h2g2 The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy: Earth Edition

Occitan. The Langue d'Oc (hence, Southern France's old moniker of Languedoc. Its extinct now. Died out with the Albigensian Crusade, and the subsequent takeover of Languedoc by the French Kings.

Ach!
I read something about the Albigensians in an idiotic book by Henry Lincoln about the last remaining descendant of Christ being a Rosicrucian Frenchman, or something like that...

Didn't realize they had their own language,
but I knew the Franks weren't always French.

Is there an Occitan link?

Whoo, I've never looked. I think I will go look now......

Incidently, I think we must have been fated to have a conversation. I had a tonsillectomy last week.

Well, there are a number of links...how good is your French, Italian, or even better, Basque? I did, however, find a nice wrap-up here:
http://www.eurolang.net/Languages/Occitan.htm
which should get you to something approaching a basic idea of it. Keep in mind what I have to learn is OLD Occitan. Like I have to know medieval Latin, German, French and Italian (meaning I will have to learn, at the least, Milanese, Florentine, Tuscan, and Roman Italian....minor variations on a theme, if you will)
It could be highly entertaining.
Oh. Yes. Don't forget paleography.
This summer I plan on reading mindless drivel. I figure it may be the last chance I have for many years to come!

And I will continue to write mindless drivel....

The older I get, the less I know.

It seems I am always running across things I didn't know on this site.
Countries, periods of history, towns, languages.
I was talking to a guy the other week about the creation myths of the Ainu...




Did they put you under?

The creation myths of the Ainu are interesting....the Magyar are even more fun! They believe that the came from the mating of a horse and giant eagle, both of which seem to come out of some demonic, Spawn sort of world.

Yes, indeed, they did put me under. It was not the most fun I've ever had. They had to do it twice, in fact. I am apparently a bleeder.

And you? How goes your day?

I'll get back to you later.
The wife rearranged the living room while I was sleeping.
I've spent twelve years trying to impart to her that family matters deserve family input.

Darling, my husband does stuff like that all the time. I finally told him to just stop doing things without telling me. It makes me nervous.

Just be glad she didn't go out and buy a new car, like my husband did a few months back!

Yeah, I tell her that, too.

She's brought home used cars out of the blue.
I had to fix one. Rather have burned it.

She's brought home "business opportunities", flea-covered cats, people, old boyfriends... other people's kids to babysit... furniture, appliances, Jackson Browne albums...plants, trees, fifty pounds of ground meat someone wanted to empty their storage freezer of... ugh.

She says,"If you love me, love me as I am. Now, go change that shirt and stop looking at me like that."

Sounds like you're married to my husband in female form. In our garage is a waterbed frame. Not because we have a waterbed, or that we want one in the future....no, he got it because he might need it "someday." Like the socks with holes he keeps in a bag, or the rubberbands that collect on doorknobs.

Oh, my. Well, at least we can sympathize with each other.

So Happy Together!