Make/take a left/right, etc.

[Laurence Horn]

At 12:19 PM -0700 10/2/02, Ed Keer wrote:
>  >
>>  Somehow this discussion of "make" vs. "take",
>>  combining with the
>>  thread on Philly, reminds me of that great billboard
>>  you see coming
>>  down on Amtrak from New York to Philadelphia just
>>  outside New
>>  Jersey's Capital City, reading
>>
>>  TRENTON MAKES
>>  THE WORLD TAKES
>>
>>  I've never been able to figure out if this is pride
>>  speaking, or a complaint.
>>
>>  Larry
>
>I've always loved that sign, which by the way is also
>in large neon letters on a bridge crossing the
>Delaware from Trenton to PA. I've tried collecting
>similar slogans with unintended (?) other readings.
>Unfortunately, the only other one that comes to mind
>is New Hampshire's LIVE FREE OR DIE which always
>seemed like a threat to me.
>
>Any others?
>
>Ed
>
Well, for many years the Exit 6 sign on the westward
Cross-Westchester Expressway (I-287) read:

WHITE PLAINS
NO WHITE PLAINS

--until, as I've remarked in print, the powerful neo-Aristotelian
lobby exerted its influence to get it changed.  It now reads NO WHITE
PLAINS/WHITE PLAINS, which is somehow less catchy.  (NO here of
course is intended to designate 'North'.)

Larry