(The counter-post to On The Train.)

Friday lunchtime, Bourke Street.

A car, let’s call it car A, waits in the tram lane to turn right. There’s no traffic coming the other way, but he sits there, for no apparent reason. A tram comes up behind, with perhaps 100 people on it. On their behalf, the tram driver dings at car A, which starts its turn to move out of the way. The tram goes past, now car A is perpendicular to the traffic. With some manoevring he finishes doing a U-turn. Now he’s double-parked.

Another car, B, is double-parked in front of him. They both sit there.

Car C is at the kerb, trying to get out. Blocked by the two double-parked A and B, who both want his space.

For a minute or two, they engage in a little posturing. Forward a few inches, back a few inches. The driver of car B gets out of his car, walks back to car A and gesticulates with some enthusiasm, then gets back in his car. More car posturing, as I watch in amazement. Car C is going nowhere, and some traffic is banking up behind them, some is dodging around them.

After another minute, the driver of car A takes a moment out from his lunchtime road rage to look across the street, where another space has appeared. He executes another quick U-turn, and parks there. Car C gets out, car B takes his place.

And everyone’s happy. Well, actually those two idiots are probably fuming, but hey, I got free lunchtime entertainment, so I’m happy.

The subject of huntsmans or huntsmen spiders came up recently on Trish’s blog (see comments). Well for a definitive answer, I asked my sister about it the other day. Not just ‘cos she’s a smart cookie or I was trying to make conversation, but because she studied linguistics at uni. And she was able to give me the answer. She mentioned a bunch of grammatical terms that I don’t recall now, but here’s the gist of it:

It’s huntsmans.

The reason it’s not huntsmen is that when considering the plural of a word, you only treat it the same as a root word (man, men) if the meaning is the same. In this case the man in huntsman spider is not literally a man.

Man. Men.

Workman. Workmen.

Postman. Postmen. (With a caveat that you shouldn’t be using such gender-biased terms, you sexist pig.)

Huntsman. Huntsmans.

Just to throw a spanner in the works, huntsman also refers to a man who hunts. So the plural of that would be huntsmen.

Another contentious one: a computer mouse does not refer literally to a mouse (even if the name was inspired by its appearance). But an oh so delicious chocolate mouse you might buy in Haigh’s does refer to a literal mouse, even if it’s just a portrayal of one.

Mouse. Mice.

Chocolate mouse. Chocolate mice.

Computer mouse. Computer mouses.

Make sense? It kinda does to me now…

Mmm…. chocolate.