Up and Coming Weekly is a weekly publication in Fayetteville, NC and Fort Bragg, NC area offering local news, views, arts, entertainment and community event and business information.
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THIS WEEK WITH MARGARET Let’s Keep Talking THIS WEEK WITH MARGARET by MARGARET DICKSON Over time, I have come to think of the English language as a vast amorphous organism, with some sections that are only thinly connected and others that overlap each other. This organism is in constant fl ux, moving in all sorts of directions, sometimes quickly — think “refudiate” sometimes screamingly slowly — think, grammar rules. Different parts of it may or may not know what other parts are doing but change is always occurring. There are only a few parts that do not change at all. While there is no defi nitive answer to the question of how many words there are in English, scholars say perhaps as many as a quarter of a million, if you count the ones rarely used today, which almost surely makes English the biggest language in the world. There are a number of reasons for this. Our present English has its roots in Latin-based languages like German and French, and we have absorbed individual words and phrases from many other languages as well — think pizza and au gratin. Compared to other languages, English is a bear to learn. Even we native English speakers struggle with our language, and some non-English speakers who fi nd themselves in an English-speaking country like ours never quite get it right even though they may have tried since young childhood. I am a native English speaker who may or may not be able to navigate among French speakers, and my sister and I were fortunate to grow up with a mother and grandmother who were, to put it politely but accurately, sticklers for correct English usage. A careless “me and Sally went to the movies” earned an immediate correction, generally in the form of “Oh, my goodness! I had no idea Sally was mean!” And woe to the girl who tried to sound high-falutin’ by saying, “Sally went to the movies with Jane and I.” That egregious error got a frown and a fi rm “Who?” I cured myself of that particular boo boo by remembering no one would ever say, “Sally went to the movies with I.” “Lay” and “lie” were a bit trickier to pin down but eventually manageable if you remember that people “lie” and chickens “lay,” except in the past tense, of course. I also struggled with “affect” and “effect,” and fi nally realized that affect LETTERS PWC Is Committed to Providing Safe and Reliable Services by LOU OLIVERA Services to PWC water customers were impacted in January by an unprecedented emergency of the PWC water system. A large water main break required us to shut down one of our water plants until the break could be isolated. This caused our water system to experience an extreme loss of pressure, a situation that risks contamination entering the water distribution system. As a precaution and under the guidance of the North Carolina Division of Environmental Health, PWC, with the upmost priority for the safety of our customers, advised our customers to boil their water until our lab tests confi rmed our water met safe drinking water standards. As your water provider, we never want to inconvenience you, our customers; however, public safety was the top priority and PWC took appropriate actions given the circumstances which have not occurred over our 100 years in operation. While the immediate emergency has passed, PWC has inspected the balance of the water main involved for structural integrity, made the repair to the line and is putting it back in service to bring our water system back to normal. As the governing leaders of PWC, we would like to share information about the operations of your public water system and assure you, our customers that our water is safe to drink, and that our system is sound and meets reliability expectations. • PWC has over 1,300 miles of transmission and distribution water mains that we operate and maintain. This year alone, PWC will invest approximately $5,000,000 in water line rehabilitation work and over $7,000,000 in sewer line rehabilitation work. This amount is spent annually to maintain our system. As you look around our community, on any given day, you will see projects that demonstrate our on-going commitment to safe and reliable services. In addition, PWC’s state-certifi ed lab conducts thousands of tests throughout the year to ensure the water delivered to our customers exceeds the standards for safe WWW.UPANDCOMINGWEEKLY.COM drinking water. • PWC is a member of the Partnership for Safe Drinking Water, a voluntary commitment for enhancing water treatment to provide high quality drinking water. In 2000, PWC became the fi rst utility in the state to be recognized with the Director’s Award from the Partnership. The award recognizes PWC’s efforts and proven ability to treat water in a manner which exceeds current regulatory practices. Out of 52,000 community water system in the U.S., PWC is one of 108 to have maintained this distinction through its exemplary practices for 10 consecutive years. • PWC operates two facilities that treat water from two sources, the Cape Fear River and Glenville Lake. With two plants and two water sources, our community has the benefi t of multiple alternatives during water emergencies as was the case in January. In addition, through strategic planning and progressive operations, our plants have the treatment capacity to meet our communities growing needs. • Our annual water quality report is distributed to customers each May. The report and information about our water treatment process is also available at the PWC website www.faypwc.com. We have and will continue to take numerous precautions to reduce the chance of another water emergency; unfortunately, we cannot promise that it will not happen again. What we can promise you is PWC is committed to providing the highest quality and most reliable services to our customers and we will continuously evaluate how we may better serve you. Lou Olivera,Public Works Commis- sion chairman. COMMENTS? editor@upandcomingweekly.com. FEBRUARY 9-15, 2011 UCW 5 is something you do, and effect is the result of what you do. You are no doubt understanding why English is such a challenge for native speakers and others alike. A quirky little website called MIStupid.com has this to say about English as a “crazy” language: “There is no egg in eggplant nor ham in hamburger; neither apple nor pine in pineapple. English muffi ns weren’t invented in England nor French fries in France. Sweetmeats are candies while sweetbreads, which aren’t sweet, are meat. “We take English for granted. But if we explore its paradoxes, we fi nd that quicksand can work slowly, boxing rings are square and a Guinea pig is neither from Guinea nor a pig. And why is it that writers write but fi ngers don’t fi ng, grocers don’t groce and hammers don’t ham? If the plural of tooth is teeth, why isn’t the plural of booth beeth?...If teachers taught, why didn’t preachers praught? If a vegetarian eats vegetables, what does a humanitarian eat?... “In what language do people recite at a play and play at a recital? Ship by truck and send cargo by ship? Park on driveways and drive on parkways? Have noses that run and feet that smell? How can a slim chance and a fat chance be the same, while a wise man and a wise guy are opposites? You have to marvel at the unique lunacy of a language in which your house can burn up as it burns down… “English was invented by people, not computers, and it refl ects the creativity of the human race (which, of course, isn’t a race at all.) That is why, when the stars are out, they are visible, but then the lights are out, they are invisible. And why, when I wind my watch, I start it, but when I wind up this essay, I end it? English is a silly language — it doesn’t know if it’s coming or going.” Thanks, MIStupid. My mother and grandmother would have just loved it! MARGARET DICKSON,Contributing Writer. COMMENTS? editor@upandcomingweekly.com