Pointless words of the day:

I'll try to keep this short because I've been up since the crack of you'vegottobekiddingme and I'm far less than functional in the brain department.

Yippee.

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I like this blog. Not a surprise, since I've been known to use nonce words now and then. I find it fun to see what other people are mucking about with as well when it comes to what some people would consider the total destruction (or at least deconstruction) of a perfectly respectable language.

My two fans already know that I don't agree with that particular tunnel-vision view of language. For the rest of you... well, I don't agree with that particular tunnel-vision view of language. Just for the record, you know.

Some of the most exciting periods in the history of English have been those where the writers weren't afraid to shoot the language through hoops Harlem Globetrotter style. Shakespeare, to use the easiest example (and, in fact, my only example today. Normally I'd come up with others, but I have the whole brain-problem thing going on at the moment) verbed his nouns without hesitation and rifled Latin and Greek for neologisms like a teenage boy leafing through his father's gun magazines looking for the hidden porn.

Or... erm... something. Thoughts aren't exactly connecting today, as you've no doubt noticed.

My point is that there have been periods in the life of the language where it was ok to play. People were inventive. Not all of the inventions worked, but the ones that didn't simply didn't last. I've said before that language is organic, and like other organisms it doesn't survive if it doesn't adapt. Constructs that screw up the evolution are cast off naturally.

In other words, they don't need language police.

I get a bit annoyed with pundits who look at language proscriptively, because to my mind they're so busy coming up with unnecessary rules that they're missing all of the fun that a language can provide. Language should be able to do tricks. Rules should be broken... maybe not all the time, although that does help prove that a rule really doesn't apply, but occasionally for effect. There's nothing wrong with it.

Right now the move to blogging and such has sent English into a period of instant invention. Words and usages spring up, become seemingly universal for a while, and then fade away again. The fuddyduddyish are probably looking at the whole thing like it's a disaster, but to me it's like watching evolution cranked up to eleven. I honestly have no idea what's going to come out of this age of instant self-publishing, but you can't deny that it has its excitement.

And did I already say that there's nothing wrong with it?

Oh, right. I did.




I'm thinking that this might be one of those days where a nap under the desk is in order. Any takers?

Yeah! Pick me! Pick me!

I can't even fathom how many times I'm going to have to edit this post just to get it to make some sense...