I am not making this up
For many years I’ve watched Baltimore’s City Paper stick pins into the hide of The Baltimore Sun, which is its right and proper function. Imagine, therefore, my surprise at receiving a message from work this morning that this blog has been included in a minor citation in this year’s “Best of Baltimore” issue. *
In the category “Best Civilized Blog”:
BOTH THE SUN AND EXAMINER have flooded the internet with blogs--too many, really, to read them all. But one we always make time for is Sun copy desk chief John E. McIntyre's You Don't Say. McIntyre, who also teaches at Loyola College, writes with wit, erudition, and conciseness about subjects--grammar, editing, the newspaper business--that could easily put one to sleep. That he does so without hectoring or prescriptivism (look it up) is just one bonus. McIntyre, while a traditionalist, knows that language and its rules evolve, and sometimes quickly so. But the real reason for visiting this Kentucky-born gentleman's blog is to learn how to do important stuff, like tying a bow tie (a May 29 video entry), cooking Cincinnati chili (July 24), and, most importantly, making a martini (July 2, also a video). If only the rest of the web was so civilized.
It would be churlish to suggest that the final sentence would have been improved by the subjunctive; one swallows compliments whole. I doff my fedora.
* As I said, I am, like Anna Russell, not making this up. Here’s the citation.
Comments
Congratulations, John! In my view, your web log is not only the Best of Baltimore, it is one of the best language-usage blogs on the Web.
Posted by: Rawley Grau | September 17, 2008 12:20 PM
Well deserved, Mr. McIntyre. Well deserved.
Posted by: Bucky | September 17, 2008 12:33 PM
You are also cited in Wikipedia, for what it's worth: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Begging_the_question#Modern_usage
Posted by: M. Gates | September 18, 2008 12:59 AM
Mr McIntyre, I preach the gospel of your blog every day.
Posted by: Joy-Mari | September 18, 2008 6:33 AM
Congrats, John.
Posted by: c o'donnell | September 18, 2008 12:20 PM
I, um, ... lessee ... sixth that notion! (Those notions, I guess.) Congratulations!
Posted by: mike | September 18, 2008 5:19 PM
Congratulations!
I'm a fan of the language as well and like this web log very much.
Posted by: PCB Rob | September 19, 2008 10:14 AM
Cheers JMc! (with Maker's Mark, of course)
What do you think of the bourbon that has the bottle that looks like a grenade and has the horse on top? Is that Bookers?
And if you had to choose: bourbon or martini? Or would it depend on the occasion? Give us your crazy civilizedness!
Posted by: Bourbon Girl | September 19, 2008 8:51 PM
I am not frequently enough in funds to distinguish among the bottles of the more exotic bourbons.
As to martini or Manhattan, an agonizing choice.
Gin always with Chinese food, of course, and perhaps with Indian, though beer is preferable there. Bourbon does well with beef.
Generally, one martini or two before/with dinner. But at a party, or some other sort of evening of extended drinking, whiskey is better. And bourbon for a nightcap leaves one less bleary at dawn.
Posted by: John McIntyre | September 19, 2008 9:21 PM
Where does rum fit in?
Posted by: Bucky | September 20, 2008 11:22 AM
Usually in planter's punch. On the veranda at sunset.
Posted by: John McIntyre | September 20, 2008 11:44 AM
Then, too, there is the beverage H.L. Mencken called "hand-set whiskey," a favorite of printers, compounded of "wood alcohol, snuff, Tabasco sauce, and coffin varnish."
I tell you, there are nights on the copy desk ...
Posted by: John McIntyre | September 20, 2008 1:28 PM
Then, too, there is the beverage H.L. Mencken called "hand-set whiskey," a favorite of printers, compounded of "wood alcohol, snuff, Tabasco sauce, and coffin varnish."
I've never cared for the taste of Tabasco sauce.
Posted by: Bucky | September 20, 2008 3:20 PM
Ah..the subjunctive. In a previous career/lifetime, I taught conversational Italian to college students as well as to adults who wanted to learn enough of the language to travel comfortably. It continually amazed me that a major complaint of both groups was that they had to learn the subjunctive when, after all, we didn't even have that tense in English! So many tenses, so little time...
Posted by: Maryanne | September 25, 2008 6:36 PM