Terms of Endearment

Greek letters used in mathematics, science, and engineering (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

Men and women belong to different species, and communication between them is a science still in its infancy.

~Bill Cosby

 

I am traveling to Greece this summer with not only my two teenage sons, but also a dear friend who I have known for years (who is displaying incredible bravery and fortitude by being willing to travel with two teenagers he is not even related to). We’ve been friends for a long time, and in the way of good friends, will sometimes say sweet things to each other. Oh come on. Guys don’t do that with each other? Seriously? Even in the emails they don’t show to girls? Oh well, this guy friend of mine and I will sometimes say sweet things to each other. Perhaps on his part, it is a relationship survival strategy…how to stay friends with a woman…something like that. But I digress.

So anyway. It was New Year’s Eve, and in my sweet way, I wished him a Happy New Year in Greek. Καλή Χρονιά!! Nice, right? We are traveling to Greece, we sometimes banter about with phrases in different languages, it was kind of cute, admit it. So, the email I received back, went something like this. “Happy New Year to you, Font Maven!” Font Maven? What language is that? Does it mean something like “Dear One”? Of course, I went straight to Google Translate to figure out what language it was. It sounded kind of French. I put it in the translator. Nothing. It kept coming out the other end as Font Maven, and insisted that the language detected was English. WTF?

Of course, you have already seen my folly. Chalk it up to having polished off perhaps a bit too much wine the evening before. Of course, the words meant exactly what they said. Font Maven. I am a font maven for having been able to figure out how to type with Greek letters. Awww. That’s so sweet!

And  there, my fellow fónts mavéns, you have the difference between men and women, in a nùtshell.