Ron Murch, a fantasy-football enthusiast and management trainee from New Jersey, writes:
Dear Grammer Genious,
I just completed the Senior Management Tier Training Course at the Bed Bath & Beyond Institute in Freehold, New Jersey, and next month I’m being assigned to manage the Casual Dining Department at our superstore at the Minuteman Mall in Revere, Massachusetts. I’m pretty excited. I’ve never been outside New Jersey before, so I want to be welcomed and stay out of arguments. So my question is, is it pronounced “Boston Seltics,” or “Boston Keltics”?
-Signed, Ron Murch
Dear Ron,
Boy, are you looking for trouble. There is a HUGE fight going on about that. Half the people around Boston think it’s one way and half the other, and they’re at each others throats all the time. Last winter they had to close all the bars in some of the neighborhoods because of it.
Play it safe. Just every once in a while yell “Yankees suck!” and you’ll be fine.
Mr. Neil Armstrong, a retired navy pilot of Wapakoneta Ohio, writes:
Dear Grammer Genious,
I’m having an argument with my next door neighbor Darryl. I’ll get to that later, but first I have to explain the situation.
Darryl wants to sell his house to the QVC Network because there is a cubic zirconium mine in his basement. Well not exactly, yet. Anyway, I’m against it because I’m upside down on my own mortgage as it is.
What happened was, he was digging a hole in the wall of his basement to make a secret hiding place for his wife Jackie’s collection of Hummel figures. She has been collecting Hummels for about 20 years starting when they were in the navy, and now the collection is huge and very valuable, and they are getting tired of hiding them every time the doorbell rings because it take 20 minutes. So Darryl was going to make a hiding place for them, so they’d be safe in case there was a terrorist attack or whatever.
Anyway, while he was digging the hole in the wall down there he came across a thick vein of what he’s pretty sure is pure, high-quality cubic zirconium. He was very excited. The batteries in his flashlight burned out so he came over to my house to borrow some batteries, and we got to drinking Dortmunders, and then we started pouring Jagermeister into the Dortmunders, and after about 6 of those Darryl told me about his cubic zirconium mine, and that it was a secret, and that he was going to sell his house to the QVC network because they would probably be the main ones that could use a source of cubic zirconium like that.
Right away you could tell he regretted telling me because he was afraid I would blab about it and the neighbors would start “drinking my milkshake,” he said. Whatever that means. I don’t care about that, I’m just worried that having a operating precious jewelry mine shaft right next door to my house will hurt the market value of my house. So I said I was going to write to the the Auglaize County Zoning Board and also to the Letters to the Editor of the Wapakoneta Tribune. He was furious.
We’ll see what happens, but ok, here’s my question. Before that little disagreement I made some comment that we were having cocktails, and he says Dortmunder and Jaegermeister is not a cocktail, it’s a “Jager bomb.” I said it’s not a Jager bomb unless there’s an actual shot glass of Jagermeister dropped inside the glass of Dortmunder, like we used to do in the bars in Cocoa Beach when I was in the Apollo Program. I say, if you just pour the Jagermeister into the Dortmunder, it’s a cocktail. Who is right?
-Signed, Neil Armstrong
Dear Mr. Armstrong,
What a boring life you seem to have had. Is this the most exciting episode of your sad, Wapakoneta existence? How sad.
Anyway, you are right. It’s not a Jager Bomb unless the actual shot glass of Jagermeister is actually dropped into the glass of beer.
Thanks for finally asking a question that I know the answer to for absolutely sure. I wish more of my fans would ask questions like that.
The Grammer Genious received this in the U.S. mail, written in a beautiful hand in dark blue ink on personalized, heavy, engraved, milled, die-embossed, cream-colored paper, from Mrs. Whitney W. Lockhurst III, a well-known society hostess of Toms River, New Jersey:
My dear Mr. Grammer Genious,
The half-sibling of my Hatha Yoga swami’s solicitor is a viola da gamba virtuosa, contracted to perform at the nuptials of my dear step-nephew Fitzwilliam. Which would be her proper appellation, “viola da gambist,” or “violist da gamba”?
With respect,
Mrs. Whitney W. Lockhurst III
Dear Mrs. III,
I realize that I said just that this column was about language, but I guess I should have specified that it is the ENGLISH language that I had in mind. So, if you are able to switch to English, I might be able to help you.
Here's a hint, to get you going: I’m pretty sure “appellation” is a mountain chain.
Laura Ramirez, who was pursuing an Associates Degree in Entertainment Management at California’s Indio Community College while working as a dog groomer at the Puppy Luv Pet Salon in Yucca Valley and who, because of a coding error at Monster Dot Com (and through no fault of her own) was recently hired as an Explosive Ordnance Disposal Instructor at the Marine Corps Air Ground Combat Center in Twentynine Palms, writes:
Dear Grammer Genious.
I am really really confused in this new job and I really need a lot of help. The guys I teach in my Explosive Ordnance Disposal class are real nice to me and call me Doctor Ramirez (woot!), but I just try to keep a page ahead of them in the book and I say a lot of stuff in class that I remember from reading it, but I don’t know if any of it makes any sense, because all the guys do is just keep writing what I say into their laptops and they keep asking if this is going to be on the test. We’re supposed to go out on the range next week and I guess I’ll just have to keep faking it and take things one step at a time (haha).
I’ll probably be a lot better instructor next cycle. Josh, one of the other instructors here, who teaches Battlespace Intelligence, Modeling, and Simulation in the Mojave Viper program, said he got here through a Monster Dot Com coding error too, and he’s been here for eight years. He likes it. In his former job he used to deliver for FedEx, which was ok too, he says.
What I want to ask is something I don’t want to ask anybody here because they might think I’m dumb. All these soldiers here – I mean marines -- that I see around here are always saying “Simper fie, simper fie” to each other and to me. What does that mean?
-Signed, Laura Ramirez
Dear Dr. :-) Ramirez,
Congratulations on your new job. Lucky you!
I realize that in the type of school where you work there wouldn’t be any reason for there to be any dictionaries around, but the words you ask about would be in the dictionary. I don’t need to look them up of course, because I can usually puzzle out the meanings of phrases on my own.
“Simpering” is sort of like whimpering and complaining, I’m pretty sure. And “fie” is an old-fashioned word for “shame on you.” So those soldiers or whatever are just reminding each other that you should be ashamed if you complain. So, simper fie, Laura! And watch your step (haha).
Father William Gilla, formerly a Benedictine monk at St. Dominic’s Monastery in Puyallup Washington and now defrocked and living on a grate in Pioneer Square in Seattle, writes:
Dear Grammer Genious,
It is doubtless a rare thing for classical grammar and theology to intersect in quite the way that it has for me recently, resulting as it has in my defrocking and excommunication from Holy Mother the Church. You are the most authoritative expert on grammar that I know of, so I am seeking out your help and advice.
For 14 years I taught English and Latin grammar, Art, and Self-Denial at the monastery’s secondary school. About a month ago I was finishing up my modest meal in the refectory, and the speakers were softly playing the Vatican Choir singing Paul McCartney’s “Let it be,” which put me in mind of the imperative mood of the verb -- I thought of the Biblical phrase “Let there be light.”
A troubling thought suddenly arose. The imperative mood of the verb is used for giving an order or request to another person – examples are when our abbott Brother Sylvester tells me, “Bless the wine,” or “Cane the insolent lad.” The person is telling a second person to do something.
But at the Creation, there was supposedly no other being but God! So if God was using the imperative mood, “Let there be light,” then there must have been somebody else there for him to be giving the command to!
I immediately brought this distressing epiphany to the attention of Brother Sylvester. He is my spiritual advisor whom I obey, but he mistakenly fancies that he knows grammar as well as I. He tried to explain that the verb in “the original Latin” of the phrase, fiat lux, is not in the imperative, but rather the hortatory (as if I didn’t know, and better than he!). I reminded him that the Latin is but a translation of the original Hebrew,יְהִיאוֺר(yəhī ‘ōr), in which the verb is clearly in the imperative, just as in English.
Brother Sylvester was obviously annoyed at my superior knowledge, and responded, “Well, Brother, it is a mystery.” I told him that it was not at all a mystery, it was plain grammar! I said that I would bring this theological realization to the attention of Archbishop Sambi, the Apostolic Nuncio in Washington. Brother Sylvester stared at me for a moment and said, “Have a care, Gilla!” and walked quickly away, fuming.
That night at about 3:00 am, two burly priests invaded my cell, hustled me from my pallet, pushed me out of the monastery’s great wooden front door at the top of the Rosary Steps, and told me that I was expelled and should depart post-haste. I protested loudly and attempted to reenter but one of the priests took out a taser, and although I cried “Do not tase me, Brother!” he did so, and pushed me down the stairs.
So now I am homeless on a grate in Pioneer Square. I am writing to you for two reasons. First, can you confirm that I am correct in my assertions about the imperative mood in Genesis 1:3, an assertion that will perforce explode the very foundations not only of the Holy Catholic Church, but of all Christianity, Judaism, and Islam as well? And second, do you know of any job openings for an experienced grammarian? Neither the Times nor the Post-Intelligencer ever mentions any such positions. Occasionally The Stranger does, but that publication’s confusing irony defeats me.
Signed, Father W. Gilla, OSB, Defrocked
Dear Father Gilla,
Exactly what do you mean by this “imperative mood”? “Imperative” is just a fancy way of saying “necessary,” and a mood is something that you get into when you feel some way, like, when you’re in the mood for a Snicker’s bar or something. I don’t get people like you. Don’t you ever look anything up in the dictionary?
Also, Pioneer Square is infested with obnoxious cops with nothing to do. You should move to the touristy areas west of Pine Street near the Pike Place Market. There are more people there at night, and more places to pee. Wear your priest collar.
Dr. Randy P. Gimble, a senior NASA researcher from BethesdaMaryland now living in a Motel 6, writes:
Dear Grammer Genious,
The other evening after dinner I was lounging in my lounge chair planning my high school class reunion on my iPad while the wife cleaned up the kitchen. Our son Cash was doing his homework and was stuck on a word problem, and my wife told him to “read it out loud to your father the great rocket scientist.” She said it sneery. That’s how she does.
He read it: “Mrs. Rodin bought a table and six chairs for $1,233. The table cost $750 more than a chair. How much did the six chairs cost?”
I was in the middle of trying to find out whether Mr. Houghton the high school drama teacher who directed the senior play “Oklahoma!” was dead or not, so without looking up from my iPad I explained to Cash that he should just subtract the $750 and divide the result by six, and he did that and said that the result is that a chair cost $80.50. Good, I said, write it down.
My wife, the great know-it-all who was loading the dishwasher, said to me, “No, dummy. Subtract the $750, then divide that by 7 (not 6), and multiply that by six and the answer is $414, because they want to know how much all six chairs cost, not one chair, and besides one chair cost $69 anyway, not $80.50, ya dummy.” And she went right on loading the dishwasher and humming loud and smirking.
The great genius dishwasher-loader! She does that crap all the time, right in front of Cash. This time I totally lost it.
Grammer Genious, I am literally a rocket scientist! LITERALLY! I can’t allow some smirky woman loading a dishwasher to call my abilities into question in front of my kid! She should just believe me and shut up! I yelled at her very loud to just shut the aytch-ee-double-hockey-sticks *UP*!!! So then she threw a dishrag at me and told me to pack up and hit the road, and that I might want to throw a cheap calculator into my fanny-pack before I went out the door.
So now I am in living in the Motel 6 and I DON’T CARE how much six damn chairs cost because that’s NOT THE POINT! I am a ROCKET SCIENTIST! When I solve a problem, people should just believe me and SHUT UP!! That’s what they do at the office! Why can’t I get the same respect at home?!
-Signed, Dr. Randy P. Gimble
P.S. It doesn’t help that this motel room smells bad and the remote control feels sticky.
Dear Dr. Gimble,
First of all, what does all that have to do with grammer?
Second of all, your big mistake was taking the bait. One of the great joys of being a grownup – perhaps the greatest of all -- is that you never have to do any word problems.
And third of all, always take the plastic wrapper off one of the plastic cups by the sink, and put the remote into it while you use it.
I am the architect charged with writing contract offers for the many subcontractors who will bid for various large jobs involved in the construction of the office towers to be built at Ground Zero in Manhattan. The goal is to make a lot of “moolah” start flowing into corporate coffers as quickly as possible. (By the way, "moolah" is what they keep talking about here. They have completely stopped mentioning any “memorial.” The talk is all about office space and “moolah.”)
The big shot corporate types at the contracting meetings have stressed to me several times that when I am writing the contract offers I should “use as many adverbs as possible, for the sake of precision and enforceability.”
The problem is, not only do I have no idea what they mean by that, but I also don’t even know what an adverb is, and I think I should. I remember hearing about them back in, like, the 5th grade or something, but I’m pretty sure there were no adverbs mentioned in any of my classes at the Cornell University School of Architecture, so I guess I must have lost track of the concept somewhere along the line. Could you explain what an adverb is, please?
- signed, Howard Roark
Dear Mr. Roark,
You’re in luck because the answer to your question is so easy. In English, words that end in “-ly” are called “adverbs.” (I believe I read somewhere that the word “ad-verb” comes from the Anglo-Saxon names for the letters “l” and “y”. Or maybe that was just a theory of mine. I'm not sure. Whatever.) Anyways, adverbs are considered highly preferable to other words and should be substituted for them whenever possible. For example, if instead of “Run quick” you say “Run quickly,” you show yourself to be erudite and precise. That’s probably what the big shots at those meetings were getting at.
It is possible to compose sentences that consist almost entirely of adverbs, and that’s what you should aim at. Some examples:
“Did a friendly burly hillbilly supply the bubbly comely shapely dolly with treacly jelly?”
“Does the smelly dastardly barfly imply that the orderly and mannerly assembly was an anomaly? “
“The lowly slovenly bully let fly a crumbly bialy at the sprightly butterfly.”
You see? The more adverbs, the better.
Now, I have a kind of an architecture question for you. My wife wants to get one of those refrigerators with a freezer drawer on the bottom, but I think a regular one with the freezer on the top will increase the house's resale value more. What is you professional opinion?
Jerrod Morse, a graduate student from St. John’s College in Annapolis Maryland now pursuing a Fulbright English Teaching Assistantship in Heidelberg, Germany, writes:
Dear Grammer Genious,
My German students studying English have a hard time with the “who/whom” distinction, since there is nothing remotely like it in their own simple language.
I find that I have trouble explaining it to them, since I myself don’t seem to understand it at all. I keep giving examples that are the opposite of each other and it gets all mixed up, and the students laugh at me and I hear them whispering “dummkopf” and “doofe amis,” which I suspect are locutions of disparagement. Could you explain the distinction, please?
Dear Jerrod,
I don’t understand why this “who/whom” thing keeps coming up, because it’s so easy that it’s just silly.
Use “who” if it’s before a verb. “To who it may concern.” “Who” comes before “may,” so “who” is the correct form.
Use “whom” if it’s after a verb. “I know whom did it.” “Whom” comes after “know,” so “whom” is the correct form. Get it, Mr. Fulbright Scholar?
Even if they “sound wrong,” those choices ought to be intuitive and automatic, without even thinking about it. If they aren’t, then maybe it’s time for you to forget about your fancy college and go back to the 3rd grade or something.
Also, a heads-up for you, at no extra charge: the Germans are still kind of clueless about how to make beer, and the beer they make is pretty bad, so watch out. Also, they haven’t heard about pasteurization over there yet, so you might get diarrhea.
