RIP OED: My best dictionary story

The story of the Oxford English Dictionary is a fascinating one – a tribute to the power and fascination of language. And now its life as a print edition is over. In honor of the OED, I offer readers my best dictionary story, one of the many delightfully bizarre incidents that occurred during my time [...]

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Beautiful short film

(Reposted from The Improvised Life) Joaquin Baldwin‘s beautiful little animated film is a reminder of how the creative process often works – in completely unexpected ways. We also love Baldwin’s story about how the film came to be: This film was inspired while driving back from a trip to Palm Springs, when my partner said [...]

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Life with Betty, part two

Click here to read Part One. I had to purchase a new Kindle book, for a couple of reasons. First, we have lots of very short breaks in our day on jury duty. Usually between one attorney and the next, or while the next attorney waits for or prepares a witness. The history of food [...]

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Life with Betty, part one

Pour a glass of wine, this is a long post. Names have not been changed, because there are no innocent to protect. Betty took a near-instant dislike to me, which made sense I guess, because I took an even nearer-instant dislike to her. It was not a race thing – I’m not like that. It [...]

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Parakeet’s Tale

Copied with permission from Tastee Pudding. A few days ago, Amanda posted this photo, followed by the tantalizing prompt “How, exactly, do you find a parakeet? Explain the story behind this flyer in 250 words or less.” Here, from the comments section of Amanda’s post, is my reply: I wake with a start. The dream [...]

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