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John Barrs
March 26th, 2009, 06:17 PM
This was an exciting round for me at least, dealt and sent defs in UK and
harvested votes in USA - evebtulally persuaded my computer to connect



Chuck Emery scored 6 and (as he anticipated) is our next dealer The real
winners are Mike Shefler and Judy Madnick with 5 points each

Each dictionary I saw made the point that my word has been used for varying
unconnected meanings. I came across it in William Cowper - asking for
toothbrushes, two of which should be with hooked bristles for scurryfunging.
The one I chose (#19) earned a D3 and was in OED but my favourite was
"(Maine colloquialism?) a hasty tidying of the house between the time you
see a neighbor coming and the time she knocks on the door" from "Obscure
Words" © 2008 by Michael A. Fischer

JohnnyB (using DIXOBASE)


1. [Obs.] pumice
Voted for by Hart [From Tim Lodge who voted for 4 and 12] and scores [1 + 0]
= 1

2. Grime or squalor
Voted for by Emery, Schultz [From Chris Carson who voted for 4 and 20] and
scores [2 + 0] = 2

3. parasitism upon several hosts
Voted for by nobody [From Russ Heimerson who voted for 14 and 19*] and
scores [0 + 2] = 2*

4. to remove unwanted details by blurring
Voted for by Carson, Lodge, Stevens, Widdis, Kornelis, van Gans [From Chuck
Emery who voted for 2 and 5] and scores [6 + 0] = 6

5. nonsense; confused mixture of unrelated things
Voted for by Cunningham, Bourne, Emery, Keating, Stevens [From Judy Madnick
who did not vote ] and scores [5 + 0] = 5

6. a path along a canal or river used by animals towing boats
Voted for by nobody [From Dan Widdis who voted for 4 and 11] and scores [0 +
0] = 0

7. a form of canine mange chiefly affecting curly-haired breeds
Voted for by Kornelis [From Dodi Schultz who voted for 2 and 20] and scores
[1 + 0] = 1

8. A variety of jellyfish found along shallow water off the eastern coast
of South America
Voted for by nobody [From Scott Crom who did not vote ] and scores [0 + 0] =


9. a: sheep dip (vermin removing bath, the liquid used therein), hence b:
bad alcoholic drink
Voted for by nobody [From Marijke van Gans who voted for 4 and 13] and
scores [0 + 0] = 0

10. an edible mushroom, having usually a bright yellow cap covered with
irregular red spots. It has a distinct volva at the base, generally an upper
ring on the stalk, and yellow spores
Voted for by Abell, Shepherdson [From Hugo Kornelis who voted for 4 and 7]
and scores [2 + 0] = 2

11. a minor character in several works of Albert Camus, usually providing an
absurdist counterfoil to the main character[s]; hence - nonsense
Voted for by Bourne, Widdis, Weltz [From Mike Shefler who voted for 16 and
19*] and scores [3 + 2] = 5*

12. a white fungus, curled at the top into a shape resembling the bowl of a
pipe, hence its common name of "Indian pipes"
Voted for by Lodge, Shepherdson [From Guerri Stevens who voted for 4 and 5]
and scores [2 + 0] = 2

13. a disease of evergreen trees commonly occurring in northern England and
Scotland
Voted for by van Gans [From Tony Abell who voted for 10 and 19*] and scores
[1 + 2] = 3*

14. [Obs.] a rough cleaning utensil used for scouring metal and other hard
surfaces
Voted for by Heimerson [From Dick Weltz who voted for 11 and 17] and scores
[1 + 0] = 1

15. the field vole (Microtus agrestis), local name S England
Voted for by Cunningham [From Tim Bourne who voted for 5 and 11] and scores
[1 + 0] = 1

16. [Scots] a pejorative name for a person from Carlisle
Voted for by Shefler [From Dave Cunningham who voted for 5 and 15] and
scores [1 + 0] = 1

17. a thief, esp. one who steals food
Voted for by Keating, Weltz [From Toni Savage who did not vote ] and scores
[2 + 0] = 2

18. a cosmetic for hiding wrinkles
Voted for by nobody [From Nancy Shepherdson who voted for 10 and 12] and
scores [0 + 0] = 0

19. to wriggle about
Voted for by Abell, Shefler, Heimerson [From OED (Compact Ed 1972) who voted
for 11 and 020] and scores [3 + 0] = D3

20. genital lice
Voted for by Carson, Schultz, Hart [From Paul Keating who voted for 5 and
17] and scores [3 + 0] = 3

##. -- No Def Submitted --
[From Jim Hart who voted for 1 and 20] and scores [0 + 0] = 0


Internal Virus Database is out of date.
Checked by AVG - www.avg.com
Version: 8.0.238 / Virus Database: 270.11.18/2009 - Release Date: 03/18/09
07:17:00

Judy Madnick
March 26th, 2009, 06:27 PM
<< Chuck Emery scored 6 and (as he anticipated) is our next
<< dealer The real
<< winners are Mike Shefler and Judy Madnick with 5 points each

Gosh, that's the best news I've had in a long time!

I apologize for not voting -- to be honest, I thought I had. But now that I am looking at the definitions...I realize that i didn't vote. <sigh>

Judy

Dodi Schultz
March 26th, 2009, 06:56 PM
Results seem to have come through here as a binary attachment. No idea
why...

Chuck
March 26th, 2009, 10:13 PM
I was more anticipating a 7 considering Dick Weltz's contribution. With
a clear lead of 2 points I thought I was comfortably in.

The Opera, which was to be accurate "Opera to Go" was extremely amusing
and well worth the trip to see it.

Dodi Schultz
March 26th, 2009, 11:22 PM
Earlier, I wrote:

>> Results seem to have come through here as a binary attachment. No
>> idea why...

I know why now. It was what I presume was a copyright symbol (it didn't
come through that way), which isn't part of the ASCII character set
(Alt-nnn) and isn't recognized by CompuServe.

--DS

Paul Keating
March 27th, 2009, 11:52 AM
Because the header says the encoding is quoted-printable, which CIS calls
binary; and that in turn was triggered by the copyright symbol in the last
line of paragraph 3.

--
Paul Keating
The Hague

----- Original Message -----
From: "Dodi Schultz" <SCHULTZ (AT) compuserve (DOT) com>
Subject: [Dixonary] Rnd 1990 SCURRIFUNGE Results



>> Results seem to have come through here as a binary attachment. No idea
why...

schultz@compuserve.com
March 27th, 2009, 12:39 PM
>> ...triggered by the copyright symbol in the last
>> line of paragraph 3.

Yes, Paul, as I said in my follow-up posting--I realized
that when TAPCIS fetched the attachment. (I have the software
set to bring me, initially, only headers on attachments,
which are more often than not things I don't want to see.)

--Dodi




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Marijke van Gans
March 27th, 2009, 10:14 PM
Johnny,

2009/3/26 John Barrs <johnb (AT) john-barrs (DOT) co.uk>:
>
> but my favourite was
> "(Maine colloquialism?) *a hasty tidying of the house between the time you
> see a neighbor coming and the time she knocks on the door" from "Obscure
> Words" © 2008 by Michael A. Fischer

I like that too... why didn't you pick it?

> [From OED (Compact Ed 1972) who voted
> for *11 and 020]

Clever... i want a dictionary like that.

--Regards, Marijke
http://www.surd.info/marijke/

JohnnyB
March 29th, 2009, 03:06 PM
Marijke,

Re your first point


>
> > but my favourite was "(Maine colloquialism?) *a hasty
> tidying of the
> > house between the time you see a neighbor coming and the time she
> > knocks on the door" from "Obscure Words" <coprt> 2008 by Michael
> A. Fischer
>
> I like that too... why didn't you pick it?
>

I wasn't sure whether that would count as a dictionary

Re your second point
>
> > [From OED (Compact Ed 1972) who voted for *11 and 020]
>
> Clever... i want a dictionary like that.
>

Of course having a son working at OED helps, although he wasn't born when
that edition was produced

but in reality, how about a software bug that I didn't spot -- I use the
word record to hold other info and forgot to "not print" it as a 'normal'
record

JohnnyB

Internal Virus Database is out of date.
Checked by AVG - www.avg.com
Version: 8.0.238 / Virus Database: 270.11.18/2009 - Release Date: 03/18/09
07:17:00

Marijke van Gans
March 29th, 2009, 08:33 PM
Johnny,

On Sun, Mar 29, 2009 at 20:06, JohnnyB <johnnybarrs (AT) gmail (DOT) com> wrote:
>
> I wasn't sure whether that would count as a dictionary

I think the rules are extremely flexible. We've had many colloquial
and technical glossaries, Mrs Byrne, Hackers jargon file, etc.

> *Of course *having a son working at OED

Really? Wow...

Do they still have every quotation on a 4" by 6" card? Are they
tempted to use e.g. Google for recent instances of use of a word?

> how about a software bug that I didn't spot

Aha! Thought you might be cooking something up... Is there a stable
version to test drive?

> -- I use the
> word record to hold other info and forgot to "not print" it as a 'normal'
> record

Recognised the symptom --- takes a programmer to spot a programmer in action ;^)

Tim B
March 30th, 2009, 02:52 AM
> Do they still have every quotation on a 4" by 6" card? Are they
> tempted to use e.g. Google for recent instances of use of a word?

I've been reading a book called "A Damp Squid" which I would think
anyone here would find interesting, and which mentions the OED a lot. It
also talks a lot about a "Corpus" held electronically, to which OED (and
I think other dictionary compilers) have access.

I doubt if they still use index cards! The brother of an old boss of
mine used to work there, but I doubt if I could contact him after so long.

Best wishes,
Tim B.

Marijke van Gans
March 31st, 2009, 04:12 AM
Johnny,

On Mon, Mar 30, 2009 at 15:21, JohnnyB <johnnybarrs (AT) gmail (DOT) com> wrote:
>
> the database engine (which is what I
> worked with for the last phase of my working life) [...] (I have
> been in and out of programming, mostly in, since 1962 - I have written
> software in more than 10 languages during that span - initially scientific
> research, then commercial software but including device drivers etc).

I see you're the real thing, a professional. I'm just just dabbling,
since 1980, few languages (mainly x86 and other asm, C, C++, bit of
perl) and i've never managed to find paid work as a programmer. Wrote
shareware, now freeware, and coded things up for my math study.

> go into the pile in the sky where good software ends up for it is limited to
> the 16/32 bit windows platforms.

Dixomatic too. I've could have made it 32-bit win but remembered at
least one player (Dodi) was still on Windows 3.1, so made it as
inclusive as possible.

> Secondly, because of my limitations the 'dixobase' program isn't as good as
> it should be, and I always run your dixomat in parallel - just in case I
> find a bug in mine that would interfere with the game I always have yours as
> backup

I'm honored :)

Let's hope old dixomat proves worthy of that trust (i remember you
testing it pretty thoroughly at the time).

> The son working at OED has just changed career and is now (as of very
> recently) no longer there.

Hope he enjoys what he's doing.

> In one sense, one doesn't get "editions"any more
> for the database is constatntly being updated and so tomorrow's dictionary
> is not the same as today's. It has been like that for nearly 30 years now -
> leastways, in 1979 they were discussing abandoning the "edition" concept

Yes, at university (2002-05) we had free access to the OED site, and
the online version is updated every day, you can even ask to see
today's additions. I'd give my eyes' teeth (if i still had them) for
access...

Dodi Schultz
March 31st, 2009, 09:29 AM
MVG> I've could have made it 32-bit win but remembered at least one player
(Dodi) was still on Windows 3.1...

Hey, Marijke, the big event in your absence: I moved up! (To Win 98SE.) I
still use the DOS-based AutoDealer, though. ;-)

Paul Keating
March 31st, 2009, 12:02 PM
> I'd give my eyes' teeth (if i still had them) for access...

Marijke,

If you're still in the UK, you can probably get access via your public
library. You don't have to go there, you just need a library card and a
browser. There was once on the oed.com site, but no longer seems to be, a
list of UK libraries that subscribe. A large number do. The current
instructions are as follows:
1.. Go to your library's web site from where you can click on a link to
access the OED Online with your library card. If you cannot see this link,
ask your librarian for details.
2.. You will be taken to a web page that prompts you to enter your library
card number.
3.. Enter your full library card number in the box provided to gain access
to the OED Online.
--
Paul Keating
The Hague

----- Original Message -----
From: "Marijke van Gans" <gmarijke (AT) gmail (DOT) com>

France International
March 31st, 2009, 03:51 PM
Still using Wordstar?

<gd&r>

----- Original Message -----
From: "Dodi Schultz" <SCHULTZ (AT) compuserve (DOT) com>
To: <Dixonary (AT) googlegroups (DOT) com>
Sent: Tuesday, March 31, 2009 9:29 AM
Subject: [Dixonary] Rnd 1990 SCURRIFUNGE Results


>
>
> MVG> I've could have made it 32-bit win but remembered at least one player
> (Dodi) was still on Windows 3.1...
>
> Hey, Marijke, the big event in your absence: I moved up! (To Win 98SE.) I
> still use the DOS-based AutoDealer, though. ;-)
>

Marijke van Gans
March 31st, 2009, 03:55 PM
Dodi,
>
> Hey, Marijke, the big event in your absence: I moved up! (To Win 98SE.)

Good choice, that's pretty stable. In fact i've got it on my laptop
that i stopped using only a few months ago. When i bought that (2001
or 2002) i insisted they give me 98SE rather than XP.

My current everyday machine is a desktop (well,
floortop-standing-on-its-short-side really, what's that, tower?) The
Windows partition has Vista Home Premium. I'm getting quite used to
the transparent-effect window furniture. And it hasn't yet crashed on
me the way other Windows versions used to, almost daily.

> I still use the DOS-based AutoDealer, though. *;-)

Good! I like it there's so much choice in dealer software here.

--Regards, Marijke

Marijke van Gans
March 31st, 2009, 04:04 PM
Paul,

> If you're still in the UK, you can probably get access via your public
> library. You don't have to go there, you just need a library card and a
> browser. [...]

Yes UK, yes library card, yes browser.

That sounds like excellent advice, i'll try it out.

--Regards, Marijke

Paul Keating
March 31st, 2009, 04:09 PM
Succes!

--
Paul Keating
The Hague

----- Original Message -----
From: "Marijke van Gans" <gmarijke (AT) gmail (DOT) com>
> That sounds like excellent advice, i'll try it out.

Chuck
March 31st, 2009, 04:40 PM
Ooooo. It works in the dominions as well. Toronto Public Library has
it and my card got me in.

Thanks ever so much,

Chuck

Marijke van Gans wrote:
> Paul,
>
>
>> If you're still in the UK, you can probably get access via your public
>> library. You don't have to go there, you just need a library card and a
>> browser. [...]
>>
>
> Yes UK, yes library card, yes browser.
>
> That sounds like excellent advice, i'll try it out.
>
> --Regards, Marijke
>
>
>

Paul Keating
March 31st, 2009, 04:54 PM
Great stuff! Glad to have been of assistance, however tangentially.

--
Paul Keating
The Hague
----- Original Message -----
From: Chuck
Subject: [Dixonary] Re: OED Online access


Ooooo. It works in the dominions as well. Toronto Public Library has it and my card got me in.

Thanks ever so much,

Dodi Schultz
March 31st, 2009, 06:53 PM
WordStar, Mike?

Yecch.

I NEVER.

Still using WordPerfect, though!

--Dodi

Judy Madnick
March 31st, 2009, 07:04 PM
<< Still using WordPerfect, though!

Same here!

Judy