliste für Titel wieder, die bei der Bestellung von Spiegel online erscheint (allerdings verdoppelt).

Wortfeld reproduces (with some repetitions) a list of titles you can choose from if you want to try out the Spiegel Online e-paper:

You can be Prof. Dr. Dr., but not just plain Dr. Dr. You can be Mr. but not Ms. (to say nothing of dropping the full stop). Frau seems to be missing too.

The Observer reports that Mongolia is introducing last names in order to be able to use a telephone book. But too many of them named themselves after Genghis Khan (that’s what I would have chosen myself too). The 1997 surnames law was ignored till an ID card system was introduced recently.

I seem to recall a similar problem existing in Iceland.

bq. Icelanders have a given name, plus the name of (usually) their father with an attached “-son” for boys and “-dóttir” for girls. So, Jón’s son Gunnar is called Gunnar Jónsson, and his daughter Njóla is called Njóla Jónsdóttir. Because of this lack of family names, telephone directories are arranged by given names – using the above example, you’d find Gunnar Jónsson under “G”, and Njóla Jónsdóttir under “N” in the phone book. In an effort to preserve national identity, all foreigners taking Icelandic citizenship must also take an Icelandic name.

Don’t know if David stayed in Iceland long enough to look at a phone book.

Here are two glossaries of terminology relating to the church.

The one on the left is a traditional alphabetically arranged one in book form: Maureen und Reinhold Trott, Glossar des kirchlichen Sprachgebrauchs Deutsch-Englisch, Englisch-Deutsch, Missionshilfe Verlag, Hamburg 2001, ISBN 3-921620-96-1

Maureen Trott was a translator and responsible for Engish at the office of the Evangelisches Missionswerk in Deutschland (EMW). I see there is a revised and expanded second edition, 224 pages long. It costs 5.50 euros (but even less if you buy ten!). It’s good and reliable.

On the right is Church Dictionary / Kirchliches Wörterbuch, compiled by Mary Newman and Fritz Neubauer, 1st ed. May 2003, no ISBN

Further copies can be obtained from:
The European Secretary
Council for Christian Unity
Church House
Great Smith Street
London SW1P 3NZ

You can get it in Germany for 15 euros using the form I have scanned here:

Download file

The dictionary is a loose-leaf resource which will be updated from time to time. It is not alphabetically arranged, but under themes: the broader themes are Bible
Biblical/Theological Concepts
Church Buildings
Christian Year
The Church Institution
Home and Family
Parish
Religious Movements
Rites and Services
There are many more sub-themes, though. It would be easy to scan, and probably best in electronic form; it would still be possible to select parts and print out those needed, for instance by an interpreter. It looks good too.

There must be other glossaries of this kind around, I can’t help thinking, known inside the churches that produce them but not to the wider bookbuying public.

It’s wonderful what they can do with sandstone these days. And they go on about baroque architecture!