Grammar Moses: An olio of staycation musings

I didn't have time to write a column last week, but I did have plenty of time to think about it while vacationing in various parts of my house.

And now that I'm back to spending the majority of my days in my dining room "office," I plan to declutter my mind of several disparate musings.

Brussel sprouts?

We carried a food section cover piece last week on all of the things you can do with Brussels sprouts, which one can surmise involves several pounds of bacon, brown sugar and balsamic vinegar.

What else can you do with them? They're basically premature cabbages, and shredding the little buggers for coleslaw would take forever.

But it got me thinking: With word pairings in which the first ends with an "s" and the second starts with an "s" and the two words flow together, you're bound to see a lot of misspellings.

Brussels sprouts were harvested in Belgium half a millennium ago. They're named after the capital city.

Now that you know the etymology, it shouldn't be hard to remember the spelling.

It's funny. I can't imagine people having too much trouble correctly spelling "lemon grass soup" or "bass soup," which Dan Aykroyd made with his Bass-o-matic blender, even though those pairings have the same issue.

Show me your muscle

My grandfather had a fascinating talent: He would roll his biceps up and down his arm. I didn't consider this a threat - merely an amusement.

He always did this with his right arm. So, should I have said he did this with his "bicep?"

Nope. "Biceps" is both the singular and plural form.

So, if you were judging a bodybuilding contest and asked a participant to show you her biceps, she would be right to show you one or both arms. Bodybuilders can't help it. I'm fairly sure they flex their earlobes for added effect.

Dueling banjos

The headline read: "Biden, Trump plan dueling events in Georgia ahead of Senate runoffs."

So, what's the difference between "dual" and "duel"?

If you've seen "Hamilton," you already know a "duel" is combat between two people to solve a judicial dispute or a point of honor." "Dualis" in Latin indicates "two."

"Dual" is basically a root word of "duel." It means, simply, "two."

So "dual" events would indicate two events, but "dueling events" would be events that compete with one another. That's how most folks see it.

Still, I would describe the first presidential debate as a "dueling event." There was no shortage of combat there.

Happy belated!

I hate to be a buzzkill, but if I see "Happy belated birthday" one more time on Facebook, I might scream.

No matter whether you're on time with your good wishes or a day late, the birthday happens on time. The birthday itself is never belated, no matter how close I get to 60.

What is belated is your kind words.

You could say, "I offer you belated birthday wishes," in which "belated" modifies "birthday wishes."

Or you could say, "I'm sorry I callously disregarded the anniversary of your birth, but I was busy watching YouTube videos about epic minibike fails."

Sloppy

Human quote machine William Safire once wrote: "Is sloppiness in speech caused by ignorance or apathy? I don't know and I don't care."

Write carefully!

• Jim Baumann is vice president/managing editor of the Daily Herald. Write him at jbaumann@dailyherald.com. Put Grammar Moses in the subject line. You also can friend or follow Jim at facebook.com/baumannjim.