Re: CHAT: Steg's wonderful .sig (and a question)

>From: nicole perrin <nicole.perrin@...>
>
>My father always says "Why don't you learn a *real* language instead of
>making up your own?  Something that's actually *useful*?"  And my mom
>rolls her eyes and makes funny faces.  My younger brother says I'm a
>freak and my younger sister (who's almost four) says non-words and tells
>me it's *her* language.  Also, my "German foreign exchange sister"
>knows, and she thinks it's really cool.  When I first told her she asked
>me about Esperanto and I told her I knew it a little bit but it's not
>the same, and so she asked me how to say "I love you" so she could tell
>her boyfriend about it.  The best understanding I've gotten about it is
>from my boyfriend, because when I tell him things about grammar or
>whatever new ideas I've gotten he listens and tries to understand...but
>then he just makes a face and says "Ohhhh you're so cute!"
>Exasperating, very.
>
>Nicole
>

Oh Nicole! The plight of precocious teenage girls! (If I recall you are a
teenage girl, correct? I've made stupider mistakes here before.) I know your
pain. I had a friend who followed the development of Yisian very closely,
and my whole gifted class knew about it, because every day I would put on
the board the Yisian word of the day. Some of them thought it was neat, but
most got sick of quickly because they couldn't get the idea through their
heads.  I have friend now who wants to learn Asiteya. It's a nice gesture
and I'll humor him till he gives up. I'm supposed to be making him a nice
copy of the grammar over the term break.  And my crazy French teacher! She
already knew about my hobby and didn't quite get it; like most of our
tormentors she couldn't get past Esperanto, but she found that Borges story
we were discussing a while ago and thought I would find it interesting,
which I did, but afterwards she proceeded to grill me for half an hour(!)
about my language. What's is like? Does it have gender? Irregular verbs? Is
it inflected? Anything to match the glorious French subjunctive (the delight
of sadistic language teachers)? How can you justify making new languages
that no one uses when so many languages of culture are fast dying?  So I
gave her the complete grammar; maybe she'll leave me alone. Isn't that all
we really want? For the secret to be embraced completely (the list) or
ignored completely (the real world under ideal circumstances)...

Jennifer
(Still waiting to legally enter R-rated movies, recommended to me by my
father as good films. Irony, irony, irony...)

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