If you are a regular visitor to this blog, you must have noticed the ever-changing header in the sidebar. The one that says, “Quite possibly the most ______, yet _______, onymous Mormon group blog in history.” When I first started blogging here — on the second day of the life of Times & Seasons — this thing (what do we call it?) was already in place. I find it oddly entertaining, and sometimes I just reload my browser again and again to see what comes up. I tend to like the simple ones. Here is my favorite from today: “Quite possibly the most admired, yet cryptic, onymous Mormon group blog in history.” Kaimi just informed us that our adjective list is 374 words, but we are always looking for more. Feel free to make suggestions in the Comments below. In the meantime, I am just curious: What was your initial reaction to the description of the blog (whatever that might have been)? How long did it take you to notice that the words change? Do you have any favorite combinations?
You’ve *got* to make sure “special” is in there somewhere. :-P
I was shocked the other day when I came here and saw the saying as “the most socialist…” and was about to say something until I noticed it was computer generated.
Well, I never noticed until this post. For now it is the most “servile, yet rhadamanthine”. I’ll have to consult m-w.com for the meaning on the latter.
Well, I should admit that the idea of a revolving theme, using javascript’s random selector, was borrowed from a now-defunct blog (not affiliated with T & S, but one I sometimes read) called Tainted Law, (it was at http://www.306taint.us ; he had a few dozen whole-sentence themes that alternated).
A very early iteration of our theme here had only a single adjective. (The adjective list was originally only 20-30 words long). The list grew rapidly, and we briefly experimented with putting two adjectives in two different sentences (all within the first 24 hours of setting up the blog); the group overwhelmingly preferred the one-sentence, two-adjective setup, which has remained ever since about day 2 of the blog’s existence.
As far as favorites, I particularly like “seaworthy,” because it usually has nothing to do with the other adjective. “Uplifting, yet seaworthy” makes me chuckle.
I also like it when the first adjective is very self-righteous or pompous sounding and then the second adjective is ridiculous or silly. “Wise, yet long-winded” or “acclaimed, yet incomprehensible” are a few favorites that I have seen.
Kaimi: And whose idea was the phrase “onymous Mormon group blog”?
That phrase was mine, as I recall. I thought that, with enough qualifiers, we could claim to be the most ___ Mormon group blog, with practically any adjective, since we were almost the only Mormon group blog.
But the Met. Elders were another. So “onymous” went in to distinguish us (the onymous blog) from them (the anonymous blog).
Since we are the only onymous Mormon group blog, we can claim to be the most uplifting, influential, incomprehensible, or whatever, and it’s probably correct.
(I had to look up “onymous” in the dictionary. My original intuition was that the opposite of anonymous would be “nonymous” (drop the “a” like “amoral”). But it actually turns out to be “onymous.”).
Today’s favorite: imperious, yet hide-bound
“Quite possibly the most Kaldor-Hicks efficient, yet soporific, onymous Mormon group blog in history.”
I had to look up Kaldor-Hicks as it sounded like some bad villain from an Edgar Rice Burroughs book.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kaldor-Hicks_efficiency
Kind of funny given the extended discussion of consecration the last week.
Every time I see gemeinschaftliche, it reminds me of my Sociology 101 course, years ago. That was the last time I had to think about gemeinschaft. I also still recall the mnemonic I used to remember the term —
A community of people, living in a mine shaft.
And how did you remember Gesellschaft?
My favorite: platonic, yet crass
Kristine: I never did think of a good menmonic for gesellschaft. I tried to connect it to Gazelle in some way, but I couldn’t think of one that worked. So, in the end, I mostly remembered it as “the one that isn’t gemeinschaft” which worked out as long as I remembered gemeinschaft.
(Being a non-speaker of German, my most pressing problem — after getting to know the two words — was keeping their meanings apart. Mine-shaft technology worked well for that)
Kaimi: this is really a stretch, especially if you aren’t conversant with German, but “Gesellschaft” contains both “Esel” (donkey) and “Schaf” (sheep). Donkeys and sheep can trade and conduct commerce, but aren’t likely to form true communities.
(Yeah, yeah, I know it’s weak, but those of us with completely useless degrees in German have to feel clever sometimes :) )
I just got “Rawlsian, yet Cartesian.” That’s an interesting combination.
Hmm. If I were behind a veil of ignorance, I would want to arrange things so I could say “I think, therefore I am.” How’s that for Rawlsian, yet Cartesian?
My reaction to the description of the blog, not only initially, but everytime I read it, is to become too distracted by the word “onymous” to even notice the other adjectives. I mean, maybe I’m just horribly unsophisticated, but does anybody really ever use the word “onymous”? At first glance, it looks like a really bad misspelling of “anonymous,” and raises serious doubts about the literacy of the blog’s participants.
Fortunately, reading the very inciteful posts usually dispels my doubts pretty quickly.
I just had:
Quite possibly the most pulchritudinous, yet gemeinschaftliche, onymous Mormon group blog in history.
Now that’s a mouthful!
I just had my first five-liner. The descriptions that I’ve seen have always been 3 or 4 lines. I had wondered if we had words in the list that could be combined to make a five line description. We do.
“Quite possibly the most linguistically challenged, yet Kaldor-Hicks efficient, onymous Mormon group blog in history.”
Or, as displayed,
Quite possibly the most
linguistically challenged, yet
Kaldor-Hicks efficient,
onymous Mormon group blog in
history.
And now I come across another 5-line combination:
Quite possibly the most anti-Cartesian, yet methodologically individualist, onymous Mormon group blog in history.
Or, as displayed:
Quite possibly the most anti-
Cartesian, yet
methodologically individualist,
onymous Mormon group blog in
history.
After today’s and yesterday’s discussions on blog about chiasm, as well as the countermajoritarian nature of judicial review, I got a chuckle when it just pulled up:
Quite possibly the most chiastic, yet countermajoritarian, onymous Mormon group blog . . .
I just got “Dworkinian, yet rip-snorting.” Bwahahahahaha!