How did Fido become the more or less generic name for the family dog, when in fact there are few canines that actually answer to that moniker? –N.D.G., Chicago
Best of Chicago voting is live now. Vote for your favorites »
Our high school French teacher always insisted learning French was important because it was going to become the international language of business. Now I hear English is mandatory in international aviation, and the Chinese students in Beijing spoke English to the international media. Was our French teacher shucking us? Merde! –Les Petites, South Boston
Now, now. He/she probably just didn’t know any better. French teachers lead lives of such yawning emptiness already that as a matter of policy no one tells them the awful truth, which is that French is a language on the way down, not up. Once the language of diplomacy, French was used in the royal courts of Germany, Russia, and Italy during the 19th century. Fifty years ago Somerset Maugham called it “the common language of educated men” (women too, one presumes). But it’s been in a state of decline since World War II, having long ago been supplanted by–you guessed it–English.
Why is the room where TV talk-show guests wait before going on the air always called the “green room”? I’ve never seen one that was green. –Zsa Zsa, Los Angeles
