shot, anyway.”
“You went looking for more cits that said
‘Broken Teaglass’
?”
“Yeah.”
“The title might have some kind of significance,” I said.
“Well, if there is, maybe you can figure it out. Really, I don’t expect us to figure it out
now
. When you’re at your desk the rest of this week, contemplating the weave of the cubicle wall fabric, just pull yourself away for a while and give these cits a little thought.”
“Okay. Sure thing. But a newbie like me probably isn’tgoing to crack the code. It might be some highly elevated lexicographical trick.”
Mona laughed and licked happily at her final spoonful of hot fudge. “There’s no such thing, Billy. Lexicography is a drone’s work. There are no tricks. Are you ready to go?”
So it’s probably fairly obvious that I was humoring Mona at first. I thought she was kind of cute with her little sleuthing project.
The morning after our ice cream date, I read over the suspect cits a couple of times.
I wanted to hug him, for strength, and then push him back out the door
. Yuck. Talk about melodrama. I suspected Mona was suspending disbelief for the sake of entertaining herself. If she could do it, I probably could too.
Content aside, Mona was right that the
blow-dryer
cit was particularly peculiar for its length. So many sentences marked just for a word like
blow-dryer?
I wasn’t sure how long blow-dryers had been around, but it seemed to me that by 1985 people would be so used to the device and the term that editors wouldn’t be noting it anymore.
Editrix
, on the other hand—I’d probably mark that word if I saw it in a magazine. Such a weird word. The kind of word someone would use only to sound odd or old-fashioned, maybe to perplex his audience. And
-trix
wasn’t exactly an everyday kind of suffix. Maybe it was a fairly new suffix that had never quite taken. Why would anyone use it, when
-ess
could be used much less conspicuously? Would anyone ever say “waitrix” or “actrix”? I looked up
-trix
and
-ess
. They were both pretty old. Both Latin, and
-ess
went back to Greek. So much for my suspicion that
-trix
was some snappy new variation on
-ess
. I felt silly for even ponderingthe idea. Mona Minot probably already knew all about the origins of
-trix
and the like from her very expensive classical education.
“Office poll.”
I looked up, instinctively shielding the two suspect cits with my hand. George, the young pronunciation editor, was standing over me. I’d seen him skulking around the office before. The wide flatness of his face made me think of a steamrolled character in an old cartoon. Usually he wore a sport jacket over some incongruous T-shirt. Today it was a navy blazer over a yellow T-shirt with a large reproduction of a Mr. Goodbar wrapper on it. In one hand he was holding up a pink slip of paper that said BRUSCHETTA on it. In the other he held a little notepad.
“What’s this?” I asked.
George let his eyes fall closed for a second.
“You’re supposed to just say the word,” he said.
“What?”
“Just pronounce it for me.”
“Okay. Uh. Brew-shetta?”
George started to make a mark on his pad, but then stopped and lifted his eyes.
“Is that a
guess?”
“Yes.”
“If you don’t have a clue, you’re supposed to say ‘Pass.’”
“What if you think you know, but you’re not sure?”
“Then you say it,” he replied, in a tone that made me feel as if he’d just flicked me off like a booger. He was gone before I could thank him for his clarification.
“Office poll,” I heard him say to Cliff.
“Brew-scetta,” Cliff said.
“Office poll,” George continued at another cubicle.
“Brew-shetta,” a confident male voice replied.
I put away the
editrix
and
blow-dryer
cits. Clearly idiots like me had no business wasting time around a place like this. I took out the next cits in my box for the
Supplement. A
suffix,
-aster
. I’d never heard of it before. I’d had enough of
“You went looking for more cits that said
‘Broken Teaglass’
?”
“Yeah.”
“The title might have some kind of significance,” I said.
“Well, if there is, maybe you can figure it out. Really, I don’t expect us to figure it out
now
. When you’re at your desk the rest of this week, contemplating the weave of the cubicle wall fabric, just pull yourself away for a while and give these cits a little thought.”
“Okay. Sure thing. But a newbie like me probably isn’tgoing to crack the code. It might be some highly elevated lexicographical trick.”
Mona laughed and licked happily at her final spoonful of hot fudge. “There’s no such thing, Billy. Lexicography is a drone’s work. There are no tricks. Are you ready to go?”
So it’s probably fairly obvious that I was humoring Mona at first. I thought she was kind of cute with her little sleuthing project.
The morning after our ice cream date, I read over the suspect cits a couple of times.
I wanted to hug him, for strength, and then push him back out the door
. Yuck. Talk about melodrama. I suspected Mona was suspending disbelief for the sake of entertaining herself. If she could do it, I probably could too.
Content aside, Mona was right that the
blow-dryer
cit was particularly peculiar for its length. So many sentences marked just for a word like
blow-dryer?
I wasn’t sure how long blow-dryers had been around, but it seemed to me that by 1985 people would be so used to the device and the term that editors wouldn’t be noting it anymore.
Editrix
, on the other hand—I’d probably mark that word if I saw it in a magazine. Such a weird word. The kind of word someone would use only to sound odd or old-fashioned, maybe to perplex his audience. And
-trix
wasn’t exactly an everyday kind of suffix. Maybe it was a fairly new suffix that had never quite taken. Why would anyone use it, when
-ess
could be used much less conspicuously? Would anyone ever say “waitrix” or “actrix”? I looked up
-trix
and
-ess
. They were both pretty old. Both Latin, and
-ess
went back to Greek. So much for my suspicion that
-trix
was some snappy new variation on
-ess
. I felt silly for even ponderingthe idea. Mona Minot probably already knew all about the origins of
-trix
and the like from her very expensive classical education.
“Office poll.”
I looked up, instinctively shielding the two suspect cits with my hand. George, the young pronunciation editor, was standing over me. I’d seen him skulking around the office before. The wide flatness of his face made me think of a steamrolled character in an old cartoon. Usually he wore a sport jacket over some incongruous T-shirt. Today it was a navy blazer over a yellow T-shirt with a large reproduction of a Mr. Goodbar wrapper on it. In one hand he was holding up a pink slip of paper that said BRUSCHETTA on it. In the other he held a little notepad.
“What’s this?” I asked.
George let his eyes fall closed for a second.
“You’re supposed to just say the word,” he said.
“What?”
“Just pronounce it for me.”
“Okay. Uh. Brew-shetta?”
George started to make a mark on his pad, but then stopped and lifted his eyes.
“Is that a
guess?”
“Yes.”
“If you don’t have a clue, you’re supposed to say ‘Pass.’”
“What if you think you know, but you’re not sure?”
“Then you say it,” he replied, in a tone that made me feel as if he’d just flicked me off like a booger. He was gone before I could thank him for his clarification.
“Office poll,” I heard him say to Cliff.
“Brew-scetta,” Cliff said.
“Office poll,” George continued at another cubicle.
“Brew-shetta,” a confident male voice replied.
I put away the
editrix
and
blow-dryer
cits. Clearly idiots like me had no business wasting time around a place like this. I took out the next cits in my box for the
Supplement. A
suffix,
-aster
. I’d never heard of it before. I’d had enough of
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