Nightingale.

Nutria.

Noodle.

What?

OMG, facebook is evil. I reconnected with a childhood friend (she & I had been in contact, just not in the last couple of years. I try to visit when I see the parents, but she was out of state the last couple times) and now with her younger sister. Both are freaking gorgeous and interesting. And saw pics of their baby brothers, who I used to babysit. They have BEARDS! OK, goatees, but still. I changed their freaking diapers and Ari was the first kid who projectile vomited on me. FACIAL HAIR. WIVES. AHRG.

Knock on wood (followed by finding an actual wooden object and knocking three times on it).

Animals that begin with "n"?

Nautilus. Nematode. Nilgai. Nightjar.

eta: Sue already called nematode

Nilly, if you need any LaTeX help, shoot me an email.

Wow, that was a great volleyball game. (Set one of the US women's game against Belgium.) So exciting. Five set points!

Oh, sad Belgians.

I hadn't heard that before! The neck of the woods I grew up in, it was sign of the cross (large catholic population.) Probably less common a habit in Israel...

Oh, there are definitely other more, um, motions-involved, superstitions against the "evil eye" here, as well, but obviously none of them involve crosses. If anything there are some people who'd probably motion them against crosses.

I will choose a different superstition and knock on woo

Thanks, aurelia.

Did you know that there are people here who say that knocking-on-wood is actually connected to the crosses sara mentioned, through the wood that the cross consisted of? So some religious people here don't play to that superstition, as well.

Same with fingers-crossed.

Me, I'm just grateful for the thought and attention behind them, from other people. So there's that. Thanks for all the computer-please-behave wishes, you guys.

Hil, thanks. I'm not sure how much of the problem is computer-going-crazy and how much of it is actually LaTex (which I used in the past and even like, in a way), but it's helping to know I have somebody to ask. Thank you.

All the animals in "n" that I can think about are in Hebrew (nemala (=ant), nahash (=snake), nammer (=leopard)). I think that much like rhyming, it's way harder in a not-my-mother-tongue language (in which I didn't play these sort of games as a kid, too, or the introductory games of "please state you name and the name of an animal which starts with the same letter").

re: women's gymnastics--this is a bunch of miserable looking girls. It makes me uncomfortable watching them.