Tag Archives: recognition

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’22 A To Z Challenge – T

 

 

 

 

 

 

In my continuing program of offering as little useful information as possible, I present another little present from my Scottish heritage – not a Tartan, but a

TARTLE

Scottish dialect: a hesitation when introducing someone, because you forgot their name,
What does “pardon my tartle” mean?

From Scottish, it is also; to hesitate in recognizing a person or thing, as happens when you are introduced to someone whose name you cannot recall; so you say, “Pardon my tartle!”  They have you, coming, and going.

If you are wondering – as I do – where I get all this useless minutia, we can blame the wife’s Italian forebears.  The Romans had gods and goddesses for just about everything.  One of their lesser goddesses was

TRIVIA

Two roads diverged in the wood, and I took the one less travelled by, and that has made all the difference.

Trivia
Trivia, the Roman goddess of crossroads and guardian of roads. Her name is derived from the Latin word ‘Trivia’ meaning “three ways” from ‘tri’ meaning three and ‘via’ meaning way or road. In Latin, ‘trivialis’ appertained to the crossroads where three roads met, which came to be known, in towns, as the ‘trivium’, or the public place. As the guardian of roads, she watched over the public paths and roads and protected travelers. She was also recognized in three aspects as part of a triad of goddesses consisting of Trivia, Luna the moon goddess and Diana the goddess of the hunt.

While you rest your probably aching brain, I’ll get a little loony with Diana, and hunt up a theme for Wednesday’s post.

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Bonus Trivia

Where it says, “all this useless minutia,” above, Grammar Checker wants me to write, “this entire minutia,” which is not the same thing at all.  😛

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Flash Fiction #274

PHOTO PROMPT © Rochelle Wisoff-Fields

ROSE COLORED GLASS

Anxiety and dissention are the unfortunate results of the Internet Age.  It was once comfortable to believe that we were all basically the same.

Rose-colored glasses are passé.  We now must view our world through kaleidoscope specs.  Freedom of information also means freedom of misinformation.  Every bright and shiny, sharp-edged sect demands its own recognition.

Tea Party and Trumpers separate from Republicans and Democrats.  Anti-vaxxers abound.  Flat Earth is a growth industry.  There are still Christian mega-churches, but more and more, worshippers are doing what they did two millennia ago – gather in groups of 10 or 15 in private homes.

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If you’d like to join the fun, go to Rochelle’s Addicted to Purple site and use her Wednesday photo as a prompt to write a complete 100 word story.

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WOW #6

Dictionary

The Word Of this Week is one which I often run into while researching other words.  It is

Cognate

Linguistics. descended from the same language or form:
such cognate languages as French and Spanish.
or; allied or similar in nature or quality.

1635-45; < Latin cognātus, equivalent to co- co- + -gnātus (past participle of gnāscī, nāscī to be born)

For example, I will get ‘hound’ – a type of dog – (cogn. German, ‘hund’) showing where the word came from. (etymology)

It is a cousin to recognize, the action of again (re)perceiving someone’s familiar identity.

My Mother insisted that I not harass my brother by calling him stupid. She told me that people will live up (or down) to your expectations.  When he was three years old, my grandson told me that he could neckerize someone.  His pronunciation was a bit off, as many small children’s is, but his usage was right on.

As we did with our children, his mother never talked down to him. When our kids were young, we had neighbors who we were friends with.  Their son was my son’s age.  Forget ‘snips and snails and puppy dogs’ tails,’ this kid was made of high-tensile springs; forever skipping, running or hopping.  One day, the mother asked my wife, “Does your son never shut up?”  My wife rejoined, “Does yours never walk anywhere?”

Another time, Skippy’s mom suddenly complained, “Why don’t you ever talk to your kids like they’re children? How come you’re always using big words?  They don’t understand them.”

As the boys neared the end of Grade 7, they found that Skippy was failing English, and might be held back. My wife commiserated, and suggested that he might need some extra help.  Suddenly the accusation changed to, “It’s all right for you and your kid.  You’ve always used adult language with him.  No wonder he does well in English.”

My adopted cognomen is Archon, a name (cogn. Latin, nomen – name) with the same meaning as Grumpy Old Dude.   👿

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DRAWANAWARD

Ouroboros

Recently, Cordelia’s Mom bestowed a Versatile Blogger Award upon me.  I treasure it, as I have treasured every blog award given to me.  It’s always nice to know that someone indifferently highly regards me and my abilities.  It has also been fun revealing little things about me, and making fun of myself while I was at it – however….

Like Ouroboros above, the snake that eats its own tail, or the central character in Robert Heinlein’s short story, All You Zombies, I’m going to bring this tale to an end at the same place where we came in. CM’s award was the 15th that I’ve received in the last 4 ½ years.

It all started with another Versatile Blogger Award from The Kindly Hermudgeon, as a nudge to get me moving down the blog, blog, blogging trail, like the Easter Behemoth Bunny.  Since then, there have been many lovely awards, from many lovely fellow bloggers.

award-free-blog

For two main reasons, I have decided to make this an award-free blogsite. First, I feel I have run out of previously untold facts about myself, and don’t feel I have the creative ability to compose any more acceptance posts that are humorous, or entertaining – hell, I’d settle for vaguely interesting.

Second, most awards urge you to pick 10, or 15, other worthy sites to pass the blog-torch on to – and link to them – and notify them. That all sounds suspiciously like a job, and I got out of the job business over 6 years ago.

At least blog awards are a little more upscale than office chain letters. The wife used to hate them.  She had a work friend who was addicted to them, and was always ‘honoring’ her with a copy.  She refused to play along, and always returned them to her friend(?), with the instruction to ‘choose someone else.’

They’re as bad as some religions; always trying to guilt you into doing something you may feel is poor behavior and manners, and always with the threat of retribution over your head. “The last woman who broke the chain got old and fat, and had to go home and make supper for her husband and kids.”

My creative consultant, darling daughter, LadyRyl, @ RylsRostrum, designed The Award-Free flag above, and will install it for me – long-distance, remote-control – like piloting a drone. While it could have applied anytime, OCD me wanted it effective the first of the month.  Then I realized that ‘the month’ was April, and the 1st was April Fool’s Day (how appropriate), and that some of you might regard it merely as a prank.

To those of you who have gifted me with awards in the past, I say again, Thank You Very Much! You have made me feel loved, supported, included and respected.  To those of you who might feel in the future that I deserve a bit more recognition, I will acknowledge any award and its donor, and display it, but there will be no long speech (Pheww, you dodged a bullet on that one), no ‘big reveal’, and no ramification.  (Look it up!)

😀

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Mistaken Identity

I recently read a post by a young woman who is a receptionist for a small firm.  She handles the few walk-ins, directs incoming emails and deals with the constant phone calls.  She wrote of the strange and wonderful telephone calls she has to deal with.

Steam ears

Like being a greeter at Wal-Mart, this is a job I could not handle.  I like to talk to people, but I don’t suffer idiots well.  By about coffee-break time the first morning, I’d want to injure someone.  Since I couldn’t get at any of the fools on the phone, it would probably be the loud blonde in accounting, with the nasal, Fran Drescher voice, who snaps her gum as she chews.

Asshole

The lady with the post estimates that she knows 83% (what an interesting number 😕 ) of her regular callers by their voice, even before they identify themselves.  That’s a useful ability to have, but it should not be relied on unquestioningly.

It’s only good telephone etiquette, and business sense to identify yourself on the phone.  When I worked as a Purchasing Agent, I always did so when I called someone – until that fateful day.  I had called a supplier one day, and told him who I was.  He replied, “Oh, you don’t have to tell me who you are.  You have a very recognizable voice.”

Once upon a time, my company required a small amount of…widgets, ASAP.   We needed them by 11 AM the next day, to allow assembly time, to make a 4 PM shipment.  I called a supplier, and in the excitement, merely started off with, “Hi Bill, could you do me a big favor?”

He replied, “Oh hi.  Yeah, sure!  What can I do for you?”  I told him what I needed, and how soon.  He put me on hold, and picked up again in a couple of minutes.  “You’re in luck.  The machine running that item is in production right now, and we have a bit of extra raw material.  I’ll tell the operator to run it out.  We’ll load your stuff tonight, and you’ll be the second stop for the truck tomorrow.  You should have them by 8 or 9 o’clock.”

I gave him a Purchase Order number, and promised to mail the confirmation.  The next day, when I arrived about 8, they weren’t there – no biggy.  They weren’t there at 9, when I took a washroom break – Hmmm.  They weren’t in by 10, when I called the receiver – startin’ to worry.  They hadn’t arrived by 11, when the receiver called me in a panic.

I finally got through to the supplier about 11:30.  “What happened to my widgets?  You promised they’d be here much earlier!”

“Oh, they’re there.  I knew how important they were to you, so I asked the driver to call me when they were unloaded.  He has a bill of lading, signed by your receiver at 8:37 AM.”

“But they’re not here!  The receiver just phoned me.”

“They must be there.  Maybe he unloaded them and just forgot.  Just call him back, Bob, and ask him….”

“BOB!!??  I’m not Bob!  This is Archon!”

“Oh shit.  You and Bob sound so much alike.”

He didn’t ask, and I didn’t tell.  The other company’s receiver unquestioningly unloaded parts they’d never previously ordered, on a waybill with a purchase order number not in their series.  The truck driver got paid overtime, because he had to go back and reload, and deliver to our plant.  And we still got a non-compliance late/short shipment demerit.

If it doesn’t say Styrofoam SM®, it isn’t, but you can be sure you’re getting the real Archon, because every one of my babbles is clearly identified as “Archon’s Den. ™”