I can relate to his observation of that "almost every story they ("The Economist") do on language is goofy." I've done very few newspaper and magazine interviews on any subject, from Hawaiian language to music and technology, where the author didn't seriously distorted something I said because of their lack of knowledge in that field. I've gotten calls from colleagues who disagreed with something that they read in those stories, and in nearly every case what has printed was a clear misrepresentation of the facts that I stated. It's enough to make you want to stop giving inteviews.

I have not played much over the twelve or so years since I last gigged, and struggled mightily in transcribing the music for my MA thesis. Once I figured out a song's key, I didn't have a very difficult time plucking out the melodies on my guitar or piano and notating them on manuscript paper, but I know I could have done it more efficiently.

I finally gave in and ordered Burge's Perfect Pitch Supercourse in the hope that I can sharpen my ears, even if I don't develop the miraculous "perfect (or absolute) pitch."

I've gone through the first three "Masterclasses" so far, and he is very long winded, and repeats himself ad nauseam regarding the tone "colors", the difference between timbre colors and tone colors, the subtleties of the colors and not to listen too deeply for these characteristics. I'm not sure if there is a reason for this constant repetition, and am just getting to the part where the exercises begin - with buying a box of crayons. Hmmm.

I must say, however, that of the tones that he has used so far, F# and Eb, I have gotten pretty good at distinguishing them, and can hear a bit of what he is talking about. I even picked out a G before he announced what it was, without relating it to the other pitches, and new instantly it wasn't the F# and Eb that he had been focusing on. I'll report my progress during the course.

I was surprised to see that he lives in Hawai'i, or at least he did at the time that this set was published.

The language received some good publicity some time back on the cartoon "The Simpsons" when Lisa Simpson shouted 'rydhsys rag Kernow lemmyn' (Freedom for Cornwall now). There is a page dedicated to this episode on the Warlinenn site.

So Scott, I'll learn Irish, you learn Kernewek, and we'll meet over a few and determine between us if there is mutual intelligibility