Any other business

I'm posting my first blog post in more than a month tonight. I thank you for coming back to see it! In the meantime, I've been seeing a couple of research projects out the door and starting the new teaching term.  I continue to be very active on Twitter, but I know that not all of you hang out there, so here are a few of the things that I mentioned there that I haven't mentioned here.  One thing that's changed here is that Google AdSense has banned me because its algorithms detected illicit activity. I have no idea what this refers to, but they turned down my appeal and took whatever money they owed me. The good news for you: back to being an ad-free blog. I hope. I still see big blank places where the ads used to be at the ends of posts. I hope they're not advertising to you without my involvement. Here, for your edification, is the story of another soul's interaction with Google NonSense.

On a happier-for-me note, I've taken the SbaCL show out on the road, giving a talk called
The degradation of the English language: who's whose fault is it?
to the Catalyst Club in Brighton. The talk had a secret punchline title (now saved for posterity in the Catalyst Club archive), which I hope blog-readers will appreciate. It was me trying to do linguistics as stand-up comedy, and I think it can be branded a success (anyone who was there is welcome to leave their opinion in the comments). My favo(u)rite post-talk comment was: "I wish I could unlearn everything you've just taught me." I now have an appetite for more, and a multimedia powerpoint that I'd love to subject others to.  So, if you'd like to book such a talk for your club, wedding or bar mitzvah, please use the 'contact Lynneguist' link on the right.  I'm scheduled to give a new talk at Catalyst in September--and you can bet I'll do something linguisticky or cross-cultural, so if you're near Brighton, come along!

In other news, the Translation Advisor website interviewed me in December on American versus British English, and you can read that here, if you like.

And in my day job, I now have this to show off:


So, not always blogging, but busybusy.

Last but not least, I received this tweet earlier this month:


I immediately, which is to say rashly, promised that I would post three blog posts this week (after my last pressing deadline) to make up for my absence. Depending on how I fare during the week, I might count this as one of them, but I'll try to post three real posts instead.

So, hello! How have you been?

8 comments

  1. Congratulations on the book!
    Great to have you back on the blog

    ReplyDelete
  2. Google AdSense has banned me because its algorithms detected illicit activity.

    Hrmm, maybe it was that you elicit activity?

    (I'm boggled as to what their problem could be, too.)

    ReplyDelete
  3. Welcome back! I've missed you as well! I am subscribed to your Twitter posts, but there are just so many of them, and so many other feeds, that I rarely find time to read them.

    Reading your blog posts (through the medium of RSS) is much easier.

    ReplyDelete
  4. Thoroughly enjoyed your Catalyst Club talk, tho I was clearly not paying enough attention ;)

    ReplyDelete
  5. Welcome back! Don't feel bad- I'm even more shamelessly inadequate as not only a blogger, but also as a follower of yours(only on here, I'm Twitphobic)and I haven't even written a book (or three).

    ReplyDelete
  6. Nice to hear from you, Solo--now stop beating yourself up! (I don't care how good at it you are!) ;)

    ReplyDelete
  7. "(I'm boggled as to what their problem could be, too.)"

    The naughty words, undoubtedly.

    --o--

    Some of the Skeptics in the Pub should have you on. It's sad to see how prescriptive otherwise rational people can be.

    ReplyDelete

The book!

View by topic

Twitter

Abbr.

AmE = American English
BrE = British English
OED = Oxford English Dictionary (online)