LEND ME YOUR EAR: `LATELY, I'VE BEEN HAVING DELUSIONS OF ADEQUACY.' ZIGGY

Ziggy and I have a lot in common. This sawed-off sub-species of cartoonage has a way of speaking great truths I wish I'd thought of first. Following are some of the reasons I can identify with the above Ziggyism.

On a recent talk show about drug addiction, the TV host asked a guest, "How did you keep from not becoming a drug addict?" How does one keep from not becoming? Where I come from, two negatives still add up to a positive, granted the rule hasn't changed.

During a TV special featuring an actress named Danielle, audiences heard that Danielle "poises" lots of problems. How do we poise problems? This might be understood in East Side New York, but in the rest of the country, problems are "posed", unless my feeling of adequacy about this is a delusion.

Radio listeners recently heard an announcer report that a man had been arrested for having a "controlled subject" in his car. Isn't there something wrong with this predicate? "Controlled substance" seems more familiar to most of us.

From another radio staffer reporting on a wedding, we learned that someone had stolen a pillow for the "ring barrier." Ordinarily, the pillow is intended to support the ring, though sometimes the bride and groom need more support than the ring or its bearer. Whatever the circumstance, the ring should be no barrier.

In an interview with a teacher who had left the fold and then decided to return, the teacher explained to his TV audience, "I got back to where I'm good at." Where is this teacher good at? Just before the "at", or in pre-kindergarten?

On "Wheel of Fortune," addicts have heard a commercial inviting Wheelwatchers to "call and book parties of any ages." Would this syntax be acceptable in a puzzle on the most watched game show in the country? How about an offer to book parties for any age group?

A nationally-known networker, commenting on the underground tunnel used for drug-trafficking between Mexico and California, announced that this newly-discovered course is just the tip of the iceberg. Sounds more like a hot tip to me, but perhaps the speaker was making a double-play on words having to do with stalagmites and stalagtites and their origin.

When Sterling Holloway, the voice of Winnie the Pooh and countless other fictional characters, died at 89, a TV staffer explained that he was "the first spoken teddy bear." Who spoken him?

From a radio talk show host who was diagnosing a caller, we heard that the caller was suffering from a "chronicle depression." The only chronicle I know other than Chronicles I and II in the old Testament is the one defined as the chronological record of historical events. The alleged psychiatrist meant "chronic depression," denoting frequent or prolonged spells of depression.

In an Associated Press article about the recent Tampa Bay tornadoes, the National Weather Service was said to have promised to "convene an inquiry." Unless I'm having another delusion of adequacy in supposing synonyms are not always synonymous, it would take a number of inquiries to produce an assembly.

A new commercial that stumps me describes an acne prevention cream that "does fragrance" and "entreats the action." Perhaps a prevention cream can do something positive despite the oxymoron, but can a cream of any sort beg for action? Why not let it speed, hasten, or accelerate the action?

Somewhere in this great land of plenty there's a man seeking help in opening a restaurant. "I plan to ask to a company what I should know about starting up," the man informed a talk show host. Never mind his desire to ask "to" a company. Many a millionaire has never heard of English idiom. But the talk show host suggested that the would-be restaurateur study 100 ways to steal from a restaurant. Clever, but who needs lessons in how to steal?

Lately, I've been having delusions of honesty. Thank you, Ziggy, for giving me a line I can paraphrase without being suspected of stealing.