About

Welcome to the "About" page! If you're curious about the name of the blog or about me, read on!

About the name - A few years back, I was having a lot of trouble coming up with a good name, and I experimented a ton with a bunch of different names, trying to see what sounds nice, is semi-easy to remember, is catchy, etc. "Fossilized" is a fun and simple word, so I decided then it would be a decent name. I've enjoyed collecting and reading about rocks and minerals, geology, and fossils since I was in elementary school, and I figured naming this blog about something that's old would suit some of my interests: dictionary history, classical music, Chinese history (especially calligraphy, origami, tangrams, and other traditions), and geology.

Ironically enough, the idea that dictionaries 'fossilize' a language is pretty naive, since lexicography as a whole has shown me that languages are incredibly fluid. So, even though the languages that dictionaries aspire to take a snapshot of are constantly evolving, the objects themselves (much like the tradition of Chinese calligraphy remaining essentially the same throughout history) are static, which is more what I was originally aiming for. :)

About the blogger - My name is Vijay (you can find me by the same name and "temporubato88" on YouTube), and I love collecting reference works and old books, collecting and researching rocks and minerals, learning Chinese, playing clarinet and piano, reading, and blogging! My brother, Vikram, also has a blog - check it out at coolstuff4819.blogspot.com. I like to use his typewriters occasionally, but I don't know all that much about them. Hope you enjoy exploring my blog!