"Dead man's float" (and not in OED)

Joel S. Berson Berson at ATT.NET
Mon Jun 2 15:57:56 UTC 2014


At 6/1/2014 08:39 PM, Laurence Horn wrote:
>On Jun 1, 2014, at 7:01 PM, Dan Goncharoff wrote:
>
> > I am curious about the [sic] --- how would you write the possessive of
> > Boston Sports Clubs?
> >
> > DanG
>
>How many Boston Sports Clubs are there?

"Sic" literally means "literally".  I didn't know how many there
were.  Apparently it is a multi-ribbed umbrella.

Joel


>As for the DMF, I remember being taught it in...must have been the
>early 1950s but, no doubt from too much water on the brain, I have
>totally forgotten what posture or angle was involved.
>
>LH
> >
> >
> > On Sun, Jun 1, 2014 at 6:08 PM, Joel S. Berson <Berson at att.net> wrote:
> >
> >> ---------------------- Information from the mail header
> >> -----------------------
> >> Sender:       American Dialect Society <ADS-L at LISTSERV.UGA.EDU>
> >> Poster:       "Joel S. Berson" <Berson at ATT.NET>
> >> Subject:      "Dead man's float" (and not in OED)
> >>
> >>
> -------------------------------------------------------------------------------
> >>
> >> In "Tales From the City" in today's Boston Globe magazine section, a
> >> Newton resident writes that "at the Boston Sports Clubs' [sic]
> >> Watertown location" he overheard an "exchange between a swimming
> >> instructor and a boy of 5 or 6."
> >> "Instructor: 'You've just learned the dead man's float. What's great
> >> about that?'
> >> "Boy: 'I don't know.'
> >> "Instructor: 'Well, if you get into difficulties, you're on your back
> >> and can breathe easily. You can then just float to the side of the
> >> pool or call for help.'
> >> "Boy: 'What if I don't have a cellphone?'
> >>
> >> The joke may be funny, but the swimming instructor's instructions are
> >> not.  In the dead man's float I was taught, one floats vertically,
> >> face immersed with just the top of the head out of water, raising the
> >> head periodically to breathe.  See
> >> http://www.ehow.com/how_6582_survival-float.html (AKA the jellyfish
> >> or dead man's float).  That provides more buoyancy than floating on
> >> one's back, important for people whose density approaches that of water.
> >>
> >> P.S.  "Dead man's float" not in OED.
> >>
> >> Joel
> >>
> >> ------------------------------------------------------------
> >> The American Dialect Society - http://www.americandialect.org
> >>
> >
> > ------------------------------------------------------------
> > The American Dialect Society - http://www.americandialect.org
>
>------------------------------------------------------------
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