Not to forget

As the shitshow begins, let’s not forget: Donald Trump told Corey Lewandowski — who was not a member of his administration — to direct Jeff Sessions to limit the scope of the Mueller investigation to interference in future elections and to prohibit inquiry into Russian interference in the 2016 election. Got obstruction?

“Coming in hot”

I was getting blood drawn (the yearly doctor’s visit) and the nurse used this expression with reference to an upcoming birthday: “It’s coming in hot!”

I had to ask: is that a midwesternism? A downstate Illinoism? I had never heard it before.

Obligatory sequel: You’ve never heard that before? No. And how long have you lived here? Thirty-four years. And you’ve never? No, never. And where are you from originally? The garden spot of the world, Brooklyn, USA. But really, I just said “Brooklyn, New York.”

The nurse understood “coming in hot” to mean “coming up quickly,” “coming up soon.” She didn’t know where the expression comes from. But she mentioned that she and her co-workers use the expression in a different way when there’s a urine sample waiting to be picked up. You know how there’s a little shelf when you? Yes, I do.

Unlike a birthday, that sample would literally be coming in hot.

[A Quora page suggests that “coming in hot” has a military origin. “The garden spot of the world, Brooklyn, USA”: as per Ed Norton, The Honeymooners. But that expression goes far back.]

Milton’s Shakespeare

From The Guardian : “Almost 400 years after the first folio of Shakespeare was published in 1623, scholars believe they have identified the early owner of one copy of the text, who made hundreds of insightful annotations throughout: John Milton.”

Adventures in hyphenation

Stan Carey poses a question: What would serve as an apt compound modifier for the opposite of user-friendly ?

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October 5: From a television commercial for Paycom: “My HR app is user-unfriendly.”

Related posts
Bad hyphens, unhelpful abbreviations : “Every generation hyphenates the way it wants to” : “Fellow-billionaires” : Got hyphens? : The Hammacher Schlemmer crazy making hyphen shortage problem : Living on hyphens : Mr. Hyphen and e-mail : Mr. Hyphen and Mr. Faulkner : One more from Mr. Hyphen : Phrasal-adjective punctuation

[As I wrote in a comment on Stan’s post, user-unfriendly sounds best to my ear. I hear in it a touch of wit, a quick negation of the more familiar term.]

Ticonderoga sighting

[Since You Went Away (dir. John Cromwell, 1944). Click for a larger view.]

No, Brig Hilton (Shirley Temple) is not gasping at the conductor’s Dixon Ticonderogas, even if they are sporting nifty clips. The conductor is played by Harry Hayden, who also turns up as the counterman in the opening scene of The Killers (dir. Robert Siodmak, 1946). I know that I’m supposed to be thinking about pencils, not diners. But the setting here is a railroad dining car. Speaking of which, the Railroad Dining Car Archives are a wonder to browse. Though they’re short on pencils.

Other Ticonderoga sightings
The Dick Van Dyke Show : Force of Evil : The House on 92nd Street : Lassie : Lassie, again : Perry Mason

Orange Crate Art at fifteen

Orange Crate Art turns fifteen today. It’s applying for a learner’s permit tomorrow. Wish us luck.

Writing every day, or nearly every day, is a great pleasure to me, whatever the fortunes of “the blogosphere,” whatever the number of hits per post. For me, keeping a blog is a way of fostering a habit of attention, which means fostering a habit of learning, permit or no permit.

Thank you for reading.

Today’s Saturday Stumper

Today’s Newsday Saturday Stumper is the work of Lars G. Doubleday, who might be a Bob and Ray character if he were not, in truth, Doug Peterson and Brad Wilber. I thought at first that I was in for another Saturday debacle. See 1-D, five letters, “Confound.” But this puzzle proved to be doable and highly enjoyable.

My starting point was 6-D, seven letters, “Authorities on diamonds,” which gave me most of 6-A, eight letters, “In defiance of warnings, say,” and 18-A, eight letters, “Cooperate.” And between 6-A and 18-A, sat 16-A, eight letters, “Curser of Capulets and Montagues.” My reading of another poet, Geoffrey Hill, gave me 40-A, eight letters, “Holy Week candle-snuffing service.” I took a guess at 4-D, fifteen letters, “Pitch dismissal,” and it turned out to be right. And the parts of the puzzle fell into place, with the southwest corner bringing a final bit of difficulty. A happy solving experience.

Clues I especially liked: 24-A, four letters, “Tip of Italy,” a nice way to make a piece of crosswordese more interesting. 30-A, eight letters, “Frequent I Love Lucy sight.” 55-A, eight letters, “Light pop style.” And for sheer over-the-top idiosyncrasy, 10-D, fifteen letters, “Koi pond filler and filter.” If you say so.

No spoilers: the answers are in the comments.

Go64

“Apple has announced that macOS 10.14 (Mojave) will be the last version capable of running 32-bit applications. Go64 identifies the apps on your Mac that are still 32-bit so you can plan to update or replace them in the near future.” Go64 is a free app for Mac.

Running Go64 on my Mac turns up a handful of 32-bit apps I’ve been using about as long as I’ve been using a Mac: Free Ruler, the timer Minuteur, and the white- and pink-noise generator Noisy. The last two appear to be abandoned. The same goes for a more recent 32-bit app, the bookmark alphabetizer SafariSort.

A turntable recommendation

“Make sure you have the record player on at night”: I’m still not sure whether Joe Biden was suggesting it’s a good thing or a bad thing to have the record player on at night. This morning I’m leaning toward bad. But if you want to have a record player on at night, or at any other time, I would like to recommend the Audio-Technica AT-LP120-USB turntable. Best turntable I’ve ever had.

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In 2023, it’s there’s the Audio-Technica AT-LP120XBT-USB turntable.

[I thought that Biden was criticizing parents who might blast music while their children are trying to do homework. But if he was saying that young children need to hear the spoken word, why not suggest that parents talk to their children? Why invoke a record player? I acknowledge that my recommendation moves forward from the record player into the world of “components”: turntable, receiver, speakers.]

Ben Leddy hosts The Rewind

Here’s the latest episode of WGBH’s The Rewind, “Let’s Read Zoom Mail!,” hosted by our son Ben. And by a special guest-host. And featuring our son Ben. You’ll have to watch to understand.