Words with silent letters  See silent vowels, consonants, digraphs and  examples of base words with silent letters that sound those same letters when other word forms are created at:  http://academic.cuesta.edu/acasupp/AS/810.htm 

digraph  Two successive letters that represent a single sound (or phoneme).

Common vowel digraphs in English include ai (as in rain), ay (day),ea (teach), ea (bread), ea (break), ee (free), ei (eight), ey (key), ie(piece), oa (road), oo (book), oo (room), ow (slow), and ue (true).
Common consonant digraphs in English include ch (as in church), ch (school), ng (king), ph(phone), sh (shoe), th (then), th (think), and wh (wheel).
http://grammar.about.com/od/d/g/digraphterm.htm

Le Puy green lentils are produced specifically in the Le Puy du Velay area in the mountains of Central France under the stringent conditions of the A.O.P. (Appellation d’ Origine Protégée/ Protected Designation of Origin) certification which ensures their traceability, specificity and quality.  Le Puy green lentils are grown by traditional methods, without the use of fertilisers, on volcanic soil in the Velay area with its micro-climate and exceptional sunshine during the ripening period.  They have excellent nutritional value (sometimes thought of as a vegetable steak), providing a valuable source of energy for growing children and a good healthy food for adults, including minerals such as potassium, phosphorus, calcium, iron and zinc - all indispensable for a healthy diet.  They are very easy to use since they do not need to be sorted or soaked.  Their cooking time is less than half the time need for ordinary lentils, and they remain firm after cooking without losing their flavour.  http://www.ifeproductsearch.com/?Action=showProduct&id=1400559

French Green Lentil Salad Recipe  http://www.davidlebovitz.com/2006/11/cheap-caviar-1/

Pennsylvania landmark  In 1700, a Quaker family named Peirce purchased the land that is now Longwood Gardens and established it as a working farm and homestead.  Prior to the Peirce family’s acquisition of the land, the Lenni Lenape tribe had inhabited the territory.  According to the Longwood Gardens website, the Native Americans “hunted, fished, and farmed the productive wilderness.”  However, in 1798 Joshua and Samuel Peirce began planting an arboretum with an impressive collection of evergreen trees, which was recognized as one of the finest in the nation by 1850.  They also began acquiring native and exotic plants through exchanges with other collectors, and over time the collection increased and was opened to the public.  The grounds were known as “Peirce’s Park” and many social events were hosted there over the years.  After the death of George Peirce, who had maintained the property, the collection of trees was under contract to be cut down for lumber in 1906.  Fortunately, Pierre du Pont (grandson of the founder of the DuPont Chemical Company, Eleuthère Irénée du Pont) was an industrialist, farmer, designer, collector, and conservationist who contacted the parties involved.  He purchased not only the lumber contract, but also the entire Peirce property.  The conservationist wrote to a friend that his reason for purchasing the contract and land was “to save the collection of old trees…many of them of extraordinary growth and arresting appearance.”  Preserving the land and its plant life was du Pont’s top priority, prompting him to write a 174-page instruction manual for his workers to follow when caring for the grounds.  Du Pont’s first addition to the property was the Flower Garden Walk, a 600-foot-long brick path through a variety of floral gardens, added in 1907.  He described the Flower Garden Walk as “the old-fashioned plan of straight walks and box borders at the edge of the flower beds.”  Additions to the gardens came quickly after the Flower Garden Walk, and the incredible mix of styles and designs found throughout Longwood Gardens is a result of du Pont’s vast array of influences.  What’s more, rather than following a coordinated and predetermined plan, he built each element making up the gardens today piece by piece.  Furthermore, Du Pont’s fascination with fountains is evidenced all throughout Longwood. He noted, “As a child I was always delighted to behold flowing water and confess to still feel a thrill at the sight of clear water running freely from a faucet.”  Drawing inspiration from Chicago’s 1893 World Colombian Exposition, du Pont began work on the five-acre Main Fountain Garden in 1929.  This fountain garden can be seen from the Conservatory’s deck, and visitors are invited to walk along the paths and through the grass surrounding the fountains.  The water is sprayed up to 130 feet into the air, with 10,000 gallons of water circulating through the pumps each minute.  The Main Fountain Garden is the site of Longwood’s yearly Festival of the Fountains, an elaborate display of the fountains illuminated with red, blue, green, yellow and white lights, set to music.   More about Longwood Gardens, its schedule, and its plants can be found at its website  http://www.longwoodgardens.org/ .  See images and sources at:  http://pabook.libraries.psu.edu/palitmap/Longwood.html

A while is a noun meaning “a length of time”  “I slept for a while.”
Awhile is an adverb, meaning “for a time,” or literally, “for a while”.

“I slept awhile before dinner.”
As you can see, the words can be used almost interchangeably in some cases – but a while needs to be accompanied by a preposition, such as “for” (“I slept for a while”) or “ago” (“I left work a while ago”).  Awhile always means “for a while”.  http://www.dailywritingtips.com/a-while-vs-awhile/

The Urbana (IL) Free Library is facing scrutiny after the director, Deb Lissak "made a unilateral decision to weed books in the print collection by date alone," ignoring established criteria and without the knowledge of the Adult Services Director, Anne Phillips.  Anecdotal reports indicate that the adult non-fiction collection has been weeded 50-75% and that the titles have been shipped to Better World Books.  According to Mary Ellen Farrell, Board of Trustees President, a “conscious effort” was made “to find the most efficient way to get [the library] up to par as far as RFID tagging and … for the most usable [and] efficient things that … our library needs to have here as a core collection, and to identify things that are easily accessed, either from other libraries … or online.”  At least three staff members reported to Phillips that they were instructed to "[weed] as quickly as possible, even at the level of going through a range in 30 minutes of 2,000 titles.”  That’s less than one second per book.   LISNews  June 14, 2013

Response from the Urbana Free Library  http://urbanafreelibrary.org/article/2013/06/14/changes-urbana-free-librarythe-faq 

As feral swine continue to pop up in parts of Ohio where they don’t belong, wildlife experts are increasingly convinced that residents are illegally transporting the invasive species from southern states.   “For decades, they were only in a handful of states,” said Dave Pauli, senior director of wildlife innovation and response at the U.S. Humane Society.  “People are definitely moving them around.”  He said reality-television shows such as A&E’s Lady Hoggers and American Hoggers have inspired people to import the pigs, which have huge populations in states including Florida, Georgia and Texas.  Craig Hicks, a wildlife disease biologist with the U.S. Department of Agriculture, hunts down feral swine in Ohio.  He said feral pigs can ruin crops and soil, outcompete native wildlife and carry disease.  The USDA estimates feral swine cost taxpayers more than $1 billion each year in damage and control efforts.  For years, feral pigs were contained mostly in southeastern Ohio. But now they have been found as far north as Ashtabula County near Lake Erie and as far west as Butler County along the Indiana border.  Hicks, who described his statewide pig-hunting operation as a “one-man show,” euthanizes feral swine that he catches.  Dave Kohler, executive administrator for wildlife management and research at the Ohio Department of Natural Resources, said it is illegal to transfer a number of wild animals, including skunks, possums and raccoons.  Doing so could be punishable by fine, restitution, imprisonment or seizure of the animal, according to the Ohio Revised Code.  Joshua Jamerson  http://www.dispatch.com/content/stories/local/2013/06/15/hogs-invade-ohio-with-illegal-help.html

June 14, 2013  Facebook Releases Data, Including All National Security Requests  by Ted Ullyot, Facebook General Counsel  Over the last week, in press statements as well as Mark Zuckerberg's post https://www.facebook.com/zuck/posts/10100828955847631 June 7 about PRISM, we’ve repeatedly called for governments worldwide to be willing to provide more details about programs aimed at keeping the public safe.  We’ve also urged them to allow companies to divulge appropriate information about government orders and requests that we receive, in a manner that does not compromise legitimate security concerns.  Requests from law enforcement entities investigating national security-related cases are by their nature classified and highly sensitive, and the law traditionally has placed significant constraints on the ability of companies like Facebook to even confirm or acknowledge receipt of these requests – let alone provide details of our responses.  We’ve reiterated in recent days that we scrutinize every government data request that we receive – whether from state, local, federal, or foreign governments.  We’ve also made clear that we aggressively protect our users’ data when confronted with such requests:  we frequently reject such requests outright, or require the government to substantially scale down its requests, or simply give the government much less data than it has requested.  And we respond only as required by law.   Read more at:  http://newsroom.fb.com/News/636/Facebook-Releases-Data-Including-All-National-Security-Requests

Casey at the Bat by Ernest Thayer  It all started in 1885 when George Hearst decided to run for state senator in California.  To self-promote his brand of politics, Hearst purchased the San Francisco Examiner.  At the completion of the election, Hearst gave the newspaper to his son, William Randolph Hearst.  William, who had experience editing the Harvard Lampoon while at Harvard College, took to California three Lampoon staff members.  One of those three was Ernest L. Thayer who signed his humorous Lampoon articles with the pen name Phin.  In the June 3, 1888 issue of The Examiner, Phin appeared as the author of the poem we all know as Casey at the Bat.  The poem received very little attention and a few weeks later it was partially republished in the New York Sun, though the author was now known as Anon.  A New Yorker named Archibald Gunter clipped out the poem and saved it as a reference item for a future novel.  Weeks later Gunter found another interesting article describing an upcoming performance at the Wallack Theatre by comedian De Wolf Hopper - who was also his personal friend.  The August 1888 show (exact date is unknown) had members from the New York and Chicago ball clubs in the audience and the clipping now had a clear and obvious use.  Gunter shared Casey at the Bat with Hopper and the performance was nothing short of legendary.  http://www.baseball-almanac.com/poetry/po_case.shtml   

June 3, 2013  Worchester, MA   In its soul, “Casey at the Bat” is about failure, something baseball fans and players are far too familiar with.  Most at bats end in outs.  At the end of each season, one team goes home as champion and the rest — that makes it 29 in the major leagues — go home as losers.  That is probably the ultimate appeal of “Casey at the Bat.”  It reflects baseball's core reality.  The game, as the late Commissioner Bart Giamatti once wrote, is designed to break your heart.  Thayer spends 51 lines of verse setting the stage for Mudville's dramatic last-inning rally, but the last words of the poem sum everything up simply and accurately — “mighty Casey has struck out.”  We know that the poem was written here because Thayer said it was.  In a letter to the Syracuse Post-Standard in 1930, Thayer said that “Casey at the Bat” was composed in Worcester in the spring of 1888, adding that the poem had no basis in fact.  Stockton, Calif., has claimed to be Mudville for a long time, and its minor league teams have traded heavily on the connection for many years.  Stockton may be right — when Thayer was a reporter for the Examiner, he is thought to have covered some games there and a couple of the last names of the Stockton team match up with players in the poem.  More locally, Holliston has made “Mudville” claims about one of its villages.  When it was first published, nobody took much notice of it and “Casey at the Bat” might have remained nothing more than newsprint if not for vaudevillian DeWolf Hopper.  Thayer's literary skills created a poem that Hopper's theatrical skills turned into must-see stuff in the days of live entertainment.  Hopper was the father of William Hopper — Paul Drake of Perry Mason fame — and an ancestor of Dennis Hopper.  He performed “Casey at the Bat” at the Worcester Theatre on Exchange Street in December 1892.  Author and performer met backstage afterward and retired to the Worcester Club for dinner, and then both went on with their lives.  http://www.telegram.com/article/20130603/NEWS/106039943/1116 

American composer and educator, William Schuman spent from 1951 to 1953 working on his first opera, The Mighty Casey composed to a libretto by Jeremy Gury and based on the famous poem "Casey at the Bat" by Ernest L. Thayer. Schuman, an avid baseball fan, remarked "To me, baseball is the epitome of American life and character. The Mighty Casey . . . musically is a straight, serious piece . . . it requires no technical knowledge to enjoy it, and we shall be satisfied if it only appeals to baseball lovers."  The opera premiered on May 4, 1953, in Hartford, Connecticut.  http://www.loc.gov/exhibits/treasures/tri090.html 

Historically, the area known as "Languedoc" covered a large part of southern France; Roussillon is a much smaller area, being more or less the area covered by the Eastern Pyrenees department. Roussillon, in the past, was the northern part of Catalonia., and people here still speak Catalan as well as French.  The fertile coastal plain is given over to agriculture, vineyards and - particularly in Roussillon - fruit and vegetables.  Inland Languedoc is a beautiful area, characterised by vineyards and "garrigue", arid rocky Mediterranean hills with their vegetation of scrub, aromatic bushes and occasional fields.  Further inland, the valleys of the Cevennes, more wooded and rural, give way to the Cevennes hills, the southeastern peaks of the Massif Central.  The area has a lot of historic cities, such as Nimes with its superb Roman remains, the famous walled city of Carcassonne, the former Roman provincial capital of Narbonne, and other smaller ancient cities, such as Agde.  The Pyrenees, forming a natural land barrier between France and Spain, are a beautiful range of high mountains, wooded on their lower slopes, but offering good mountain and hill walking higher up - not to mention the attraction of day trips into Spain.  The coastline where they meet the sea is unlike the rest of the Languedoc coast, and is characterised by old coastal villages such as Banyuls and Collioure, rocky cliffs and small coves.  Access to Languedoc:  by TGV from Paris Gare de Lyon, or from Lille; train from many cities, motorway from Paris, Lille, Strasbourg, Nancy, Lyon, Geneva.  There are airports at Nimes, Montpellier, Carcassonne and Perpignan, with low-cost flights from the UK, Belgium and Holland.  http://about-france.com/regions/languedoc.htm  NOTE that in our recent trip to France, we learned that the Languedoc is the largest producer of wine in the world, both in area planted in grapes and number of bottles produced. 

In addition to visiting quaint villages in southern France, we went to Fontcaude Abbey in

Hérault where I was allowed to play the organ.  The abbey was constructed in the 12th century, 17th century and 18th century.  

See many pictures at:  http://en.patrimoine-de-france.com/herault/cazedarnes/abbaye-de-fontcaude-ancienne-1.php

We stayed just outside Puisserguier, less than half an hour's drive from the Mediterranean coast, and 15 minutes away from the large town of Beziers.  It is said that Clementine, a monk, who came from Puisserguier, discovered the small oranges that bears his name, in north Africa.  One of the roads in the village is named after him.  He was later to become Saint Clementine.  See pictures at:  http://www.languedoc-roussillon.eu.com/Puisserguier.html

June 14 is the 165th day of the year (166th in leap years) in the Gregorian calendar.  There are 200 days remaining until the end of the year.  Selected events:

1775 – American Revolutionary War: the Continental Army is established by the Continental Congress, marking the birth of the United States Army.
1777 – The Stars and Stripes is adopted by Congress as the Flag of the United States.
1789 – Mutiny on the Bounty: HMS Bounty mutiny survivors including Captain William Bligh and 18 others reach Timor after a nearly 7,400 km (4,600 mi) journey in an open boat.
1789 – Whiskey distilled from maize is first produced by American clergyman the Rev Elijah Craig. It is named Bourbon because Rev Craig lived in Bourbon County, Kentucky.
1822 – Charles Babbage proposes a difference engine in a paper to the Royal Astronomical Society entitled "Note on the application of machinery to the computation of astronomical and mathematical tables".
1900 – Hawaii becomes a United States territory.
1937 – Pennsylvania becomes the first (and only) state of the United States to celebrate Flag Day officially as a state holiday
1966 – The Vatican announces the abolition of the Index Librorum Prohibitorum ("index of prohibited books"), which was originally instituted in 1557.  http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/June_14
 

It's a song known around the world; "Happy Birthday to You" is performed, heard, and played millions of times every day, but it's also a major moneymaker for Warner Music subsidiary Warner/Chappell, which owns the copyright to the song.  Jennifer Nelson, a filmmaker who was producing a documentary on the song, discovered that to use the track in a single scene would cost $1,500.  Although she agreed to the fee and signed a licensing deal, she's now filed a lawsuit in the hope that a New York court will invalidate Warner Music's copyright claim.

  Nelson says that the song, which is an adaption of the 19th Century song "Good Morning to All," is in the public domain.  A full copy of the filing at http://www.techdirt.com/articles/20130613/11165823451/filmmaker-finally-aims-to-get-court-to-admit-that-happy-birthday-is-public-domain.shtml makes for entertaining reading.  The lawsuit says that "irrefutable documentary evidence" dating back as far as 1893 shows that the copyright to any part of the song expired no later than 1921.  It adds that if Warner Music "owns any rights to Happy Birthday to You, those rights are limited to the extremely narrow right to reproduce and distribute specific piano arrangements for the song published in 1935. " The filing calls for the song to be made public domain, and asks the Warns Music pays back the millions of dollars it's collected through "unlawful licensing fees."  Aaron Souppouris   See the "Good-Morning to All" song at:  http://www.theverge.com/2013/6/14/4429412/happy-birthday-lawsuit-demands-warner-music-pay-back-royalites

There are no visual or auditory clues, and there are no gestures to soften the words you send electronically.  Below are tips for sending texts and emails that communicate effectively, and do not alienate or confuse.    

Texting in itself isn’t bad or good.  It’s in how we use it.  Texting in a place where you’re not with anyone or bothering anyone is fine.  However, texting around others or as part of multi-tasking often causes harm.  It’s in the less obvious ways than car crashes or while walking, (a New York City area teen fell into a manhole while texting; luckily, she’s fine now) that texting hurts by depersonalizing our personal encounters.  With every text message sent or received in the presence of others around the family table, the living room sofa, the boardroom, or the grocery store check-out lane, we’re separating our focus from the person in front of us.  Our attention is a gift.  Our full attention is the foundation of every kindhearted, other-centered interaction.  Read more at:  http://www.mannersmentor.com/only-at-work/seven-ways-to-text-with-graciousness-and-savvy

 

Email courtesy

Pay careful attention to where emails will end up.   It can be embarrassing if a personal message ends up on a mailing list goes to the wrong people.
When asking for something, don't forget to say "please".   
Similarly, it never hurts to say "thank you".
Don't expect an immediate answer.  Most people will not check their email more than a few times a day, so a delay should be expected.  
Never send personal or sensitive information by email.  Email systems are not always designed to be secure so it is best to err on the side of caution.
Don't use sarcasm or write emails when angry.  Witty sarcasm is hard to detect in email and may accidentally offend the recipient.  Anger can also be offensive. 
Don't send or forward emails containing libelous, defamatory, offensive, racist or obscene remarks.  Also avoid sending virus hoaxes and chain letters.
Unless the recipient has previously agreed, don't forward poems, jokes, or attachments.  
Always have the recipient's permission to send them such emails.   http://helpdesk.ws.edu/pages/guide_emailEtiquette.asp

At a performance of the Indianapolis Symphony Orchestra, there was this piece of music that was getting louder and louder and was supposed to stop all of a sudden.  A woman was talking to a friend during the crescendo, and when the music stopped, she shrieked "I FRY MINE IN BUTTER!" 

The Indianapolis Brewery was shut down by Ar­ticle XVIII of the United States Constitution, which declared in 1919 that the manufacture, sale, or transportation of intoxicating liquors was against the law.  Intoxicating liquors did not be­come lawful again until 1933. 

Timequake (semi-autobiographical novel) by Kurt Vonnegut  1997 

Indianapolis Brewing Company was started by an "English syndicate" in 1887.  Peter Lieber was the president of the new company for its first year, retiring in 1888 due to ill health.  Albert Lieber, Peter Lieber's son was the first managing director and took over as president.  Peter was appointed Counsel to Duesseldorf in 1893 by President Grover Cleveland.  They won a gold medal for their Duesseldorfer at the Paris Exposition of 1900.  There was a "magnificent industrial parade" when they returned with the medal.  They also won the grand prize gold at the St. Louis World's Fair in 1904 and a gold medal at Liege, Belgium in 1906.  Kurt Vonnegut's grandfather was Albert Lieber.  The recipe for a dark lager beer that Peter Lieber devised was brewed by Wyncoop Brewing, Denver, in 1996 to celebrate the new library there.  It was called Kurt's Mile-High Malt.  A "secret ingredient" of the brew was coffee.  In 1938 they appealed a case to the US Supreme Court to fight Michigan's beer importation laws.  They lost.  This case has been referenced many times including G. Heilman's bankruptcy and many cases about mail-order beer and wine sales.  Read much more at:  http://www.indianabeer.com/History/IH-In.html 

To celebrate Denver and National Poetry Month, Denver's Wynkoop Brewing Company hosted its second annual Liquid Poetry event in the brewpub's Mercantile Room.  The event featured the 2009 Liquid Poetry beer, and beer-minded poetry.  http://www.thefreelibrary.com/Wynkoop+Brewing+Co.+revives+Liquid+Poetry.-a0210034349 

A.Word.A.Day with Anu Garg

chevy    (CHEV-ee)  verb tr.:  To chase or annoy.  noun:  A chase, hunt, or a hunting cry.
After Cheviot Hills bordering England and Scotland.  A battle between English and Scottish forces over a hunting expedition is described in a 15th-century ballad (The Ballad of Chevy Chase).  A chase is a tract of land reserved for hunting.  The name of the city Chevy Chase in Maryland has the same origin.  Earliest documented use: before 1825.
Himalayan  (him-uh-LAY-uhn, hi-MAHL-yuhn)  adjective 
1.  Enormously large.
2.  Relating to the Himalayas.
After the Himalayas, the mountain range having Mount Everest, the highest mountain in the world. From Sanskrit him (snow) + alaya (abode).  Ultimately from the Indo-European root ghei- (winter), which is the ancestor of words such as chimera, hibernaculum, hiemal, and hibernate.  Earliest documented use:  1866.

Updated June 10, 2013  River Danube has reached highest level in 500 years after days of rain.  Budapest was on high alert yesterday as the River Danube threatened to burst its banks and flood the historic city.  The river peaked at record highs as desperate homeowners, hotel staff and military reservists piled sandbags in front of their buildings to protect the Hungarian capital.  Tens of thousands have been forced to leave their homes and at least a dozen people have been killed in floods that have hit central Europe in the past week.  The Danube – Europe’s second longest river which flows through four capital cities and ten countries – started rising rapidly in Hungary last Friday.  The country announced a state of ‘extreme danger’ which is likely to last into next week as the waters are expected to recede very slowly.  Claire Ellicott  See many pictures at:  http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-2338449/Danube-reaches-record-levels-historic-capital-Budapest-goes-high-alert-river-burst-banks.html

We planned a two-week vacation in Europe about a year ago, but all did not go as planned:

The Danube flooded, and our one-week cruise from Passau, Germany to Budapest, Hungary was cancelled.  DANUBE RIVER WINS--TOURISTS LOSE
Our hosts at Domaine La Veronique, "Gourmet  Breaks in the Languedoc" http://www.domainelaveronique.com/ were able to take us an extra two days. 
DOMAINE LA VERONIQUE WINS--TOURISTS WIN
Air traffic controllers in France went on strike, disrupting travel throughout Europe. 
FRENCH AIR TRAFFIC CONTROLLERS WIN--TOURISTS LOSE
KLM Airlines treated us to a hotel and meals, re-booked our flight, and did much more when the strike made us miss our flight home.  KLM AIRLINES WIN--TOURISTS WIN

April 15, 2011  What are the odds?  A Las Vegas replica of Statue of Liberty, not the real one, appears on U.S. postage stamp -- forever.  Though 2 billion of the stamps were issued Dec. 1 -- and 3 billion were printed -- the agency learned of the discrepancy only last month.  "A stamp collector looked at the image and noticed that's not the original, that's the replica, the Las Vegas version," said Roy Betts, manager of community relations for the Postal Service in Washington.  The scaled-down version appears at the New York-New York Hotel and Casino on the Las Vegas Strip.  What tipped the collector to the differences on the stamp?  The dark areas instead of windows in the crown for starters, Betts said.  The stamp is based on a photograph from Raimund Linke that was labeled only "Lady Liberty."  Mary Forgione 

http://articles.latimes.com/2011/apr/15/news/la-trb-lady-liberty-stamp-20110415 

We pledge our allegiance to a republic, and not to a democracy.  The original wording of the pledge of allegiance was:  I pledge allegiance to my flag and to the republic for which it stands:  one nation, indivisible, with liberty and justice for all.  It has been claimed that the pledge of allegiance to the flag first appeared in a children's magazine called The Youth's Companion.  On Columbus Day, October 12, 1892, by proclamation of President Benjamin Harrison, the pledge was first used by school children, and it was amended by the substitution of the words the flag of the United States of America rather than my flag.  The pledge was adopted officially on Flag Day, June 14, 1924 by joint resolution of Congress and was again amended, this time in 1954, by the addition of the words under God.  In a democracy the sovereignty of the nation rests with the people, as it also does in a republic.  The primary difference is in the exercise of that sovereignty.  In a democracy the people exercise the powers of sovereignty in person, while in a republic they exercise the powers of sovereignty through representatives elected by the people, or through the organs established by the constitution.  http://www.learn-usa.com/transformation_process/roa022.htm 

The former central role of the horse in our society is reflected by the influence of all things equestrian on our language.  From curtail and marshal to put the cart before the horse and curry favour, English is pervaded by either explicit or long-lost references to our equine friends – so much so that we’re now more likely to encounter them linguistically and figuratively rather than literally.  To give a horse free rein is to hold the reins loosely so as to allow the animal freedom of movement – it’s the opposite of keeping a tight rein on the horse (controlling it closely). 

http://blog.oxforddictionaries.com/2012/03/rein-or-reign/ 

John Harris (1756–1846) published children's books in England from the end of the 18th century to the mid-19th century, creating innovative and popular new styles.  Apprenticed to Thomas Evans he found employment for a short time with John Murray before joining John Newbery's publishing firm.  Harris took over Newbery's firm which had passed first to his son, then to his nephew and nephew's wife.  Harris had managed the firm for Elizabeth Newbery and in 1801 bought it from her, renaming in his own name.  Noticing that playful books such as Mother Goose's Melody sold better than Evangelical fare, in 1805 he issued The Comic Adventures of Old Mother Hubbard and Her Dog which departed from Newbery's publications in that it was completely devoid of didacticism and was meant to amuse.  The first edition of the book was illustrated with copperplate engravings, one on each page, unlike Newbery's sparse use of woodcuts, and of a relatively small size (4 inches by 5 inches).  Mother Hubbard sold well and began a run of similar books such as Whimsical Incidents in 1805 followed a year later by an edition of John Gilpin with colour illustrations.  The Butterfly's Ball was published in 1807 to great success, followed by a number of similar titles as well as a few cautionary tales such as The Cowslip by Daisy Turner.  In 1807 he added a series he called Harris' Cabinet of Amusement and Instruction with stories that were meant to entertain children, unlike works written by authors such as Mrs. Trimmer who wrote to instruct children.  By 1809 he had a catalogue of 419 titles that he sold from his premises at St Paul's Churchyard.  In 1819 the firm became J. Harris & Son, and at that time they began to issue newly illustrated colour editions of editions previously published without colour illustrations. The books were expensive by the standard of the time, costing "One Shilling plain and Eighteen Pence coloured.  Children's literature scholar Jack Zipes explains that because of traditional Puritan laws against fairy tales, English publishers had to import fairy stories of French and German origin.  Harris published a volume of fairy tales in 1802, Mother Bunch's Fairy Tales, and in 1820 the firm published The Court of Oberon; or, The Temple of Fairie which children's literature and folklore scholar Iona Opie calls "an important volume".  See images at:  http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/John_Harris_(publisher) 

The Memorial Tournament always yields a top-notch field to test Jack Nicklaus' Muirfield Village Golf Club.  The 2013 tournament includes many of the world's top 20 players, including international stars such as Master's champion Adam Scott, Rory McIlroy, Luke Donald and Justin Rose, as well as American stalwarts Bubba Watson and defending champion Tiger Woods.   http://www.dispatch.com/content/pages/sports/memorial/memorial-tournament.html 

May 31, 2013  At the Memorial Tournament, roving teams confiscate cellphones from spectators to protect golfers from jarring ringtones, snapshots.  Its members wear matching blue shirts and stern expressions.  Wrapped around their biceps are ominous yellow bands stamped with the four letters of fear:  MDCC.  They are the Mobile Device Courtesy Committee, and they want you to put away your darn phone.  Or else:  They get their phone confiscated, and they can’t fetch it from lost-and-found until the last player finishes that day.  The MDCC, a band of volunteers who carry paddles displaying pictures of circled-and-slashed cellphones, formed because fans got a little too aggressive with their mobile devices last year, said Memorial executive director Dan Sullivan.  Golfers complained.  Some speculated that Phil Mickelson’s early withdrawal after the first round had something to do with cellphones.  Memorial officials actually want fans to bring phones.  They want them to tweet their location and tell everyone what a great time they’re having at the golf tourney.  But they don’t want those phones ringing.  They don’t want them taking pictures during competitive rounds, which began yesterday.  They don’t want people chatting up grandma in Florida while Rory McIlroy tries to dig his way out of a lousy opening round.  And so they say:  Keep the phone on silent, don’t talk on it outside designated areas, and don’t dare pull it out near the ropes.  Marshals remind the fans of the rules at each hole.  MDCC teams travel in packs of eight and follow the most-popular player pairings, two in the morning and two in the afternoon.  Lori Kurtzman    http://www.dispatch.com/content/stories/sports/2013/05/31/memorial/roving-teams-confiscate-cellphones-from-memorial-spectators.html 

The Memorial Tournament runs from May 30-June 2, 2013 and is located at the Muirfield Village Golf Course in Dublin, Ohio.  The Memorial Tournament is themed each year around a person, living or dead, who has contributed to the game of golf.  Find more information and a list of honorees, 1976-2013 at:  http://www.thememorialtournament.com/the-memorial/honorees/ 

Part of the allure of learning a new language is discovering words for things you wouldn’t have known existed or thought of in the same way before.  The perpetual fascination of attempting to translate between two languages lies in the gap that always exists, even between very closely related words.  The Spanish olvido describes something we don’t quite have a word for: not an act of forgetting or moment of forgetfulness or total oblivion, but a mental compartment that sits opposite memory, just as blindness is the opposite of sight.  Words that don’t seem to have an exact equivalent are often described as untranslatable.  The great Japanese translator Motoyuki Shibata claims that Arthur Golden’s Memoirs of a Geisha (an English fiction that purports to be a translation from Japanese) is much improved by its translation into Japanese by Takayoshi Ogawa, who transformed it into something authentic by incorporating the actual traditional vocabulary used by geishas.  Esther Allen  http://www.publishersweekly.com/pw/by-topic/industry-news/tip-sheet/article/57551-why-does-language-always-change.html  Many thanks, Paul. 

May 30, 2013  Jack Vance, who penned his first short stories while serving in the U.S. Merchant Marine in the 1940s and became a prolific, award-winning author of elaborate works of science fiction, fantasy and mystery, has died.  He was 96.  Among his best-known works was "The Dying Earth," a collection of linked fantasy stories first published in 1950 that told of life on the planet in the far distant future, with a weak sun ever in danger of burning out.  Complete with heroic quests and magical duels, it is considered to have influenced many more recent fantasy writers, including "Game of Thrones" author George R.R. Martin, and was later expanded into several novels.  Vance, who published more than 60 books, collected various honors over his career, including several Hugo awards, a prestigious science fiction and fantasy prize.  He won Hugos in 1963 for "The Dragon Masters," in 1967 for "The Last Castle" and in 2010 for his memoir "This is Me, Jack Vance!"  Other awards included an Edgar, for mystery writing, for "The Man in the Cage," published in 1961.  But for many of his fans, he never received quite the credit he was due.  In 2009, a New York Times magazine profile described him as "one of American literature's most distinctive and undervalued voices" and quoted author Michael Chabon speaking in a similar vein.  "Jack Vance is the most painful case of all the writers I love who I feel don't get the credit they deserve," Chabon said.  "If 'The Last Castle' or 'The Dragon Masters' had the name Italo Calvino on it, or just a foreign name, it would be received as a profound meditation, but because he's Jack Vance and published in Amazing Whatever, there's this insurmountable barrier."  John Holbrook Vance, known as Jack, was born Aug. 28, 1916, in San Francisco, the son of Charles and Edith Vance.  His first short story, "The World Thinker," was published in 1945 in a pulp magazine.  Other stories soon followed, although he also supported himself with non-writing work — as a carpenter and welder, among other jobs — until the early 1970s.  Rebecca Trounson 

http://articles.latimes.com/2013/may/30/local/la-me-jack-vance-20130531 

June 1, 2013  That guy you may have seen busily building a nest in the Cleveland Public Library’s Eastman Reading Garden?  He’s not some birdbrain.  Nor is he preparing for an avian invasion.  The nest builder is New York-based artist and Cleveland Institute of Art grad Mark Reigelman, who expects to be finished June 3 with his public art installation, “Reading Nest.”   The nest structure, which patrons can enter through a door, is 30 feet wide and 12 feet high.  Reigelman has already made his mark on Cleveland.  At the Cleveland Museum of Art, he created the “White Cloud” public art exhibit and “Wood Pile.”  He also conceived Cleveland’s downtown Bike Rack project and designed steel and concrete planters along the reconstructed Euclid Avenue.  Michael K. McIntyre  See picture at:  http://www.cleveland.com/tipoff/index.ssf/2013/06/at_the_cleveland_public_librar.html

Characters in disguise appear in the 1926 operetta The Desert Song (originally titled Lady Fair), The Shadow, Batman, Spiderman, The Scarlet Pimpernel, Zorro, and Superman.  Characters switching identities:  The Prince and the Pauper and Trading Places.  Some authors disguise their names by using pseudonyms.

Ten of the best disguises in literature by John Mullan  http://www.guardian.co.uk/books/2010/sep/25/ten-best-disguises-literature 

Holdings in WorldCat for English literature in the Age of Disguise  http://www.worldcat.org/title/english-literature-in-the-age-of-disguise/oclc/3552747/editions?referer=di&editionsView=true 

Liberty Bell facts

Location:  Liberty Bell Center, Market Street & 6th, Philadelphia, Pennsylvania

Bell Originally Cast:  Whitechapel Foundry 1752
Bell recast:  Pass & Stow Philadelphia 1753 and again later that year
The yoke weighs 200 pounds and is made of American elm a.k.a. slippery elm.  Read more at:  http://www.ushistory.org/libertybell/facts.html

Imply means to state indirectly (for instance, to include a suggestion in a message).
Infer means to deduce (for instance, to extract a suggestion from a message).
http://www.grammar-monster.com/easily_confused/imply_infer.htm

Impute means to:
1.  attribute or ascribe
2.  attribute or ascribe (something discreditable) to someone or something.
3.  attribute (righteousness, guilt, etc.) to a person or persons vicariously.
4.  charge (a person) with fault.
http://www.thefreedictionary.com/impute

Poor eyesight can no longer be an excuse for not playing Scrabble at the Highland Public Library.  Vincent Alcorn, a senior at Lakeland High School in White Lake, Michigan made sure of that, creating a giant Scrabble set for the library for his Eagle Scout project.  “I worked along with librarian Dawn Dittmar to come up with the idea,” Alcorn said.  Alcorn, part of the Highland library's Teen Advisor Board, said he brainstormed various ideas for projects and since he was so active at the library, it seemed logical to come up with a project to benefit the library.  And soon after, the larger-than-life Scrabble idea was raised.  “So many different sections of the library could use it,” Alcorn said.  “It has a word theme, so it fits.”  The folding, hinged wooden board measures five feet by five feet and is complete with all necessary labels to play a game.  The Scrabble letter tiles are 3'ªø1‚-2-inch squares, complete with point values.  Accompanying giant replica tile racks complete the set.  The large Scrabble set joins the library's jumbo Jenga set and is being used in both the adult and teen services areas.  http://www.hometownlife.com/article/20130509/NEWS11/305090410/Scout-creates-giant-Scrabble-set-Highland-library 

Elmhurst. a neighborhood in Queens

One of the first European towns in Queens was present-day Elmhurst.  Its original name in 1652 was Middleburg, and then in 1662 New Towne (soon just Newtown).  When Queens became part of New York City in 1898, the name changed to Elmhurst, at the bequest of Cord Meyer developers, in order to distance it from polluted Newtown Creek.  Elmhurst is in western Queens. Roosevelt Avenue is the neighborhood's northern boundary with Jackson Heights.  To the east is Corona at Junction Boulevard. Woodside is to the west along 74th Street and the LIRR tracks.  Elmhurst dips south of Queens Boulevard to the Long Island Expressway (and Rego Park, Middle Village, and Maspeth).  The area below Queens Boulevard, especially south of the LIRR tracks, is a sleepy area of row houses, multi-family homes.  The neighborhood used to go further south to Eliot Avenue, but a zip code change added a sliver of "South Elmhurst" to Middle Village.  For a student of architecture or diversity, the neighborhood's religious buildings are fascinating.  You can find: Christian churches with roots in the colonial-era whose congregation is Taiwanese; historic St. Adalbert Church, the main Thai Buddhist temple in NYC, a Jain temple, a Chinese Chan Buddhist hall; and the beautiful Geeta Hindu temple.  A lively, diverse population makes Elmhurst one of the most interesting New York City neighborhoods for food.  The zip code is considered the most diverse in NYC, with some 57 languages spoken according to the NYC Department of Education.  http://queens.about.com/od/neighborhoods/p/elmhurst-ny.htm 

Health insurance subsidy calculator  This tool illustrates health insurance premiums and subsidies for people purchasing insurance on their own in new health insurance exchanges (or “Marketplaces”) created by the Affordable Care Act (ACA).  Beginning in October 2013, middle-income people under age 65, who are not eligible for coverage through their employer, Medicaid, or Medicare, can apply for tax credit subsidies available through state-based exchanges.  Additionally, states have the option to expand their Medicaid programs to cover all people making up to 138% of the federal poverty level (which is about $33,000 for a family of four).  In states that opt out of expanding Medicaid, some people making below this amount will still be eligible for Medicaid, some will be eligible for subsidized coverage through Marketplaces, and others will not be eligible for subsidies.  With this calculator, you can enter different income levels, ages, and family sizes to get an estimate of your eligibility for subsidies and how much you could spend on health insurance.  As premiums and eligibility requirements may vary, contact your state’s Medicaid office or exchange with enrollment questions.  http://kff.org/interactive/subsidy-calculator/ 

If you haven't heard, the future is wearable computing.  But how that future—seen through Google Glass specs—will go mainstream is still out of focus.  At the D11:  All Things Digital conference in Rancho Palos Verdes, Calif. this week—here, the tech elite buzzed about the promise of microcomputers that attach onto humans.  They opined not just about fitness-tracking bands, which are already becoming ubiquitous, but also about multipurpose mobile gadgets that we can strap onto our wrists, heads or other body parts.  Tim Cook, CEO of Apple Inc., which is reported to be working on a watch-like device, said wearable computers will likely be "another key branch" of the Apple tree.  But in reference to competitor Google Inc.'s Glass headgear, Mr. Cook said high-tech eyeglasses would be "difficult" to pull off as a mainstream product.  On stage, he wore a Nike+ FuelBand bracelet that tracks physical activity.  Mary Meeker, a partner at Kleiner Perkins Caufield & Byers, said wearable computing would be the star of the "third cycle" of the Web.  In her annual report on the state of the Internet, she said the world was already entering a cycle of "wearables, driveables, flyables and scannables."  Even companies that few would consider high-tech were eager to plant a flag in wearable computing.  On Wednesday, Tom Staggs, the chairman of Walt Disney Parks and Resorts, trotted out MagicBand, a wristband that stores information about consumers' identity and preferences, so that Disney characters can greet guests by name. 

Evelyn M. Rusli  The Wall Street Journal  May 31, 2013