A random thought while doing the dishes: Why is unwise a word but unsmart isn't?

Unsmart does not appear in the dictionary on my desk, my trusty Webster's New Twentieth Century Dictionary Unabridged (which I still use deep into the 21st century because I don't want to grow up, I'll always be a 20th-century kid). Unwise is also nowhere to be seen in either The American Heritage Dictionary, 2nd College Edition we keep upstairs or my copy of The Official Scrabble® Players Dictionary, Second Edition. If it's not in the Scrabble® Dictionary, it's not a real word.

However, the Internet has never cared about reality. Merriam-Webster online recognizes "unsmart" as meaning exactly what you would think it means (i.e. "not smart"), but their example for how to use the word comes from the October 18, 2022 issue of Elle magazine:

Tweets swimming reports from Barton Springs pool; carries an unsmart phone so as not to be distracted by the internet; has lived in France; and read Anna Karenina in 16 hours.

So in this case unsmart means essentially landline. That's nothing like unwise (in word or deed).

Elsewhere, the online Oxford English Dictionary also has an entry for unsmart, going so far as to quote itself when it says "OED's earliest evidence for unsmart is from before 1500, in the writing of Robert Henryson, poet." Curiously, that citation is absent from the Online Etymology Dictionary, but I looked up The Complete Works of Henryson at the University of Rochester's Robbins Library and did find this in the "Prologue" of his 1480s work Fables, lines 22-25:

For as we se, ane bow that ay is bent
Worthis unsmart and dullis on the string
Sa dois the mynd that ay is diligent
In ernistfull thochtis and in studying.

As you can see, that is not English. (Henryson wrote like what he was: a Scotsman.) It's Middle English, where smart had nothing to do with intelligence but a "stinging, sharp pain." In other words, in this case unsmart is akin to relax. I wouldn't say that's unwise either.

So call someone dumb, but don't call them unsmart lest you sound stupid.

Next time: Why is uncharismatic a word but unfortitudinous isn't? Actually, wait. No, this one makes sense. Never mind.

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Seen from parking lot
the sunset's a forest fire.
Hooray pollution!

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I just read the truncated version of yesterday's annual New Year's Poetry post as it went through Facebook, and I was struck with the realization that it's superficially similar to the endless earnest drivel you expect to find on Facebook.

Should I be pleased that I can write that schlock sappy enough to shock myself (I didn't know I had it in me!), or horrified that someone unfamiliar with my body of blogging might see and fail to recognize my caustic intentions? Curse you, Facebook, for making me doubt the intensity of my own sarcasm!

It's going to be another long, long year, isn't it?

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I spent this past weekend at a fine art opening in the Miller Gallery, located in the picturesque Hyde Park region of Cincinnati, Ohio. But before you congratulate me, let me say that it wasn't my opening. I was a tagalong. (The proverbial "third wheel," not the tasty Girl Scout Cookie.) This event was for real artists, not graphic/web designers. So what if I can write scripts in php so elegant that you could cry? You don't code with a paint brush. (If you did, it'd be really hard to see the monitor.)

Painters are a funny lot. On the whole, I don't suspect that we are any different than the rest of the population. Sure, most of us are driven by a desire to flee typical social conventions. And maybe more than our share have a fear of soap and water. But by and large, artists are exactly the same as anyone else: put enough of them in a room, and you'll get the spontaneously occurring artist's version of the pissing contest. With artists, it's always whose theory is best. The problem with this, of course, is that unlike the traditional pissing-contest arbitration method of comparing sexual conquests, which can be qualified and quantified, artists are forced to prove whose figurative brush is biggest by comparing their lifestyles: "I'm more artistically countercultural than you are!"

At a rather posh dinner this weekend one artist bragged that he didn't watch television, as it drained his creativity just as it does the millions of huddled masses who spend hour after hour on the couch. (He said this wearing a shirt that looked as though it had never seen an iron.) Not to be one-upped, another questioned everyone else's integrity by challenging their satisfaction and drive. (The only way to nirvana is through suffering. Not selling enough $2,000 paintings, it would seem, counts as very painful.) A third complained/boasted that long hours in the studio led to excessive loneliness. (Though you wouldn't have any idea that he was friendless based on the number of patron names he was dropping.)

If this sounds stupid, that's because it is. All of these artists are fantastically talented. However, having great technique is like having the most expensive car in your neighborhood: everyone knows, but that's not going to stop you from bragging.

Meanwhile, I spent most of the weekend trying to stay out of their way to intermediate degrees of success. Still, every day is a learning opportunity, and following is a short list of information gathered while I was out of pocket:

• If a Cinicinnatian offers to let you swim in their pool, do it. It's really the path of least resistance.
• Speaking of Cincinnatians, word to the wise: they don't think that WKRP jokes are funny.
• Chicks dig robots and doughnuts with sprinkles.
• Unlike Paul Newman, if you're going to deface a parking meter, wait until after midnight and act like you know what you're doing.
• Bicycle racing is like poetry: it's created only for the enjoyment of the writer/rider and is really, really boring to everyone else.

So a good time was had by all. Unlike most gallery owners, everyone associated with the Miller Gallery is a gem of a human being. (Read: Buy their art.) I'll have to go back one day soon, as I didn't find out until after the trip that Cincinnati's Union Terminal Train Station was the inspiration for the Super Friends' Hall of Justice. Sightseeing fail!

By the way, If you're an art fan, you may wish to check out the work of artists Jessica Hess, Eric Joyner, and Otto Lange. Be sure not to judge them by their web sites, though. After all, while they're fantastic painters and really great people, they're not graphic/web designers.

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I just realized that I've wasted my entire afternoon (the last few hours, anyway) looking at pics of abandoned amusement parks on the internet. I can't help it. I know I've mentioned it before, but I'm just fascinated by scenes of manmade structures overcome by nature. Best of all are the fallen amusement parks: titans of technology devoted to staving off mankind's worst enemy -- boredom -- left fallow and destroyed by sun, wind, water, and time. If these haunted steel and concrete skeletons are discovered by future archaeologists, what conclusions will they draw about their ancestors?

See the ruins of Chippewa Lake Park in Ohio. Wander through abandoned Dogpatch USA in Arkansas. Or, if you're feeling adventurous, visit the orient to see the remains of "waste recreational area T" or "Nominal Koka family land" in Japan, the home of the decaying theme park.

>sigh< It's like poetry for the eye.

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