First snow!

monshu was all excited about the flurries in the forecast Saturday night. "I could wake up to snow on the ground," he told me, and I had to dash his hopes with a patient explanation of how a couple hours below freezing over the course of a night wouldn't chill the ground to the point where snow would stick without melting. The flurries began late in the afternoon the next day and, sure enough, every flake melted the moment it left the air. (Though that doesn't mean it wasn't pleasant to stand in the living room and watch them sift over the lawn I'd just raked.)

So when I saw flurries in the forecast for today, I expected more of the same. I certainly didn't think I'd walk out into a thickly swirling mass of snow at quitting time. The pavements were slick, but everywhere else was progressively whitening as I waited for the shuttle. Then all at once, as if by arrangement, the snow simply stopped. I didn't know if there'd be any left on the lawns as I returned home, but I varied my route just in case and found them covered to the depth of at least a centimetre.

Two weeks ago, I dragged monshu to Big Chicks for burgers on the patio because I assumed it would be our last chance to do that this year. But even then, I didn't expect to be able to glance out the window and see white stuff covering the dead leaves.

आज का शब्द / آج كا شبد / ਅੱਜ ਦਾ ਸ਼ਬਦ

बीड़ी / بيڙي / ਬੀੜੀ beeRee "cheap cigarette"

This is a word I've wondered about for some time. If you read much Indian fiction or watch enough Indian movies--particularly crime stories--sooner or later you'll hit references to smoking "bidis". For a long time, I thought this was simply a name for cigarettes you rolled yourself. Then, when I noticed characters carrying packs of bidis, I thought they were small cigarillos. The second impression was nearer the mark, although the leaf which serves as a rolling paper comes from the Coromandel ebony or तेन्दू tendoo (a relative of the persimmon).

This is actually an interesting case of transference. The Sanskrit etymon is विटी viṭī "betel plant" and Platts actually defines बीड़ी as "a flake of pān or betel for eating"; the related word बीड़ा / بيڙا / ਬੀੜਾ beeRaa still retains this meaning. Even though cigarettes are smoked rather than chewed, the experience was apparently similar enough to the long-standing Indian habit of chewing betel that an older word was given new meaning.

For ordinary cigarettes, the loanword सिगरेट / ਸਿਗਰਟ sigret is preferred, e.g. एक सिगरेट देना कामरेड! "A cigarette, comrade!"