Saturday, March 31, 2007

Msing Something

So, honestly now, I'm in a bit of a quandary. Not that that would bad per se - it's a nice word really; sounds like a sort of Lewis Carrollesque* type place with improbable animals floating around and talking in mathematical riddles. Besides, it's not really a big quandary, it's just a sort of niggling one (another fine word).

*How sad am I to Google Lewis Carroll to make sure I had the correct number of r's and l's, while misspelling quandary twice? Oh, and on Carroll? I got it right all by myself.

It's filling out forms that gets me. What am I now? Not Miss... haven't been that for a very long time and I don't really want to try now. It would sort of be like putting on a pair of jeans from high-school: an uncomfortable fit, and sadly inappropriate. I know some widows (NOT a nice word) use Mrs still, but that entails explanations sometimes. So - Ms? But I don't really like Ms. It's got baggage of its own for one thing, and for another it's really pretty ugly. It looks all truncated and angry on the page, and spoken it's just a nasally buzz.

Throwing out a fourth category just for women seems a little selfish though when men have to make do with the catchall Mr. Besides, political correctness has lumbered us with too many cautious alternatives to labels and conditions and things. Still maybe it's the answer.

The question is, what?

I suggest: Msn't

6 comments:

Anonymous said...

did you know buddah has large earlobes?

Anonymous said...

that sounds like a bee about to sting you on your nose on the day of school pictures just to make you mad!

Megan said...

I did know that ackshully! Because I'm a terribly well educated person as long as by "educated" you mean "equipped with a large amount of useless trivia." Not that Buddah's earlobes are trivial.

Anonymous said...

Unfortunately, Miss Manners was mum on the subject.

So, when in doubt, ask Emily Post:

And a widow no less than a married woman should always continue to use her husband’s Christian name, or his name and another initial, engraved on her cards. She is Mrs. John Hunter Titherington Smith, or, to compromise, Mrs. J. H. Titherington Smith, but she is never Mrs. Sarah Smith; at least not anywhere in good society.

In business and in legal matters a woman is necessarily addressed by her own Christian name, because she uses it in her signature. But no one should ever address an envelope, except from a bank or a lawyer’s office, “Mrs. Sarah Smith.”

Emily Post

Of course, it does all depend on whether or not you travel in "good society" as Emily so kindly points out.

Megan said...

Excellent! Next form I fill out I'm definitely going to be Mrs. J.H. Titherington Smith!

Anonymous said...

Tithering sounds like dithering, which fits you to a cue! you know, if you spell tithering on spell check it will show up dithering.