americans love doxxing their home states more than anything. we hear the name of our home state and everything goes black and we wake up 10 minutes later, having reblogged no fewer than 8 posts featuring the name of our home state
I love the orchestra trying and failing to maintain a straight face throughout
Exactly. These people had to rehearse at least a few times all at once yet when it’s nkt their turn to play they still look at that guy with the typewriter as if he was the most fascinating thing they have ever seen.
My husband’s wind ensemble played this song when he was in high school! you can do it with normal auxillery percussion, but it’s so much more fun if you do it with a real typewriter
now that is a writing mood
they were really like, the only reasonable approach to this piece is to insert a clown at the center of the orchestra
If you’re not playing Leroy Anderson’s 1953 classic “The Typewriter” with an actual typewriter on stage… why would you even BOTHER?
From wiki
According to the composer himself, as well as other musicians, the typewriter part is difficult because of how fast the typing speed is: even professional stenographers cannot do it, and only professional drummers have the necessary wrist flexibility
hate when mummy movies use Imhotep as the big bad. He was an architect. Imagine a mummy movie but the mummy is Frank Llyod Wright. And he was buried at the House On The Rock. Ok nevermind that would be a sick ass movie.
After the hell of the past two days, this reminded me of what America could and should be about. It’s a little pocket of hope when our administration is trying to extinguish diversity and community and basic human decency and replace them with fear and hate and division.
Hello! Horsie question: if horses had six or eight legs, what words would horse people use to describe them? I imagine fore and hind, near and far would still get used -- what about the middle legs? Mid? What if there's two sets of middle legs? Foremid? Midhind? Hindmid???? what's the combo I'm missing. Midfore? (Is that just a mediocre golf swing?) I'm sure there's other words that I'm not thinking of. What do you think?
We’ll handwave the evolution here, and presume a world in which everything else is exactly the same, but horses have eight legs. Because they are traditionally animals of high utility that English is desperately in love with, their anatomy is specifically detailed in delightful words, many of Old English origin. I think limb pairs would have their own words, because people would want to specify them. (The reason that spider leg pairs are merely numbered in English is because we don’t pay them as much attention.)
(Horses with multiple legs wouldn’t “work” as we know them, but I said “everything is the same” and that includes our fascination with them. Again, handwave the gait mechanics.)
I reckon for English, for sequential paired limbs, I’d keep it in a rough messy Old English configuration to match “fore” and “hind.” “Mid” is a good instinct on your part and is the correct choice for things between fore and hind. Despite it suggesting “waist,” I feel it would be natural to have “mid” be the second pairing of limbs. (This is probably an internal bias because of sails, which isn’t very Old English of me, but we’ll excuse it because it’s also reasonably natural for English speakers to think about things from the top down, and to prioritise “hands” over feet.)
I like “gird,” as in “girdle,” for a third pairing. This is short, matchy, meets the cadence of the fellows we plan to use it with, sounds quite different (like the NATO alphabet, they need to be hard to mix up), and ends with a consonant. The words are all roughly the same age. I think it would work for a natural, usable word.
Limping on the left side leg in the third leg pair, - “lame in the near gird.”
I think that post-Age-of-Sail, horse limb pairings would probably pick up some sailing terms, and the Italian-derived “mizzen” should drift in for the third leg pair, coming after the mids. It’s no crazier than the genuine English horse anatomy name of “gaskin,” and would provide charm and irritation - two qualities that ring true.
Of course, the horse above would have more limited mobility and utility. We could also try arranging leg pairs on the horizontal axis, although for utility I think they’d be held off the ground. In which case English would abruptly call them a new thing.
I suggest “thumb” for forelimbs that don’t normally touch the ground, and “spur” for the hindlimbs.
Mind you, these horses probably won’t have the limb mechanics or mobility to fill the niche they serve in our world, so this is just for fun.
What do you think?
…my brain is now throwing together fragments of All Creatures Great And Small meets Norse mythology, and James Herriot trying to do veterinary things to Sleipnir…
I struggled under the weight of the carthorse’s thumb, which he rested on my shoulder in a friendly fashion, enjoying the sensation of support. As I was examining his forehoof, and the big draught-bred animal must have weighed a hundred and fifty stone, this was no small matter.
The animal pulled me close to his chest with his thumb, in order to drape his massive head along my back. It was impossible to pare in this position. Gripping his forehoof with my knees, I stuck the hoof knife in my teeth - regretting that vets were among the majority of God’s creatures, and only had four limbs - and tried using both hands to disentangle myself, shoving futilely at the great arm-like weight of the thumb.
“Gi’ ower, Blossom,” his owner said gruffly. “Sorry, Mr. Herriot. Thinks he’s a lapdog.”
“That’s all right, Mr. Greendale,” I forced out, “could you please hold his head.”
“Gi’ ower,” the old man said again, and the horse - possibly responding to this, or possibly just shifting his weight - released me, lifting his head and dropping his thumb. Gasping in relief, I straightened my shoulders and dove back to the forehoof. This was a tremendously rewarding process, when the pared horn suddenly gave way to a burst of trapped pus, affording instant relief to animal and vet.
The angle was poor, the stables dingy - I decided to change position. The horse decided the same thing, and snagged me again - this time with both of his thumbs. He set the near thumb down to support himself in order to pull me in close to his chest, where exploratory lips started to mumble thoughtfully at my hair.
“Ah, he’s a big old softie, really,” Mr. Greendale said, seemingly unimpressed.
At this point Tristan Farnon burst in, babbling. Eyes wild, tie undone, he was a picture of urgency. Still, he checked on the threshold. “James, what on earth are you doing with that horse? Or is that horse doing to you?”
“He’s favourin’ Mr. Herriot,” the old man said, and broke into a most remarkably cracked cackle.
“So does fortune,” Tristan gasped. “James! Siegfried’s lost his wallet!”
“That’s absolutely marvellous, Tris,” I said, despite the sensation of being crushed by a friendly Alsatian the weight of my own motorcar. “Help.”
“Oh, don’t be so bloody Scottish and uptight,” Tristan said, and thumped the horse on the off spur. Blossom dropped me as if trained. “You’ll never get on in practice if you can’t manage horse thumbs. We’ve twenty minutes to replace his wallet with the duplicate, or it’ll be curtains for both of us.”
On the one hand, Tristan’s indiscretions were his own business. On the second, Siegfried’s temper affected us all. On the third hand -
I looked at Tristan, dressed in white tie and cummerbund.
