Inspired by the recent report of a spousal beheading in Buffalo, NY, I hereby present a double-post on a related theme:
I’ve only written a handful of letters to the editor in my life. Something has to really bug me to get me to sit down at the computer and set out to prove someone else wrong.
One time when I actually sat down and went to town was after the beheading of Wall Street Journal reporter Daniel Pearl z”l. The Boston Globe had crassly referred to his “decapitated head.” I and everyone else know what they meant—the head without the body. But it’s not only grisly, it’s wrong. You can’t take the head off someone’s head.
When the head and body are separated from one another, the head becomes disembodied and the body is decapitated. Thus, the fiery head that appears to Dorothy and her friends in the film The Wizard of Oz is disembodied, while the Headless Horseman that haunts the pages of The Legend of Sleepy Hollow is decapitated.
I haven’t found an expression that describes the unhappy situation of Nearly Headless Nick in the Harry Potter series. If anyone else knows one, please chime in.
Shimshonit 
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