The misnamed 12th month

[Verbivore]

I encountered in the news the following headline.

It is ambiguous and clunky. How best to improve it?

Palorchestes was a blind, sharp-toothed creature with a trunk that lived for millions of years in Australia.

Simplest fix, I suggest, would be to replace trunk that with trunk, which.

Other approaches?

(Yes, it’s a dull December afternoon here! I’ve mowed, weeded, and fed the lawn. I’ve mulched the latest foliage drop and distributed it around the garden. I’ve hung, dried, folded, and put away the laundry. I’ve dusted and de-cobwebbed the house interior; swept, vacuumed, and mopped; made lunch and prepared for dinner … so at 1320 hrs there’s little to do other than retreat from the garden's 33° and stay indoors with the aircon set to 23°, read the news – nothing really worth the read! – and worry about ambiguities in headlines.)

[Twoddle]

-0.6C last night, and there's about a centimetre of snow on the ground. Can't wait for summer.

[Verbivore]

French language spelling reform urged by linguists.

[Dave Miller]

Vv asked
“ It is ambiguous and clunky. How best to improve it?
Palorchestes was a blind, sharp-toothed creature with a trunk that lived for millions of years in Australia.
Simplest fix, I suggest, would be to replace trunk that with trunk, which.”

I think the “mental pause” produced by the comma would help understanding, but not in a technical way. Even the “which” after a comma usually applies to the noun before it. I suggest:
Palorchestes was a blind, sharp-toothed creature with a trunk and lived for millions of years in Australia.
Or
Palorchestes was a blind, sharp-toothed creature that had a trunk and lived for millions of years in Australia.

[Little Jack Horner]

I will briefly respond to the item about French spelling. Anne Catherine Simon says, "French spelling is very complex, takes time to learn and does not allow learners to fully master the language". I disagree, but then I have had to master English spelling which I would have thought was much more complex. I have mentioned before the twelve different ways of pronouncing OUGH in English and, although I have never claimed to be able to speak anything more than rudimentary French, the spelling has never been a problem and, whilst it might make some sense to replace the X with S in some plurals, I wouldn't have thought the present system would be much of a problem for anyone. It would be much more useful to abandon noun genders or, at least, to abandon the need for adjectives to agree with the noun. 

[Twoddle]

I agree, LJH. French genders are a pain in the proverbial, though less so than German ones. I'm surprised that "...eaux" was singled out as a problem, because it does at least signify a masculine plural, whereas "...eaus" could be mistaken for a mistyped feminine plural with an "e" missing.

What's happened to most of the December postings? Am I going daft or have most of them mysteriously disappeared?

[Twoddle]

I was listening to a sixteen-year-old girl being interviewed on TV tonight. The interview lasted between two and three minutes and I had to play it pack to assure myself I wasn't mistaken: there twenty-eight inappropriate uses of the word, "like". (There was also one correct use.) I couldn't tell you what the girl said because I was concentrating on counting the "likes".

[Little Jack Horner]

Harking back to the question raised by Vv at the beginning of the month, it is, of course, possible to misunderstand the sentence but I think it is unlikely. It does raise the question about who is/are Palorchestes. I assume it is a genus of extinct animals, in which case I think it should be in italics and the following verb should be in the plural — Palorchestes were blind, sharp-toothed creatures with trunks and lived for millions of years in Australia. Still ambiguous, of course, because none of them lived for millions of years with or without trunks (however along the trunk survived) and in those days there was no such place as Australia. Let's try again:

Palorchestes are an extinct genus of blind, sharp-toothed creatures, each with a trunk, that lived for millions of years in a region subsequently incorporated into a land area we now call Australia. Still not free of ambiguities so I don't think that will do:—

Palorchestes are an extinct genus of animals that were extant for millions of years and consisted of comparatively short-lived, blind, sharp-toothed vertebrates, each with a trunk, that lived in pockets* of land subsequently incorporated into a land area, part of which English-speaking people now call Australia.

* A slightly Aussie terminology in the original article!

On the whole, I think I prefer the original. I am afraid I haven't done any of the useful chores that Vv did but it's after my bedtime so Good Night.

[Verbivore]

Here is a RobWords piece on the Shavian alphabet.

Here be a brain twister for holiday play (for those with nothing better to do): the Shavian alphabet.

or

𐑣𐑽 𐑚𐑰 𐑩 𐑚𐑮𐑱𐑯 𐑑𐑢𐑦𐑕𐑑𐑼 𐑓 𐑣𐑪𐑤𐑦𐑛𐑱 𐑐𐑤𐑱 (𐑓 𐑞𐑴𐑟 𐑢𐑦𐑞 𐑯𐑳𐑔𐑦𐑙 𐑚𐑧𐑑𐑼 𐑑 𐑛𐑵): 𐑞 𐑖𐑱𐑝𐑾𐑯 𐑨𐑤𐑓𐑩𐑚𐑧𐑑.

To achieve this transliteration, I used the ReadLex converter. I did not go ahead and learn Shavian.

𐑞 𐑒𐑢𐑦𐑒 𐑚𐑮𐑬𐑯 𐑓𐑪𐑒𐑕 𐑡𐑳𐑥𐑐𐑕 𐑴𐑝𐑼 𐑞 𐑤𐑱𐑟𐑦 𐑛𐑪𐑜.

If you don’t have the appropriate font/s installed, here’s a site whence one can download a collection of them.

NOTE: Most modern computers (especially those running UTF8) will already contain a Shavian font.

𐑯𐑴𐑑: 𐑥𐑴𐑕𐑑 𐑥𐑪𐑛𐑼𐑯 𐑒𐑩𐑥𐑐𐑿𐑑𐑼𐑟 (𐑦𐑕𐑐𐑧𐑖𐑩𐑤𐑦 𐑞𐑴𐑟 𐑮𐑳𐑯𐑦𐑙 UTF8) 𐑢𐑦𐑤 𐑷𐑤𐑮𐑧𐑛𐑦 𐑒𐑩𐑯𐑑𐑱𐑯 𐑩 𐑖𐑱𐑝𐑾𐑯 𐑓𐑪𐑯𐑑.

[Verbivore]

Neologism

“The museum and the Nisga’a delegates are calling it a rematriation, a challenge to the patriarchy and a word that makes sense given that the Nisga’a are a matrilineal society …”

I doubt that I’ll have anything more to post until I’ve recovered from tomorrow’s feasting, so I wish you all greetings of the season.

[Little Jack Horner]

HAPPY CHRISTMAS TO EVERYONE

[Twoddle]

Happy Christmas, everyone. Hope you have a great time.

[Verbivore]

Ah well. That’s all over for another year!

I managed to avoid a bellyache, despite a huge banquet spread: the pork roast; the turkey roll; the smoked salmon; the prawns; the numerous imaginative and colourful salads; the trifle; pavlova; cheesecake; lychee sorbet; the chocolates … .

We were 20 to lunch, 16 to supper, and still eight remaining for breakfast.

I hope you all managed to avoid bellyaches and other consequences of xmas indulgence.

Ho ho ho – ’tis a seasonal garden joke.

[Verbivore]

Les woops!

Okay, so English is not their first language, but …

[Little Jack Horner]

Some may find this interesting:
www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-england-lancashire-67832377