/nəˈθænjəl/
@nathanielbdemiller.bsky.social
Arabophone guinea pig in Colorado with a PhD who works on automatic speech recognition. Currently learning Old English.
Egyptian Arabic idiom of the day:
زِهِقْت
zihíʾt
"I'm sick of it, I'm fed up."
It can take an indirect object with min, e.g.
[zɪhɪʔtə mɪnə ʃːuɣl]
"I'm sick of work."
زِهِقْت
zihíʾt
"I'm sick of it, I'm fed up."
It can take an indirect object with min, e.g.
[zɪhɪʔtə mɪnə ʃːuɣl]
"I'm sick of work."
November 11, 2025 at 12:22 AM
Egyptian Arabic idiom of the day:
زِهِقْت
zihíʾt
"I'm sick of it, I'm fed up."
It can take an indirect object with min, e.g.
[zɪhɪʔtə mɪnə ʃːuɣl]
"I'm sick of work."
زِهِقْت
zihíʾt
"I'm sick of it, I'm fed up."
It can take an indirect object with min, e.g.
[zɪhɪʔtə mɪnə ʃːuɣl]
"I'm sick of work."
Is Congress about to shut up about the shutdown?
November 9, 2025 at 9:26 PM
Is Congress about to shut up about the shutdown?
"quote" and "quoth" are not related. Quote is from Medieval Latin (via French) quotāre (“to distinguish by numbers, number chapters”), itself from Latin quotus (“which, what number"). Quoth is from ME quoth, quath, from OE cwæþ (first and third person past indicative of cweþan = to say).
November 9, 2025 at 5:07 AM
"quote" and "quoth" are not related. Quote is from Medieval Latin (via French) quotāre (“to distinguish by numbers, number chapters”), itself from Latin quotus (“which, what number"). Quoth is from ME quoth, quath, from OE cwæþ (first and third person past indicative of cweþan = to say).
OE "stede" /ˈste.de/ meaning a place or site survives in compounds such as homestead, set phrases such as in her stead, and the word instead. It's cognate with German Stadt (city) and Yiddish שטעטל (shtetl).
November 9, 2025 at 4:47 AM
OE "stede" /ˈste.de/ meaning a place or site survives in compounds such as homestead, set phrases such as in her stead, and the word instead. It's cognate with German Stadt (city) and Yiddish שטעטל (shtetl).
I just learned the word "vigesimal," meaning base-20, of a numeral system. French has pseudo-vigesimal numbers like quatre-vingt treize (4 • 20 + 13 = 93)
November 9, 2025 at 12:25 AM
I just learned the word "vigesimal," meaning base-20, of a numeral system. French has pseudo-vigesimal numbers like quatre-vingt treize (4 • 20 + 13 = 93)
Wiktionary thinks that Biblical Hebrew אֵיד (distress, calamity) is a descendant of Latin idus (ides)!?
November 8, 2025 at 9:29 AM
Wiktionary thinks that Biblical Hebrew אֵיד (distress, calamity) is a descendant of Latin idus (ides)!?
Done
The moral of the story is that you should never answer your email or fill out paperwork
November 8, 2025 at 3:53 AM
Done
"NaN: The Mystery of the Missing Data" is a book I'm guessing no one would read.
November 7, 2025 at 10:59 PM
"NaN: The Mystery of the Missing Data" is a book I'm guessing no one would read.
Note to self: Levenshtein Distance is a great song title for a song about being in love with someone named Levenshtein
November 7, 2025 at 9:20 PM
Note to self: Levenshtein Distance is a great song title for a song about being in love with someone named Levenshtein
The shutdown isn't on the floor
November 7, 2025 at 9:07 PM
The shutdown isn't on the floor
Humanities people should do this kind of fun stuff on social media. Word Cup or Archival Document Cup. Overwrought Theoretical Intervention Cup. Do the kids still say intervention?
#OreCup R2M1: Are you supporting tendrils of native #Copper or dark grains of #Ilmenite?
vote: www.mineralcup.org/vote-results...
results: www.mineralcup.org/vote-results...
vote: www.mineralcup.org/vote-results...
results: www.mineralcup.org/vote-results...
Vote in Semifinals Match 1 — Mineral Cup & Ore Cup
Vote in Copper vs Ilmenite Credit: Carles Millan and Modris Baum
www.mineralcup.org
November 7, 2025 at 2:43 PM
Humanities people should do this kind of fun stuff on social media. Word Cup or Archival Document Cup. Overwrought Theoretical Intervention Cup. Do the kids still say intervention?
Today at work I was the only person sitting at a cluster of six desks. Beside me was an empty cluster of four desks. I was also told today that they're going to unassign my desk because I'm not coming into the office three days a week. I'm going to sit there anyway and see what anyone does about it
November 7, 2025 at 4:00 AM
Today at work I was the only person sitting at a cluster of six desks. Beside me was an empty cluster of four desks. I was also told today that they're going to unassign my desk because I'm not coming into the office three days a week. I'm going to sit there anyway and see what anyone does about it
If I were a betting man I would have just lost a bunch of money. Which is why I don't gamble.
November 6, 2025 at 2:39 PM
If I were a betting man I would have just lost a bunch of money. Which is why I don't gamble.
The i in "handiwork" is a remnant of the OE ġe- prefix, usually indicating completion: handġeweorc [ˈhɑnd.jeˌwe͜orˠk]. This prefix is of course cognate with the ge- used in regular German past participles.
November 6, 2025 at 6:08 AM
The i in "handiwork" is a remnant of the OE ġe- prefix, usually indicating completion: handġeweorc [ˈhɑnd.jeˌwe͜orˠk]. This prefix is of course cognate with the ge- used in regular German past participles.
I was aiming to send off fifty resumes a week but I think that may have been too ambitious. I think I've applied to the twelve jobs on LinkedIn I might be qualified for. Maybe I'll reduce it to twenty per week.
November 5, 2025 at 4:59 PM
I was aiming to send off fifty resumes a week but I think that may have been too ambitious. I think I've applied to the twelve jobs on LinkedIn I might be qualified for. Maybe I'll reduce it to twenty per week.
Reposted by /nəˈθænjəl/
Live Laugh Love
November 5, 2025 at 3:49 PM
Live Laugh Love
Capybaras are guinea pig-adjacent
You have to admire the bloody-minded ambition of a pelican trying to eat a whole capybara (who seems utterly unconcerned).
The thing with pelicans is that they have ONE super-power & their brains default to "get it in your mouth & deal with it later."
Let's talk about the gular sac of the pelican.
The thing with pelicans is that they have ONE super-power & their brains default to "get it in your mouth & deal with it later."
Let's talk about the gular sac of the pelican.
November 5, 2025 at 3:18 PM
Capybaras are guinea pig-adjacent
I can't think of a better place to enjoy a nice bowl of Life cereal than a bench at the Mile High RTD station.
November 4, 2025 at 3:59 PM
I can't think of a better place to enjoy a nice bowl of Life cereal than a bench at the Mile High RTD station.
The word "whit" is mostly preserved in the expression "to not care a whit." It is a descendant of OE wiht (/wixt/, [wiçt]), meaning a creature or thing. "Wight" is a descendant of the same word.
November 4, 2025 at 4:55 AM
The word "whit" is mostly preserved in the expression "to not care a whit." It is a descendant of OE wiht (/wixt/, [wiçt]), meaning a creature or thing. "Wight" is a descendant of the same word.
I lived on Charles Babbage Rd in Cambridge for a year and never knew a thing about him and just came across this quote. Anyway I'd like to be able to respond to a question as he does here someday.
November 4, 2025 at 3:51 AM
I lived on Charles Babbage Rd in Cambridge for a year and never knew a thing about him and just came across this quote. Anyway I'd like to be able to respond to a question as he does here someday.
Very interesting read on where "she" comes from. "Sche" is an East Midlands variant of the 3rd per. fem. sing. I like the idea that maybe OE hēo > scho in the north got its vowel under the influence of "he".
But it might also be some kind of dialect compromise, with a southern vowel and a northern onset? Very weird www.deadlanguagesociety.com/p/she-is-a-w...
“She” is a weird word
The mysterious origin of a simple pronoun
www.deadlanguagesociety.com
November 3, 2025 at 11:40 PM
Very interesting read on where "she" comes from. "Sche" is an East Midlands variant of the 3rd per. fem. sing. I like the idea that maybe OE hēo > scho in the north got its vowel under the influence of "he".
Reposted by /nəˈθænjəl/
just drew the connection between gemination and gemini. brain expanded. perhaps even doubled
November 3, 2025 at 8:44 PM
just drew the connection between gemination and gemini. brain expanded. perhaps even doubled
Apparently the etymology of "she" is not that clear. OE is hēo, and then, "with an irregular change in stress from hēo to heō /hjoː/, then a development from /hj-/ to /ç/ to /ʃ-/, similar to the derivation of Shetland from Old Norse Hjaltland" according to Wiktionary.
November 3, 2025 at 7:00 PM
Apparently the etymology of "she" is not that clear. OE is hēo, and then, "with an irregular change in stress from hēo to heō /hjoː/, then a development from /hj-/ to /ç/ to /ʃ-/, similar to the derivation of Shetland from Old Norse Hjaltland" according to Wiktionary.