Sunday June 27

Even without doing any research, I am 100% certain that "Kansas"
derives from a Choctaw word meaning "very flat land where the roads go
on forever and there's often a very strong wind in your face. Plus
it's waaay corn- and cow-intensive." Here's a picture of Kansas
terrain on an early, sunny, summer morning.

Spending substantial time with my Kiwi friend Clive, as I did today on
the bike (Eureka to Newton KS; 75 miles; long + flat + boring + strong-
wind-in-face = very hard ride -- I am very tired, and MIMAS), I've
been trying to attend to the subtleties of the Newzealandish tongue.
My hope is that with sufficient study and practice I might someday be
able to carry on a simple conversation in that language. It is clear
to me already that in order to do that, I'll have to solve a
fundamental linguistic mystery: What are the features or attributes
of a thing, or a condition, which render it (a) merely "bloody" (which
I gather is everything's default), versus (b) "f**king," versus (c)
"bloody f**king"? That's it -- there do not appear to be any finer
gradations beyond "thing," "mildly onerous thing," and "the most
outrageously onerous thing any human being has ever
endured." (Instances of "f**king bloody" have also been observed, but
that transposition seems to be used merely to inject some verbal
variety onto the talk stream, without altering substantive meaning.)

After riding for 8,000 miles (*) today into a 384 mph headwind (**), I
tentatively offered to Clive that that was a class c ("f**king
bloody") headwind. He concurred. I'm making progress!

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(*) Ok, 38.
(**) 15-20, maybe.