-
Pet peeve: people mixing up “in dem” and “indem”
At least twice in recent days, I’ve seen people using “in dem” and “indem” incorrectly (I think one each of the two possible directions of mix-up).
It should be simple, really: the two-word one is the more literal “in which”; the one-word one is the fossilised “by” indicating the means:
“Er öffnete den Kofferraum, in dem er das Schloss ( Read more... ) -
Things I’d like to do one day: drive down the Fosse Way
One day, I’d like to drive down the Fosse Way from beginning to end: either in one go (at 370 km according to Wikipedia, that shouldn’t take more than a day even if parts of it are byways and the Way is no longer contiguous, requiring detours to rejoin the Way after existing roads leave the original alignment) or in a couple of stages with B&B ( Read more... ) -
Das Pferd, das keinen Gurkensalat frisst, ist im Stimmbruch
Aufnahmen von jemandem, der durch seinen Stimmbruch hindurch immer wieder denselben Satz „Das Pferd frisst keinen Gurkensalat“ aufnahm. Man vergleiche die sich verändernde Tonhöhe (die auch in einer Tabelle auf der Seite dargestellt wird).
Recordings of a boy who recorded the same (German) sentence over and over again during the period where his ( Read more... ) -
It’s a miracle drug!
I just read an advertisement for a weight-loss product in a newspaper from the chemist’s which was accompanied by three testimonials… all of which said, essentially, “I weighed [higher number], then I started taking [product] and exercising regularly and only [time] later, I only weighed [lower number]!”.
Gee. I wonder how much of the weight loss ( Read more... ) -
Happy New Year!
Happy New Year!
-
Police in Poland and elsewhere
While looking through Postcrossing profiles (I sometimes click on names in the ticker of recent events ont he home page), I came across a mention of a city called Police, in Poland.
A bit more investigation showed that there are several places of that name, in Poland, the Czech Republic, Slovenia, and Croatia.
Apparently, the name is derived from ( Read more... ) -
German teknonyms
Today, I came across a facebook account with the first name “Leonimama”: presumably, to provide some anonymity and non-searchability while remaining recogniseable to her friends who know that she has a daughter called Leonie.
It reminded me of Arabic kunyas where people will be referred to as the father/daughter of their eldest child (for example ( Read more... ) -
A fool and his money…
Here in Germany, you have to put a coin into a shopping trolley in order to release it from the chain that connects it to the next shopping trolley.
So this evening, I go shopping, put my coin into the shopping trolley, and head inside.
Then I notice that my hand sticking to my sleeve a bit; I look at it and see that the side of my hand has ( Read more... ) -
Spam und die Grammatik
Eben in meinem Spamordner als Betreffszeile entdeckt: „Warum sind Sie nicht beantworten meine E-Mail?”
Meine spontane Reaktion: „Weil du nix können sprechen deutsch.”
(Meine zweite Reaktion: *ungelesen lösch*)