Posts by Dr. Boli
HOW LUCKY WE ARE…
…to have software to help us with our grammar, as we see in this description of a browser extension:
Writer wants to the things right. This means using software to catch errors early on. One of the market’s favourite, Grammarly, does the job quite well on it. It doesn’t export to Markdown though — developers favourite format. This tool converts Grammarly texts to Markdown, copying it to the clipboard after been converted.
FROM THE ILLUSTRATED EDITION.
OUR PURPOSE IS SIMPLE.
For nearly 40 years, SMA has always sought out uniquely talented and highly motivated individuals to become associates. Our associates are a group of smart, passionate professionals unified by purpose and community. Our purpose is simple: to create value by helping clients improve their competitiveness throughout the program lifecycle, from pursuing markets in innovative and differentiated ways, through winning programs and creating competitive capacity, to improving program performance with disciplined cost/schedule management, and reducing execution risk by enhancing program team capability with high caliber, hard to find management and technical expertise.
Dr. Boli has still not guessed what SMA does. It must be a secret.
What led him to that site? Oh, it was our discussion about Microsoft Word. Dr. Boli wanted to see what settings various writers used to improve the grammar and style suggestions from Microsoft Word. “Word’s option to check style is a useful tool to helping you write in a compelling, consistent style,” says the advice from one of SMA’s uniquely talented and highly motivated associates. “You should check all of the options under Grammar.… You can check all of the options under Style except Use of first person.”
And behold the results.
FROM THE ILLUSTRATED EDITION.
THE MICROSOFT EFFECT.
“But first we have to take care of a few things…”
“Have to” should be “must,” says Word, because “More concise language would be clearer for your reader.” “Have to” is two words; “must” is one. 1 < 2.
“In spite of his natural reluctance to…”
“In spite of” should be “despite,” because “More concise language would be clearer for your reader.” 1 < 3.
The effect of these and similar changes is to make the language sound more bureaucratic, even though the intention was certainly the reverse. The office drone who expresses himself in natural American English because he wants to get the writing out of the way as quickly as possible is pushed toward formalistic vocabulary that makes him sound less like a living human being and more like all the other Word users in the English-speaking world. Since most writing for publication (as memos, as academic articles, as textbooks, as court opinions) is still done in Microsoft Word, and since every Word user who has not specifically dismissed them will get these suggestions, they must have a significant effect on our language.
Dr. Boli’s readers, as a class, are probably little influenced by the Microsoft Effect. He has noticed that his readers have strong opinions on language (frequently they even disagree with Dr. Boli!), so they are not likely to be bullied by mere software. But the average secretary or temporary receptionist who has to write a memo (“has to” should be replaced with “must,” Microsoft suggests) is going to take these suggestions seriously. Microsoft wouldn’t say these things if they weren’t true, right?
There is good news, however. Google Docs will probably replace Microsoft Word as the dominant word processor in a few years. That means we all have to (“must”) adapt to Google’s prejudices, correcting “all right” to “alright” and so on. But they will be different prejudices.
COMMUNITY BULLETIN BOARD.
The Ladies’ Quilt, Throw, and Afghan Society will be holding a “crochet-in” this Saturday beginning at 8:30 in the morning. We are hoping to be able to crochet at least a dozen afghans to give away to refugees from Afghanistan. We are told that last month’s similar event made the refugees from Quiltistan very happy.
The Port Authority has asked us to inform residents that, owing to scheduled maintenance, Red Line cars will be running on the Brown Line, Blue Line cars will be running on the Silver Line, Brown Line cars will be running on the Blue Line, and Silver Line cars will be running in the parking lot of the Food Festival as part of a federally funded installation-art project.
To raise funds for restoring the vacant building at 1328 Bland Street, the Blandville Area Concerned Citizens will be holding a raffle Thursday night at 7 p.m. The lucky winner walks home with the deed to the building at 1328 Bland Street.
Blandville Elementary School has asked the community to stop donating box tops for education. After consulting with the prestigious Materials Department of the Duck Hollow University College of Education, the principal has determined that box tops are of no educational value whatsoever.
From DR. BOLI’S UNABRIDGED DICTIONARY.
Reubenesque (adjective).—Resembling or having some of the attributes of a Reuben, but not meeting the strict definition.
FROM THE ILLUSTRATED EDITION.
DEATH AS POP ART.
You will notice that Andy lies under a perfectly ordinary grave marker, indistinguishable from thousands of other grave markers installed in the late 1980s. That in itself may be seen as the consummation of a career devoted to finding the art in the ordinary.
If you make a pilgrimage to Pittsburgh, the land of Warhol, you may begin at the Andy Warhol Museum, which (with seven floors of Warhol) claims to be the largest museum in the world dedicated to a single artist. Then you can walk to the North Side subway station, where you can catch a Blue Line car and ride about half an hour out into the suburbs to Washington Junction, which is an easy walk from St. John the Baptist Byzantine Catholic Cemetery.
But, you ask, if his monument is indistinguishable from everyone else’s, how will I find it in the cemetery? No need to worry. The cameras will point the way. Andy Warhol lies a mouldering in the grave, and his mouldering is livestreamed to the world, brought to you by the Byzantine parish he grew up in.
Empire was only a dress rehearsal. Andy Warhol is still working on the greatest avant-garde film of all time.
The pictures are from Father Pitt’s Pittsburgh Cemeteries. Like most of Father Pitt’s work, they are released into the public domain.
A HALLOWEEN STROLL.
You will see all those things everywhere else on the Internet, so Dr. Boli thought he would set aside a day to celebrate beauty instead. Halloween is a perfect day for a stroll through a cemetery, and we borrow these pictures from Father Pitt, who took them all in one afternoon’s leisurely strolling in Allegheny Cemetery, Pittsburgh. Every picture is provided in full resolution: you can click on any one of them to enlarge it and examine the details.
The Winter mausoleum was designed by John Russell Pope, architect of the National Archives, the Jefferson Memorial, the National Gallery of Art, &c., &c. If you have money (Emil Winter was a banker), distinguished architects are at your beck and call. If Dr. Boli decides to die at some point in the near enough future, he plans to have a mausoleum designed by Frank Gehry.
An extraordinarily fine stained-glass window in the Flower mausoleum.
Many sections of the cemetery are quite prickly with obelisks.
A picture of mourning and consolation on the Graham family monument.
The cemetery’s Penn Avenue gatehouse, with its weighty Romanesque tower, finished in 1889. The architect was Henry Alexander Macomb, a Philadelphia architect who won the cemetery’s design competition.
Many other beautiful and fascinating monuments can be found at Father Pitt’s Pittsburgh Cemeteries, a fine place to spend a few hours for Halloween.