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Friday

December 6, 2019
Happy Hollandaise, Fellow Yolkels, 

We got some solid replies on the Latin List from last week. The New York Times (a big city newspaper) responded robustly with a forty million word article on a Latin dictionary that will take two centuries to complete. And if you think this is staff bluster, well, so did we. But no:
More significant, thanks to Reader of the Week #7, Bill Durham of Key Biscayne, Florida, we epistemologically engage with his critical addition to our Latin List, one that takes us back to our very roots:
Ex nihilo. To make something out of nothing.

Definitely a dynamic out of which nihilists can make something.
Nothing is obvious in the parts you can’t see.
In the nothingness of it all, questions emerge.
How do trees bark?
Do spiders have websites?
What are the lyrics to Inna Godda Divida?

Funny you should ask. The last question catapults straight to our favorite weekly Wikipedia page, because Doug Ingle (a real person), keyboardist and vocalist for Iron Butterfly, consumed a gallon of Red Mountain wine and then, as best he could, sang his new song, the key stanza of which contains the lyrics, “in the Garden of Eden,” which in light of the circumstances emerged as “Inna Godda Divida, baby.”  And this is a mondegreen. (If you knew that, you can have the box of feathers which nobody won last week.)

Wikipedia Friday Favorite: In honor of the intersection of curiosity and logarithmically expanding human knowledge, we offer a weekly favorite obscure Wikipedia page.

Special Contest! This Week Only!!!
Submit your best above-average mondegreen. Winner gets a Vagus Metropolitanus* in our favorite color! (What? After all this, we should please you?)

Fictionary Friday: Words You Need. Whether you know it or not.
Clambastic (klamm bass tick) Adjective: Saying nothing, with great fanfare.
In a sentence: The Staff at Floss Fri takes our admittedly grandiose, clambastic observations very, very seriously.

Fizzdom Friday: from our collection of favorite quotes.
“It shows an excellent command of language to say nothing."
- Karol Newlin

Reader Reply of the Week #11:
Speaking of nothing and something and the cosmic dance between them, we applaud Derek Hardison of Stone Mountain, Georgia, who likes to spy on his neighbors’ vehicles. He reminds us of last week’s *Vagus Metropolitanus, which (as everyone knows) is Latin for Rambler Metropolitan.
Zippity-do-da
(Thanks, Derek!)
3 or 4 cylinders, 1 barrel carburetor, whatever
Would you buy it? Ask General Reader of the Week #37 Burnley Hayes of Midway, Georgia. She advises:
“Rambler! Buyagra! I would barter but ipse dixit . . .  just like the way it sounds.”

Well said! We’re gonna send you a nice box of feathers! First chance!
Write if you (do) or (do not) believe in nothing.

Coming from something, maybe,
Jonathan
www.jonathanmarcus.org

PS: If you're not going to submit anything for next week, do not click here.

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PPPS: Access the complete archive of past Flossophy Fridays, from the very beginning.
Everything is Happening at Once, is now available on Amazon,
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