Feb 08 2012

Pharangula is on the short-list for the Skeptic Magazine Awards 2011

Categories:

It’s quite an honor to share the stage with The 21st Floor , Men Make a Tiger , Pharangula , Science, Reason & Critical Thinking , Skepchick, but something bothers me about that list. I’m misspelled! I’m doomed, I tell you, doooomed.

It’s my family curse. My father gave me a name everyone gets wrong, and then a create a blog with a name no one can pronounce and few can spell. I knew I should have taken my wife’s name when I got married. No one would have ever mangled “Gjerness”.

Also, normally I’d be able to tell my minions to take wing and conquer the voting, but Skeptic Magazine is not making this an internet popularity contest — they actually have a panel of distinguished judges who will evaluate the contributions of the nominees. Doooooomed.

Unless, of course, you run into Chris Franch, Wendy Grassman, Jon Ranson, Simon Sangh, or Richard Waseman on the street, in which case you should grip them in your taloned feet and fly immediately to my castle, where we can shackle them in the oubliette and…convince them…on how to place their vote.

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29 comments

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1

Blondin

8 February 2012 at 8:00 am (UTC -5) Link to this comment

Goad one!
2

Blondin

8 February 2012 at 8:01 am (UTC -5) Link to this comment

Oaps…
3

gregoryhilliard

8 February 2012 at 8:06 am (UTC -5) Link to this comment

Gjerness — isn’t that like Guinness, only more potent?
4

marcus

8 February 2012 at 8:11 am (UTC -5) Link to this comment

It’s that polymorphous “Y” that is the problem in both cases. What the fuck is it? Is it a vowel? Is it a consonant? “Y’s”, how the fuck do they work? “Y’s” are just too damn liberal.
5

anthonyallen

8 February 2012 at 8:15 am (UTC -5) Link to this comment

… and then a create a blog with a name no one can pronounce and few can spell.

How is it pronounced?

fer-IN-gyoo-la is how I’ve always pronounced it. Is that incorrect?
6

Lycanthrope

8 February 2012 at 8:22 am (UTC -5) Link to this comment

anthonyallen, I think it’s fuh-RING-gyoo-la. Pretty close.

I dunno, PZ, they might get the spelling of Gjerness right, but you can bet everyone would mangle the pronunciation.
7

Brownian

8 February 2012 at 8:29 am (UTC -5) Link to this comment

I dunno, PZ, they might get the spelling of Gjerness right, but you can bet everyone would mangle the pronunciation.

What’s difficult about TRO•fee SIR•naym?
8

DLC

8 February 2012 at 8:39 am (UTC -5) Link to this comment

They spell your blog name wrong, spell your last name wrong . . . Well, you know, PX, some people just can’t be bothered to spell check. . .
9

Glen Davidson

8 February 2012 at 8:54 am (UTC -5) Link to this comment

Oh, those crazy athiests at Skaptic magazine….

Glen Davidson
10

Charlie Foxtrot

8 February 2012 at 8:58 am (UTC -5) Link to this comment

No, no, no. It’s spelt “Raymond Luxury Yacht” … But it’s pronounced ‘Author of insanely popular blog Pharyngula’.
A common mistake.
11

Pteryxx

8 February 2012 at 9:19 am (UTC -5) Link to this comment

I feel your pain, bro.
12

Glen Davidson

8 February 2012 at 9:36 am (UTC -5) Link to this comment

My father gave me a name everyone gets wrong, and then a create a blog with a name no one can pronounce and few can spell.

And instead of writing “I” in a sentence complaining about it, you write “a”.

Well it is a tad ironic, if still rather trivial.

Glen Davidson
13

Stephanie Zvan

8 February 2012 at 9:38 am (UTC -5) Link to this comment

It’s not actually your last name at fault. It’s your middle name. Put a Z anywhere in your name and you’ll get the most…interesting spellings. Many people try to drop the Z completely. Since they can’t do that in your case, they mangle the rest of it in revenge.
14

Kevin Anthoney

8 February 2012 at 9:41 am (UTC -5) Link to this comment

I left my taloned feet at the cleaners. Can I be excused?
15

robro

8 February 2012 at 10:30 am (UTC -5) Link to this comment

@marcus #4 — It’s because it’s in a state of quantum superposition, that’s “y”.
16

adamarmstrong

8 February 2012 at 11:12 am (UTC -5) Link to this comment

You said “Oubliette” <3 <3
17

simply not edible

8 February 2012 at 11:14 am (UTC -5) Link to this comment

@ 5, 6:

It’s frngjl-AH, I tell you.
18

marcus

8 February 2012 at 11:19 am (UTC -5) Link to this comment

@ robro 15 Well, obvy dude. “Quantum” explains everything, that’s why I didn’t even bother to mention it.
19

whheydt

8 February 2012 at 11:21 am (UTC -5) Link to this comment

When we were married, my wife cheerfully changed her last name because people could not correctly spell…Jones.

Go figure…

–W. H. Heydt

Old Used Programmer
20

siessor

8 February 2012 at 11:37 am (UTC -5) Link to this comment

“Unless, of course, you run into Chris Franch, Wendy Grassman, Jon Ranson, Simon Sangh“

I suppose Simon Singh will have a blog post lamenting about misspellings of his name, even by the meticulous PeeZed /s
21

chigau (違う)

8 February 2012 at 12:30 pm (UTC -5) Link to this comment

siessor
All the names are spelled wrong.
22

Jen

8 February 2012 at 1:07 pm (UTC -5) Link to this comment

I made the first round of consideration, but didn’t make the cut. But now I know why – look at all those awesome blogs I was competing with! Glad I was nominated at all :)
23

cag

8 February 2012 at 1:22 pm (UTC -5) Link to this comment

Now that you’ve put a spell on the panel, you can spell them while they take a break from deliberations.

There’s a grain of truth in the way spelt is spelled.

You need to recruit your insect friends, the spelling bees, to set them straight, even though it might sting.
24

Happiestsadist

8 February 2012 at 1:43 pm (UTC -5) Link to this comment

I feel your pain, PZ. Nobody, ever, from hospitals, schools, anything, has ever spelled my full name right on the first go aside from my parents. And my names are some of the most mundane, whitebread names out there.
25

madscientist

8 February 2012 at 2:54 pm (UTC -5) Link to this comment

Has Mike Shermer got a poll for us to crash? :)
26

Jadzia626

8 February 2012 at 6:56 pm (UTC -5) Link to this comment

Hopefally I’ll get to see Richard Waseman in a couple of weeks. I’ll tell him the peoples want PC Meyers and Pharangula to win!

… and siessor, you may think you were observant there, but you really were not :)
27

'Tis Himself, OM

8 February 2012 at 7:02 pm (UTC -5) Link to this comment

My father gave me a name everyone gets wrong, and then a create a blog with a name no one can pronounce and few can spell.

Poor PV Meyers, nobody knows his proper name.
28

Irene Delse

9 February 2012 at 12:35 pm (UTC -5) Link to this comment

Glen Davidson:

My father gave me a name everyone gets wrong, and then a create a blog with a name no one can pronounce and few can spell.

And instead of writing “I” in a sentence complaining about it, you write “a”.

Well it is a tad ironic, if still rather trivial.

No, it’s in application of a long-established Internet law: any post complaining about typos or orthographic error will contain at least one typo or orthographic error.

Though in PY’s case, he must have accumulated bad karma with the god Tpyos. Maybe he was an English teacher in a previous life?
29

david robertgrimes

11 February 2012 at 8:13 pm (UTC -5) Link to this comment

Congrats PZ, well deserved. I’m also on that list (3menmakeatiger..) and am quite frankly terrified that any moment the judges will realise they’ve made a monumental error in judgement when they realise most of my posts are actually drunken rants directed at no one in particular. Which, come to think of it, is quite an Irish thing, so at least I’m fitting comfortably into my national sterotype *Knocks back a triple distilled whiskey and goes to type more things on the interweb machine..*