Inconceivable: Think words don't matter? Here's why you'd be wrong. . .

In The Princess Bride, Inigo Montoya reacts to Vizzini’s continual use of the word, ‘inconceivable’ by finally saying, “You keep using that word. I do not think it means what you think it means.”

I find myself in the same position today as regards the phrase, “DEI Hire.”

It seems to me, if you’re going to use that phrase as a pejorative — which one political group is very much doing these days — you ought to be:

1. Clear on what it means, and

2. Confident that the person you’re trying to tar with that brush is actually an inferior candidate.

It looks to me like a fail on both counts.

When you look at our current presidential candidates, one of whom is being derided as a DEI Hire, the contrast is pretty clear.

Education: The “DEI Hire” is a law school graduate, the other barely squeaked out with a BS degree.

Overall career arc: The “DEI Hire” served as a prosecutor before getting elected as District Attorney, then Attorney General, and then was elected to the US Senate and the Vice Presidency. She had to work for all she accomplished.

The other inherited wealth, and inherited a real estate business. He tried to develop other businesses in his own right, but they all failed and many were involved in fraud. Oh, and he starred in a reality TV show.

Background: The “DEI Hire” was the child of two immigrant parents who attended public school, the other was a couple of generations away from immigrant forbears, whose early life was full of privilege.

The phrase “DEI Hire” is apparently meant to imply that the DEI hiree is less qualified than others who are not members of minority or protected groups. Do you think it applies here? I sure don’t.

Because, you know, words matter.

I ran into a more entertaining example of where words matter just this morning.

My kids and I love word games, and we regularly play the word puzzles published by the New York Times. Every morning, as a way to jump-start my sleepy brain, I do a couple of quick puzzles.

One of them is called Connections. They present 16 words, which the player has to assign into four categories of four words each. Sometimes it’s pretty straightforward. Sometimes the categories get squirrelly. Today was one of those squirrelly days. (If you play this puzzle, don’t worry about spoilers, because by the time you receive this newsletter, this particular puzzle will be history.)

Today, one of the words was solfége (without the accent, because the puzzle can’t do those). I knew the word, because I had some seriously specialized knowledge. But the others complained — and with some validity in my opinion — that a word like that shouldn’t be used in a puzzle aimed for general audiences. Especially as the category it fit in was a bit punny, which makes it even more complicated.

For those of you who don’t know, solfége refers to the method of teaching music using do, re, mi, etc., and other mnemonic devices. To put it in context, the scenes in The Sound of Music when Maria and the Von Trapp children were running around Salzburg singing “Doe, a deer,” that’s an example of solfége.

I only knew it because my mother was a piano teacher and I spent quite a few hours every week hanging out in the music school while she taught, and eavesdropping on lessons all over the building, including solfége.

Just for fun, can you figure out how solfége fits into a category that also includes fish, justice, and libra?

Wait for it. . . They’re all associated with scales. BA DA BOOM!

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What I’m Reading

Dedication to Murder by Lauren Elliott

This is the ninth book (of ten so far) in Elliott’s Beyond the Page series.

Addie Greyborne has moved to a small New England town — one founded by her ancestors — after receiving an inheritance from a great aunt. When Addie moved into the large house that her aunt left her, she found books. Lots of books. Enough to start a bookstore with.

So she opened Beyond the Page. But mysteries seem to follow her wherever she goes, and in Dedication to Murder, a mystery follows her down the aisle and blows up her wedding.

Addie manages to figure things out, but only at great personal cost.

Murder Under the Mistletoe by Erica Ruth Nubauer

An addition to the Jane Wunderly series, this story takes place at Yuletide. Jane and Redvers are celebrating the holidays — their first Christmas together — with his family, and he had been looking forward to presenting his fiancee and having the family’s attention.

But that’s not happening. Instead, it turns out his father is recently engaged as well, to Evelyn, a woman Jane believes can’t be trusted. Add some long-lived local feuds to the mix, and it looks like the season of good cheer is going bad fast. Jane and Redvers definitely have their work cut out for them if they’re going to salvage this Christmas.

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Notable Quotes

This quote made me LOL when I read it recenctly.

When I first came to Maine I was leaving behind a husband so mindbendingly atrocious that my marriage license should have had a skull and crossbones stamped on it.

- Death by Chocolate Malted Milkshake by Sarah Graves

I had a husband like that once! (I absolutely do not recommend it…)

While we’re on the subject of husbands. . . here’s one from one of my favorite characters, Amelia Peabody, who has unique views on matrimony and the relations between the sexes. (Keep in mind her stories span from the end of the 1800s to post-World War I.)

I never meant to marry. In my opinion, a woman born in the last half of the nineteenth century of the Christian era suffered from enough disadvantages without willfully embracing another. That is not to say that I did not occasionally indulge in daydreams of romantic encounters; for I was as sensible as any other female of the visible attractions of the opposite sex. But I never expected to meet a man who was my match, and I had no more desire to dominate a spouse than to be ruled by him. Marriage, in my view, should be a balanced stalemate between equal adversaries.

- The Last Camel Died at Noon by Elizabeth Peters

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Wise Words

Ready for this week’s game? Your mission, should you choose to accept it, is to select the word that’s more appropriate to fill in the blank. Your choices are amiss / remiss.

“Florence is a third cousin of my father’s.” Ginger stared ahead blankly. “I’ve been _____ in not looking her up these last four years that I’ve been back in England.

- Murder at Yuletide by Lee Strauss

As always, we’ll review the choices and present the better word choice next week.