Anyone in NYC watching the news right now? It looks like a Hellmouth just opened up in Astoria.

Isn't Astoria near the Hellgate?

doesn't that make it possible that his is only slightly less terrible.

My sister is a huge language snob. She doesn't allow for gradations of terrible. Quantum improvements only. Something about a couple years living in a Latin country.

Oh then, cancel my $20 for descalating (wrong word, but you know) the BA esteem.

Howabout this instead to descalate? I don't understand how he goes from slobby and bloaty one day to almost good looking the next. Barring abuse of alcohol, what could make that be so?

Jessica, what's going on?

Edit: She read my mind.

Isn't Astoria near the Hellgate?

Good point! No wonder their water main broke so spectacularly. (Water levels are almost covering small houses in a 5-block radius. I'm hoping my co-worker who moved yesterday isn't in a ground-floor apartment...)

[HUGE water-main break, Maria. Nothing online about it yet that I can find, but it looks pretty bad.]

I've learned how to say "I know what you just said" in Spanish pretty well. And my Spanish-speaking kids perk up and say "Que?" and I have to go back to the lesson to keep up the pretense that I know all the bad things they're saying in Spanish.

Keeps me on my toes, and I'm trying to add more phrases to my Spanish lexicon. I figure if my ESl kids have to read 450 year old English plays, I can tack on a couple of hundred words and useful sentences.

Barring abuse of alcohol, what could make that be so?

I bet Matthew Perry wishes he knew what Ben does. Forced dehydration? Diuretics? Dunno. When he's looking pretty, I think he's < a href="http://bestof.provocateuse.com/show.php/ben_affleck">way pretty, but you're right -- he sure turns on a dime. Fugging It Up was giving some credit to JG, but that's probably about him achieving a more even keel.

Huh. I was taught that "Que?" was impolite and you should say "Como?" Was that nonsense?

I think Nilly had it right. I think it's usually Hasidic (or Hassidim, or Chassidim).

I've usually heard "ultra-Orthodox" used to encompass more than just the Chassidim -- it also includes the people who are less "in the outside world" (for lack of a better phrase) than the Modern Orthodox, but aren't Chassidic, either. It's kind of a vague category -- the dividing lines aren't entirely clear.

Nilly, I'm trying to remember what I've seen people do here about sleeves on wedding gowns. I think that bridal shops in neighborhoods where there are lots of Orthodox people will generally try to carry the long-sleeved dresses from the fashionable lines, and most of them are used to doing things like adding fabric to sleeves and necklines.

I have no idea, Betsy! But my kids say "Que?" all the time. I figure it's teenspeak -- "Huh? Say what?"