New Gothic Lesson, coming up...

I've realized that I'm just a terrible blogger. I have lots of things to blog about, I'm just usually too busy doing them to blog about them.

In any case, I'm starting to get a little feedback on my new Gothic for Goths series, thanks in no small part to my good friends on Facebook spreading the word! I also finally got around to actually creating a YoutTube channel and all that fun stuff, and already I have two subscribers! Wo0t!

I'm off now to work on the third lesson, which will deal with some irregular verbs and the dative case, and will center around the Goths' Night Out.

Getting ready for Imbolc...

Work for the week is over, and now the real work begins...

We're hosting our (mostly) annual Imbolc party tomorrow night, and i've got to get cooking!

First on the agenda:

Coconut Snow Oranges

			(1/2 batch)
6	pkts	unflavoured gelatin	3
1 1/2	cups	cold water	3/4
2	16oz. cans	coconum cream (not coconut milk!)	1
4	11oz. cans	mandarin oranges, drained (reserve syrup)	2
7	cups	sugar	3 1/2
2	pints	heavy whipping cream	1
1/2	tsp	vanilla	1/4

Dissolve the gelatin in the cold water. Set aside.

Drain two cans of mandarin oranges and reserve the syrup. Add water to the reserved syrup to make 6 cups. Combine the syrup with 6 cups of the sugar in a medium-large saucepan and slowly bring to a boil over medium heat. Boil for five minutes. Add syrup and coconut cream to the gelatin and stir until gelatin is completely dissolved. Let cool to lukewarm (105ºF is about right).

If you have a KitchenAid, this next part will be a snap. Otherwise, just go out and buy whipped cream from the store. Take your metal KitchenAid bowl and put it outside (or in the freezer) until it is very cold. This is why we do these things for Imbolc in Minnesota! Depending on the size of your KitchenAid bowl, you may want to do this in two batches. Add the heavy cream to the bowl. Using the whisk beater, beat the cream on speed 4 while gradually adding the remaining sugar and the vanilla. Increase the speed gradually to 8, stopping every few seconds to check to see if peaks are forming properly. Once a stiff peak forms, you have whipped cream. Do not overwhip the cream! (It will become butter.)
If you are just making a couple pans of this stuff (9" x 14" cake pans will do fine), fold the whipped cream into the lukewarm gelatin. Press mandarin orange slices into the dish - they will sink through the whipped cream and rest on the jello, and sort of glow. Chill for 4 hours and serve.

If you want to be really facy about this, though (and i recommend it!), fold half the whipped cream into the gelatin and mix thoroughly. Then spoon the rest of the whipped cream into individual ramikins and pour the gelatin over it, then garnish each with 4 - 5 orange slices. Chill for 3 - 4 hours before serving.

This should make about 24 servings.

Peat will also be making his famous Ginger Carrots, the recipe for which is in the name... Ginger, and carrots. Add lots of butter and brown sugar, and you're done. It's trickier than that, of course, but i can't give away secrets that aren't mine.

Other things in the back of my mind are:

• Mandarin Martinis
• Screwdrivers
• Sweet Potato French Fries
• Masoor Daal
• Apricot Jello Shots
• something with peppers?
• any other random red, orange, or yellow things i happen to run across while grocery shopping tomorrow morning.

Ginger v2.0 and Judi "with an i"

So it appears we're getting two new chickens from The Chicken Martyr (no, seriously, "...she does good things...") named Ginger-Georgia and Judi-with-an-i. They're 1 1/2 year old Buff Orpington twins who were rescued from a gloomy basement.

Their names are a little hard to pronounce, and we already had a Ginger. Since they're the Buff Orpingtons that Phyllis has so long coveted, i think she should get to name them.

I feel bad for them, though, coming to our coop, because while it's a little more spacious and friendly than a basement, they've never been outside before, and when i left the house this morning it was six freakin' degrees below freakin' zero! And i don't even want to mention the wind chill of -30. And yes, as screwey as the weather has been this year, tomorrow it's supposed to be in the 40s. 50s on Saturday!

04.20.03.10.12.23.50

And another while. I have made progress, though, having added quite a few new words due to translating parts of my website into maltжέgj, dlatci, norðısca, latinovesa, and various other languages. Rather than embarking on a long discussion of it now, i would rather just paste it in here and refer to the updated lexicon any changes.

The above images of the ginkgo are from the 本草綱目 (Běn Cǎo Gāng Mù, Pen Ts’ao Kang Mu), or the Great Catalogue of Herbs, still used in Chinese Medicine today. Compiled by 李時珍 (Lǐ Shízhēn, Li Shih-chen) in 1578, it is among the most invaluable extant books on Chinese herbalism. The ginkgo is a remarkable tree, being in its own class of gymnosperms (Kingdom: Plantae, Division: Spermatophyta, Subdivision: Gymnospermae, Class: Ginkgoopsida, Order: Ginkgoales, Family: Ginkgoaceae, Genus: Ginkgo, Species: biloba), and is not closely related to any other plant species. It is unique among trees, being neither deciduous nor evergreen (hence Goethe’s reference in the second verse, above). It is also known in chinese as the silver apricot (銀杏, yín xìng, yin hsing).

Below is Goethe’s original manuscript of the poem above, which can be found today in the Goethe Museum in Düsseldorf, complete with the two leaves he pasted on it himself from a ginkgo tree in the garden at the castle in Heidelberg.

εc ul ac imbiláj ul gγ́nco u ul 本草綱目o, rélεb ul bórga clag ac жarc u, εc rac ðroж calc úli nad scan djungwó жtral ðrax oc. rac scrav lìжudjέn íli avíl 1578 oж, e εc paj am ac narán жal oc blai εc clag u djungwó жarc жtral ðrax έloì. εc ul gγ́nco am gráva víctro, εc calc mεs frantж i ac bwílio dat u (djεжt arán: Plantae, cεrðíð: Spermatophyta, cεrðíðilà: Gymnospermae, frantж: Ginkgoopsida, cwaðrat: Ginkgoales, mávilà: Ginkgoaceae, djip: Ginkgo, pγtá: biloba), εc blεg paj ðέfni fórwið ac pγtá íli жarc u. εc paj ac víctro u ámεst, ðrímiέm εc blεg bláca-жafát blεg gwéðul-gnir, (ðrímiέm εm guþa o ul sàpatál ul gji dai bjir e). blγnþ xányu glơd paj að ul ђέbna zaníж.

iþ εc ul urál narám nascáj guþa u ul em cveð u, rac culóm calc úli nad ul guþa nascáj arán e, εc calc dísλdorf e, dai bláca oc, dγd fástnar gúþa calc að, am gγ́nco víctro o ul gwárxo e ul bórga márga a háidλbεrg e.

Also...

Below is a painting of the ginkgo by Minneapolis-based artist Michelle Layland. More examples of her work can be found on her website at:

iþ εc am zεndj nascáj ul gγ́nco víctro u, nascáj lað mγжέl léland íli mγ́niápolγs o. patáx rac cúlεn ac εlέђam nascáj u pεl u wέbsait alx pεl u:

http://msfledermaus.whosiswhatsis.com

[Editor's Note: whosiswhatsis.com is no more, but Michelle's work can still be found today by visiting http://www.msfledermaus.com/]

04.20.03.01.31.07.56

So it's been a while. Most of the past year has been spent working on τsœɧısca, and little progress has been made in maltжέgj except, as you can see, i did away with § and replaced it with ж.

I think i mentioned this before, perhaps when i was talking about those locative adverbs (up, down, in, out, off, on, &c), but just to stress in case i haven't: Infinitives must directly follow any verb that modifies them, i.e. djogóж tжoc jơg.

04.20.02.03.04.12.38

One slight revision that’s been bothering me: I have changed the broad l to λ. It only occurs in the words tέfλðu and §λþ, but it was annoying me.

Just for fun, i’m going to have another go at translating the Vǫluspá. Here goes:

[Old Norse]
Hlióðs bið ec allar helgar kindir,
meiri oc minni, mǫgo Heimdalar.
vildo at ec, Valfǫðr, vel fyrtelia
forn spiǫll fira, þau er fremst um man.

[My original translation]
Aþ bad jơg cúluì bjólεt ac-rata,
bórga e íla ac-hanác-ráta Hémdal-u
dγd-gjot clεg jơg, Válfóðr, bjólεt ðac
vεlc ac-gú§e ac-hanác-u, calc εc narán tεmtíð clεg glácsi-jơg.

[My current translation]
Bad jơg aþ að mέlεm o, cúluì ac ráta bjólεt
bórga e íla, mέlεm hanác ac ráta Hémdal u.
Dγd gjot mέlεm clεg ðac bjólεt jơg, Válfơðr, mέlεm a
ac gú§e að ac hanác u, calc εc narán tεmtíð clεg glácsi jơg.

04.20.02.01.30.14.41

I’ve noticed that i’ve had some confusion as to the order of genitive constructs when eliminating the preposition. I see that i’ve used both áran clag (library) and djε§t lað (king). In keeping with the order that makes the most sense to me and the correlatives, the official rule shall now be: genetive particle first followed by subject. Hence:

library – clag arán	ruler – djε§t lað	dlatci – dlát§i glơd	bedtime – caiþ ðlai
school – bul arán	student – bul lað	german – doit§ glơd	morning – tεmέt (ðlai)

and so on... And note the invention of caiþ, the word for sleep.

Well, time to revise the lexicon again.

04.20.02.01.19.10.43

Just some words i’ve been tossing around in my head. Let’s see if we can come up with something for them to mean... What words do i still need? Prepositional adverbs might be good; i have a few, but i’m not sure if i like them. Then again nothing beats good old fashioned nouns and adjectives. Then again, probably i should just hold onto them until i come up with something i need.

caiþ
mεc
brau
stax
vlaið

Anyway, moving on, i foresee a sort of revolution coming on for malt§έgj... i’m thinking of merging the language, at least language family-wise, with barac. Of course the grammar is completely different, but i think a few cognates would help along barac’s development as well as give an interesting sense of history for the two. Of course, this won’t really affect malt§έgj very much, but i thought i’d bring it up anyway.

04.20.02.01.10.11.52

A couple new words spawned from an email i wrote to a friend about malt§έgj:

vlag = to teach (hence,
lað vlag = teacher,
lað rac vlag = student, &c.)
jiv = beer
nac = now (see above)

nos dyd ðac almítra, “mεn ðac jalc að ðblεucþ έloi.” e dyd bran pul mεs talp e dyd culóm ut ul ga§ág a, e dyd t§ơ§ am wára parþ ap. e dyd ðac pul am harέc bórga oc: lơ bad t§ơ§ ðblεucþ naur o§ mέlεm að, mεn grol§ pul it, mal lơ εc pul u ac bweð xa§ e tεlx. e lơ t§ơ§ pul u ac fwi naur o§ mέlεm εð, mεn gεlc mέlεm pul a, mal lơ dyd nag patáx ul styx huct mέlεm að, úla, rac stáfad calc pul u ac áro§ e. e ðac pul naur o§ mέlεm a, cwégir pul a, mal lơ dyd nag patáx pul u harέc naxád a§ mέlεm u ac vlaj, lεf naxád a§ batár yen u gwárxo. ðrímiὲm lεf anácne ðblεucþ mέlεm að, t§a nag clớgεx pul mέlεm að. lεf εc pul mέlεm u dúmbwe i, t§a εc pul mέlεm u xóre§à i. lεf t§ơc mεs pul mέlεm u ac §ála a, e §adé pul ul ac ro§ að narán javlé jadío iþ (calc?) rac báralà, t§a nag t§ơc na§ pul mέlεm u ac rεnáþ a, e báralà a§ parþ að parþ u fástnar o mó§arà a. nag scrav ðblεucþ úli ac ðrax cúluì að mέlεm a, ðrímiεm nag patáx mέlεm apþan ac jomεn að mεs baxέf u, e, úla apþan oc, cleg nag patáx mέlεm ðráupnir am þrε§ að báldrεf u baxέf u. rεb §él, mέlεm u §ax vul, lơ nag cúlεn mέlεm tárεx ðblεucþ u wára e ðblεucþ u bjólεt að, ðrímiεm εc nan bjólεt, clεg lơ blánaþ mέlεm mεs bwíliò að e t§ơc ut ðblεucþ u lacþ §afát o, som alm múndi e, ùlarán e nag hahár mέlεm, rεb blεg mέlεm u hahár cúluì að, e nag wahár, rεb blεg mέlεm u ac §iþ cúluì að.

Yay! Well, now that that’s all over with, and the new words have been added to the lexicon, we can finally move on...

04.20.02.01.10.01.40

I’m again starting to feel the need for some sort of alphabet for malt§έgj. Don’t worry though, i’ll try to keep it to myself for as long as possible.

I think the word mεs should be considered an article of some sort. A reflexive demonstrative adjective, if you will. Something like the difference between hennes and sin in swedish or hæra and sǽna in τsœxısca. Only it can apply to any pronoun, no matter the person, because it is only used in conjunction with the pronoun it modifies if that pronoun is the subject. Hence,

I saw my sister = Dγd culóm jơg mεs adína að. But,

He saw my sister = Dγd culóm pul jơg u adína að.

Okay, i’m feeling better about that one now. So what’s next? I am still a bit concerned about clauses regarding this latest nutso sentence structure craze. But that’s probably something i’m going to have to worry about later when [REDACTED].

I need some simple words to break down some complex ideas. At first i was all about compound words like “úla ðlai o§” to mean “when” and such, but it’s getting really annoying. Some new words that i need:

who	-	-	the other person	the same person	everyone	anyone	someone	noöne
what	this	that	the other thing	the same thing	everything	anything	something	nothing
when	now	then	the other time	the same time	always	anytime	sometime	never
where	here	there	yonder	the same place	everywhere	anywhere	somewhere	nowhere
why	herefore	therefore	-	-	-	-	-	-
how	-	-	-	-	-	anyway	somehow	no way
how much	this much	that much	-	the same amount	-	any	some	none

Of course i modified the traditional esperantoèsqueness of this table, which i actually worked out quite nicely in dlatci, but i don’t think that malt§έgj, being a more random and a priori language, really requires too many words. By the way, can i mention just in passing that I actually came up with this table for dlatci and had it all worked out long before i ever heard of the esperanto correlatives, and it really pissed me off when i found out about them. Fortunately not too much, however, since mine are better! Therefore:

mlau lað, mlað	-	-	úlot lað, uláð	the same person	everyone	anyone	someone	blεg lað, blað
mlau ðrax, mlax	úli (ðrax)	úla (ðrax)	úlot (ðrax)	the same thing	everything	anything	something	blεg ðrax, blax
mlau ðlai, mlai	úli ðlai, nac	úla ðlai, naur	úlot ðlai	the same time	always	anytime	sometime	never
mlau arán, mlarán	úli arán	úla arán	úlot arán	the same place	everywhere	anywhere	somewhere	blarán
mlímiὲm	ðrímiὲm		-	-	-	-	-	blímiὲm
mlau cþið	úli cþið	úla cþið	-	-	-	anyway	somehow	blεg cþið
mlau mára	úli mára	úla mára	-	the same amount	-	any	some	blára

04.20.02.01.09.14.35

04.20.02.01.09.14.35

I believe i need to rethink the way certain words are put together, and really come up with something solid as far as sentence structure goes. I’m not sure why, but it’s really been bothering me the last couple of days. I think partly it has to do with adjectives: in particular, the demonstrative kind. So let’s analyze that for moment, if we can...

Let’s see... demon adjectives consist of:

am	(a)
ul	(the)
úli	(this)
úla	(that)
úlot	(the other)
calc	(that, which)
mlau	(what, which)
blεg	(no, none)
jơg u	(my, mine)
mέlεm u	(your, yours)
mεlmíne u	(your, yours)
pul u	(his)
pεl u	(her, hers)
paj u	(its)
jalc u	(our, ours)
parþ u	(their, theirs)

My brain is foggy today, and i think i might be coming down with some malevolent virus, so if i don’t make a whole lot of sense, or if i overlook something fundamental, forgive me. However, thinking on a much lower level like this actually opens me up to interesting new ideas, which i’ll most likely have to undo as soon as i’m well again.

My confusion lies herein: if we are to treat these words as adjectives, they should, naturally, follow the noun they modify. However, i have been preceding the noun with most of these, which is fine as long as we can establish a decent rule for it. The problem with the possessives, in particular, is that they contain a pseudo-suffixed preposition, which conflicts with any preposition the noun might be using. So my initial solution is to declare that all demonstrative adjectives precede the noun they modify. So using that idea, let me see what still bothers me about changing around this translation...

nos dyd ðac almítra, “mεn ðac jalc að ðblεucþ έloi.” e dyd bran pul mεs ul talp mεs e dyd culóm ut ul ga§ág a, e dyd t§ơ§ am wára parþ ap. e dyd ðac pul am harέc bórga oc: lơ bad t§ơ§ ðblεucþ úla ðlai o§ mέlεm að, mεn grol§ pul it, mal lơ εc pul u ac bweð pul u xa§ e tεlx. e lơ t§ơ§ pul u ac fwi pul u úla ðlai o§ mέlεm εð, mεn gεlc mέlεm pul a, mal lơ dyd nag patáx ul styx huct mέlεm að, úla, rac stáfad calc pul u ac áro§ e. e ðac pul úla ðlai o§ mέlεm a, cwégir pul a, mal lơ dyd nag patáx pul u harέc pul u naxád a§ mέlεm u ac vlaj mέlεm u a§, lεf naxád a§ batár yen u gwárxo a§. ðrímiὲm lεf anácne ðblεucþ mέlεm að, t§a nag clớgεx pul mέlεm að. lεf εc pul mέlεm u dúmbwe i mέlεm u, t§a εc pul mέlεm u xóre§à i mέlεm u. lεf t§ơc mεs pul mεs mέlεm u ac §ála a mέlεm u, e §adé pul ul ac ro§ að narán javlé jadío iþ (calc?) rac báralà, t§a nag t§ơc na§ pul na§ mέlεm u ac rεnáþ a mέlεm u, e báralà a§ parþ að parþ u fástnar o a§ mó§arà a parþ u...

Well, that looks a little different. New rules: adverbial particles (gads, i can’t even think of the proper names for things... those little end-of-the-sentence things that aren’t quite prepositions) will now DIRECTLY FOLLOW the verb they modify. This being a language with no changeable words, we have to stick related things as close together as possible so we can keep track of them!

Here’s an idea that just seeped out of my addled brain. It might be interesting one day to create an alternative malt§έgj language that would actually incorporate all the adverbs and particles and prepositions into their respective nouns and verbs and pronouns and such... the pronunciation would remain the same, but the orthography would change significantly... for instance instead of

e dyd bran mεs pul ul talp e dyd culóm ut ul ga§ág a, e dyd t§ơ§ am wára parþ ap.

one might write

e dydbran mεspul ultalp e dydculomut ulga§aga, e dydt§ơ§ amwara parþap.

or something vaguely similar that would allow for a slightly less rigid sentence structure. But that’s a project for a different day.

The other thing i wanted to take care of was a standardization of the orthography concerning diphthongs. I’ve been rather wishy-washy about it and i’d like to get something set in stone. I’m just not sure what. I think i’d feel a lot better about it if i had some other vowel that i could use for “y,” because right now it’s [ɪ] and [j] and [i]. The trouble is, i need something that has a full range of diacritics so i can indicate if it’s stressed or not. Perhaps ι? That would at least give me ι, ί, and ὶ, but it looks a little too similar to i, í, and ì. и, и́, ѝ? No. I can use some random character and play around with combining diacritics, too, i suppose. Then again there’s also ê, ế, and ề, but that seems a little excessive on the diacritic front. η, ή, ὴ? Maybe... or υ, ύ, ὺ. Yes, that does bring out that lovely welsh feel to it, even though it’s a greek letter.

Ευρηκα! How about i break a couple rules of what’s supposed to be a consonant and what’s supposed to be a vowel and i just use γ? Perfect.

So... γ will now represent the short i [ɪ], diphthongs will be formed with i, and glides will remain y. Similarly, although this isn’t as i’d planned it, diphthongs will be formed with u and glides with w. So mote it be!

Which means i have to go mess with the lexica again.

Ack. I forgot about the voiced velar fricative. That’s y too, and by rights it should have the first stab at γ. Too late now... that shall become...um...ђ? ג? That might look a little weird. But since i haven’t really used that letter yet that i can remember, i’ll just say that theoretically, should i ever use it, it will be ђ, just because i kinda like that letter. Then again, since it’s a consonant and i really don’t have to worry about diacritics and such, it could be just about anything. ğ perhaps. Actually, i’m not going to worry about it until i have a need for it.

04.20.02.01.07.13.08

A few rules to review, which i’m not sure if i’ve made rules before, or if i’m just breaking them now:

The plural particle ac shall now and evermore directly precede the noun it modifies.

The following rigid sentence structure shall hereby be adhered to:

– conjucntion – particle [§lþ – lơ – dyd – nag – cwarþ – blai – rac] – verb – adverb – (ac) subject (adjective) – (ac) temporal or spatial clause (adjective) (preposition) – secondary verb – (ac) direct object (adjective) (preposition) –

I think there are a few more things that will eventually fit into that diagram as well, but for now, let that serve as a model for all sentences until i can find something to add to it.

...ðrímiὲm lεf anácne ðblεucþ mέlεm að, t§a nag clớgεx pul mέlεm að. lεf εc pul dúmbwe i mέlεm u, t§a εc pul xóre§à i mέlεm u. lεf t§ơc pul mεs ac §ála a mέlεm u, e §adé pul ul ac ro§ narán javlé jadío iþ rac báralà, t§a nag t§ơc pul na§ ac rεnáþ a mέlεm u, e báralà parþ að fástnar a§ mó§arà a parþ u...

04.20.01.11.22.01.41

Okay, i’m back. I’ve updated the lexicon thus far and made a few slight corrections. Since the malt§έgj orthography is now pretty firmly established in somewhat standard characters, i see no reason to continue using the Chrysanthi Unicode font, as proud as i may be thereof; Times New Roman is capable of producing all the characters i need, and is somewhat more compact.

So, to continue...

...e ðac pul úla ðlai o§ mέlεm a, cwégir pul a, mal lơ dyd nag patáx harέc pul u naxád ac vlaj mέlεm u a§, lεf naxád batár yen u gwárxo a§.