Thursday, November 12, 2015

Phrase banks for the peripatetic

hearty.bond.dependents
Where have I been?  Today?  I began at bunch.like.laptop and ended up at forgot.select.harsh.  My brother the Geek Guru pointed me to this very cool site which maps three word English phrases to small areas on the globe.  How small?  "forgot.select.harsh" is the pet food aisle at my local Acme.  I also made a brief swing through produce, which is bars.hunter.swift.  Small!

I could have told Math Man to meet me at forum. drama.alas after Mass at St. Peter's Basilica.  Instead we went through a couple of iterations to make sure we both agreed on which fountain we intend to rejoin forces at.  And I can't count the number of times I've waited on one side of a hotel lobby to meet someone who is patiently standing on the other side.

There is a warmth to naming a place that numbers don't carry — even for me, who loves numbers.  In the 40th chapter of Isaiah, God counts the stars, but also gives them names.  I enjoy, too, the randomness of the words.  Are we a bunch who likes laptops, who also gather to celebrate the Eucharist and the Liturgy of the Hours in a small chapel at the back of the parish church?  We may be.  We are a geeky lot.

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