The Vine: May 13, 2005
Hey Sars,
I’ve been living in the United States just on three years now (am a New Zealander, go All Blacks!) and apart from my accent, I haven’t had many communication problems. Except just recently I’m having a problem with what I think is some regional usage. It’s the use of “from” in a sentence to make a statement like “we know from funny” or “he didn’t know from funky.” Got the latter one from the SATC episode about the guy with the funky spunk. Heh.
Anyway, I’ve just started noticing it. Isn’t the “from” redundant? It’s very confusing and more and more I’m having to take a beat in conversations to work out exactly what people mean. Is this a regional thing? (I live in Baltimore, go Orioles!)
Cheers,
I don’t know from usage?
Dear From,
Garner doesn’t have a note on that usage, and Googling it didn’t do me much good.My theory is that the longer phrases “we know unfunny from funny” or “he didn’t know not funky from funky” are implied.Yes, you could just say “we know funny,” but in my opinion, “we know funny” and “we know from funny” do not mean quite the same thing; the former means exactly what it says, while the latter suggests a greater breadth of what is known, if that makes any sense — that not only do we know funny but we also known un-funny.
It’s a colloquialism that I wouldn’t advise using in formal writing, but I can’t swear to its derivation and I don’t know where it comes from.I do have a bet with myself on which regular usagehound reader is going to tell me, though, so tune in next week to see if I win.
Dear Sars,
You seem to be pretty sensible, and I was hoping you could help me.I don’t feel like I can talk to any of my friends about this, because it feels kind of like bragging, or something. They are mostly single, and I can just see them rolling their eyes and snickering. I’m in a serious relationship, and I would talk to him about it, but he is currently on the other side of the country, and again, this is actually a pretty dumb (but so necessary!) question. I don’t think that this would bother him, but he’s got better things to worry about like finals, or doing laundry, or cleaning the crud from his windowsill.
Guys hit on me all the time, and sometimes it gets a little surreal. I will be honest, I am pretty decent-looking, but nothing too special. I’m a student, I shower. I sometimes even put on mascara. I don’t dress so my boobs hang out. It used to be a lot worse before I cut my hair off but it still happens.
For example, I met this guy at the library who owns a coffee shop on campus that I have to walk past several times a day (otherwise it’s a big, long detour in the cold), and sometimes I’ll smile at him as I walk past if we happen see each other. I am a friendly person, I walk with my head up and if I meet someone’s eyes, I will smile or nod or do something friendly-looking and keep walking. Just because I live in a city, doesn’t mean I need to be perpetually cranky. I’m also pretty okay with talking to people I meet. I did work in retail for a really, really long time.
Anyway, back to this guy, we got to talking at the library, because we recognized each other, eventually he told me to stop by sometime and say hi (he did mention free coffee, too). Today I stopped by to say hi, since I was getting lunch across from his shop (it is a long narrow building, with a narrowish walkway between the two halves of the building, shops on each side). I went up to the coffee girl and ordered and was about to pay for my coffee, when he jumps in from whatever he was doing and then tells me, “No, no, it’s on me.” Okay, I say my hellos and we chat for a minute or two, and the regular that was there joins in too, and then I sit back down and go back to studying.I’m off in study-land when all of a sudden, a piece of gingerbread loaf is plunked down on my little table. I look up and its him, and he says something about me not starving, here’s a snack. I went back to studying.He’s also asked me out for coffee or dinner twice now, and I always say no and bring up my fiance.
Should I have taken it? I don’t know, whenever I get into these situations, I get my nice-pleasant face (relic from dealing with difficult customers) and I get quiet. I do try to tell people that I’m engaged. This is a pretty extreme case but usually I do end up with phone numbers and email addresses, because I don’t know what else to do.
I am newly engaged to a wonderful man, and I love him dearly. I know he isn’t jealous, because he knows he can trust me, and he thinks it’s funny when people check me out and I’m oblivious. I do like to tell people, but it feels weird when I’m just asking the time and a conversation starts to have to figure out a way to drop the engaged-bomb. I’m also pretty awful at trying to nonchalantly drop things into conversation. When I do try, if I figure out a way to do it, I feel weird. Talking to people I’ve just met and trying to force the fiance thing into conversation feels like I’m assuming that every person I meet wants to get into my pants. But I keep getting addresses, and then later I look back and realize that yeah, I think I was getting hit on. I’m really not usually this dumb, Sars, but sometimes I wonder.
Anyway, that took way too long, but if you could offer some advice, it would be great. I will print it off and put it into my wallet and keep it there forever. I’m totally serious.
No, really, my name isn’t Helen
Dear Not Helen,
It’s called “a thousand-yard stare and a brisk tone.”Develop both and start using them.I’m all for friendliness in daily life, especially in cities where it’s crowded and therefore extra important for everyone to make an effort with the pleasantries — but there’s friendly interactions with staff at shops or people who hold doors for you, and then there’s nodding to strangers, which…no.
I understand that you don’t want to be impolite, but chatting with people in whom, really, you have no more than a businesslike interest, and accepting freebies from men who might want to date you, is not an unequivocal message.Neither is “nonchalant.””Thanks so much, but I can’t accept this coffee for free.””Please stop asking me out; I’m engaged, and you’re making me uncomfortable.”If you don’t want strangers to take an inappropriate interest in you, shorten up the eye contact, cut out the small talk, and make it clear from your body language that you’re not having it.
“But that’s not me!”Okay, but…you’re winding up with phone numbers and attention you don’t want, so either you can live with that stuff, or you can learn to avoid the kind of interaction that leads to it.Neither one is wrong; I’m just saying, I shoot the breeze with strangers all the time because, you know, a million stories in the naked city and I’m out to collect the whole set.But sometimes a guy gets the wrong idea and has to be told he isn’t walking me home; that’s a risk I take, and sometimes it bugs, but I could solve that problem by just not talking to anyone I don’t know.So, really, it’s your call, but if the constant on-hitting is bugging you, try casting a slightly narrower net of friendliness and see how it feels.
Sars,
I need some sage advice.Quickly.I feel like you are the person to
give it…
I have been married about a year and a half.Things are great, my
husband is super, blah blah blah happy-cakes. However, there is one issue that is really starting to bother me.
My husband has a large-ish family and they are a pretty technically
savvy and opinionated bunch.They all have email
and they have a family distro list which they use frequently.
When we first got married I thought, “Oh, how wonderful that the whole
family communicates and stays in touch.”
I. WAS.WRONG.Beginning last year about four months before the
presidential election, there started a bit of political…volley.
EVERY SINGLE DAY there were some 15 to 20 (including some very, very
ugly and angry) emails sent back and forth, back and forth.They are a
very divided group,
split about 50/50 between very liberal and very conservative.I grew
increasingly uncomfortable as the election neared because
it was sounding like a gigantic unmendable rift was about to form.
Things tapered off a bit after the election.This morning I got an
email from one of them about
drilling for oil in Alaska.AAAAAAAND we’re off to the races.I have
already received four emails in about an hour.
At the time, I considered emailing everyone and politely letting them
know that I did not want to be included in the political diatribes.
Family news — yes.”You’re a big fat stupidhead” — NO.
Don’t get me wrong — I am the first
person to support having your own political beliefs.But this game is
getting old.Mean spirited emails to other family members aren’t my
thing.
However, I am afraid that I will alienate some of the more vocal family
members.I don’t have a problem AT ALL with all of their differing
beliefs, I just want them to leave
me out of the mud-slinging.
I know that it is an option to just delete the emails and get over it.
I’ve been doing that.I was just wondering what you thought…
Signed,
Keep the mud off me
Dear Mud,
Just delete them.You don’t really gain anything by huffing that you want no part of the political arguments, especially when you could just stay out of them and not draw any attention to yourself, so that’s the wisest course.If you really don’t even want to read enough of those particular emails to know whether you should delete them, set up an email filter to trap messages with keywords like “Bush” or “liberal” and send them straight to your deleted messages folder.
I assume you haven’t participated so far, and that nobody has been all, “Hey, Mud’s pretty quiet over there, what’s up with that,” so if nobody really seems to care that you don’t wade into the fray, I’d leave it at that.
Tags: boys (and girls) etiquette grammar the fam
