The Independent profiles an upcoming book on “words for which there is no equivalent in the English language,” and runs a nice list of some of the more peculiar. Highlights:

Iktsuarpok: Siberian for those people who can’t sit still waiting for a visitor, getting up "to go outside often to see if someone is coming."

Zechpreller: German. “A person who leaves a restaurant without paying.”

Alghunj: Persian. The “feigned anger of a mistress.”

Some of them, sort of like that old notion of Eskimos having a billion words for snow, speak to something in their underlying culture, that they should need a specific word for that. Odd.

(Via Arts&Letters Daily)

Posted by: Dr. Reo Symes at 02:20 PM | Comments (45)
Post contains 116 words, total size 1 kb.

The Independent profiles an upcoming book on “words for which there is no equivalent in the English language,” and runs a nice list of some of the more peculiar. Highlights:

Iktsuarpok: Siberian for those people who canÂ’t sit still waiting for a visitor, getting up "to go outside often to see if someone is coming."

Zechpreller: German. “A person who leaves a restaurant without paying.”

Alghunj: Persian. The “feigned anger of a mistress.”

Some of them, sort of like that old notion of Eskimos having a billion words for snow, speak to something in their underlying culture, that they should need a specific word for that. Odd.

(Via Arts&Letters Daily)

Posted by: Dr. Reo Symes at 02:20 PM | Comments (45)
Post contains 122 words, total size 1 kb.

Recently, someone on (formerly) jailed NyTimes reporter Judith MillerÂ’s team started the ball rolling toward her release by contacting the prosecutor, Patrick Fitzgerald. The story they told him: the only reason their client was still sitting in jail, refusing to testify, was because Joe Tate (lawyer for CheneyÂ’s Chief of Staff, Lewis Libby) told them a year ago LibbyÂ’s waiver wasnÂ’t really voluntary.

Fitzgerald apparently sent off a heated letter to Tate. I say "apparently," because though we donÂ’t have that letter, the NyTimes obtained TateÂ’s excited response. They also have Floyd Abrams' (Miller's lawyer) reply to Tate and released them both today.

Comparing them, it seems obvious they can't both be telling the truth. The NyTimes Adam Liptak writes:

The dueling letters give sharply divergent accounts of what was said a year ago when lawyers for Ms. Miller and her source, I. Lewis Libby, Vice President Dick Cheney's chief of staff, discussed the possibility of Ms. Miller's testimony before a grand jury investigating the possibly unlawful disclosure of the identity of a C.I.A. officer.

That summary doesnÂ’t do them justice. To get the real 'No, youÂ’re lying. No you are' schoolyard sizzle, you have to read the actual letters (link in Liptak's article). Or just read this: more...

Posted by: Dr. Reo Symes at 12:07 AM | Comments (21)
Post contains 1118 words, total size 8 kb.