Date: Wed, 14 Jun 1995 10:31:36 -0400

From: "M. Lynne Murphy" 104LYN[AT SYMBOL GOES HERE]MUSE.ARTS.WITS.AC.ZA

Subject: Kmart



in response to larry horn's response:



Well, in response to Lynne's query about misreadable non-hyphenated names and

descriptions: I'm not sure whether the constraint she mentions--



but...i (and those in my great sphere of influence) use bday and cmas

(christmas)--the former is quite wide spread among those who mark the

joyous season of lynneukah (otherwise known as the 8 days of lynne's

bday). (only 110 shopping days left! shop now and avoid the rush.)



these are better than "krations" because, in english, you'd have to

syllabify the "b" before "day" and the "c" before "mas", but the

"kr-" works as an initial cluster. (the k rations e.g., is kind of

cheating, though because it's not hyphenated in the first place.)



is operative for me, although it clearly is for others with their own

significant spheres of influence. Some time ago I realized that the chain of

stores I've always thought of as K Mart (space, no hyphen) is officially, at

least in these parts, rendered with capital K but no space: "Check out your

neighborhood Kmart store for bargains during this special Lynneukah shopping

season!" For me, this is a severe violation, since I can only pronounce

their store [kmart], with at most a schwa to epenthesize mid-initial-cluster

(as in "c'mon" or the down-underian "G'day!"). No wonder they're heading for

bankruptcy. B'bye, Kmart!



it seems to mean something that the letter that is pronounced as a

letter is capitalized--we saw that in the original post about Email,

though i do think this is also written as email. (it's hard to tell

w/ people like me who are anti-shift-key. i read that this is the e-

mail equivalent of mumbling.) actually, i have provided evidence of

this elsewhere on e-mail, spelling my name lynnE, in order to be

pronounced "lynnie"--a spelling i don't like because it undermines

the 'e' on the end of the my name (which people tend to leave off, to

my distress). when i write my name by hand, i use a macron instead,

but since that's not possible here, the capital E works.



Kmart, incidentally, also has the metaorthographic aid of color: the

"k" is red, the "mart" blue in their logo.



but this still doesn't explain bday, which, i swear, i'm not the only

person to use.



narcissistically yours,

lynnE



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