The first week of February is the annual pinnacle of two things: groundhogs and Roman numerals. No other time of year drives more attention to these largely ignored items.
While we still analyze the consequences of Punxsutawney Phil's appearance this morning, we'll look at Roman numerals. They have only a few uses in newspapers. The Associated Press stylebook ominously begins its entry on Roman numerals this way: They use letters to express numbers. Sounds like something a journalist would think up.
The AP says to use Roman numerals:
- For wars
- For personal sequence for people and animals: King George V
- For certain legislative acts: Title IX
- For Super Bowls
And that's about it. It's been a long time since we gave a war a Roman numeral, and it's been even longer since King George V. Plus, Roman numerals have virtually no use in real life, except for tables of contents and figuring out the year of a movie in the credits.
So for each Super Bowl, the coaches conjure the X's and O's, and the journalists bust out the X's and I's and more. This year: Super Bowl XLVI.
The groundhog lobby will be upset to know we write almost nothing about groundhogs outside the context of Groundhog Day, either the day or the movie (released in MCMXCIII). The critter is cute, but he never qualifies for Pet of the Week.
So groundhogs, Romans, countrymen, lend me your ears and know this: It's your week.
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