Newsgroups: bit.listserv.words-l
Date:         Tue, 10 Nov 1992 02:10:41 EST
From:         blomberg cepeda <ST402747@BROWNVM.BROWN.EDU>
Subject:      Re: One simple (?!) question
Comments: To: words-l@uga.cc.uga.edu

Posted Agnes Kruchio
>
>Oh,  sigh..A whole day of going through old mail, now this...
> -------------------------------------------------------------------------
>> >> This is indeed good Hungarian (if that isn't an oxymoron).
>> >                                                ^^^^^^^^^
>> >                                          [a.k.]
>> >      [b.c.]                                    Ah..._excuse_ me?
>> >                                                Do you really
>> >     I know how to  pronounce Hungarian         expect to get laughs
>> >      and you call me IGNORANT?                 from this rather
>> >                                                cheap and ignorant
>> >     Sheesh, don't they teach irony in          throwaway remark?
>> >     the schools anymore? My undergraduate      Shame on you.
>>       advisor, an very ccourtly Hungarian
>>       himself, had no illusions about the Hungarian language, discouraged
>>       from learning it even those whom he would gladly impale on Russian.
>>       My dear Agnes, I come to suspect that you are not so much pragmatic
>>       as an unbearably humorless prig  8-/

>Sorry, Blomberg, it won't wash. See how you would react if you substituted
>anything else for "Hungarian" - say "American" or Yankee. It's a wanton
>comment, completely unwarranted. And your subsequent tone, "my dear
>Blomberg",  is equally patronizing. I could go further, but it would
>go below the belt, where, unlike you, I would rather not sink.

OK, you prig Agnes, in English we have an indefinite article. The fact that
there is no indefinite article in the sentence above means that I am referring
to an incredibly complex language, and not to any person of the ancient and
rich culture in which that language is native.

I do hope, you inattentive bore, that I am not being patronizing. I assume you
were inattentive, or else you think American is a language.

>Is that supposed to impress? You must be joking.

 In a fit of delete-lining, I erased the lines, first AK on being a "good
Hungarian" and mine on Newfie and Swamp Yankee heritage.  Mine were included
first as counterpoint to hers (I guess one can't be as proud of one's heritage
if they're not Magyar?) and second ACTUALLY as self-deprecating---anyone with
more than a passing knowledge of North America knows that Newfies are more of
a butt of jokes in Canada than Hungarians are anywhere, including Slovakia and
Romania. And with Swamp Yankee I was trolling for a gleaning, I admit, and
anyone from New England knows that it is not a boast--it is the equivalent
hereabout for Poor White Trash.

>Hmm..Thanks, BTW, for calling me a "humorless prig" - I
>was worried I was getting a little too mellow and laid
>back in my old age..though some of the Words-lers concerned
>about the health the list as a result of the aforementioned
>ad hominen attacks might see it as further eidnence that
>that list is in danger...and worry even more
>
>Not nice, blomberg cepeda, not nice.....

Gee, and judging from the inanities you had put forth the last couple of days
(rusting mainframes for Sierra Leone? Please. There's a character just like
you in Bleak House, but I forget her name) that you were young and naive. That
was excusable. Having a few years under your belt and still being so clueless
is not. Go get a humor transplant, take a course in irony, and then bother me.

Note: I can take Ruth, I can take Graham, but this sort of crap just completely
 throws me off my feed. My apologies to any offended innocent bystanders.
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