Vampire Weekend, Lil Jon, the Dalai Lama, & the Oxford Comma: a fuller consideration

You have probably by now heard all about this week’s dust-up, kerfuffle, brouhaha, call it what you will, about the Oxford Comma: By Associated Press, Published: June 30 LONDON — A report that Oxford University had changed its comma rule left some punctuation obsessives alarmed, annoyed, and distraught. Passions subsided as the university said the news [...]

Antidisestablishmentarianism, you prick

A friend and Moonraking reader asked my advice about the nuances of British Victorian Antidisestablishmentarianism (that is, the “conservative” position of those who opposed the drive to disestablish the Church of England, e.g. to render it no longer the official state Church).  I didn’t have a very precise answer, but when I checked Wikipedia I [...]

Beeswax/ Mumblecore

Watched — in pieces, on my laptop via Netflix, starting with a misbegotten attempt to watch on the Airtran flight — Andrew Bujalski’s Beeswax.  This is my favorite of the probably three movies of his I’ve seen.  He’s the standardbearer for the so-called Mumblecore movement.  I read an interview where he genially complained about the [...]

Oll Korrect! Know Yuse! Oll Wright!

Iris asked me what O.K. stands for.  Sarah seemed (initially) to be mildly impressed that I came up with an answer: it’s some kind of 19th-century railway slang derived from Swedish-accented “oll korrect” e.g. All Correct.  As I said it, it sounded it a bit dubious, so I turned to Wikipedia. Fascinating!  This is a [...]