The language of the slot-machine industry:
There's a term bandied about at the trade shows: "extinction." We need to design for extinction, we need to reduce time-to-extinction, and so on.Read more: The flip side of customer experience (Good Experience).
What's extinction? That's the moment that the customer — the gambler sitting at the slot machine — runs out of money. The wallet, or credit card, is now "extinct." Mission accomplished.
David Sedaris, from an account of life with cigarettes:
A light cigarette is like a regular one with a pinhole in it. With Kools, it's the difference between being kicked by a donkey and being kicked by a donkey that has socks on.Related post
Killer's Kiss (1955), written and directed by Stanley Kubrick, is a great film noir. Running only 67 minutes, it feels like a longer, fuller film, as it's told largely in images: fight posters, dance-hall posters, photographs tucked into the edges of a mirror, a doll tethered to a bed railing, a tiled staircase. Boxer Davy Gordon and dance-hall girl Gloria Price (played by Jamie Smith and Irene Kane) meet, fall in love, and become the targets of jealous dance-hall owner Vincent Rapallo (played by Frank Silvera). There are great scenes of Times Square at night and a brutal fight in a mannequin warehouse.
Above, a still from a Times Square scene with Davy and Gloria. Imagine: an electric sign for Scripto mechanical pencils in Times Square. In 1955, people took their pencils seriously. But even better: the sign has moving parts and becomes, as Davy and Gloria talk, an advertisement for ballpoint pens: 29¢, same price as the pencils.
If you're wondering what the sign on the left is advertising, it's Himberama, "a sleight-of-hand musical revue" under the direction of orchestra leader and magician Richard Himber. Note the changing position of the rabbit: this sign too has moving parts. In another shot, the snappy slogans are readable: "A HARE RAISIN' SHOW," "THE 4D PRODUCTION."
In working out the mysteries of Himberama, I'm indebted to the New York Times obituary for Richard Himber (1966) and two articles from American Speech, John Lotz's "The Suffix '-Rama'" (1954) and the unattributed "Some Popular Components of Trade Names" (1958). The phrase "a sleight-of-hand musical revue" is from the Times. I still don't understand the fourth dimension.
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March 9, 2021: I updated the link for Roger Russell’s Scripto pages, which are now saved at the Internet Archive.
Related post
Is there a pencil in The House ? (on pencils in The House on 92nd Street)
Cartoon aesthetics:
"I think it would look really goofy if you had made a speech balloon with multiple teats."(Thanks, Elaine!)
I find a plausible explanation of the Rev. Jeremiah Wright's current "tour" in Charles Crumb's observation in the documentary Crumb (1994):
"When narcissism is wounded, it wants to strike back at the person who wounded it."An observation that helps, I think, to explain Bill Clinton's recent behavior too.
Edward Kennedy Ellington was born on April 29, 1899. The above image is from the LP-sized booklet that came with This One's for Blanton (Pablo, 1972), the first Ellington recording I bought.
Roaming through the jungle, the jungle of "oohs" and "ahs," searching for a more agreeable noise, I live a life of primitivity with the mind of a child and an unquenchable thirst for sharps and flats. The more consonant, the more appetizing and delectable they are. Cacophony is hard to swallow. Living in a cave, I am almost a hermit, but there is a difference, for I have a mistress. Lovers have come and gone, but only my mistress stays. She is beautiful and gentle. She waits on me hand and foot. She is a swinger. She has grace. To hear her speak, you can't believe your ears. She is ten thousand years old. She is as modern as tomorrow, a brand-new woman every day, and as endless as time mathematics. Living with her is a labyrinth of ramifications. I look forward to her every gesture.
Music is my mistress, and she plays second fiddle to no one.
Duke Ellington, Music Is My Mistress (New York: Doubleday, 1973), 447.
I remember thinking about the ampersand when I worked as a legal proofreader for a summer at Rogers & Wells in Manhattan. Proofreading was a two-person job, with one person reading aloud and the other "holding copy." We sounded all punctuation in abbreviated forms: com, peer, q, sem. The firm's name was always cap rogers amp cap wells. Some law firms used and and some, the ampersand, and they were — and I'm sure still are — picky (if they still exist).
I sometimes ask my students if they know what & is called. They sometimes insist that it's the andpersand — it does, after all, stand for and. But it's the ampersand, really, and Jonathan Hoefler of the type foundry Hoefler & Frere-Jones has a wonderful post about its history: Our Middle Name (Ask H&F-J).
A newspaper article about a falafel vendor states that falafel is served on "pizza bread." The reporter doesn't know from falafel, which is served on pita bread.
When writing about an unfamiliar subject, it's smart to check the vocabulary. Doing so helps to avoid anchor performances, pneumonic devices, and surrealist falafel.
This post is no. 19 in a very occasional series, "How to improve writing," dedicated to improving stray bits of published prose (and falafel sandwiches).
All "How to improve writing" posts (via Pinboard)
[Photograph by Rachel Leddy.]
Dr. Ralph Stanley and His Clinch Mountain Boys, April 26, 2008.
(Thanks, Rachel!)
All "dowdy world" posts (via Pinboard)
"Well, he may be a 'dreamboat,' but young lady, you have studying to do. Young lady? I am talking to you! I would advise you to stop all this nonsense this instant and apply yourself. Finals begin in just two days! Two days! Are you listening to me, young lady? You haven't heard a word I've been saying! Oh — [deep sigh] — co-education!"
[Photograph from Alan H. Monroe, Principles and Types of Speech (New York: Scott, Foresman, 1955). Words from my imagination.]
