Bremerton City Councilman Brad Gehring
has been one of the chief proponents of a four-year degree
possibilities for Kitsap County. Outside the Roxy Seahawks rally in
early February he and I discussed his views that such a venture
would help further Bremerton’s redevelopment. Colleges, he said,
help attract employers offering family-wage jobs. I thought it an
interesting discussion and told him I’d talk to our education
reporter, Chad Lewis, about it.
Chad had been looking for a way to get
that question answered when I told him about Gehring. It gave Chad
a great way to begin looking at the issue, the result was
Sunday’s story about what it would take for Bremerton, or
anyplace in Kitsap, to get a four-year college in place.
One of our designers came up with the logo on the mug on the front page. The phrase at the bottom, “Fortes Fortuna Adiuvat” means “Fortune favors the brave” in Latin. The original phrase was “Ad Kalendas Graecas.” Bonus points to the first person who can write back with what English language idiom is the equivalent.
Okay, I’m reaching back to ninth grade Latin, now, but doesn’t Ad Kalendas Graecas just mean “never” or “a date that doesn’t exist”? You’ve got me curious now, so let me know what it is!
You’re correct that the phrase means “never,” and from what I’ve read it is equivalent to a fairly common English idiom we use to mean the same thing. If you’ve ever watched the Simpsons and remember the episode where Lisa becomes a vegetarian, you might recall a conversation Burns had with Smithers.