Never On Sunday

Somewhere the soul of William Strunk, Jr. is writhing in agony.

This morning, WNYC featured an article on the benefits other than revenue of raising the fees for parking meters. It ended with the assent of a a committee studying the question: “Their heads were nodding up and down vigorously—in agreement.”

The last two words were delivered with an odd emphasis, like it was a powerful zinger to close the report, and my immediate reaction was to think, “Was that really necessary?” Why else would they be nodding, I not in agreement? Palsy? Eileene suggested we might otherwise think they were nodding off to sleep, but one does not nod vigorously off to sleep.

And once I started questioning, I couldn’t stop. I mean, nodding means “up and down.” Heads don’t nod side-to-side. Nodding implies the head, too. Unless they were sitting in council conversing through sock puppets or something. “They nodded vigorously” would be entirely satisfactory. Three unintentional redundancies in ten words is something of an accomplishment, but though not a proud one.