It’s the wine-whine merger. From the Mary Tyler Moore Show episode “The System” (January 11, 1975). Mary wonders why Lou bets on football games:
“I just wondered why you put yourself through this agony week after wheek.”Odd to find a /hwēk/ where there’s no wh. I think it’s meant to add emphasis.
Chock full o’Nuts is marking the seventy-fifth anniversary of Jackie Robinson’s breaking the color barrier in Major League Baseball with commemorative cans and a donation from profits to the Jackie Robinson Foundation.
Robinson made his first appearance as a Brooklyn Dodger on April 15, 1947. After retiring from baseball, he became vice president of personnel for Chock full o'Nuts in 1957, the first Black vice president of a major American corporation.
Related reading
All OCA Chock full o’Nuts posts (Pinboard)
I like to read the box at breakfast, or the carton, or the plastic bag. Thus I noticed a typographical oddity on the bag holding a loaf of Thomas’ Cinnamon Swirl Bread.
And before I go any further: no, Thomas’ is not as good as Pepperidge Farm Cinnamon Swirl, but the Pepperidge Farm was gone. (There was, however, contra a recent claim, plenty of bread in the store.)
Here’s what caught my eye at breakfast:
[Larger view coming up.]
It’s not an apostrophe. It’s not ®, the registered sign. What is it? And what’s it doing there?
[Click for a even larger view.]
I’d call the customer-service number to inquire, but having called one such number to ask about Hellmann’s Mayonnaise and Best Foods Mayonnaise (is there a dividing line? if so, where?), I’m pretty sure I could expect to get nowhere. Let the mystery be a mystery.
I hope they have Pepperidge Farm next time.
[I’d spell it as Thomas’s, but it’s not my bread.]
From the Mary Tyler Moore Show episode “Mary Richards: Producer” (January 4, 1975). Ted (Ted Knight) is increasing his vocabulary. Murray (Gavin MacLeod) is skeptical.
Ted: “Say, the newsroom is certainly redolent of coffee this morning.”Murray refuses to work any of Ted’s vocabulary words into his copy. But that night, on the news:
Murray: “It’s what?”
Ted Baxter: “And you call yourself a writer? Redolent, redolent of coffee. It means it smells.”
Mary: “Ted, what’s the book?”
Ted: “You and Your Vocabulary. I’m planning to work in a few words to every newscast to give it a little class. What do you think of the idea, Mur?”
Murray: “I think it’s redolent, Ted.”
Ted: “Monsignor Walter O’Rourke is dead at eighty-seven. Until his retirement in 1958, Monsignor O’Rourke served the Twin Cities diocese, where he was much beloved. Let me just say this: I didn’t know the monsignor personally, but I’ll bet you he was never lethargic, redolent, bellicose, or lascivious.”From the Garner’s Modern English Usage essay on sesquipedality : “Build your vocabulary to make yourself a better reader; choose simple words whenever possible to make yourself a better writer.”
The March 30 installment of Heather Cox Richardson’s Letters from an American is an especially helpful one, about CBS, Mick Mulvaney, facts, democracy, and authoritarianism. HCR puts events into context in ways that go far beyond what’s available on “the news.”
The Chicago Sun-Times reports that Representative Mary Miller (IL-15) “is benefiting from a $74,054.74 independent expenditure by the Right Women political action committee.” The group’s founder: Debra Meadows. Among its leaders: her husband Mark.
As the Sun-Times reminds us, the Meadowses are suspected of voter fraud, having voted from a North Carolina address where they never resided. As the Sun-Times also reminds us, Miller issued a press release before taking office calling the 2020 presidential election “the greatest heist of the 21st century.” She voted against certifying the result, of course.
Related reading
All OCA Mary Miller posts
My friend Fresca just informed me that today is National Pencil Day and that the Library of Congress Instagram account has an appropriate array of photographs.
Thanks, Fresca!
Related reading
All OCA pencil posts (Pinboard)
From the Mary Tyler Moore Show episode “Not a Christmas Story” (November 9, 1974). Murray (Gavin MacLeod) has written a new opening for Ted (Ted Knight):
“Good evening. This is Ted Baxter, with news from around the world and around the corner.“But Ted thinks it would be better the other way around:
“Good evening. This is Ted Baxter, with news from around the corner and around the world.“And, of course, an argument follows. Perhaps the show’s writers themselves had disagreed about how the line should go.
Advice in The Washington Post: “How to stay up-to-date on terrible news without burning out.”
Eberhard Faber Mongols were on the job in the WJM newsroom during the first season of The Mary Tyler Moore Show. After that, it’s Dixon Ticonderogas and no-name pencils. A great loss for Mongol fans.
Perhaps one of the writers was using a Ticonderoga when working on the episode “Mary Richards and the Incredible Plant Lady” (March 3, 1973). The premise: Rhoda (Valerie Harper) has borrowed money from Mary to open a plant shop, and she’s taking her time about paying back. The reason: she’s secretly using her earnings to buy Mary a new car, a yellow Mustang convertible. Rhoda knows that Mary has had her eye on a Mustang. But it turns out — uh-oh — that Mary hates yellow. She and Rhoda and Georgette (Georgia Engel) sit in the newly purchased car in the dealer’s showroom:
Georgette: “Yellow’s a lovely color, Mary. It’s the color of the sun, and wheat fields.”Related reading
Mary: “Yeah.”
Rhoda: “Ticonderoga pencils.”
Georgette: “And daffodils, and lemons — whoops, I shouldn’t have said that.”
