Birch month/Oak month

Bye bye, birch month. Hello, Prague Castle and many other places that open for sightseeing. Says my phrasebook: "Unlike most European languages, Czech doesn't use the Latin-based words to name months. The Czech names for months have Slavic roots dating from before the onset of Christianity and reflect the seasonal changes in the world of nature." I love the pagans!

Here they are:

* January -- leden (ice month)
* February -- únor (month when ice drips)
* March -- březen (birch month)
* April -- duben (oak month)
* May -- květen (flower month)
* June -- červen (month of worms)
* July -- červenec (month when fruit ripens)
* August -- srpen (sickle month)
* September -- září (month when the sun shines, but isn't hot)
* October -- říjen (rutting month)
* November -- listopad (falling leaves)
* December -- prosinec (probably from "prasinec", the month when pigs (prasata) were slaughtered) Or from "prosit" - to request

I like how 'leden' reminds me of 'leaden,' or how a large enough quantity of solid ice feels. 'Rutting' has to do with mating, now there's an archaic term. And I like 'listopad,' like padding around the forest in your socks, and also 'Moby Octopad'- for you Yo La Tengo fans. I actually think that will only make sense to Jessica.

Sometimes I think I should study linguistics. Then I remember that not everybody who enjoys music should study musicology, and I check myself. Susan Faludi's partner and former Mother Jones editor Russ Rymer says: "Linguistics is arguably the most hotly contested property in the academic realm. It is soaked with the blood of poets, theologians, philosophers, philologists, psychologists, biologists, anthropologists, and neurologists, along with whatever blood can be got out of grammarians."