I've Started Shelby Foote's "Civil War"

Shelby Foote - Southern Man of Letters

Now that I've finished a biography of Douglas MacArthur, I've decided to take the plunge into Shelby Foote's three volume history of the Civil War. (Sorry Admiral Nimitz, you'll have to wait.)

To be fair I'm not reading it. My conscience compels me to admit that I'm not reading it in the strict sense. I'm listening to it as an audio-book. Yes, I feel a little twinge of guilt for not actually reading the book, but I don't feel that guilty.

Actually, I feel so little guilt that I actually have a complaint about the audio-book - the reader's voice is not that good. The reader's voice is tinny and flatly accented (no accent at all), sounding more like a computer than an actual person. This is such a shame, since Foote had a wonderful low, gravely Southern accent that just curled up on you like a sleepy cat  looking for a warm place to rest.

In learning a tiny bit about Foote himself, I have come across some wonderful anecdotes about his life and quotes from him about writing and life in general. One of my favorite anecdotes is as follows:

A story I’ve heard, possibly apocryphal, has it that Shelby Foote and William Faulkner once made a pilgrimage together to the battlefields of Shiloh, in Tennessee. It was a Sunday morning, but along the way they were able to score some moonshine from a fellow they spotted having his shoes shined, Faulkner’s logic being that any man having his shoes shined was likely to know where to find some whiskey. By the time they’d reached the battlefield’s famed Peach Orchard, they were loose enough to want to reenact the great cavalry charge on their own, sabers drawn in their minds. That’s how to drink like a Southerner.

I hope that's a true story.

How Do You Correctly Pronounce "Certiorari"?

Even the Justices of the US Supreme Court can't agree.

Yet another sign of a divided U.S. Supreme Court: The justices cannot even agree on how to pronounce the word “certiorari.”

A new and somewhat whimsical research article reveals that justices are “profoundly divided” into at least six camps on the proper way to say that Latin word.

“There was only one point of unanimous agreement,” legal scholar James Duane wrote in the latest edition of The Green Bag legal journal. "They all pronounce the beginning of the word “ser,” presumably because of its obvious resemblance to certain."

I'd be interested to see how the South Carolina Supreme Court Justices come down on pronouncing it. I think we would certainly say it a little more slowly and maybe let the ARRR sound lengthen out a little bit, softening and rounding out the word.

Sounds like a good research project for a law clerk.

My Dialect Map - I Can't Name the Area Between the Sidewalk and the Road

You see that picture? I have no idea what to call the grass between the road and the sidewalk.

You've probably already taken this quiz from the New York Times. It's exploded across the internet faster than knife fight in a phone booth. Likely, it's gone viral because people love to talk about how they talk.

I don't normally take quizzes (online or otherwise) but since I had plenty of time this Christmas Day, I decided to go for it. It actually doesn't take very long and it pegs you pretty close to where you live. (At least it did for me and Mrs. Permanent Press). I can't show you my map because it's not linkable for some reason. Take my word for it, it's pretty accurate for someone who lives in Columbia, has a father from Augusta, GA and went to college in the Shenandoah valley of Virginia.

To me, the most interesting question was "What do you call the grass strip between the sidewalk and the road?". It just blew my mind. It's so common and everyday, but I've never given that a second thought and I don't have a word for it.  It's not like some weird thing that only exists in Norway.

Anyone got a word for that?

Anyway, I used to think that I had no accent at all, but that changed when I went to Northwestern Indiana for law school. Most of my classmates were from the midwest or the upper midwest. I certainly didn't sound like them. I'd be interested to see their maps. Maybe they have a word for what the grass between the sidewalk and the road is.

Illegal Sports Gambling

John Monk has a column about illegal sports betting in South Carolina.

"Sports betting is known as a gateway drug in getting young people hooked into gambling,” said John Kindt, a professor at the University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign campus and a nationally known gambling expert.

I bet he's totally wrong about that. Anybody want some action on that? On a related note, only about 4 weeks until football starts, or as the bookies call it, the busy season.

Do You Need to "Tame" Your Southern Accent?

An Auburn graduate (of all people) can help you smooth out the rough edges of your southern accent.

I guess there are some Southerners who are taunted by non-Southerners, and that makes them want to try and eliminate what they perceive to be a flaw. I guess I'm just more self-confident (or maybe I don't venture out of Columbia much) but I wouldn't try to change my accent for anything. Being Southern means that we are warm, welcoming, and our accents reflect that.

If your Yankee boss doesn't like it, then you can impress him with your actual skill and knowledge. Also, if you're a Southerner in an office full of non-Southerners, they're probably jealous that your accent makes you unique.

Don't let the bastards get you down.