My friend Mike is round to watch The Wire. "Wire boys, oi oi oi!" That's what we chant at each other. And we say, "Good Wiring," afterwards, or, "All Wired up now", or something.
We're not intrinsically cool, Mike and I. But we're happy, so whatever.
We're not happy. Of course we're not happy. Don't be silly.
Today, Mike is not happy because of his headphones.
He comes round wearing these headphones. I've not seen them before. "Nice headphones," I say, meaning it.
Mike says: "They make my head look enormous, don't they? I mean, my head is already enormous. And then you add these awful things on top. It's ridiculous. I'm very self conscious about it all." He is smiling, but he also means it, also.
So I make jokes about his massive head for a while. But you know what? I didn't think Mike had a massive head, or that his headphones were massive. Of course, if Mike wanted to present me with this narrative, then sure, I'd run with it, because humans like ready-made narratives, and this one involved someone being the butt of a joke, and that someone not being me. That's always a plus.
But if I'd seen Mike in the street, and not known him, here's what I would have thought: "That man is wearing headphones." And then I would have gone back to thinking about myself, and all the incredibly important things happening to me, like whether my head looked stupid or over- or under-sized in any way.
Or perhaps, paying the absolute maximum amount of attention possible to another human being, directing all my awareness outside of myself, I might have thought: "Does that man have better headphones than me?"
And I would have studied the man, and the headphones. And if the answer that I arrived at was, Yes, the man did have better headphones than me, then I would have felt miserable for a while, and pondered how unfair it was that I had cheap tiny crappy headphones while everyone else in the world, in the entire goddamned world, had giant powerful beautiful headphones.
If, on the other hand, I concluded that, No, my headphones were best, then I would have immediately dismissed the man from my thoughts, and gone back to the integral work of worrying about whatever it was I was I was worrying about. The weird shape of my head, probably.
What I'm saying is that we ALL think we have stupid heads. We ALL think our accoutrements, technological, sartorial, show us up to be impostors and unfathomably pathetic losers. We ALL worry that, walking around in the spotlight, at the centre of the universe, everyone is watching us and sees all our faults and blemishes, that all those bit part actors on the sidelines are staring in at us and pointing and laughing.
But to everyone else WE are the bit part actors. WE are the ones who might point and laugh. To them, it is they who are the centre of the universe. We are as entirely meaningless to them as all those faceless nobodies in the street are to us.
And they are, aren't they? Nobodies. God, how they shuffle and lurch towards us, down the high street, wearing their puffer jackets, their tie-dyed ponchos, their luminous wellington boots, their pin-striped suits. Ceaseless throngs of them. Shoving, sweating, burping. In Armani. In charity shop throws. In torn bin bags.
Whatever. We don't care. We don't give a shit. Get out of our way. We've got important business to attend to, we're incredibly stressed here, distracted, off in the glorious unique temple of our skulls, at the precise, we're certain, centre of the universe, so vital, so necessary, worrying about the things that truly matter, such as our flabby knees, our oddly hanging scarves, everything we own, wear, possess, are.
It doesn't matter, does it? It doesn't matter whether Mike has a big head (and he does, objectively; it is gargantuan). It doesn't matter whether your jeans are tight around your hips. Whether your breasts are small, or large, or wonky. Whether your tongue lolls out of the side of your mouth when you laugh, or your feet slant inwards when you walk, or you have a double chin when you are turned to profile in unguarded photographs.
You're simply not as important to others as you think you are. You don't matter to them, to me, at all. You're entirely insignificant.
And I very much hope that brings you comfort.
......
Music: Sixtyniner, by Boards of Canada. Don't /think/ I've listened to this really early stuff before. It's lush. Wide, expansive, intricate, intriguing. Lush, I say. Lush.
Thursday, 3 January 2019
Wednesday, 2 January 2019
Day 250: Wednesday Reviews - The Bourne Ultimatum
This is the third film in the cerebral spy series starring Matt Damon as secret-agent-with-amnesia Jason Bourne, with director Paul Greengrass returning, after second film The Bourne Supremacy, to again inject his stylish brand of swift cuts and shaky cam that helped define the feel of the series.
It’s slick, polished, but it has lost character from the second, which had lost character from the original. The filmmakers know what they’re doing, it rattles along confidently and capably, the story beats are where they need to be - with plot elements ossifying into tropes, series cliches - but it’s not fresh and intriguing like the first film.
There’s far less motivation, for a start. Bourne is getting flashbacks to his birth as a shadowy CIA operative, and wants to uncover the truth of who he is, how he came into being. Despite the closure presented by the previous film, with CIA bad apple Brian Cox flushed out and brought to light, the agency, now personified in David Straitharn’s Deputy Director Noah Vosen, isn’t ready to give Bourne a pass. “As far as I’m concerned,” Vosen declares in an early expositional scene in Langley, “Bourne is still a threat until proven otherwise.”
And so they’re right back at it. Bourne racing and ducking around a handful of global locales - London, Madrid, Tangier, New York - looking for answers, using his mouse-like powers of evasion, while the big clumsy cats of the CIA hunt him with all their gadgets and intel and manpower.
Bourne has an early cohort in Paddy Considine’s Guardian reporter, which, like, if you were going to make a mood board of Bourne films, the Guardian’s masthead would be right up there, along with the Eurostar, the Berlin public transport system, and a beat-up boxy old Citroen or something, to define the iconography of the series. As a fully paid-up Guardian supporter, I’m fine with this.
Joan Allen is back as Pam Landy, the sympathetic voice of reason inside the CIA, again stern and fair and unwilling to kowtow to the powerful men around her. She argues with Vosen, stands her ground, sounds great while doing so. But she’s got less to do this time out, and sadly Julia Stiles, the only other woman on the cast, has an even less active role, relegated to pouting at Bourne’s war wounds and cutting her hair to look like his dead girlfriend. No, the film doesn’t pass the Bechdel test.
It does look fantastic, again, though. Washed out day scenes, moody, lugubrious night scenes, lots of greens and blues and oranges and yellows, continuing the tone from where the previous film left off. Greengrass knows what he’s doing with action, filming movement and pace and excitement, with the overall emotional impression given precedent over any clear details. Cars crash, windows smash, bullets zip, bodies roll, and you don’t have time to think about each event, you’re just caught up in the ride. You always know who has the upper hand, what the micro goals are, how they’re being achieved - you know the story of the action - but pause and consider what you just watched and you realise it’s pretty dumb.
Dialogue follows a similar approach, zinging back and forth, forcing plot transitions, but not meaning a hell of a lot if you stop to analyse.
And this is maybe the film’s biggest weakness. It just doesn’t have the heart of the first film, the soul, the core. It ticks the boxes, goes through the motions, and does so probably the most capably of the three, but in essence its existence is predicated upon the thought: “people liked this thing, let’s give them more of this thing”, rather than a drive to make something inherently intriguing and worthwhile. The story is not a story worth telling, when taken on its own merits, but simply an engineered excuse for the audience to have more of the bits they enjoyed the first two times. Which, yeah: sequels. But that’s why sequels are bullshit. Never give people what they think they want. Give them what they could never imagine.
There’s a late car chase, feeling forced and overblown, and then a rushed conclusion, and then we’re thrown into that iconic Moby track, the credits roll, and the trilogy is over, with, despite the noise and agility, more of a whimper than a bang. The Bourne Momentum, is the name I’d give to this one, with all the strength of the first outing being enough to slide the franchise through two sequels, just about to the end of this one, but with the momentum used up and no more thrust added.
After this they waited five years, then tried a different tack with The Bourne Legacy. I'll watch that next week, and report back.
……
Music: Mother, by IDLES. Aggressive, activist indie punk from Bristol. Brazen and bold, it asserts its intent, does its thing, and gets out. Good stuff.
……
Music: Mother, by IDLES. Aggressive, activist indie punk from Bristol. Brazen and bold, it asserts its intent, does its thing, and gets out. Good stuff.
Tuesday, 1 January 2019
Day 249: Other sounds
Ouuef. Blaaarp. Other sounds. Not feeling too hot today, for some weird reason. Got work at five, not supremely up for that. But it should be a quiet night, and then I’ve got two glorious days off.
So, yeah. “A few bevs”, when you’ve not been drinking for 250 days, can very quickly become “probably too many bevs”. I mean, I don’t feel horrendous today, just incredibly tired and run down, and like I need to remove my brain and bathe it in cold water while humming lullabies to it soothingly.
But it was lovely to be out with people, to remember the energy of that world of “out” that I haven’t been inhabiting for eight months now. The bodies pressed together, the shadows, the softly flowing spirits (both kinds).
It was good to do for a special occasion, and it was good to realise I don’t want to do it again for a very long time. It’s a mode of being, going out, going to late bars, boozing, that has its upsides, for sure, but it is for people younger than myself, with still the feel of their lives stretching infinitely in front of them. It’s not what you want to be doing at my age, when you start to be happier getting an early night and being productive tomorrow than rushing headlong into action and excitement wanting to catch the stars in your coruscating tumbler but only eventually finding bleary morning, sickness, an empty bank account.
Anyway, I’ve brewed coffee today, made leek and potato soup, had it with a brown roll and two satsumas, drunk tea with lemon and honey. I’m treading gently, carefully, healthily.
Last night was the end of 2018, and a last spritz of silliness. Today is the beginning of the new year.
So, yeah. “A few bevs”, when you’ve not been drinking for 250 days, can very quickly become “probably too many bevs”. I mean, I don’t feel horrendous today, just incredibly tired and run down, and like I need to remove my brain and bathe it in cold water while humming lullabies to it soothingly.
But it was lovely to be out with people, to remember the energy of that world of “out” that I haven’t been inhabiting for eight months now. The bodies pressed together, the shadows, the softly flowing spirits (both kinds).
It was good to do for a special occasion, and it was good to realise I don’t want to do it again for a very long time. It’s a mode of being, going out, going to late bars, boozing, that has its upsides, for sure, but it is for people younger than myself, with still the feel of their lives stretching infinitely in front of them. It’s not what you want to be doing at my age, when you start to be happier getting an early night and being productive tomorrow than rushing headlong into action and excitement wanting to catch the stars in your coruscating tumbler but only eventually finding bleary morning, sickness, an empty bank account.
Anyway, I’ve brewed coffee today, made leek and potato soup, had it with a brown roll and two satsumas, drunk tea with lemon and honey. I’m treading gently, carefully, healthily.
Last night was the end of 2018, and a last spritz of silliness. Today is the beginning of the new year.
......
Music: Fan the Flames, by Sheer Mag. Holy shit. I love this. Grungy, lo-fi garage punk, with a bluesy 70s dad rock lead guitar vibe under the vocals. Chunky, melodic, sexy, stupendous. Holy shit. I can't. It's great.
Day 248: A pirate
Oh man, I’m beat. I’m just home. Went out after the close, I had a whisky, and then a few more after that, and spent a great evening with Zoe and Lizzie and James and Dan, whom I never go out with, and, OK, I broke the rules, but they’re more what you’d call “guidelines” than actual rules. (That’s a Pirates of the Caribbean reference there, because it’s New Year [winky smiley face.])
So, yep. It was a tough old shift, but I made it through, and then I let my hair down a little afterwards. I think that’s fair enough. And I came here to write my blog.
2019 is going to be good. I’ve got high hopes for 2019.
All the loves xxx
So, yep. It was a tough old shift, but I made it through, and then I let my hair down a little afterwards. I think that’s fair enough. And I came here to write my blog.
2019 is going to be good. I’ve got high hopes for 2019.
All the loves xxx
Monday, 31 December 2018
Day 247: The needle and the damage done
File this one under: a bad day. Don't feel I can do this. I'm ragged. Physically, mentally. Down to the bone. A cosmic horror has got my soul shoved into the grindstone of the universe, and it is grinding, crushing until all that is left is bloody stump.
I felt better at work this morning, with drugs in me I felt the worst of the flu was over, and pub was quiet, and it was nice to joke around with Zoe and Liz, take it easy, have a laugh.
Then we were not quiet, and I could not handle it. I was dizzy, faint, couldn't concentrate, every step was exhausting, I was on an uneven keel. Got to 5pm and I grabbed my coat and bolted, left the pub a mess and everyone struggling, which, like, I hate to do, but I haven't called in sick the last three days, so you get what you get. Came home and made Earl Grey, got into bed, passed out.
Now it's 11pm. I haven't eaten. I'm working the close tomorrow with minimum staff, because last year was quiet, but I'm worried this year won't be quiet, and I'm running at 40 or so percent right now...
And, more, I'm just struggling right now. I'm lost. I feel I'm going nowhere with the writing, it's all I can do to force myself to write this little blog every night, but I'm building no momentum, working towards nothing, it all feels harder rather than easier day by day.
I guess that's not true. Guess I am improving, though it never feels like it in the moment. It's always struggle, but that is life, you feel caught in marshland, slippery stones under foot, the way ahead hazy, but you look back, and you have journeyed from where you were.
And the writing has improved. I don't feel the anxiety of people seeing me imperfect and unguarded that I did. I'm better at putting up rough pieces and moving on. And those pieces, all first drafts, which everyone involved in creativity agrees is the stage to be loose, to make mistakes, to get it wrong - some of those first drafts have actually been very good. Sometimes there is energy, and there are intriguing sentence constructions, and I can feel the music, and I am borne along. And when there are not these things there are still words, one after the other, forming some kind of structure, and it is always worthwhile to have done that. On the worst days there is still this.
And maybe that cosmic horror isn't grinding down my soul, but my ego. The process is unbelievably painful, exhausting, but the shards that fly off are in the end everything that wasn't me. And maybe the cosmic horror is not a horror, but God, disguised, as all horror truly is, and he is simply trying to make me small enough to fit through the eye of a needle.
Keep going. Keep going. Keep going.
......
Music: Don't Delete the Kisses, by Wolf Alice. Oh, man, I adore this electro indie 80s throwback stuff. Driving rhythm, breathless vocals, aching longing etched in neon moonlight. Gorgeous.
I felt better at work this morning, with drugs in me I felt the worst of the flu was over, and pub was quiet, and it was nice to joke around with Zoe and Liz, take it easy, have a laugh.
Then we were not quiet, and I could not handle it. I was dizzy, faint, couldn't concentrate, every step was exhausting, I was on an uneven keel. Got to 5pm and I grabbed my coat and bolted, left the pub a mess and everyone struggling, which, like, I hate to do, but I haven't called in sick the last three days, so you get what you get. Came home and made Earl Grey, got into bed, passed out.
Now it's 11pm. I haven't eaten. I'm working the close tomorrow with minimum staff, because last year was quiet, but I'm worried this year won't be quiet, and I'm running at 40 or so percent right now...
And, more, I'm just struggling right now. I'm lost. I feel I'm going nowhere with the writing, it's all I can do to force myself to write this little blog every night, but I'm building no momentum, working towards nothing, it all feels harder rather than easier day by day.
I guess that's not true. Guess I am improving, though it never feels like it in the moment. It's always struggle, but that is life, you feel caught in marshland, slippery stones under foot, the way ahead hazy, but you look back, and you have journeyed from where you were.
And the writing has improved. I don't feel the anxiety of people seeing me imperfect and unguarded that I did. I'm better at putting up rough pieces and moving on. And those pieces, all first drafts, which everyone involved in creativity agrees is the stage to be loose, to make mistakes, to get it wrong - some of those first drafts have actually been very good. Sometimes there is energy, and there are intriguing sentence constructions, and I can feel the music, and I am borne along. And when there are not these things there are still words, one after the other, forming some kind of structure, and it is always worthwhile to have done that. On the worst days there is still this.
And maybe that cosmic horror isn't grinding down my soul, but my ego. The process is unbelievably painful, exhausting, but the shards that fly off are in the end everything that wasn't me. And maybe the cosmic horror is not a horror, but God, disguised, as all horror truly is, and he is simply trying to make me small enough to fit through the eye of a needle.
Keep going. Keep going. Keep going.
......
Music: Don't Delete the Kisses, by Wolf Alice. Oh, man, I adore this electro indie 80s throwback stuff. Driving rhythm, breathless vocals, aching longing etched in neon moonlight. Gorgeous.
Saturday, 29 December 2018
Day 246: Creaking
Flu hasn’t abated. Woke up creaking, sore, decidedly unwell. Had to push myself to finish the post last night - was I writing about dinosaur nomenclature? Huh? - and when I finished I was wiped out. Tried to meditate but everything ached, my brain was on fire, so crawled to bed with my book, managed half a paragraph, before slumping down into delirious slumber.
Work now. Ten hour shift on what, if yesterday is anything to go by, promises to be a disgusting Saturday filled with roaming packs of feral dad-lads unleashed from their families and stalking the streets, searching for meaning in the bottom of pints of mainstream lagers.
If I worked in an office I’d call in sick today. Just going to have to load up on paracetamol and caffeine and wade on through.
......
Well, I’m home. Work was quiet. Thank God, was all I could do to be there, to stay upright, to exist. Spent time organising staff files, pottered on glasses, downed pints of Lemsip Max. Left early, had tea, been sat half asleep in front of PC for the last hour.
Open tomorrow, then not in till the close NYE, so an evening then a morning to recuperate. Luverly.
......
Music: Stan Getz and The Oscar Peterson Trio. JAZZ!
Work now. Ten hour shift on what, if yesterday is anything to go by, promises to be a disgusting Saturday filled with roaming packs of feral dad-lads unleashed from their families and stalking the streets, searching for meaning in the bottom of pints of mainstream lagers.
If I worked in an office I’d call in sick today. Just going to have to load up on paracetamol and caffeine and wade on through.
......
Well, I’m home. Work was quiet. Thank God, was all I could do to be there, to stay upright, to exist. Spent time organising staff files, pottered on glasses, downed pints of Lemsip Max. Left early, had tea, been sat half asleep in front of PC for the last hour.
Open tomorrow, then not in till the close NYE, so an evening then a morning to recuperate. Luverly.
......
Music: Stan Getz and The Oscar Peterson Trio. JAZZ!
Day 245: Stegosauruses
Well, I've got nothing else to write tonight, so I'm going to talk about stegosauruses.
No, I'm not. I am going to talk about Stegosaurus, but I'm not going to write it "stegosauruses".
OK, so here's where I'm coming from. My cousin sent a screenshot from a listicle of "17 mind-blowing facts" or whatever to our family Whatsapp group yesterday, with the mind-blowing fact in question explaining that Stegosaurus is older than grass, which grass apparently evolved "as we know it" a good 60 million years after the last of those dinosaurs popped their scaly clogs and slid, clogless, off this mortal coil.
Which, fair enough, is mildly interesting. But here's how the listicle spelled Stegosaurus: "stegosauruses".
The writer, and pedant, and dinosaur lover, in me cannot let that stand. No way.
Dinosaur names, you see, are terms for the taxon - the label within the scheme of taxonomic classification for lifeforms - rather than for individuals within that taxon. As such they can never be plural.
Remember that old hierarchy of taxonomy from biology lessons? Life > Domain > Kingdom > Phylum > Class > Order > Genus > Species. Dinosaur names tend to refer to a species or genus. Triceratops is a genus. Tyrannosaurus rex is a species (Tyrannosaurus is the genus, and the rex suffix distinguishes the species.
There can only ever be one of each genus, or species, so the issue of how to pluralise it technically never arises.
For extant species, of course, we do have colloquial terms for groups of members of that species. So where Panthera leo and Panthera onca are the scientific names of two species in the Panthera genus, we more commonly refer to them as "lions" and "jaguars". There is only one Panthera leo, but it's fine to say "Oh, no, Dave, there are three lions charging at you right now." (Or shout, more like.)
Similarly, we ourselves belong to the species Homo sapiens (singular form, Latin for "wise man"), of the genus Homo, but we use "humans" to talk about groups of us.
For dinosaurs, however, because there are no more dinosaurs, there's never been such a pressing need to develop such a system.
Except that we're fascinated by dinosaurs, and we can't help imagining them loping about the lands. We're forever making films where they're cloned from the DNA of sap-covered mosquitoes (the family Culicidae, comprising many thousands of fly-species), or writing fantasy books where children are transported back to the Triassic era, or compiling thoughtless listicles about the temporal existence of dinosaurs in relation to grass (the family Poaceae).
And, in these cases, well, it's important to talk about herds of triceratops, or a mating pair of T-Rexes, or those three velociraptors hunting Robert Muldoon through the underbrush.
Yes, the pedantry exists because there's a genuine gap where the correct usage comes up short. This often happens when there are large numbers of people making spelling or grammar mistakes. The mistake highlights a need, and there's a change, and the language slowly evolves. That's why pedantry can so often be tedious and enervating - old bores grumpily refusing to move with the times.
But there's also a reason to uphold standards, to point out and stick to the rules. Let everything be of equal value and order quickly breaks down, you descend into chaos, and precision and discernment become impossible.
So, in summary, here is my guide to dinosaur names:
In informal conversation go wild. T-Rex, T-Rexes, stegosauruses, velociraptors, whatever floats your boat. There's no universally agreed standard for dinosaur groups, as there is with "lions" or "humans". And life's too short to pause a conversation every time you need to work out whether it's "Gerald and I" or "me and Gerald", let alone to worry about formal scientific taxonomy. Does the person to whom you're talking get your meaning? That's good enough.
In writing, however, I'd take more care. If you're writing formally, always abide by the International Code of Zoological Nomenclature, and use italics and capitalisation of the first letter. Tyrannosaurus rex. Compsognathus. Velociraptor. The genus name can be abbreviated, as in T. rex, or V. mongoliensis (a species of Velociraptor), but you should never, ever, pluralise.
If your writing is less formal, on a blog like this, or in a listicle, then writing closer to speaking might be more appropriate. "The last individuals belonging to the taxon Stegosaurus roamed the Earth 60 million years before grass evolved..." is perhaps too stuffy. But "stegosauruses" will make certain people wince - especially as the plural of saurus, if you're insisting on pluralising, should be sauri.
If you're breaking the rules you should know when you're doing so, and why. It's always a compromise, so ensure you understand the trade-off, and make your choice consciously.
Signalling to your audience that you know about things like this is the best way to appear elegant, to build confidence, and thus to have your thoughts heard, trusted, and believed. A little care goes a long way.
......
Music: Pristine, by Snail Mail.
No, I'm not. I am going to talk about Stegosaurus, but I'm not going to write it "stegosauruses".
OK, so here's where I'm coming from. My cousin sent a screenshot from a listicle of "17 mind-blowing facts" or whatever to our family Whatsapp group yesterday, with the mind-blowing fact in question explaining that Stegosaurus is older than grass, which grass apparently evolved "as we know it" a good 60 million years after the last of those dinosaurs popped their scaly clogs and slid, clogless, off this mortal coil.
Which, fair enough, is mildly interesting. But here's how the listicle spelled Stegosaurus: "stegosauruses".
The writer, and pedant, and dinosaur lover, in me cannot let that stand. No way.
Dinosaur names, you see, are terms for the taxon - the label within the scheme of taxonomic classification for lifeforms - rather than for individuals within that taxon. As such they can never be plural.
Remember that old hierarchy of taxonomy from biology lessons? Life > Domain > Kingdom > Phylum > Class > Order > Genus > Species. Dinosaur names tend to refer to a species or genus. Triceratops is a genus. Tyrannosaurus rex is a species (Tyrannosaurus is the genus, and the rex suffix distinguishes the species.
There can only ever be one of each genus, or species, so the issue of how to pluralise it technically never arises.
For extant species, of course, we do have colloquial terms for groups of members of that species. So where Panthera leo and Panthera onca are the scientific names of two species in the Panthera genus, we more commonly refer to them as "lions" and "jaguars". There is only one Panthera leo, but it's fine to say "Oh, no, Dave, there are three lions charging at you right now." (Or shout, more like.)
Similarly, we ourselves belong to the species Homo sapiens (singular form, Latin for "wise man"), of the genus Homo, but we use "humans" to talk about groups of us.
For dinosaurs, however, because there are no more dinosaurs, there's never been such a pressing need to develop such a system.
Except that we're fascinated by dinosaurs, and we can't help imagining them loping about the lands. We're forever making films where they're cloned from the DNA of sap-covered mosquitoes (the family Culicidae, comprising many thousands of fly-species), or writing fantasy books where children are transported back to the Triassic era, or compiling thoughtless listicles about the temporal existence of dinosaurs in relation to grass (the family Poaceae).
And, in these cases, well, it's important to talk about herds of triceratops, or a mating pair of T-Rexes, or those three velociraptors hunting Robert Muldoon through the underbrush.
Yes, the pedantry exists because there's a genuine gap where the correct usage comes up short. This often happens when there are large numbers of people making spelling or grammar mistakes. The mistake highlights a need, and there's a change, and the language slowly evolves. That's why pedantry can so often be tedious and enervating - old bores grumpily refusing to move with the times.
But there's also a reason to uphold standards, to point out and stick to the rules. Let everything be of equal value and order quickly breaks down, you descend into chaos, and precision and discernment become impossible.
So, in summary, here is my guide to dinosaur names:
In informal conversation go wild. T-Rex, T-Rexes, stegosauruses, velociraptors, whatever floats your boat. There's no universally agreed standard for dinosaur groups, as there is with "lions" or "humans". And life's too short to pause a conversation every time you need to work out whether it's "Gerald and I" or "me and Gerald", let alone to worry about formal scientific taxonomy. Does the person to whom you're talking get your meaning? That's good enough.
In writing, however, I'd take more care. If you're writing formally, always abide by the International Code of Zoological Nomenclature, and use italics and capitalisation of the first letter. Tyrannosaurus rex. Compsognathus. Velociraptor. The genus name can be abbreviated, as in T. rex, or V. mongoliensis (a species of Velociraptor), but you should never, ever, pluralise.
If your writing is less formal, on a blog like this, or in a listicle, then writing closer to speaking might be more appropriate. "The last individuals belonging to the taxon Stegosaurus roamed the Earth 60 million years before grass evolved..." is perhaps too stuffy. But "stegosauruses" will make certain people wince - especially as the plural of saurus, if you're insisting on pluralising, should be sauri.
If you're breaking the rules you should know when you're doing so, and why. It's always a compromise, so ensure you understand the trade-off, and make your choice consciously.
Signalling to your audience that you know about things like this is the best way to appear elegant, to build confidence, and thus to have your thoughts heard, trusted, and believed. A little care goes a long way.
......
Music: Pristine, by Snail Mail.
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