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Ardith Hinton to Anton Shepelev:

AS>> I think `suit' there denotes general perseverence in an
AS>> effort, but the dict.org begs to differ:
AH> According to THE FREE DICTIONARY, this term may refer
AH> either to card games or to a highly developed
AH> characteristic/talent/skill.  Dict.org says it may refer
AH> to a person's best asset & uses neatness as an example.

Indeed: I saw that boring, if not ill, example while writing
the my previous post. It says: "Neatness is not his strong
suit".  But neatness is a passive quality, not requiring
creativity, courage, fortitude, or vigour.  Characterising
it as a "suit" devaluates the word!

AH> The second alternative is more figurative... but I think
AH> you were on the right track when you mentioned
AH> perseverance WRT Alexander's citation.

But I dislike that citation on the same ground as the
dict.org exmaple. A suit of a man to a maid (whence
`suitor') is more to my taste.

AH> No matter what talents an individual was born with, they
AH> may be improved by hard work & perseverance.

I quote the above for the fun of mentioning my surprise upon
initiaal misreading of `improved' as `removed'.

AH> We could also say neatness isn't a person's forte, using
AH> the term as it's used in music to refer to strength (but
AH> not necessarily to volume).  :-)

I believe `forte' refers to the attack of the sound rather
than to its volume -- a term I know not from music but from
electroacoustics.  Yours is a fine point in both senses. It
leads to many interesting insights and contrasts: Imagine a
fast-rocking song with minor chords (example upon request!),
a naturally bright color (Yellow, Cyan) in a low tone.


P.S.: I offer my warmest compliments on the coming of the
      New Year and the going of the Old one.  Has anything
      changed, except the snow in the streets is not last
      year's?

P.P.S.: I see you indent the first line of your paragraphs
        by nine spaces, which may be a typewriter
        convention.  But they having no line breaks, each
        one is essentially a very long single line, whose
        proper display depends on whether and how the client
        software re-flows it to screen width. I therefore
        propose another step towards the typewriter
        canon -- breaking lines at a readable lenght, which
        is usually between sixty-five and seventy two
        characters.

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