Random Thoughts

[hotdogPi]

They're called three strikes laws... but isn't getting caught stealing an out, not just a strike?

[1995hoo]

The plural of "dwarf" is "dwarves."

The plural of "thief" is "thieves."

So, yesterday, why weren't the Cincinnati Bengals playing the Kansas City Chieves?

[TheHighwayMan3561]

The plural of "dwarf" is "dwarves."

The plural of "thief" is "thieves."

So, yesterday, why weren't the Cincinnati Bengals playing the Kansas City Chieves?

Also applies to the Toronto Maple Leaves.

[1995hoo]

The plural of "dwarf" is "dwarves."

The plural of "thief" is "thieves."

So, yesterday, why weren't the Cincinnati Bengals playing the Kansas City Chieves?

Also applies to the Toronto Maple Leaves.

Apparently in their case the name doesn't refer to the leaf itself but instead refers to a Canadian regiment that fought in World War I, such that "Maple Leaf" is considered a compound proper noun and takes just an "s" for the plural.

[kkt]

The plural of "dwarf" is "dwarves."

The plural of "thief" is "thieves."

So, yesterday, why weren't the Cincinnati Bengals playing the Kansas City Chieves?

The plural of "dwarf" is "dwarfs" unless you're JRR Tolkein or have his permission.

[Scott5114]

The plural of "dwarf" is "dwarves."

The plural of "thief" is "thieves."

So, yesterday, why weren't the Cincinnati Bengals playing the Kansas City Chieves?

The plural of "dwarf" is "dwarfs" unless you're JRR Tolkein or have his permission.

Tolkien doesn't have ownership of dwarves. Pretty much every fantasy RPG system has dwarves, and they're pluralized with the v. For example, in Dungeons & Dragons 5e:

("Dwarves" is also used in the SRD text that is under Creative Commons licensing due to WOTC's massive licensing fuckup a couple years back.)

In Pathfinder 2e:


On the other hand, Tolkien does have ownership over "hobbits". Pretty much every system has something that looks and acts like a hobbit, but they're usually called "halflings" (or something like that) because the Tolkien estate has successfully sued for the right to the name "hobbit".

[kkt]

The plural of "dwarf" is "dwarves."

The plural of "thief" is "thieves."

So, yesterday, why weren't the Cincinnati Bengals playing the Kansas City Chieves?

The plural of "dwarf" is "dwarfs" unless you're JRR Tolkein or have his permission.

Tolkien doesn't have ownership of dwarves. Pretty much every fantasy RPG system has dwarves, and they're pluralized with the v. For example, in Dungeons & Dragons 5e:

("Dwarves" is also used in the SRD text that is under Creative Commons licensing due to WOTC's massive licensing fuckup a couple years back.)

In Pathfinder 2e:


On the other hand, Tolkien does have ownership over "hobbits". Pretty much every system has something that looks and acts like a hobbit, but they're usually called "halflings" (or something like that) because the Tolkien estate has successfully sued for the right to the name "hobbit".

The RPGs are written in imitation of Tolkien following his invented spelling.  See Tolkien's note in foreword to The Hobbit:

In English the only correct plural of dwarf is dwarfs, and the adjective is dwarfish. In this story dwarves and dwarvish are used, but only when speaking of the ancient people to whom Thorin Oakenshield and his companions belonged.

Further reading if you're interested:

https://thebettereditor.wordpress.com/2013/10/29/when-is-a-dwarf-not-a-dwarf/

Summarized:  In a letter Tolkien says "dwarves" started as a misspelling, but he must have liked it in order to keep it through several rounds with the copy editors.  The OED found a use of "dwarves" way back in the early 1800s, but it was an outlier, not standard usage, and Tolkien was apparently unaware of it.  Current authorities on usage prefer "dwarfs" in general but some allow "dwarves" for fantasy races.

[CtrlAltDel]

And just for the sake of completeness:

[Scott5114]

Summarized:  In a letter Tolkien says "dwarves" started as a misspelling, but he must have liked it in order to keep it through several rounds with the copy editors.  The OED found a use of "dwarves" way back in the early 1800s, but it was an outlier, not standard usage, and Tolkien was apparently unaware of it.  Current authorities on usage prefer "dwarfs" in general but some allow "dwarves" for fantasy races.

Interesting. I would be surprised if anyone uses the fs spelling as a noun these days (when I see the spelling dwarfs I parse it as a verb, which comports with other words ending in f that can either be a noun or verb, like scarf and loaf). I think this is one of those cases where popular usage moved out from under the dictionaries (which, for those with a descriptivist philosophy, means the dictionaries are out-of-date).

For what it's worth, Tolkien's dwarves were based upon those from German folklore, and the term was only later applied to humans of short stature as a euphemism. The v spelling did originate with Tolkien, but I would consider it the correct one simply because it is the more regular pluralization of nouns ending in f to my eyes—after all, elfs looks stupid as hell and I don't think anyone would consider it "correct".

Another aspect of how fantasy-specific jargon has evolved since Tolkien, judging from the Hobbit foreword you quoted, is that formations with the -ish suffix now usually refer to a language and -en is the adjectival form. So you would expect a dwarf to speak Dwarvish and carry a dwarven axe, for instance. (The same construction is mirrored in Elvish and elven, though the spellings elfen and elfin also sometimes appear, and Firefox spell check only recognizes the last one by default.)

[Rothman]

For what it's worth, Tolkien's dwarves were based upon those from German folklore, and the term was only later applied to humans of short stature as a euphemism.

*citation needed*

[Scott5114]

For what it's worth, Tolkien's dwarves were based upon those from German folklore, and the term was only later applied to humans of short stature as a euphemism.

*citation needed*

The oldest attestation that the Oxford English Dictionary has for the term dwarf, as applied to a person, is circa 1330, Bevis of Hampton (Auchinleck MS.) l. 2526. Dwarves in folklore, however, appear in the Prose Edda, which is believed to have been compiled in Iceland circa 1220.

If you trace it back further, dwarf derives from from Proto-Germanic dwergaz. Proto-Germanic was used as far back as 500 BC, so it's possible that dwergaz as a word is that old. Dwergaz was probably being used for the folklore creature, as the various cultures that use languages descended from Proto-Germanic are those that have dwarves in their folklore and call them by names descended from dwergaz (e.g. in Norwegian it's dverg). However, the problem you run into is that, because Proto-Germanic was not a written language, there's no way to tell for sure if they were concurrently using it to discuss dwarfism in humans, and it just took 110 years longer for that usage to end up in written form for some reason.

Anyway, that's about as far as I'm willing to dig into it just for a post on a web forum. I usually prefer playing elves rather than dwarves anyway.

[formulanone]

The plural of "dwarf" is "dwarves."

The plural of "thief" is "thieves."

So, yesterday, why weren't the Cincinnati Bengals playing the Kansas City Chieves?

How many legal brieves have you filed this year?

[1995hoo]

The plural of "dwarf" is "dwarves."

The plural of "thief" is "thieves."

So, yesterday, why weren't the Cincinnati Bengals playing the Kansas City Chieves?

How many legal brieves have you filed this year?

None, I don't do that sort of work anymore.


In terms of exceptionally random thoughts, I had one this morning that is probably worthy of bandit957 in terms of its utter off-the-wall randomness. I had gone into the bathroom to blow my nose and our cat came wandering in. I found myself thinking that I know a cat's nose can run because I've seen it happen. But I found myself wondering whether animals get boogers like people do and, if so, how they go about getting rid of them.

[formulanone]

The plural of "dwarf" is "dwarves."

The plural of "thief" is "thieves."

So, yesterday, why weren't the Cincinnati Bengals playing the Kansas City Chieves?

How many legal brieves have you filed this year?

None, I don't do that sort of work anymore.

Aw, vooey.

[Rothman]

For what it's worth, Tolkien's dwarves were based upon those from German folklore, and the term was only later applied to humans of short stature as a euphemism.

*citation needed*

The oldest attestation that the Oxford English Dictionary has for the term dwarf, as applied to a person, is circa 1330, Bevis of Hampton (Auchinleck MS.) l. 2526. Dwarves in folklore, however, appear in the Prose Edda, which is believed to have been compiled in Iceland circa 1220.

If you trace it back further, dwarf derives from from Proto-Germanic dwergaz. Proto-Germanic was used as far back as 500 BC, so it's possible that dwergaz as a word is that old. Dwergaz was probably being used for the folklore creature, as the various cultures that use languages descended from Proto-Germanic are those that have dwarves in their folklore and call them by names descended from dwergaz (e.g. in Norwegian it's dverg). However, the problem you run into is that, because Proto-Germanic was not a written language, there's no way to tell for sure if they were concurrently using it to discuss dwarfism in humans, and it just took 110 years longer for that usage to end up in written form for some reason.

Anyway, that's about as far as I'm willing to dig into it just for a post on a web forum. I usually prefer playing elves rather than dwarves anyway.

So, it predates Tolkien's use of it, then.

[Scott5114]

So, it predates Tolkien's use of it, then.

Which wasn't what I meant—what I was trying to say with my original post was that fantasy dwarves also predate Tolkien. I just wrote a sentence that was complete garbage at expressing that.

[ZLoth]

[vdeane]

Apparently there are ideas that even K12 considers ridiculous (outside of Fictional Highways and MMM/PoiPoi-type stuff).

https://www.aaroads.com/forum/index.php?topic=59.msg2944296#msg2944296

[Max Rockatansky]

Apparently there are ideas that even K12 considers ridiculous (outside of Fictional Highways and MMM/PoiPoi-type stuff).

https://www.aaroads.com/forum/index.php?topic=59.msg2944296#msg2944296

Here was my takeaway from the incident:

The usually-sensible Ontario Premier Doug Ford

LMFAOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO

[SEWIGuy]

Apparently there are ideas that even K12 considers ridiculous (outside of Fictional Highways and MMM/PoiPoi-type stuff).

https://www.aaroads.com/forum/index.php?topic=59.msg2944296#msg2944296

So the guy who thinks we should heat the streets to melt snow thinks building a tunnel is too expensive?

[kurumi]

So the guy who thinks we should heat the streets to melt snow thinks building a tunnel is too expensive?

Guys, guys... maybe tunneling could be more cost-effective if we melted the dirt!

[Max Rockatansky]

So the guy who thinks we should heat the streets to melt snow thinks building a tunnel is too expensive?

Guys, guys... maybe tunneling could be more cost-effective if we melted the dirt!

Does this involve helicopters with deployable plasma drills?  I feel this would be a great secondary feature for the grappling hook tethers.  I think this is needed.

[D-Dey65]

The owner of the YouTube channel "Smart Trucking" has died. Why am I posting this? Because one of his last videos is an aimed at car drivers on how to safely deal with truck drivers;
https://youtu.be/Lq5_XILwhm8?si=iFUQRh1bYnqypdtq
These tips all make sense, and I've known them even before I got my license. But when I was forced to move down to Florida 25+ years ago my parents and I drove down in two cars. My father and sometimes my mother drove down in his 1991 Toyota Camry station wagon, while I drove down in that 1985 Chevrolet Caprice with the front seat stuck all the way back. During this time, both my mother and I were supposed to follow him. While we were on I-95 in South Carolina, he zipped between some trucks that were crowding up the lanes, which I refused to do because I knew that if I did, I would cause a huge accident. I lagged behind temporarily, knowing I was going to catch up with him. Once I did catch up with him, he demanded that I pull over to an interchange and he and I argued about this. He got on my case about not following him, and I tried to tell him that I refused to cause an accident with a bunch of speeding oversized big rigs.

It's possible that my mother may have been able to reason with him, but I'm not entirely sure whether this was resolved or not.

[vdeane]

What do the longshoremen strike and an outage of Archive of our Own have in common?

They both interrupt shipping.

[LilianaUwU]

What do the longshoremen strike and an outage of Archive of our Own have in common?

They both interrupt shipping.

Boooooooooo.