How I say to fix it

"How the owner says the two men got away with his vehicle."

This leading W- word is so common in journalese, but it just annoys me. You're not describing how the owner/police/lawyer/witness/whoever says anything. They are saying how something happened. At the very least you need commas - how, the owner says, the two men got away. But really, dangit, move that w-word!

The owner says how the two men got away.

How Police Say Two Women Almost Got Away With Stealing at Least 6 Houses - Police say how two women...

A-Rod: How lawyers say team could avoid paying him. - Lawyers say how team could ...

Let's be clear about this:

You know the joke Lincoln used to tell? "If you call a tail a leg, how many legs does a dog have? Four. Calling a tail a leg doesn't make it one."

Let's be clear about this. Calling Indiana's law an RFRA (Religious Freedom Restoration Act) like the federal law and the other state laws doesn't mean (pace the Washington Post and a bunch of other places) doesn't mean that it actually is like those laws.

Here's an excellent article from the Atlantic explaining why. The bottom line:

The statute shows every sign of having been carefully designed to put new obstacles in the path of equality; and it has been publicly sold with deceptive claims that it is “nothing new.”

Or, in a longer excerpt:

... the Weekly Standard’s John McCormack: “Is there any difference between Indiana's law and the federal law? Nothing significant.” I am not sure what McCormack was thinking; but even my old employer, The Washington Post, seems to believe that if a law has a similar title as another law, they must be identical. “Indiana is actually soon to be just one of 20 states with a version of the Religious Freedom Restoration Act, or RFRA,” the Post’s Hunter Schwarz wrote, linking to [a] map created by the National Conference of State Legislatures.

The problem with this statement is that, well, it’s false. That becomes clear when you read and compare those tedious state statutes. If you do that, you will find that the Indiana statute has two features the federal RFRA—and most state RFRAs—do not. First, the Indiana law explicitly allows any for-profit business to assert a right to “the free exercise of religion.” The federal RFRA doesn’t contain such language, and neither does any of the state RFRAs except South Carolina’s; in fact, Louisiana and Pennsylvania, explicitly exclude for-profit businesses from the protection of their RFRAs.

The new Indiana statute also contains this odd language: “A person whose exercise of religion has been substantially burdened, or is likely to be substantially burdened, by a violation of this chapter may assert the violation or impending violation as a claim or defense in a judicial or administrative proceeding, regardless of whether the state or any other governmental entity is a party to the proceeding.” (My italics.) Neither the federal RFRA, nor 18 of the 19 state statutes cited by the Post, says anything like this; only the Texas RFRA, passed in 1999, contains similar language.

What these words mean is, first, that the Indiana statute explicitly recognizes that a for-profit corporation has “free exercise” rights matching those of individuals or churches. A lot of legal thinkers thought that idea was outlandish until last year’s decision in Burwell v. Hobby Lobby Stores, in which the Court’s five conservatives interpreted the federal RFRA to give some corporate employers a religious veto over their employees’ statutory right to contraceptive coverage.

Second, the Indiana statute explicitly makes a business’s “free exercise” right a defense against a private lawsuit by another person, rather than simply against actions brought by government. Why does this matter? Well, there’s a lot of evidence that the new wave of “religious freedom” legislation was impelled, at least in part, by a panic over a New Mexico state-court decision, Elane Photography v. Willock. In that case, a same-sex couple sued a professional photography studio that refused to photograph the couple’s wedding. New Mexico law bars discrimination in “public accommodations” on the basis of sexual orientation. The studio said that New Mexico’s RFRA nonetheless barred the suit; but the state’s Supreme Court held that the RFRA did not apply “because the government is not a party.”

Remarkably enough, soon after, language found its way into the Indiana statute to make sure that no Indiana court could ever make a similar decision. Democrats also offered the Republican legislative majority a chance to amend the new act to say that it did not permit businesses to discriminate; they voted that amendment down.

So, let’s review the evidence: by the Weekly Standard’s definition, there’s “nothing significant” about this law that differs from the federal one, and other state ones—except that it has been carefully written to make clear that 1) businesses can use it against 2) civil-rights suits brought by individuals.

PS: Over at Slacktivist, Fred puts it succinctly:

Indiana’s new law is not an attempt to hold statutes restricting religious liberty to strict scrutiny. It is, rather, a reaffirmation and expansion of the obnoxious logic of the Oregon v. Smith ruling that the real RFRA was written to correct. And it goes beyond that, to grant this power to discriminate not just to the state itself, but to private businesses and business owners.

A good run ... now ABC

Tennessee had a good run, making it into the Elite Eight again but falling to Maryland. In the women's tournament, the Final Four is all the Number One seeds, so somebody did a good job.

But of course, I'm for the Terps now! Heck, I'd even take a Notre Dame championship... ABC (anybody but Connecticut).

One thing about Indiana's law to bear in mind

Indiana has no state anti-discrimination laws based on sexual orientation. Thus, this law enables such discrimination.

In fact, when amendments explicitly denying such discrimination were proposed, they were rejected.

Because that discrimination is what this bill is about, Pence and his corps of supporters notwithstanding.

Fun fact: Georgia was advancing similar legislation, though they had be pretty creative to get it through their state Senate. But when people got a look at what was happening to Indiana, they got an anti-discrimination clause added in the House. And the bill died.

Here's a great exchange: Sen. Josh McKoon (R): “That amendment would completely undercut the purpose of the bill.”
Rep. Roger Bruce (D): “That tells me that the purpose of the bill is to discriminate.”
Sen. McKoon: “It couldn’t be further from the truth, no sir.”

The Week in Entertainment

Live: Cabaret on Broadway, the next to last day of its run. Alan Cumming was totally brilliant as the emcee, and Linda Emond and Danny Burstein were great as Fraulein Schneider and Herr Schultz. Wonderful show, all the way around.

Film: Der Fliegender Holländer, the Royal Opera broadcast with Bryn Terfel leading an outstanding cast in an interesting, modern(ish) production.

DVD: A couple of episodes of the second season of Longmire. They have really layered in a bunch of personal plots that don't even begin to be in the books. But the show's interesting on its own as its own thing.

Read: The Dead Mountaineer's Inn: One More Last Rite for the Detective Genre, which was unexpected in the way it ended. The Joy of X, about math. About half of The Turnip Princess and Other Newly Discovered Fairy Tales, a collection of Bavarian folk stories. I believe this is my favorite bit so far: "While the king was at war, his wife bore a beautiful son, and the midwife took him and substituted a little dog for the child. The king received a message about the strange birth, but he was not upset and imagined that something had just gone wrong." Like women have puppies all the time, you know?

Ted Cruz does not like this

As Fred puts it:

Science-denying U.S. Sen. Ted Cruz says his “music taste changed on 9/11” because he “didn’t like how rock music responded.” Cruz said this in a clumsy bid for the Toby Keith voting bloc, apparently, but it’s worth pointing out, specifically, what it is that Sen. Cruz doesn’t like.

Sen. Cruz doesn't approve of this. Sen. Cruz does not want to come on up for the Rising. Nor does he wish to meet you at Mary’s place. And he is decidedly opposed (with these hands) to the idea that (with these hands) we should (come on) join together and (come on) rise up.

Good to know that about him.

By the way, here's a great piece by Ed Kilgore, in which, among other things, he says (first quoting Jonathan Chait):

It is true, however, that, in general, rock stars did not reach the jingoist heights of their country brethren. The rockers were mourning victims and celebrating freedom; country stars were demanding blood. That was a real partisan cultural divide.

And it was in order to identify with that partisan cultural divide, suggests Chait, that Ted Cruz gave up (or at least pretended to give up) his own musical tastes for something more—and I use this term very precisely—politically correct in his peer group.

Two worlds in spring

Haven't done one of these in a while...

Washington Times
Terrorism | Allies show no reluctance to call out 'Islamic' terror; term Obama rejects
Military | Bergdahl case gives black eye to Army, Obama | Deserter charges after Taliban swap
Accountability | Clinton scandals delay her campaign | Latest suggests political cronyism
Affordable Care Act | Obama takes pride in health care | Pleases with legacy even if many Americans are not
Yemen | Saudis lead Arab attack; Iran proxy war loom | U.S. aids strikes against Shiite Houthis
Wisconsin | Religious exemption sought for Amish | Building codes force out family
Their big picture is Obama 'leaving a legacy of partisanship'; two smaller ones of Yemeni fleeing gunfire in Aden and Ghani addressing congress, the latter accompanying the 'Terrorism' story


Washington Post
Saudi Arabia launches strikes in Yemen as rebels advance
Desertion charge for onetime POW | Bergdahl could face life sentence | Soldier went missing from Afghan base in 2009
U.S. warplanes join stalled battle for Tikrit | Strikes will support Iranian-backed Shiite militias on the ground
Plane crash in French Alps killed mom, daughter from Va.
$45 billion merger to create a food-industry behemoth
For 2016 campaign: Out with the rich, in with the really rich 
And their big picture is Yemenis running toward a weapons depot to fight off a rebel advance

Several interesting things here. First, the visusals about Yemen: people fleeing in terror versus people preparing to defend their city.

But the Amish story was particularly interesting, as it began by complaining about the religious freedom to leave your house under code and without smoke alarms if you want but ended being a jab at unions because the Amish do their own work and the firefighters' unions are backing the builders' unions in punishing the Amish. (I know...) Note that the story is from Wisconsin.

"Far From Finished" ... apparently.

In today's Washington Post there's a story on Bill Cosby's tour. After listing the venues where there have been protests or cancellations, the writer gives us the most unsurprising sentence:

In Florida, West Virginia and Georgia, performances go off without a hitch.

I know, that's stereotyping. But really: given this list - Westchester, New York; Denver, Col.; Worcester, Mass; Pittsburgh, PA; Des Moines, Iowa; Las Vegas, Nevada; Melbourne, Fla; Wheeling, WV; and an unnamed city in Georgia - and told to pick the three places the show went on with no disruption,wouldn't you have picked those three?

The man is performing in Baltimore Friday. I never was planning to go. But it will be interesting to look at the paper Saturday. Tickets are still available (that fact at this late date is telling), if you want to observe first hand...

Gwen

A few more pictures of Gwen

This one in January 2000, one of the first I ever took of her, her first Christmas at my father's



Bird watching



Rug wrestling



Tucked in between the curtain and the window

Goodbye, Gwen

Gwen came into my life back in 1999.



She was a young cat hanging around a coworker's house. He couldn't have another one, so he asked me if I wanted her. My previous cat, the imperious and very vocal half-Siamese Bast, had been gone about a half a year, and I agreed to take this little girl.

The vet figured her for almost a year old, and said she'd been spayed. Our best guess is that she either got kicked out of her house when someone got a new significant other, or else she got lost, maybe out of a car. She was as sweet and friendly as she could be, and she stayed that way her whole life.


I'm not going to say traveling was her favorite thing, but she didn't mind it. She'd go into her carrier willingly and she traveled calmly, even across country to Washington state. She enjoyed our visits to my father's house, especially looking out the big picture window into the woods, and she bullied my friend's big cat in Washington the one week she stayed with him. Poor Beowulf...

But while she wasn't crazy about strange cats, she did like people. She was friendly, and with me she was very affectionate. She loved to lie on top of me on the couch, and to sleep at the other end if I was reading on on the laptop.

She didn't care what flavor her food was, but she was picky about the texture: had to be the "grilled" variety. She wouldn't eat out of my hand, but she would lick bacon until it was limp if you put it down for her. And she loved ham.

She liked to sit out on the balcony in a chair in the sun. Or lie between the curtain and the glass in the winter sun, when it was too cold to let her out. She didn't like the oscillating fan I'd have to turn on in the week or so of summer-like heat that always comes in May before the building switches from heat to air conditioning, but she didn't mind the box fan that would be on in the living room, so those nights she'd spend out there. And she loved lying in the bathtub ...

Back in 2012 when the derecho came through and knocked my building's power out for ten days, she lived happily (and neatly) in a motel room, just like she did when I went on a business trip for two weeks to Ft Lewis. She was always happier when she traveled with me than when I left her. Me, too.

You've undoubtedly noticed that all of this is in the past tense. She had lost a lot of weight a couple of years ago, though overall she as still healthy and active, but just in the last couple of days had been getting kind of feeble. She walked slower, with a little wobble. She wasn't at the door when I came in; she was coming out of the bedroom. She wasn't eating as much, and she wasn't as particular about keeping her chin clean. I was thinking about taking her to see a vet this weekend.

But last night she came into the kitchen and asked for something to eat. I gave her a Tongol Tuna Appetizer, and she drank the tuna water happily. She ate a couple of chunks of meat, too - I thought she was eating it all, but I left the kitchen and only this morning did I see how much she'd left. She came back into the bedroom and got up onto the bed. She lay there for a few minutes and then kind of just collapsed onto the comforter. She spoke softly a couple of times and then, while I was stroking her and talking to her, she shuddered, kicked out a back leg, and just stopped breathing.

I am going to miss the hell out of my good girl.

Arianwen: ? 1999 - March 23, 2015

Not exactly.

George Zimmerman said:

I still believe that people are truly good at heart, as Anne Frank has said, and I will put myself in any position to help another human in any way I can.

TPM, for some reason, chose to headline that as:

George Zimmerman Compares Himself To Anne Frank

You know what? No.

Just no.

Quoting someone is not comparing yourself to them. Even agreeing with the quote is not comparing yourself to the person who said it.

The Week in Entertainment

Live: The Flying Dutchman at the Washington National Opera at the Kennedy Center, with Eric Owens powerful in the title role, Jay Hunter Morris strong as Erik, Christiane Libor very good as Senta, and Ain Anger excellent - and funny - as Daland. The production was a bit anvilicious - really, did the Dutchman need to carry around a placard reading "Verdammt (Damned)"? - but the music and singing were excellent.

DVD: A number of episodes of A&E's series Longmire, which is pretty good, though they've made a number of substantial changes to the books (no Saizarbitoria, not enough Henry Standing Bear, and waaaay too much Branch Connally). Robert Taylor is very well cast, and the others are good, too. But there's some sort of odd subplot going on with his wife...

Read: All the rest of Craig Johnson's Longmire books. (Yes.) Started The Dead Mountaineer's Inn: One More Last Rite for the Detective Genre by the Strugatsky brothers.

March Madness

Tennessee is in the tournament (seeded #2 in the Spokane Division), playing their first game on Saturday afternoon.


I don't think they'll win, but they have a good chance. They'll have to play Maryland to get to the Final Four, and Connecticut to get to the final game (yes, I'm assuming those schools will win), and then face Notre Dame or South Carolina (again, assuming the number one seeds advance).

It'll be a good tournament. Watch the brackets here.

One little word

OMG Bing, this translation is dreadful.


Волонтер и журналист Виктория Ивлева рассказала, что власти «ЛНР» отказались выпустить в Украину 45 женщин и детей

Volunteer and journalist Victoria Ivleva told authorities "LNR" refused to release Ukraine 45 women and children

No. She didn't tell the authorities anything. She "said that the authorities of the LPR refused to release 45 women and children into Ukraine".

OK, so two little words. В and что, into and that respectively. But what a difference they make.

Inarguably, Google is worse: Volunteer and journalist Victoria Ivlev said that the authorities "LC" in Ukraine refused to release 45 women and children

Sure, Google got the "that". But that's all it got. First, where did "LC" come from? It's LNR in Russian, LPR - the Lugansk People's Republic - in English. How did NR become C? Second, "authorities "LC" in Ukraine"? That's an accusative of motion, not a locative. And it's nowhere near the LPR in the clause; it's right after the flipping verb. Выпустить в Украину is "allow into Ukraine". And thirdly, it has the Ukrainians (these LC authorities) refusing to release the women and children, when the women and children aren't even in Ukraine (allowing the argument that the LPR is in fact its own thing).

Also, her name is Ivleva, though I do know Russians who didn't keep the gender marker on their name when they emigrated so just possibly that's ... no. Her name is Ivleva. Also, both of you?  Almost always власти is better translated as the "government," not the "authorities".

My translation: Viktoria Ivleva, a volunteer (from Predanie, a Russian charitable foundation) and journalist, said that the LPR government has refused to release 45 women and children\to Ukraine

Really? I don't think so

A Facebook friend posted this on her page today:

All I can think when I read that is, And nothing will ever change. Sitting back in your cozy faith and trusting in what will be while accepting what is?

No.

You have to get out and fight to change what is into what should be.

 Lessonslearnedinlife, you've learned the wrong ones.

From over the sea?

So, a friend came back from Peru and brought me a very cute little toy guinea pig with a hat and bag. We were trying to remember what they're called in Russian, and when we looked it up, it's морская свинка (morskaya svinka), which is literally "little sea pig".

Sea pig? we all asked. The name, says the etymological entry, is borrowed from Polish świnka morska, and the Poles got it from the Germans - Meerschweinchen, which, it said, is literally "морская свинка". Which is true. Why do the Germans call guinea pigs "little sea pigs", is the logical next question.

And here the Germans let us down. According to their Wikipedia entry on Hausmeerschweinchen (little house sea pigs),

Laut Duden kommt die Bezeichnung Meerschweinchen von dem spätmittelhochdeutschen Ausdruck merswin. Dieser bedeutete ursprünglich ‚Delfin‘ und wurde wegen der (als ähnlich empfundenen) Grunzlaute verwendet. Es gibt jedoch viele andere, möglicherweise weniger sprachwissenschaftlich begründete Vermutungen, wie die Bezeichnung Meerschweinchen entstand. Am häufigsten wird der Name dadurch gedeutet, dass die Tiere sehr schweineähnlich aussehen und über das Meer zu uns kamen. Es könnte jedoch auch aus einer Verballhornung des Wortes „Möhrenschweinchen“ entstanden sein. Eine weitere Möglichkeit ist, dass sich die Bezeichnung aus einem ähnlich klingenden Wort entwickelt hat, welches jedoch eine völlig andere Bedeutung hat, ähnlich wie bei der Meerkatze, welche als Affenart weder etwas mit Meer noch mit Katze zu tun hat, deren Name sich aber vom indischen Wort „marcata“ ableitet, was übersetzt „Affe“ bedeutet.


According to the dictionary, the term Meerschweinschen comes from the late Middle High German expression "merswin". This meant originally "dolphin" and was used because the grunts were perceived to be similar. However, there are many other, possibly less linguistically educated guesses, for the name's origin. Most often the name is characterized as that the animals look very similar to pigs and came over the sea to us. However, it could also be a corruption of the word "Möhrenschweinchen (little carrot pigs)". Another possibility is that the name has evolved from a similar-sounding word, Meerkatze, which is the name of a monkey and has nothing to do with "sea cat" but rather comes from the Indian word "marcata" which translated means "monkey".

None of those seem very convincing. Plus, I don't think guinea pigs' grunts sound like dolphins', so that hardly strikes me as more convincing than "little pigs from over the sea", however more "linguistically educated" it might be.

Of course, I never got the "pig" part of "guinea pig" anyway.

The Week in Entertainment

A busy week, so a short entry.
Live: A splendid La Donna del Lago, Rossini's colaratura spectacle based on a Sir Walter Scott poem. Wonderful cast, particularly Joyce DiDonato, Daniela Barcellona, and Juan Diego Flórez.

Read: Kazuo Ishiguro's new novel, The Buried Giant, which I liked very much. Two by Edward D Hoch, The Shattered Raven and a short story collection, Leopold's Way. Terry Pratchett's The Dragons at Crumbling Castle. A short story collection by Craig Johnson, Wait for Signs, which I found reviewed in EQMM, and which led me to the Longmire novels, the first of which (The Cold Dish) I like so well I bought a few more.

My favorite line

At the end of La Donna del Lago, the king grants Elena's wish and pardons her father and lover. As he hands Malcolm over to her, the pair say "Oh Stelle!" (Oh, Stars!). The Met's titles translated that as "Oh merciful God!", not a bad in-context translation.

And it perfectly set up my now favorite line, from Bertram, the king's major domo. "Oh Re clemente!" Which is to say, "Oh merciful king!"

Yeah. Credit where it's due.

Thank you

(Click through for full size)

Death comes

The Guardian has a tribute page.

The Week in Entertainment

DVD: Big Hero Six - I loved it. It was touching and funny, and well deserved the Oscar it won. And the little cartoon that comes with it, "Feast," is funny as heck.

TV:Modern Family - amusing though not special. The Middle - very nice final scene with Brick and Sue. Very nice. Selma, Lord, Selma - the events of that summer through the eyes of a nine-year-old girl.

Read: Karen Memory by Elizabeth Bear. Steampunk that starts off very light and builds to a full-on adventure climax, this terrific novel features a representative mix of POC, LBGT, and women characters - you have to read the author's note about Marshal Bass Reeves including a feisty, terrifically engaging protagonist with a terrific narrative voice. Grave Matters, a sequel to Night Owls, just as good and possibly better.

"Somebody already got us over that bridge."

Selma.

"50 years from Bloody Sunday, our march is not yet finished, but we’re getting closer. 239 years after this nation’s founding, our union is not yet perfect, but we are getting closer. Our job’s easier because somebody already got us through that first mile. Somebody already got us over that bridge. When it feels the road is too hard, when the torch we’ve been passed feels too heavy, we will remember these early travelers, and draw strength from their example…we honor those who walked so we could run. We must run so our children soar." —President Obama

(And how ironic that the bridge is still named for a KKK Grand Dragon.)

A classic error

One of the things you learn as an instructor is how to write tests - and for multiple-choice tests, that includes writing the distractors - the wrong answers. Here's a question from a Facebook quiz that illustrates one of the classic errors:

Do you see it? The grammar forces you to the right answer. "A ten thousand words" and "a unlimited words" aren't possible English phrases. The 'a" belongs with the answer, not as part of the question.

(I certainly have quibbles with the quiz, though: since when is "When the going gets tough, the tough get going" a proverb, let alone a "most important" one?)

A magical ride

I'm sure you saw the "baby weasel takes a magical ride on a woodpecker" photo. (In case you haven't, here it is, and here's the story.)


Of course, it wasn't a fairy-tale, magical ride; the (fully adult) weasel was trying to kill the wood- pecker to eat it. This was a last-ditch effort by the bird to escape, and when it landed near the photographer the weasel was apparently distracted so the bird managed to fly away sans unwanted passenger. Whether it survived is unknown.


However, the Internet of course began adding to the photo. And of course we got this one:













But my personal favorite is this one:

The leader of the free world

On the flip side, a Quinn Hillyer column at the National Review:

The leader of the free world will be addressing Congress on Tuesday. The American president is doing everything possible to undermine him.

Israeli prime minister Benjamin Netanyahu leads a nation surrounded by enemies, a nation so small that it narrows at one point to just 9.3 miles. Yet, in a world where the Oval Office is manned by someone openly apologetic for most American exercises of power; and where Western Europe’s economy is enervated, its people largely faithless, and its leadership feckless; and where Freedom House has found “an overall drop in [global] freedom for the ninth consecutive year,” the safeguarding of our civilization might rely more on leaders who possess uncommon moral courage than on those who possess the most nukes or biggest armies.

Right now, nobody on the world stage speaks for civilization the way Netanyahu does.

...

Benjamin Netanyahu of course speaks first for Israel, but he speaks also for you and for me, for decency and humaneness, and for vigilance and strength against truly evil adversaries. Congress, by inviting him, is wise. Obama, by opposing him, is horribly wrong. And the civilized world, if it ignores him, will be well-nigh suicidal.

This is what Ed Kilgore says about that:

Throughout the last presidential cycle as just about every Republican presidential candidate not named Ron Paul called for outsourcing U.S. Middle Eastern policy to Israel, I kept wondering how these super-patriots justified explicitly subordinating our national interest to any other country’s. Hillyer goes a step further in basically pledging allegiance to a foreign prime minister and encouraging others to do the same.

A Common Interest

For both president -- Prime Minister Netanyahu and the hawks in Congress, mostly Republican, the primary goal is to undermine any potential negotiation that might settle whatever issue there is with Iran. They have a common interest in ensuring that there is no regional force that can serve as any kind of deterrent to Israeli and U.S. violence, the major violence in the region. And it is—if we believe U.S. intelligence—don’t see any reason not to—their analysis is that if Iran is developing nuclear weapons, which they don’t know, it would be part of their deterrent strategy. Now, their general strategic posture is one of deterrence. They have low military expenditures. According to U.S. intelligence, their strategic doctrine is to try to prevent an attack, up to the point where diplomacy can set in. I don’t think anyone with a grey cell functioning thinks that they would ever conceivably use a nuclear weapon, or even try to. The country would be obliterated in 15 seconds. But they might provide a deterrent of sorts. And the U.S. and Israel certainly don’t want to tolerate that. They are the forces that carry out regular violence and aggression in the region and don’t want any impediment to that.

Noam Chomsky via azspot.net

The Week in Entertainment

DVD: Several episodes from another good German series, Der Kommissar und das Meer (The Inspector and the Sea) about a German ex-pat working as a cop on a small island in Sweden. His wife is played by a rather well-known Danish actress named Paprika Steen. I know it's no different than, say, Pepper Binkley, but it strikes me as funny every time I see her name.

TV: The Mentalist - I am going to miss them, but I hate that they went out with a damned super-serial-killer-with-a-grudge-against-Jane arc. That was the worst part of the earlier seasons and they got away from it lately. I actually put off watching the last two eps out of this fear, but then the guy proved (a) not to be too smart and then (b) got comprehensively caught. So, it ended well. I was glad to see Van Pelt and Rigsby again, and it's funny how everyone is Episcopalian on TV - at least when they get married. :-) Modern Family - Luke's hair is awesome. The Middle - saddish episode about Darren and funny one about Weird Ashley. Agent Carter had a terrific season ending. And the final shot of Peggy on the bridge was genuinely moving.

Read: Karen Lord's wonderful The Best of All Possible Worlds. A very different book to Redemption in Indigo, an episodic low-key romance built on the destruction of a world, but equally wonderful.

As I tell my students...

You have to watch those endings. The grammar tells you what is happening.

These photos are from Vox's photo-essay on the Nemtsov march today. They're they cover, and one showing the sign they translate as "the bullets are in each of us". But the Russian, as you can plainly see (and even plainly read assuming you can read Russian!) is Эти пули - в каждого из нас.

Каждого is the accusative case, not the prepositional, which would be каждом. The accusative is used for motion, the prepositional for location. That makes this sign mean "the bullets hit each of us." (edited to add: the Washington Post's photo album says "these bullets - for everyone of us" which isn't bad, either (though I'd have said "every one of us").)


 

Dyyd Dewi Sant!

Look at this lovely UK Google Doodle for today:

Thanks, New Zealand!

Whoo hoo! I'm getting $1978.50 NZD tax refund! They sent me an email and everything! All I have to do is give the Inland Revenue all my details. ...

What? I didn't actually earn any income in New Zealand and they should have my details if they have determined that I'm eligible for this payment? Why are you raining on my parade, common sense?