The artists were being praised for their technique in which, the article said, they "use only pallet knives, not brushes." The conference attendees were told that "it's not too early to start whetting your palette for" the food expected to be served. And the article talked about a shipment of "wooden palates infested with the Asian long-horned beetle." Possibly wrong, wrong, and ouch.  Continue reading...

Los Angeles Times tech reporter Chris O'Brien has discovered that the favorite word among techie types is "delight": "A squishy, subjective, hard-to-pin-down term. So daringly unquantifiable, so proudly immeasurable. And now, suddenly, all the rage in data-driven Silicon Valley." Read O'Brien's delightful piece here.

The mayor's op-ed piece urged action on a regional 911 system, which, among other things, would "provide consistent and transparent performance metrics countywide." Alas, the program has not been put into effect, "as a result of the political optics." Jargon and more jargon.  Continue reading...

There are all sorts of words in English based on the -onym word part, which derives from a Greek word that means name. Everyone knows about homonyms and synonyms, but what about retronyms, demonyms, and aptonyms?  Continue reading...

Poking around a mall with his sons, the linguist Neal Whitman came across a sign that said, "Violators will be trespassed." It turns out that the verb trespass has picked up a new meaning in the last twenty years or so, one which hasn't yet made it into any of the dictionaries.  Continue reading...

What the city of Boston experienced last week was described again and again as surreal. It was the only word that seemed capable of encompassing the week's unfolding events, from Monday's deadly explosions at the Boston Marathon finish line to Friday's lockdown of the city as SWAT teams zeroed in on the remaining suspect of the bombing.  Continue reading...