Hm. It never occurred to me to look for a literary source of the phrase "pursuit of happiness" beyond the pen of Jefferson. I always assumed he meant "happiness" in the old-fashioned sense of finding an apt niche in society for oneself, chosen by oneself and pursued by oneself rather than assigned to one at birth because of one's ethnicity, place of origin, or one's father's occupation. The root word "hap" has more to do with happenstance, chance, luck, opportunity, than it does with elation, joy, or glee. Far from being a frivolous pursuit of pleasure, or an altruistic burden as that Scotsman opined, happiness means finding just the right living situation for oneself in harmony with one's unique gifts and yens (in every aspect: mate, domicile, occupation, etc.) as opposed to having those things pre-assigned to one from sources outside one's control; and, there being no guarantee of ever actually achieving that perfect happiness, the least a free government can do is remove the artificial fetters that prevent citizens from pursuing their dreams among a wide variety of socially approved channels.
Wearable, terrible? My Southern California (standard broadcast English) accent finds no difference in rhyme. The first vowel sound is a short "e" as in pet or mend. The second vowel sound is a schwa, a completely unaccented "uh." I can't even picture in my mind how anyone could pronounce them differently.
Maybe. You are surely aware that "tear" has two different standard pronunciations, depending on meaning: "tear" rhyming with "there" means to rip something apart (v.) or a torn flaw in some material (n.) but "tear" rhyming with "fear" means a drop of secretion from certain glands around the eye. The first has a short "e" sound, and the latter a long "e."
I just looked up "feral" on Merriam-Webster online and listened to the two pronunciations they provided: one used a long "e" sound (depicted by the letter "i" in the international phonetic alphabet) as in "fear" or as in "there's a tear in my eye." The other used a short "e" sound as in "fair" or as in "there's a tear in my hem." The "a" in both versions of "feral" is pronounced as a schwa.
I don't use the word "feral" in speech very often and I'm probably not consistent in how I pronounce it. I imagine I have used both standard versions at one time or another.
I am aware of the regional differences between "marry" and "merry." Could that be the kind of subtle vocal shift you are getting at?
A guy from the Bronx is giving us elocution lessons? I remember Mel Blanc saying he based Bugs Bunny’s voice on the Bronx accent. The only thing pleasing to the ear outta the Bronx was Eddie Layton on the Hammond organ at Yankee Stadium (a master of the chin music riff).
The slogan of the United Negro College Fund will never recover its dignity after its mangling by George W Bush. It is like an actor typecast after appearing in a wildly popular farce, and must accept its fate. A glancing blow struck by the NYT crossword will hardly be felt. I feel worse about “Oppenheimer”, reduced to a pink mushroom cloud for merely being released on the same weekend as the Barbie movie.
>>>Q: You wrote: Rachel was one of those Harper Lee’s. Wrong use of the apostrophe, no?
>>>A: I argue no. “Lees” reads weird. It’s like using an apostrophe when referring to the baseball >>>team, the A’s. If you call them the As, you look like an ass.
Hmm. Well, I don't write "The dog pee's on the floor." Nor do I write "I bought new golf tee's." I see your point, but I'm more of a grammar nazi than that, bro....
As the Ponce de León of Prose (another Florida Man)--- being the discoverer of the ephemeral "Googlenope" among other noteworthy findings --- and getting your knickers in a twist over a near rhyme (if you say so) --- I think it only fitting and proper to set you the task of coming up with additional dubious examples.
Actually, Geno, I am disappointed that you apparently forgot to mention Occam's Racer, a '55 Chevy, if I recall, and it's significance in getting to the correct answer quickly.
Here are my 2000 MWCollegiate's pronunciations of "terrible": TAIR-uh-buhl, TEH-ruh-buhl. Like you, I say it the second way because I was born and grew up in RI. But the first is more far more common outside the Northeast.
Gene - While I agree with your assessment of the credibility of the Anus Under Oath (AUO, pronounced "Ow!"), I urge caution in making statements like this: "defying all laws of physics realized by Isaac Newton and clarified by Albert Einstein". This is exactly what Niels Bohr, Werner Heisenberg, et al, did in the early part of the 20th century. They literally defied all, or at least most, of Newton's laws of physics and gave us the gift of quantum mechanics. For which most of us should be grateful even if we don't understand it.
I believe beyond a reasonable doubt that Lee Harvey Oswald was the sole killer of President Kennedy.
If, however, someone were to produce very strong proof that the Cuban government were somehow involved in getting Oswald to do this, I might be willing to accept the proposition, because there IS very strong evidence that the US government had attempted to assassinate Fidel Castro, and IIRC the President knew of the plans and at very least did nothing to stop them. To date, I have not seen any such evidence about Cuba.
I contribute regularly to UNCF, and greatly admire its work. There is a similar Native American group the American Indian College Fund (AICF) to which I also contribute and whose work I also greatly admire.
Beyond that, the UNCF did not originate that sentence, and IIRC there was a joke long before the UNCF started using it: "A waist is a terrible thing to mind." But yeah, I also felt some unease with it because of the UNCF connection.
I noticed that "Terrible" and "Wearable" make an imperfect rhyme (though, unlike you, I would admit it as such). More importantly, from the Joke of the Puzzle point of view, it broke the rule that the change in spelling was supposed to be a flip of the initial consonants, and that's it.
Sorry for sending you something so unfunny. Unless you think this is so stupid that it is funny.
Rhymezone.com disagrees with you, as does my rhyming dictionary...
https://www.rhymezone.com/r/rhyme.cgi?Word=wearable&typeofrhyme=perfect&org1=syl&org2=l&org3=y
Jon, do not use rhymezone as a source. Trust me. I will elaborate later but rhymezone will rhyme "fart" with "grunt."
Gene,
Don't use Merriam-Webster, either, because it will rhyme wearable with terrible.
'wer-ə-bəl- (https://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/wearable)
ˈte-rə-bəl- (https://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/terrible)
And I don't see grunt listed on the rhymes for fart, not even in the near rhyme category. You are full of grunt sticks.
Next you'll be telling me that wash rhymes with Porsche.
Hm. It never occurred to me to look for a literary source of the phrase "pursuit of happiness" beyond the pen of Jefferson. I always assumed he meant "happiness" in the old-fashioned sense of finding an apt niche in society for oneself, chosen by oneself and pursued by oneself rather than assigned to one at birth because of one's ethnicity, place of origin, or one's father's occupation. The root word "hap" has more to do with happenstance, chance, luck, opportunity, than it does with elation, joy, or glee. Far from being a frivolous pursuit of pleasure, or an altruistic burden as that Scotsman opined, happiness means finding just the right living situation for oneself in harmony with one's unique gifts and yens (in every aspect: mate, domicile, occupation, etc.) as opposed to having those things pre-assigned to one from sources outside one's control; and, there being no guarantee of ever actually achieving that perfect happiness, the least a free government can do is remove the artificial fetters that prevent citizens from pursuing their dreams among a wide variety of socially approved channels.
Wearable, terrible? My Southern California (standard broadcast English) accent finds no difference in rhyme. The first vowel sound is a short "e" as in pet or mend. The second vowel sound is a schwa, a completely unaccented "uh." I can't even picture in my mind how anyone could pronounce them differently.
I can’t picture how anyone could pronounce them the same. Does the first syllable in feral sound the same as the word tear to you?
Maybe. You are surely aware that "tear" has two different standard pronunciations, depending on meaning: "tear" rhyming with "there" means to rip something apart (v.) or a torn flaw in some material (n.) but "tear" rhyming with "fear" means a drop of secretion from certain glands around the eye. The first has a short "e" sound, and the latter a long "e."
I just looked up "feral" on Merriam-Webster online and listened to the two pronunciations they provided: one used a long "e" sound (depicted by the letter "i" in the international phonetic alphabet) as in "fear" or as in "there's a tear in my eye." The other used a short "e" sound as in "fair" or as in "there's a tear in my hem." The "a" in both versions of "feral" is pronounced as a schwa.
I don't use the word "feral" in speech very often and I'm probably not consistent in how I pronounce it. I imagine I have used both standard versions at one time or another.
I am aware of the regional differences between "marry" and "merry." Could that be the kind of subtle vocal shift you are getting at?
Yeah. As a native Bostonian, Mary, merry and marry all sound very different to me.
A guy from the Bronx is giving us elocution lessons? I remember Mel Blanc saying he based Bugs Bunny’s voice on the Bronx accent. The only thing pleasing to the ear outta the Bronx was Eddie Layton on the Hammond organ at Yankee Stadium (a master of the chin music riff).
The slogan of the United Negro College Fund will never recover its dignity after its mangling by George W Bush. It is like an actor typecast after appearing in a wildly popular farce, and must accept its fate. A glancing blow struck by the NYT crossword will hardly be felt. I feel worse about “Oppenheimer”, reduced to a pink mushroom cloud for merely being released on the same weekend as the Barbie movie.
>>>Q: You wrote: Rachel was one of those Harper Lee’s. Wrong use of the apostrophe, no?
>>>A: I argue no. “Lees” reads weird. It’s like using an apostrophe when referring to the baseball >>>team, the A’s. If you call them the As, you look like an ass.
Hmm. Well, I don't write "The dog pee's on the floor." Nor do I write "I bought new golf tee's." I see your point, but I'm more of a grammar nazi than that, bro....
Another aptonym.
In the mid-70's I lived in London. Near the school where I taught was the office of a dentist, Dr. Phang.
As the Ponce de León of Prose (another Florida Man)--- being the discoverer of the ephemeral "Googlenope" among other noteworthy findings --- and getting your knickers in a twist over a near rhyme (if you say so) --- I think it only fitting and proper to set you the task of coming up with additional dubious examples.
I always thought that “ The waist is a terrible thing to mind” was the pun of choice there
Gene, you are just wrong: the phonetics of "wearable" (https://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/wearable) and "terrible" (https://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/terrible) are identical except for the first letter.
Actually, Geno, I am disappointed that you apparently forgot to mention Occam's Racer, a '55 Chevy, if I recall, and it's significance in getting to the correct answer quickly.
Nothing is too sacred to pun on!
Here are my 2000 MWCollegiate's pronunciations of "terrible": TAIR-uh-buhl, TEH-ruh-buhl. Like you, I say it the second way because I was born and grew up in RI. But the first is more far more common outside the Northeast.
Gene - While I agree with your assessment of the credibility of the Anus Under Oath (AUO, pronounced "Ow!"), I urge caution in making statements like this: "defying all laws of physics realized by Isaac Newton and clarified by Albert Einstein". This is exactly what Niels Bohr, Werner Heisenberg, et al, did in the early part of the 20th century. They literally defied all, or at least most, of Newton's laws of physics and gave us the gift of quantum mechanics. For which most of us should be grateful even if we don't understand it.
I believe beyond a reasonable doubt that Lee Harvey Oswald was the sole killer of President Kennedy.
If, however, someone were to produce very strong proof that the Cuban government were somehow involved in getting Oswald to do this, I might be willing to accept the proposition, because there IS very strong evidence that the US government had attempted to assassinate Fidel Castro, and IIRC the President knew of the plans and at very least did nothing to stop them. To date, I have not seen any such evidence about Cuba.
I contribute regularly to UNCF, and greatly admire its work. There is a similar Native American group the American Indian College Fund (AICF) to which I also contribute and whose work I also greatly admire.
Beyond that, the UNCF did not originate that sentence, and IIRC there was a joke long before the UNCF started using it: "A waist is a terrible thing to mind." But yeah, I also felt some unease with it because of the UNCF connection.
I noticed that "Terrible" and "Wearable" make an imperfect rhyme (though, unlike you, I would admit it as such). More importantly, from the Joke of the Puzzle point of view, it broke the rule that the change in spelling was supposed to be a flip of the initial consonants, and that's it.
Sorry for sending you something so unfunny. Unless you think this is so stupid that it is funny.