kokopelli

FH, actually Koko also mentioned Egypt. It would be my top choice except for the unstable situation there. Kuhn Worthy did mention that Thailand has a troubled situation but, so far, a bus, with tourists, has not been hijacked and the tourists killed as in Egypt. My fascination is with the pyramids, Tut, temples, hieroglyphs, demotic script, mummies and other antiquities. Of course there are a number of animate mummies on view in parts of Thailand!

I do spend a lot of time down at the navel base working my way from stem to stern! The mates, cockswain and I splice the mainbrace and wet our whistles if you catch my drift Bob? No guesses on port side?

FH wins again with Jan Kees = YankeePer Pong's post and my own interest in seamen and nautical tails I did find a number of Dutch seafaring terms that migrated into English although many had earlier roots in other languages.During this search I discovered the origins of two words (not necessarily Dutch) I never knew; starboard the right side of a ship and port the left side. At one time (before rudders) a ship was steered with something that resembled an oar or board from the right side of the ship. Thus steerboard or starboard. Now which of you clever swabs (middle Dutch swabbe/mop) can figure out the origin of port for the left side? It does make sense! And no, it has nothing to do with Port wine.

You win FH but on the shoulders of giants in the field of linguistics, namely Rogie, Bob and Khortose. Here a clever cartoon of Jean Francois Champollion and a link to an article in the New York Times with a graphic showing how adobe and ebony crept through time into English. I could not figure out how to include the graphic other than thru these links.http://www.nytimes.c...tml?ref=sciencehttp://www.nytimes.c...?pagewanted=allThe prize is a multi-use, non-electric; use anywhere blender.

You guys sure are clever linguistic sleuths so maybe just one more cunning clue will lead to the correct answer?The answer can be found written in Stone as the clever Frenchman, mentioned before, so discovered. His name was ...., well you really didn't think I would tell you!! But here is his grave.(Kind of hard to read the name, 5555)Plus a photo of him.

Oh no! I hope that was an unintentional pun? Dick lickers, but never cunning linguists.

Well, I did find an interesting word that migrated from Dutch into English. Jan Kees. Bet you all know that one???

First destination that comes to my mind is Paris. If I gave it more thought I would likely come up with something more exotic. Egypt was another thought but given the situation there not an option.

Yes, a disappointing performance by the President; all the more reason to vote for Kokopelli.

If you recognize this script you will know the word origins. One clever Frenchman recognized it.

Phineas = Man from Nubia; Susan = Water lily

New and different staff at CB or same same?

Rogie, bricks and ebony, where oh where could they originate?

For our resident linguists can anyone wager a guess on the origin of these two words. Maybe not what you think, at first. Adobe and Ebony A clue will be provided to further confound and confuse you although Susan and Phineas would know the answer.

Koko's fertile brain picked up on this thread and posted a new quiz for the entomology inclined to review.

Pong, can you give some examples of Dutch words such as seafaring terms migrating into English?

Can't you have your boyfriend pamper your ass?

I finally got around to watching the video posted by FH. At the end of this video there were additional clips of other videos including one about the Franklin expedition and the sailors who were "Frozen in Time". There was an excellent documentary on TV about this subject some years ago if one could ever find a copy of it.

I believe "nucular" is a regional dialect rather than national. From where I live, I say "nuclear" but then, I am not a President.

And there is the difference between "skedule" and "schedule" because the Brits went to different schuls.

My brother, the physicist, Acoustopelli advises that noise cancelling headphones are not designed to cancel intermittent or random sounds such as speech but rather sounds that are constant in amplitude and frequency (volume/pitch) such as engine and wind noise in airplane cabins. These headphones detect incoming sound waves and then generate an equal but opposite wave (out of phase by 180 degrees) which then cancels out incoming sound wave. Likely your headphones mitigated the FA's speech by physically blocking it plus any music or sound track would also mask incoming speech. As an experiment, put on the headphones while the TV is on a talk show, such as Fox Lies, and then switch on/off the noise cancelling function. See if there is a difference and report back. It is possible that new circuitry could also cancel speech but unlikely.

Have never met anyone I knew on any flights and when someone does try to chat me up I shut up. Nothing beats putting on the headphones and tuning them out.

Thanks for the info. I will be flying on Delta Business Class in Jan so am looking forward to the experience. Bought 100 K miles on sale for $2400 plus 20K I had for my award ticket.

As a youth I did read of the expeditions of both Shackelton and Scott and found them intriguing. There were also similar expeditions leading to tragedy in the Arctic regions. One was a failed expedition by an American, George Washington DeLong about 1881 and described in an excellent book, Hell on Ice, published about 1938 and still available. Another of these type of expeditions was led by Sir John Franklin, a Royal Naval officer, in 1845. Years later the icy graves of some of his sailors were temporarily exhumed in 1981 in an attempt to discover the cause of their deaths which was likely lead poisoning from canned food. The photo is of John Hartnell, age 26 at time of his death. Photo taken about 130 years later.

I enjoy Pattaya and plan to retire there but I do think the future for gay life, as it currently exists, is bleak. I hope I am wrong.