And what’s your curiosity %?

Tuesday, June 29, 2010

Tweet By ANNE DONNELL What’s the best way to write %? Percent? Per cent? Per-cent? -Merely Curious, Not Really Needing to Know Seeing today’s signature, I had to laugh (LOL in texting or on Facebook  – Laugh Out Loud, as if you laugh “in your head” very often. Try it. Less than a hoot. LOL can mean Lots of Love, but why would I feel that for this anonymous correspondent? I’m still working hard on not spitting at strangers.). Our QP of T (Question Person of Today) exhibits an accuracy most of us neglect when dressing up our 50%-100% pretend selves for public viewing. The Clothing of Sham – a good book title. Well, how about Faking It the American Way? Disinterest in America: The Public’s Demand for Less Content, More Pizzazz. Sounds like something good to ignore.  By ANNE DONNELL What’s the best way to write %? Percent? Per cent? Per-cent? -Merely Curious, Not Really Needing to Know Seeing today’s signature, I had to laugh (LOL in texting or on Facebook  – Laugh Out Loud, as if you laugh “in your head” very often. Try it. Less than a hoot. LOL can mean Lots of Love, but why would I feel that for this anonymous correspondent? I’m still working hard on not spitting at strangers.). Our QP of T (Question Person of Today) exhibits an accuracy most of us neglect when dressing up our 50%-100% pretend selves for public viewing. The Clothing of Sham – a good book title. Well, how about Faking It the American Way? Disinterest in America: The Public’s Demand for Less Content, More Pizzazz. Sounds like something good to ignore.   Here’s a book title I didn’t make up: Bright-sided: How the Relentless Promotion of Positive Thinking Has Undermined America by Barbara Ehrenreich. Her interest in this developed when she was diagnosed with breast cancer. From the Publisher’s Weekly review: “Chided for her anger and distress by doctors and fellow cancer patients and survivors, Ehrenreich explores the insistence upon optimism as a cultural and national trait, discovering its symbiotic relationship with American capitalism and how poverty, obesity, unemployment and relationship problems are being marketed as obstacles that can be overcome with the right (read: positive) mindset. Building on Max Weber's insights into the relationship between Calvinism and capitalism, Ehrenreich sees the dark roots of positive thinking emerging from 19th-century religious movements. Mary Baker Eddy, William James and Norman Vincent Peale paved the path for today's secular $9.6 billion self-improvement industry and positive psychology institutes. The author concludes by suggesting that the bungled invasion of Iraq and current economic mess may be intricately tied to this reckless national penchant for self-delusion and a lack of anxious vigilance, necessary to societal survival.” At least our QP of T has kept the flame of curiosity flickering. And, he or she is not asking such burning questions as: Is there any part of my skin with enough space for a tattoo of Elvis and Priscilla on their wedding day? Or Which body piercing makes old people cringe the most? Or Can my dog vote? ONLINE DEPARTMENT “Oxymorons Plus” (Thanks, C.G.) • 1.Why is the third hand on the watch called the second hand? • 2.If a word is misspelled in the dictionary, how would we ever know? • 3. If Webster wrote the first dictionary, where did he find the words? • 4. Why do we say something is out of whack?  What is a whack? • 5. Why do "slow down" and "slow up" mean the same thing? • 6. Why do "fat chance" and "slim chance" mean the same thing? • 7. Why do "tug" boats push their barges? • 8. Why do we sing "Take me out to the ball game" when we are already there? • 9. Why are they called "stands" when they are made for sitting? • 10. Why is it called "after dark" when it really is "after light"? • 11. Doesn't “expecting the unexpected” make the unexpected expected? • 12. Why are a "wise man" and a "wise guy” opposites? • 13.Why do “overlook" and "oversee" mean opposite things? •14. Why is "phonics" not spelled the way it sounds? • 15. If all the world is a stage, where is the audience sitting? • 16. Why is bra singular and panties plural? • 17. Why do we put suits in garment bags and garments in a suitcase? • 18. How come abbreviated is such a long word? • 19. Why doesn't glue stick to the inside of the bottle? • 20. Why do they call it a TV set when you only have one?  •21. Why do we drive on a parkway and park on a driveway? FINALLY, REACHING THE POINT So I think I can whip up a quick answer, no matter how tortured the path of arriving. The Oxford University Press has a simple reply on this: Use percent if you can’t get by with %.  How great is that?  Also noted: American writers say “at ___ %” and British writers use “on ___%”   I bet that last bit just snapped the final dab of curiosity right off our QP of T who was “Not Really Needing to Know” anyway.                 A percentage is a way of expressing a number as a fraction of 100, which represents the whole of something. There are many, many dull uses of percentage. And some in between versions, too, like these statistics from “Twenty Interesting and Useful Water Facts.” [A WORD OF ADVICE: Always be wary of something with “Interesting and Useful” in its title.] “Roughly 70 percent of an adult’s body is made up of water. At birth, water accounts for approximately 80 percent of an infant’s body weight. Somewhere between 70 and 75 percent of the earth’s surface is covered with water. The United States uses nearly 80 percent of its water for irrigation and thermoelectric power. Approximately 85 percent of U.S. residents receive their water from public water facilities. The remaining 15 percent supply their own water from private wells or other sources. By the time a person feels thirsty, his or her body has lost over 1 percent of its total water amount.” BW (Bigtime Word) matutinal – an event occurring in the morning. For maybe 95% this doesn’t include graciousness.