Cliché gone wrong

Driving, listening to the oldies station, now a "holiday music" station, I heard the anonymous voice of a syndicated newsreader: ". . . winter storm cutting a wide swipe across much of the country."

The word the reader was needing is swath. Merriam-Webster OnLine explains:

Middle English, from Old English swæth footstep, trace; akin to Middle High German swade swath
Date: 14th century

1 a: a row of cut grain or grass left by a scythe or mowing machine b: the sweep of a scythe or a machine in mowing or the path cut in one course
2: a long broad strip or belt
3: a stroke of or as if of a scythe
4: a space devastated as if by a scythe

Winter of course might take (not cut) a swipe at us, but that would suggest a brief bit of bad weather, not unrelenting movement. "Wide Swipe" turns out to be the name of a spell in World of Warcraft, which might explain this cliché gone wrong.

In other clichéd news, "embattled" Governor Rod Blagojevich has vowed not to talk about his situation in thirty-second sound bites. Says Blagojevich, "I will fight, I will fight, I will fight until I take my last breath. I have done nothing wrong."

Let go my Hugo

A 19th-century novel and a 21st-century legal fight:

Victor Hugo's family loses battle to ban sequels (Telegraph)

How to make friends by Telephone

Teeming with expert advice: "Shouting distorts your voice and is not pleasant."

How to make friends by Telephone (via Good Experience)

Experts say

I enjoy almost any headline that ends with the words "experts say." Rising gas prices hard on commuters, experts say. No perfect gift for everyone, experts say. Experts: they're smart!

My local paper recently ran an article with tips from local experts on saving money: do full loads of laundry, lower the thermostat, turn off lights. Ordinary people could never figure out even a handful of these things on their own, experts say.

Glenn Gould chair project

The "Sole Official Replica" of Glenn Gould's famous chair ("a boon traveling companion," which served for almost thirty years) sells for €990.

But starting with a $35 chair from Costco, an enterprising pianist has created a functional equivalent (not replica) of the Gould chair. Here's how: Building a "boon companion."

Thanks, MPR, for letting me know about your project.

Related posts
Glenn Gould's chair
Glenn Gould's chair again

Mighty minimus

I like the idea of a New York Times article about the minimus:

The pinkie, the humble fifth finger, has long been viewed as a decorative accessory, something to extend daintily from a wine glass. So what would you lose if you didn’t have one?

Get Along Without a Pinkie? It’s Tougher Than You Might Think (New York Times)

Related post
Minimus, minimi

Proust's letters to Céleste Albaret at auction

A number of Marcel Proust's letters and notes to his housekeeper Céleste Albaret are being auctioned in Paris today, including the last note that Proust wrote to her, a few hours before his death on November 18, 1922.



The note reads:

Céleste Odilon peut partir dans 10 minutes, et rentrer vers 6h1/2, 7 du matin. Approchez de moi la chaise.

[Céleste, Odilon can leave in ten minutes and come back about 6:30 or 7:00 in the morning. Pull the chair closer to me.]

Odilon was Mme. Albaret's husband. On the other side:

J'avais entendu fer au lieu de verre.

[ I heard "iron" instead of "glass."]

I saw a similar note last year during a visit to the Kolb-Proust Archive at the University of Illinois. The thing itself — in Illinois! I'll never forget it.

You can browse all twenty lots at Sotheby's.

(And if anyone sees something wrong in my translation, please let me know.)

[Update: Bloomberg has a report on the auction.]

PLaza, PLaza, PLaza

The Amazing Dr. Clitterhouse (dir. Anatole Litvak, 1938) is an unusual vehicle for Edward G. Robinson, playing a doctor curious about the criminal mind. In the course of his research (which involves, of course, becoming a criminal), Clitterhouse discovers that (like Augustine) he enjoys crime for its own sake, reporting that it brings him "something like the effects of champagne — a high, heady reaction, a strange exhilaration." I'll leave the rest of the story to your imagination, potential viewer.



PLaza, the PLatonic telephone exchange name, plays a part in this picture. Here, safecracker Rocks Valentine (Humphrey Bogart) has jotted what turns out to be Clitterhouse's home telephone number. See that paper disc? Rocks has "translated" seven marks made by a bit of pencil lead that he affixed under the phone's dial. How does he know the sequence of numbers? He used a "little jigger to click it over a notch with every turn." Pretty clever, huh? (Huh? Click it over a notch? What?)

When we next see the matchbook, it's a bit worse for wear. (And yes, the handwriting is different, which makes the movie a bit like Hi and Lois.)



Dr. Clitterhouse's office too has a PLaza number. And dig that notepad and the snazzy Modern Medicine!



The Amazing Dr. Clitterhouse also offers the chance to see Robinson, Bogart, and Claire Trevor together, long before their powerful performances in Key Largo (dir. John Huston, 1948).

Another post with PLaza in it
A pocket diary and an exchange name

Rod Blagojevich's hairbrush

From the real news, making the work of The Onion more difficult:

Mr. Blagojevich, 52, rarely turns up for work at his official state office in Chicago, former employees say, is unapologetically late to almost everything, and can treat employees with disdain, cursing and erupting in fury for failings as mundane as neglecting to have at hand at all times his preferred black Paul Mitchell hairbrush. He calls the brush “the football,” an allusion to the “nuclear football,” or the bomb codes never to be out of reach of a president.

Two Sides of a Troubled Governor, Sinking Deeper (New York Times)

The Henington Press

Three generations of the Harris family have run the Henington Press in Park Slope, Brooklyn. Printer David Harris:

"Mostly every corner that I turn here, I see something reminds me of my father, my grandfather, even my grandmother. Everything's here from them. And it — it hurts. It really does. But I've got to come to the realization that it's got to come to an end. It can't go on forever. . . . This place was our life, the Harris family life."

The business will close this winter. WNYC reports: After 96 Years, a Press Closes in Brooklyn (via Design Observer).