Approximations

Being precise is a gift as well as a skill that takes practice. Mark Twain is quoted on the topic, discussing lightning and lightning bugs. Dr. Beverly Hofstadter on The Big Bang Theory requires it constantly. It echoes the power of naming a thing from folklore and mythology.

The Sarge, in Season 1 of Red Vs Blue, has difficulty pronouncing "Chupacabra" in his eagerness to make fun of Grif and resorts, as many of us would do, to approximating the word. Thus, the "chupathingy" is born. 

To be fair, approximations are a valid use of language. We all have those 'tip-of-the-tongue" moments where we can't recall the exact term we need. The brain files things away in its own special way sometimes. So we have place-markers like "thingamagig" and "whathisface" and "whozit" to fill in until we figure it out. Or we use similar, sometimes related terms/names to approximate what we need. For example, a man I used to know could never remember George Stroumboulopoulos' surname so would refer to him as "Snuffleupagus" instead because he had a better grasp of Muppet characters than pretty much anything else in his life. And I guess the CBC connection made it relevant.

However, the point of approximations is to direct the brain to the precise term you are looking for NOT to take the place of said term. If vocabulary becomes too vague or inaccurate, you end up with the Bushisms that #43 will always be remembered for and all the questionable intelligence that entails. Or you discover that when you REALLY need a precise term that you once knew, you've genuinely lost it. Studies show that early onset senility is as much a case of lack of use as a genetic predisposition. 

Where this shows up on the other end of the timeline is profound - language acquisition in babies. Nouns are the easiest things for children to learn as they are usually visual, tactile and novel. Pointing to something and saying a word is easily interpreted as naming that thing. Acquaintances I met last fall were describing their daughter's pre-talking activity of pointing and grunting at various things she desired. Mum would randomly pick things up and ask Baby,"Is it this? Is this what you want?" until assent was given. When Baby started verbally asking for things, everything was "this" rather than any specific name for an item. It apparently took weeks to de-program that little trick. 

When I was visiting friends in the UK who had a precocious and eager to learn toddler, we had a sudden power outage and dinner had to be served by candlelight. Their toddler immediately reached for the flame of the nearest candle and, reactively, I grabbed his hand and said clearly,"No. HOT!" indicating the flame. He looked at me very seriously and pointed to the flame and repeated "HOT!" and I reinforced the learning by agreeing "HOT!" He did not try to touch another candle that night. Lesson learned. The next night, power had been restored and we were in the living room when he looked up, saw the light fixture in the ceiling and pointed. "HOT!" In fact, anything bright was now "HOT!" Oops. Well, generally, in the world of incandescent bulbs, that's sort of accurate. Net learning for the grown-ups: adjectives are trickier.

Playing the Odds

**backdated AGAIN :)**

Changes in routine screw with everything. I usually take the daily t-shirt picture with my phone when I pick it out in the morning and then get dressed and get going. Today's routine changed because I had to pack a change of "teacher" clothes for parent-teacher interviews this afternoon and I got dressed faster than usual, forgetting to take the picture first. And since I maintain that this blog is not meant to be a vehicle for me to post pictures of my clothed chest online, here you get the first picture of a daily tee taken while at work (after I'd changed into my "teacher" clothes.

Shirt is yet another giftie from Kerri

I was aiming for the double entendre when I came up with my title today. ***Might've ended up with a triple.

The obvious reference is to The Hunger Games wherein the competitors are wished "May the odds be ever in your favour!" before being carted off to a "last one standing" melee to the death. It's like Survivor on acid - gladiator battles for the glory of a conquering entity, The Capitol. The books are a popular and not badly written trilogy. My favourite part, the epilogue of the concluding novel, is most people's least favourite but I maintain that even if a lot of the plot suspiciously shadowed that of Battle Royale, even if the movie adaptation took all the "hunger" out of the Games (and the casting was spotty), and even if the second book was mostly rehash and angsty filler, I will always promote Collins as a solid author for her respect for the trauma the protagonist undergoes and her understanding that "happily ever after" might not mean being happy every day onwards. Odds are, in my opinion, that the happiest moments in people's lives are times of ignorant bliss not mindful connectiveness and that's because connectiveness means recognizing the dark, the ill, the painful parts of one's heart and memory. What the characters in The Hunger Games go through cannot be healed without suffering.

The second original meaning to the title is a personal and localized reference to the CBC Food Bank Fundraiser last Friday held in Vancouver for the municipal Food Banks all around the province. The house band was local rock stars, The Odds. I honestly had never heard of The Odds until I moved to Vancouver for university in the 90s and my first experience with them was when I waitressed at the UBC night club, The Pit Pub, and they played a rare concert (possibly a one-off reunion gig since I believe that it was during their "hiatus" period) where I remember I set my personal record for tips for the entirety of my (relatively short) waitressing career. The clientele that night were a different set of folks from the usual broke undergrads that hung out at The Pit. They were mostly young professionals who had forgotten that beer on campus is FIVE dollars not FIFTEEN dollars a pitcher. Thanks to The Odds and their fans, I was able to invest in my first and only pair of leather pants. (Those sort of helped with the tips for a while afterwards too.) 

The Odds were a great house band for the CBC fundraiser last week and, as many local businesses were coming forward with "incentive items" to encourage donations, they decided on the spur of the moment to donate a house concert to a pledge contributor in the Greater Vancouver area. Their only contract rider? The winning contributor must provide beer and a ride home for the band. (It tickles my sense of humour that their rider includes an actual ride.) I tweeted the sentiment at the band's Twitter account and the response came back: "now everybody knows about our rider. Secrets out. We're simple people."

 
***sheesh, I just noticed that I went from the Hunger Games to a Food Bank fundraiser in the same post. Not intentional but kind of neat still***

***When I came back to finish up this post, I realized playing the odds in life can also result in those happy accidents - times when you beat "the odds", achieve the improbable, or stumble into genius. I attended a lovely event in Coquitlam last Sunday night hosted by a childhood friend who is deeply involved in her church and community. Sat across from me was another one of my elementary school classmates whom I hadn't seen since our undergrad days at UBC. She is a mother of FIVE. Five babies in eight years and all of them delivered by caesarian section. Talk about beating the odds. One of our other classmates who wasn't in attendance is a mother of four and that's after recovering from severe anorexia in high school and suffering several miscarriages after getting married as her body fought to get healthy enough to have a child. Another odds beater. And our hostess on Sunday night is expecting HER fourth in April. Really, what are the odds in this day and age that I could have three classmates who, between them, could field a football team of their children. After April, they could even pass for a Saskatchewan Grey Cup team. ;)

I have a student in one of my classes who is one of a set of triplets. Well, technically, she's a twin twice. She has one identical twin and one fraternal twin. They just happened to all be born at the same time. Now someone, get me the Math on that! Seriously.

These are not my students