Amber Alert

You see "amber alerts" posted on Interstates when a child is missing or abducted. Usually a license plate, make and color of car are provided, along with age and distinguishing characteristics. But there's another kind of "Amber alert" that's fast becoming an Urban Legend. It’s "Amber Heard." Whatever your feelings about the suit involving Johnny Depp and his former wife, neither “heard” nor “amber” will ever be the same. Literally “Amber Heard” sounds like an acknowledgement over a police radio. Remember Highway Patrol the 50’s tv series? Imagine Broderick Crawford intoning “Amber Heard” instead "10-4" after an all points bulletin has gone out. Amber itself had lost its meaning as a color. People either associate it with an alert or an actress in a defamation suit. “Heard” once the past tense of “hear” has been retired as a past participle. Such are the vicissitudes of everyday usage--which may cause language (and meaning) to evolve. “Have you Heard?” has now become a loaded expression that can get you #MeTooed” when employed in a PC crowd. Here's where "affirmative consent" comes in. Be sure to ask your partner's permission, if you find yourself in a situation where you need to utter "Amber Heard." 

read "Hamptons Journal: La Grande Bouffe" by Francis Levy, TheScreamingPope

and listen to "Roadrunner" by Junior Walker & the Allstars