July 2005 Archives

The Senate is considering an amendment to the Native American Graves Protection and Repatriation Act which would ensure that tribes could claim ancient remains even if a direct link to a tribe can't be proven.

This is partially a result of the controversy over the Kennewick Man, a complete 9,300 year-old skeleton found near Seattle back in 1996. Several area Native America tribes are claiming rights to the remains and want to give them a "proper burial," even though they were discovered on federal land and may belong to a man of European or Asian origin.

This controversy puts a liberal in a difficult position, and indeed I had to think twice before deciding which side of it I was on before evenatually siding with the scientists.

I took a rather funny photo of Ray that I decided to turn into an Andy Warhol-esque montage.

This was pretty simple: just apply a gradient map and fiddle with the hue and saturation until it looks right.

I suppose it's because I toiled for so many years in Communication Studies that I tend to be quite reflective of my own argumentation style and strategies.

I just had to deliver two presentations at two diffeent meetings on the same topic. I anticipated a hostile audience for both as I was essentially telling people that they had to do more work for potentially less reward than in years past.

The presentations went remarkably well in part because I employed various rhetorical strategies that I didn't even know the names of. However, thanks to A Handbook of Rhetorical Styles I am now able to speak more precisely about my argumentation.

First, I employed metabasis to cover what I have said on the topic in the past and what I planned to say during the presentation. Then, I used procatalepsis to raise anticipated questions and answer them on my own terms. I employed antanagoge in bringing up a positive aspect of my plan right before a negative one. And the, finally, my favorite: I used dirimens copulatio to balance my facts and prevent the argument from being one-sided.

I did not use, but thoroughly enjoy, the practice of apophasis, or asserting or emphasizing something by pointedly seeming to pass over, ignore, or deny it -- as in "I pass over the fact that Jenkins beats his wife, is an alcoholic, and sells dope to kids, because we will not allow personal matters to enter into our political discussion."

As previously mentioned in this space, Ray has demonstrated an amazing ability to communicate pretty clearly despite only having about 8 consonant sounds. Nevertheless, distinguishing between garbage can (eɪ jɒ) and apple sauce (ɒ jɒ) can prove to be quite challenging.*

Yesterday, Amy called me at work to translate something Ray was quite emphatically demanding.

Ray: Been bay!
Jim: Been bay?
Ray (tentatively): Yeah...
Jim: Green grape?
Ray (enthusiastically): Yeah!! Been bay!!! Been bay!!!

Sometimes, it just takes a new pair of ears.

* - Transliteration of Ray into the International Phonetic Alphabet courtesy of Michael-Forman.com, and apparently not viewable in Internet Explorer. Get Firefox!.

Over the last month, Ray has been learning to string adjectives together to describe nouns. For example, he has always been rather fond of garbage cans. A month ago (or so) he started calling them by a single adjective only -- no noun (for example, "new" or "green".) A little while later, he started to put the adjective with the noun (e.g. "new garbage can," or "green garbage can.")

Lately, he's been running multiple adjectives together: "new green garbage can," "old green garbage can," etc.

Amy has noted that when he hits about 3 or 4 adjectives, he starts to lose track of the order. So, "two new green garbage cans" sometimes comes out as "green two new garbage cans."

The amazing thing about all this is that he recognizes when they are out of order and struggles to assemble all the words into the proper syntax: "two new green garbage cans." And he knows when he gets it right.

Often, midway through the phrase, he will insert a "dump, dump, dump," or "garbage truck" to describe what he saw happen to the garbage cans earlier in the day. When he gets tired and starts putting all the words together into nonsensical strings, it is quite amusing.

I guess it had never occurred to me that adjective types had an order. "Two new green garbage cans" sounds more natural than "two green new garbage cans," but I didn't know there were rules that governed the order.

The University of Victoria's ESL web site was the first hit on a Google search for "order of adjectives" -- their 410 Grammar: Adjective Order lesson describes the different types of adjectives and what order they go in.

Opinion: An opinion adjective explains what you think about something (other people may not agree with you).

Size: A size adjective, of course, tells you how big or small something is.

Age: An age adjective tells you how young or old something or someone is.

Shape: A shape adjective describes the shape of something.

Colour: A colour adjective, of course, describes the colour of something.

Origin: An origin adjective describes where something comes from.

Material: A material adjective describes what something is made from.

Purpose: A purpose adjective describes what something is used for. These adjectives often end with "-ing".

According to them, age comes before color, so "new green garbage can" is proper. So, Ray's favorite thing right now is the "cool, big, new, rectangular, green, American, plastic, dumping garbage can."

So, I've been stricken down twice in recent days by minor displays of hubris in incredibly mundane circumstances. Still, I pay attention, and I am letting the Universe know that my sense of humility is restored!

First, yesterday I decided to return a damaged belt to the store. Usually, since I'm so chronically disorganized, this would entail tearing up the house searching for the receipt, but I opened my inconsistently-used receipt box and pulled out the first one I saw, and it was the right one! I said something to Amy about how that never happens and it must be a sign that I'm meant to own a better belt.

Later in the day, Amy and I were adjusting Ray's car seat before I planned to go to the stroe. I placed the receipt on the back seat of the car along with the belt. At some point, I saw Ray over by the side of the house putting something in a garbage can. Only later, when I couldn't find the receipt, did I think to ask him....

Me: Ray, did you find a little slip of paper on the car seat?
Ray: Yeah.
Me: What did you do with it?
Ray: Ah-yah (garbage can)!
Me: You put it in the garbage can?
Ray: Yeah!

Well, after tearing through the garbage can, I found nothing except beer- and raspberry-concentrate-soaked napkins and bits of trash. By the time I found the receipt under the car seat (Ray's not too terribly reliable with information), it was too late to go to the store.

Then this morning, I woke up late and was in danger of missing the bus. For a moment, I contemplated staying in bed and catching a later bus, but I pulled myself up, threw on some clothes, said goodbye to Amy and Ray, and ran to the corner where I caught the bus with not a moment to lose. On the way to work, I felt so proud of myself for getting in early (6:45) on Monday and not succumbing to the comfort and warmth of the bed despite my late wake-up.

When I arrived at my office, I discovered I had left my keys at home. No one was scheduled to come in until 8:00, the building coordinator was on vacation, and the Dean's Office didn't have a copy of a key to my office. I could have just opened up the tablet and worked somewhere else, but the battery was dead and I left my power cord at home. My cell phone and PDA were, likewise, dead. I eventually got ahold of campus police and managed to convince them to let me into my office. I sat down and got to work about 8:00 -- the same time I would have if I had taken the later bus.

I literally should have stated in bed.

And my belt is broken.

I've learned my lesson.

Congress recently approved a change to daylight savings time. Apparently, this will save energy, which everyone says they want to do as long as they don't have to actually be bothered to do anything.

But one of the bill's sponsers thinks that another constituency will appreciate this, too.

[Representative Fred] Upton [R-MI] noted that the extension means daylight-saving time will continue through Halloween, adding to safety. "Kids across the nation will soon rejoice," said Upton, because they'll have another hour of daylight trick-or-treating.

Look at Charlie Brown's Halloween special. They all go out at night and they're supposed to be, what, five? Hell, Linus spends the entire night in a pumpkin patch, for Christ's sake.

How scary is it when someone's older brother covers himself in fake blood and jumps out at you from behind a tree if it's 4:00 in the goddamn afternoon?!

You know who went out trick-or-treating during daylight when I was a kid?!? Lame-ass losers and sissies, that's who.

Fuckin' Republicans.

From atop one of the mountains near South Lake Tahoe, I snapped this rather nice panoramic shot of the lake. Click for a pan-able version (Java required).