Partcip* (for Particip*)

From the longing of an infant for its mother's breast, to the lifelong necessity for safe, clean drinking water—be it a gulp, a quaff, a belt, or a sip (there's hardly a smaller part than a sip)—the need to quench one's thirst is a truly universal one. And a participatory one to boot. Potable, as well as portable, water is shockingly hard to come by in many parts of the world, but the problem, at least according to some people, is rather easily solved. In this 2009 TED talk, Michael Pritchard discusses "the portable Lifesaver filter, which can make the most revolting water drinkable in seconds." While most of us decry global warming and the polluting of our lakes, streams, and oceans, we don't need to wait for some sort of global ecological miracle to occur before people in developing countries can start avoiding the dehydration caused by diarrhea, along with various other water-borne diseases. Water filtration or purification systems such as this one can make the difference between life and death. So take a sip from that cup of coffee on your desk, or the office water cooler over in the corner, and ponder how we might all do our part in helping to solve the world-wide water crisis. Then check out today's typo, which was found nine times in OhioLINK, and 576 times in WorldCat.

(Société Industrielle de Photographie (S.I.P.) postcard, 1900s, from Wikimedia Commons.)

Carol Reid

Textural + Textual (For Textual or Textural)

Words have certain textures, formed by the consonants, vowels, syllables, and stresses they comprise, and are used to weave together all sorts of texts. Textiles would seem to have a certain story arc as well: a warp and a weft, a colorful background, a bold beginning, and a tight tying-up of threads at the end. Due perhaps to this similarity in both meaning and sound, the words textual and textural, much like tortuous and torturous, are very often confused. (Wonderfully enough too, in this regard, I just learned that one meaning of the word webster is a woman who weaves!) My sister once needled me for being "tactile defensive" simply because I chafe at stiff collars and pointless cuffs, wasteful waistbands and hawing hems, all fibers unnatural and un-soft, and of course those horrid little name tags that come welded onto practically any new article of clothing you buy. (They're like a literal pain in the neck to me.) When it comes to abrasive fabrics, however, whether worsted or not, wool is the absolute worst, in my admittedly thin-skinned opinion. Sort of like the opposite of The Princess and the Pea: no matter how many layers I pile on beneath it, I can still feel its itchy, scratchy, prickly there-ness up on top. In any case, and regardless of which fibers you might cotton to, don't be sheepish today and shy away from this combined typo, found nine times in OhioLINK and 84 times in WorldCat. (Be especially careful to rule out any false positives—that is, records that contain both words correctly spelled.)

(Textile crafts for sale at Palenque, Chiapas, Mexico, 17 April 2011, from Wikimedia Commons.)

Carol Reid

Propet* (for Prospect*, Property, etc.)

Folks of all types keep pets of all stripes, and dogs are arguably the most popular of these in the good old U.S. of A. There once was a time when gay Americans were not legally allowed to adopt, but fortunately those days are (partially now, at least) behind us. Unwanted children, as well as abandoned animals, may now be adopted (in many states) by any prospective parent, if otherwise qualified, regardless of sexual orientation. And when it comes to canines, some would even say that gay people make the best dog owners of all. Though we often speak of "owning" pets, many would regard that as a meaningless misnomer and often feel closer to their pets than they do to their own family or friends. Animals—these animals, anyway—are not property. As Groucho Marx once put it: "Outside of a dog, a book is man's best friend. Inside of a dog, it's too dark to read." If you are pro-pet (or even if you're not) and it's not too dark to read right now, please sniff around a bit for our typo of the day, which was dug up 42 times in OhioLINK, and 782 times in WorldCat.

(At the Capital Pride parade near Dupont Circle in Washington, D.C., June 9, 2012, Washington Animal Rescue League brings along some of their most ardent supporters. From Wikimedia Commons.)

Carol Reid

Luxenbourg* (for Luxembourg*)

While studying up on RDA and FRBR, I noticed a language note for Luxembourgish. Along with French and German, Luxembourgish is one of three official languages spoken in Luxembourg. It's a sort of High German dialect employed by approximately 400,000 people worldwide, and the one native speakers refer to as the "language of the heart." I really don't know very much about the place, but it sounds rather nice, if this shining beacon of a war memorial is any indication. It was created by the artist Claus Citro, a leader in the avant-garde Luxembourg Secession movement of artists in the early twentieth century. My new favorite word in Luxembourgish is "Firwat," which is translated as "Why?" To an Anglo-American ear and eye, it looks like it might be pronounced "For what?" (it's actually more like "feer vat"), which is what I suspect many catalogers are secretly asking themselves about FRBR/RDA. LOL. (For a crew that eschews abbreviations, this one has certainly contributed its own memorable ingredients to the alphabet soup which are library acronyms. Although I kinda like WEMI. Firwat it's worth.) In any event, we found four cases of today's typo in OhioLINK, and 281 in WorldCat. And since there were no names in the OCLC authority file (personal, corporate, or geographic) starting with Luxenbourg*, it's a pretty good bet that virtually all of them are typos for Luxembourg*, and not merely Luxembourg-ish.

(Gëlle Fra, the Golden Lady, World War I Memorial in Luxembourg City, from Wikimedia Commons.)

Carol Reid

Preceed* (for Preced* or Proceed*)

Sometimes I feel big, see,

And sometimes I feel small,

Sometimes I feel adamant,

And sometimes not at all.

Seeds come with the seasons,

Though cede they not an inch,

A plante is often preferable,

But sedes do in a pinch.

C's also short for century,

A neat one hundred years,

While not a grade to celebrate,

It hardly leads to tears.

The C is round and curvy, but

Musicians like them sharp,

Just like the giant instrument

We all know as the harp....

Hey, I could go on all day here, probably, so let me just add that C is the third letter of the English alphabet, and the first letter of my own first name. Although my parents-to-be played around a bit with other possibilities (Alice? Rebecca?), I was actually sort of pre-C'd by default. Each of us being the eldest in our families, my mother, grandmother, great-grandmother, and I all carry some form of Carol in our names. Let's proceed now to precede (don't even get me started on supersede) and point out that there were an amazing 233 cases of today's typo in OhioLINK, and "too many records found for your search" in WorldCat. Please intercede on its behalf and see that it's spelled as it should be.

(Latin letter C, from Wikimedia Commons.)

Carol Reid

Walter* + Watler* (for Walter*)

Walter the Farting Dog is one beleaguered pooch who has had his ups and downs. William Kotzwinkle and Glenn Murray's book rose to the top of the New York Times bestseller list, at the same time that tight-assed critics were refusing to carry it in bookstores and libraries, or dismissing it as worthless "poop fiction." Based on a true story, it took the authors eleven years to find a "willing publisher." Walter was once (in one of several sequels) banned from the beach, but I bet he never thought he'd be banned from the library as well. Or even worse be held responsible for getting a fledgling teacher and aspiring librarian fired from her job. Which is exactly what happened in 2004 in Broome County, after this teacher had the temerity to present the popular title for "reluctant readers" as part of a book talk to her fellow educators. Such a reckless act sparked outrage from a coworker in the kindergarten, who along with the other local church ladies proceeded to raise a big stink. Amid some loose talk about the so-called "F word," librarian and book were soon out on the street. (Something smelled in upstate New York that day, and it wasn't just Walter. A friend says you could write a children's book about the entire incident: Farting in Such Sweet Sorrow, or, The Great Whitney Point Gas Crisis.) If you have passed so far on this olfactory ode to "everyone who's ever felt misjudged or misunderstood," it's may be time to rectify that. In a piquant comparison to the 1956 children's classic Harry the Dirty Dog, John Sutherland writes in the New Statesman that Walter "is to Harry as Portnoy was to sexually uptight Holden Caulfield—dirtier." Clean up the dogs in your own catalogs by rounding up all the slightly flawed Walters you can find and giving them good, well-spelled homes. There were six in OhioLINK, and 91 in WorldCat. (Watler* alone gets a dozen hits in the former and 168 in the latter, some of which could be correct, of course, so please check.) And let's all support intellectual freedom in any way we can. (Whew, that feels better!)

P.S. Don't forget: "He who farts in church sits in his own pew." (A couple cases of windy wordplay here come courtesy of our censored librarian.)

(Cover of Walter the Farting Dog by William Kotzwinkle and Glenn Murray, charmingly illustrated by Audrey Colman.)

Carol Reid

Inflaton* (for Inflation*, etc.)

On my way to work the other day, I noticed an old diner with a new sign. Johnny's Hot Dogs is now the Joe N' Dough Café. The "Joe" refers to coffee, of course, and the "dough" is obviously its classic companion, the doughnut. (One rather inspired menu selection in that regard is the Stiglemonkey, which is a "store-made glazed cake donut with Nutella frosting and topped with a banana.") Recently a friend sent me a link to the photograph pictured at left, asking: "When did we start spelling Donuts without a space?" Another recipient added, "When did we start selling brains for only 25¢?" Upon closer inspection, the more appetizing of the two offerings appears to be faintly hyphenated, using a small dot instead of a line. Compounds often start out as separate words, gradually growing closer through hyphenation, and finally merging into a single unit. (Although there is no evidence that doughnut was ever actually two discrete words.) The shortening (no pun intended) of doughnut to donut occurred at some point as well, at least in American English (the Brits still prefer to make the "dough" plain). A related example of how words and their meanings can change over time is the saying "I'll bet [or give] you dollars to doughnuts..." The idea was that dollars were worth so much more than doughnuts back then that this would perforce be a very good wager. Of course, given the rate of inflation, a doughnut (or donut) now often costs more than a dollar, making the expression nonsensical, or in any case, backwards. The phrase first arose around 1870, but was originally given as "dollars to buttons" or "dollars to cobwebs." It wasn't until the turn of the century that the alliterative appeal of "dollars to doughnuts" proved stronger. We found two cases of Inflaton* (for inflation*, etc.) in OhioLINK today, and 370 in WorldCat.

(Photo of store advertising donuts and brains, found on the Web.)

Carol Reid