"My fan died."

"Poof?"

"Poof."

Last night I was reading a book and so only slept at 5am. I have this innate inability to put a book down as long as it's unfinished. This applies only to fiction, which explains why I haven't finished Mere Christianity... or What's So Amazing About Grace?... or Bird by Bird -- not to mention all my textbooks, too.

Staying up late to read is one of those things I do and then later kick myself for doing. I don't know why I never learn, it's just that it always seems a good idea to continue reading since I don't feel very sleepy, but then in the morning I realise that it wasn't a good idea after all. I am a night person and am not kindly disposed to mornings, but on days like this it becomes 10 times worse and I am prepared to declare to the world that I hate mornings.

The antipathy runs so deep that... I love my housemates, they are the most wonderful people in the world, but even for them it's all I can do to grunt unintelligibly when we meet in the kitchen before rushing off to shower and get ready for work. Hey, at least I've acknowledged their presence. I'm sooooo not inclined to conversation in the mornings.

Did you know that there actually is such a thing called krypton? The Oxford English Dictionary defines it as:

An inert gaseous chemical element, present in trace amounts in the air and used in some kinds of electric light.

I always thought it was something the creator of Superman made up! Amazing the things you discover when you flip through the dictionary at random, hoping to find suitable words to use as examples in your linguistics assignment.

Oh, and the word 'krypton' is apparently derived from the Greek krupton, meaning 'hidden'. Superman's weakness is a hidden one, only manifesting when he is in close proximity with the green-coloured (and fictional) kryptonite stone. How cool is that?

Who knew a comic would have me scrambling for a dictionary?

Louche, adj.
Disreputable or dubious in a rakish or appealing way.
(Oxford English Dictionary)

When I was a child, whenever I asked my parents what a word meant, they'd say, "Look it up in the dictionary." Immensely aggravating, I can tell you. I admit that I wasn't always diligent; lots of times I'd just guess at the meaning from the context -- inimitable is a good example; I know the word but am not too sure what it means exactly.

But sometimes my curiosity would get the better of me. I have this indescribable desire to know, to discover, and I'd go get out our dictionary and look the word up, and breathe, "Ohhhh..." in a greatly enlightened tone of voice.

Today, I still happily look up the dictionary every time a word stumps me or looks particularly unfamiliar. With the Internet, this process has gotten even easier -- Dictionary.com is almost indispensible to me.

I'm fascinated by words and always enjoy discovering the more obscure ones, but I don't consciously use them to impress. Whenever I use a "big word", it's a case of my brain slotting in what it thinks is the most appropriate term to use rather than me choosing to favour a complex word over a simpler one. I think if you tend to slip in big words just because you can, it will tend to show in your writing; and I don't think it necessarily makes your writing any more impressive. Why say pulchritude, why not just say beauty? Using unnecessary big words can clutter up your piece, making it more difficult for readers to wade through the work. They distract readers and can hinder readers from grasping the overall message you are trying to convey.

Bought a book on plagiarism today: Stolen Words, by Thomas Mallon. The subtitle reads, "Forays into the Origins and Ravages of Plagiarism".

As a writer, I'm very attached to what I write. I've heard it say that having your work copied is a form of flattery and perhaps a high compliment, but the fact that someone liked your work enough to copy it isn't enough to offset the offence of having that person take credit for something you came up with. A piece you crafted, choosing words with painstaking care, ensuring that your ideas, your sentiments, your feelings would be conveyed so clearly to the reader that it would almost be as if the reader were dwelling inside your head.

That's why when somebody takes credit for something you write, it feels very, very personal. It feels like an imposter walked into your house, donned your clothes, sat in your favourite chair, ate your food, made love to your spouse. When he claims to be you, he strips you of your thoughts, your opinions, your emotions, your identity, saying, "All this was me," and you become superfluous, invisible, a nonentity.

I know plagiarism is especially rife on the Internet, although I doubt I've ever had any of my writing plagiarised because I seldom write particularly profound or moving pieces that might tempt others to claim authorship. I could be wrong, of course, but I'd rather not know; ignorance is bliss, as they say.

I'm so used to speaking English that I never consciously realised all English words of more than one syllable are pronounced with different degrees of stress placed on the different syllables within a word. It wasn't until my lecturer pointed out the importance of 'word stress' that I thought about it and went, "My goodness, that's so true!"

For example, you might leave an imprint (noun) on a page but have a pretty lady
imprint (verb) her image onto your mind.

You might suspect (verb) someone, and if there is enough evidence against him, he eventually becomes the suspect (noun).

The stressed syllable here indicates a change of meaning (or change of word class from noun to verb and vice versa). But even words that don't change meaning have stress, like receive and partner. Not only that -- when speaking, you'll find yourself giving more time to the stressed syllables and less to the unstressed ones. I mean, stressed syllables last ever so slightly longer than their unstressed friends.

Suddenly I realised why native speakers of Malay and Mandarin have such a hard time learning to speak English as a second language. Both Malay and Mandarin don't have this 'stress' feature. Each individual syllable is given equal stress and time.

Since English doesn't give equal time to each syllable, when we speak in sentences, some words likewise end up more 'compressed' than others. Take this example from the British Council & BBC's Teaching English website (go there to download an audio clip of the same):

1	2	3	4
1 and	2 and	3 and	4
1 and a	2 and a	3 and a	4
1 and then a	2 and then a	3 and then a	4

1, 2, 3, 4 are the stressed words while the rest are unstressed. Notice how the unstressed words get "compressed" whilst the 1, 2, 3, 4 fall on a steady beat. Now, try doing that in Malay or Mandarin. It simply doesn't work.

That's why native speakers of Mandarin, especially, often sound a little strange when they first try to speak English. There's nothing wrong with the structure of the sentence, but they have some trouble putting the stress in the correct places, so they may either end up stressing all the syllables or stressing the wrong ones. And they aren't used to the idea that one can prolong or shorten a syllable, so they may give equal time to all syllables as is normally done in their native language. For me, it's all very intuitive because I'm familiar with the language. For them, it's a total minefield.

I wonder if anyone has ever figured out how to teach word stress and sentence stress effectively.

So there I was, ambling downstairs in the morning clad in my usual choice of sleepwear -- a flowing batik kaftan -- my hair still mussed from sleep (nice way of saying it was uncombed) and eyes squinting through heavy eyelids.

And there on the living room sofa sat a guy.

A guy who was thumbing through one of the books on the coffee table... one of my books on the coffee table.

I was about to slip past and step into the kitchen on my way to the shower (which I rely upon to wake me up every morning), when he stood and apologised, indicating that he had to use the gents'. I magnanimously waved him ahead and seated myself on the sofa to wait.

He returned to the living room and had proceeded to leave with his friend -- my housemate -- when he paused to turn back and say, "Hey, that book's pretty good."

Death by Spelling: A Compendium of Tests, Super Tests, and Killer Bees? I blinked.

"Yes, it's cool, isn't it? I got it at Payless Books," I replied with grave aplomb. Of course he couldn't know how honoured he should be that I was actually making coherent conversation with him at that hour of the morning.

Later I thought, My goodness, I met a guy who thought a book on spelling is cool?!? And I had to look like I had just crawled out of bed? I mean, admittedly I had just crawled out of bed, but could I have looked any less prepossessing?!

Damn, I'm such a girl.

I've just finished going through the entire Oxford Dictionary of Abbreviations. That's what you do when your lecturer insists that you come up with examples other than the ones she provided in class -- and you can't think of any. It's also what you do when you are somewhat kiasu (afraid of losing out, or uber-competitive), and mild symptoms of OCD start to pop up.

We've been learning about the way new words are formed. Of course one of the most common ways to come up with a new word is to simply borrow a word from another language. Then there are the words that echo sounds (meow, moo, woof, clink, bang, pop), and words that are formed by joining two words together (lightweight, fanfare, lovesick). Not to mention, words created by adding prefixes (mis-, de-, un-, etc.) and suffixes (-tion, -ly, -ist, etc.).

Abbreviations are a whole different kettle of fish.

It seems to me that there are at least four types of abbreviations:

1. Blending: Where two or more words have been abbreviated and joined together to form a new word, like brunch (breakfast + lunch), or sitcom (situation comedy);
2. Clipping: Informal abbreviations that shorten longer words, like vet (veterinary surgeon) and fridge (refrigerator);
3. Acronyms: Initials that are read out as a word, like NASA (National Aeronautics and Space Administration) or NATO (North Atlantic Treaty Organisation); and
4. Alphabetisms: Initials that are read out by each individual letter, like WTO (World Trade Organisation) or UN (United Nations).

From what I've read online, there seems to be some dispute as to whether the last two categories should really only come under one, but I'm going to go with what I've been taught.

There are no end to acronyms and alphabetisms, but when it comes to words formed by clipping and blending, I've ended up scratching my head for new examples.

Still, it's not that bad. Leaving abbreviations aside, the worst -- the absolute worst -- is trying to come up with examples of proper nouns that have ended up being used as a common noun. Like how Tupperware now is used to generally refer to any kind of plastic container, and Maggi mee, in the Malaysian context, is taken to mean any kind of instant noodles. I think I might need to spend yet more time reading through the dictionary.

I have totally busted my budget for books this month. And I didn't even go to the Payless Books warehouse sale.

Apart from the book on plagiarism, the Oxford Dictionary of Abbreviations was also a recent acquisition. In addition, I bought:

• The Call of Stories: Teaching and the Moral Imagination, by Robert Coles
• Why Do Clocks Run Clockwise? (And Other Imponderables), by David Feldman
• Letter Perfect: The Marvellous History Of Our Alphabet From A To Z, by David Sacks
• The Life of Language: The Fascinating Ways Words Are Born, Live & Die, by Sol Steinmetz & Barbara Ann Kipfer
• Dictionary of Proverbs And Their Origins, by Linda and Roger Flavell
• Disconnected: Why Our Kids Are Turning Their Backs On Everything We Thought We Knew by Nick Barham
• Port Out, Starboard Home: The Fascinating Stories We Tell About The Words We Use by Michael Quinion
• Women, Sex, And Addiction by Charlotte Davis Kasl
• Subversive Thoughts, Authentic Passions: Finding Love Without Losing Your Self by Bonnie Kreps

A friend pointed me to the Holland Occupational Inventory, one of those tests that help you "discover the work environments suited to your interests, abilities and personality".

Always curious, I tried it, and my top three scores fell into the following categories:

Artistic: 12
Social: 11
Investigative: 9

I found only one career for the ASI combination. And guess what it is?

News Analysts, Reporters, and Correspondents

Sounds like I got it right the first time after all... Maybe I should just go back to journalism and forget about teaching English!