I'd also like to thank Timeline (aka Punkin) for having created a word describing all that is me. — Hanover

Aww Hanover, that is simply adorable. You named a fine lady after a gourd we carve, to scare people as we jack them for free candy, when the sun goes down on all Hallows Eve. Brilliant! :roll:

You named a fine lady after a gourd we carve, to scare people as we jack them for free candy, when the sun goes down on all Hallows Eve. — ArguingWAristotleTiff

He is every girls dream.

:rofl: Hanover would never have the gall to post a picture of himself like that.

Not sure who is hipper and cooler, the young flopping Travolta with the goofy grin or the serious and aloof gum chewer in the spaghetti strap cut off.

Sorry, you can't be Punkin cuz Punkin said so. You're now Luscious.

Carry on.

Aww Hanover, that is simply adorable. You named a fine lady after a gourd we carve, to scare people as we jack them for free candy, when the sun goes down on all Hallows Eve. Brilliant! :roll: — ArguingWAristotleTiff

Don't be jelly Sweet Petunia.

Don't be jelly Sweet Petunia. — Hanover

You know I am not a flower in any interpertation of the word.
You can affectionately call me 'EvilBitchLilth" :snicker:

Fine, here's a pic of me.

https://media.giphy.com/media/YI0HM7ix6pFbW/giphy.mp4

:vomit:

Words of the Day - March 29, 2018

Homophones with at least three different spellings

Rude, rood, rued
Two, to, too
Sees, seas, seize
You’re, your, ewer
Wright, write, rite, right
Adds, adze, ads
Poor, pore, pour
Maize, maze, Mays
Roe, row, rho
New, knew, gnu

Added later:
Rapt, wrapped, rapped
High, hie, hi.
Meat, mete, meet
Hoard, horde, whored
Flew, flu, flue
Toad, towed, toed
Rowed, road, rode
Seer, sere, sear
Raise, rays, raze

He is every girls dream. — TimeLine

Can you please use "Hide and Reveal" for that clip. It's making it hard for me to come to this page. I have, as you know, delicate sensibilities. By which I mean it gives me the heebie-jeebies.

I quite like heebie-jeebies. The word, not the experience.

As we are posting gifs lifted from the internet of 1994, here is a dancing garden gnome:

[gif]Dancing garden gnome[/gif]

(Obviously you have to imagine it. Delicate sensibilities.)

Word of the Day - March 30, 2018

Avuncular. Sounds like a medical condition. "He has an avuncular spleen." Means "like an uncle." Whoda thunk you needed a word for that. I don't know of a similar word for "like an aunt."

Also, feels good to say.

From the Latin for maternal uncle.

Zeitgeist.

Schadenfreude, the pleasure one finds in other people's misfortunes. Schadenfreude should have an opposite -- the not-altogether-pleasant feeling one experiences when hearing about somebody else's good fortune. Apparently to the German, this isn't the same as jealousy.

Last year I started making a list of words I had never heard before -- amazingly obscure words authors of spy novels, science fiction, history, and so forth would let drop.

Like...

Crepuscule - twilight
Tyro - a beginner or novice
Marmoreal - made of or likened to marble
Revanchist - someone who wishes to reclaim lost national territory
Peculate - embezzle or steal. Embezzle is a nice word. Quite woody.
Perlustrate - inspect thoroughly. Too tinny. Don't like it.
Accouchement - the process of giving birth to a baby (which is what one usually gives both to, Mr. dictionary writer)
Mensuration - Not something women do. It means measuring of geometric spaces like... blocks on the streets.
Operose - tedious, wearisome
Hubris - not too obscure; a good word to know.
Invigilating - keep watch

There are many more in the list. I'll stop now with Monocausotaxophilia - the love of a single cause than explains everything. There are a few Monocausotaxophiliacs around here.

Irregardless
Merriam Webster definition of irregardless:
nonstandard
: regardless

(In wanting a sabbatical from debates, this will be my last post for a while, I think.)

In thinking about the evolution of language—which has many examples, such our tendency to trust “The Bank of Billy” more than “Billy’s Bank” and other such often aesthetic factors that play out in which words fall out and which become popularized—wanted to address the word ejaculation: expressing brief and abrupt statements. Just checked with Wiktionary and this definition is not even outdated, and also includes thus expressed prayers. The term can be found in older novels, as in “the person ejaculated many things upon the others” … was copiously used in books such as Withering Heights in such manner. So here we are, ejaculating concepts to each other all the time on TPF … both men and women. No wonder we can on occasion gain new conceptions of things. :cool:

Eccentric - I like this word. It goes two ways. 1) Describes a person who's behavior is unconventional and maybe a bit odd. — T Clark

Kookaburra.

Didn't know that one. — Baden

You don't watch Vikings? :gasp:

There aren't that many of them around these days. In South East Asia at least.

Read the book. — T Clark

It's a bloody good book, that. One of the best.

I have so many pet peeves about big words that sound impressive. — Noble Dust

I ate words wot make ya sand impressive.

Malaprop is nice; especially in the context of the forum. — Noble Dust

Found one! :party:

But I also hold communism with similar content. — Mr Phil O'Sophy

There aren't that many of them around these days. In South East Asia at least. — Baden

This may seem like a non-sequitur, but...I'm pretty sure Norsemen never got to Thailand, but they did make it as far south as Sicily. That has always amazed me.

Circumambulation: Walking around a sacred object. I sometimes use the term to describe the philosophical process (circumambulating ideas).
Exegesis: Interpretation of religious texts.
Synecdoche: Figure of speech when you use the name of a part or property to represent the whole (or the reverse, where you use a name or property of the whole to represent a part). An example would be calling businessmen "suits".

from mw: lagniappe
: a small gift given to a customer by a merchant at the time of a purchase; broadly : something given or obtained gratuitously or by way of good measure The waiter added a cup of lobster bisque as a lagniappe to the meal.

from mw: lagniappe
: a small gift given to a customer by a merchant at the time of a purchase; broadly : something given or obtained gratuitously or by way of good measure The waiter added a cup of lobster bisque as a lagniappe to the meal. — Raspberry

I remember looking that word up when I saw it for the first time. It's meaning is nothing like what I imagined it would be. I also pronounced it wrong. Correct - lan yap

Circumambulation: Walking around a sacred object. I sometimes use the term to describe the philosophical process (circumambulating ideas). — Ying

Made me think of "peripatetic." Also means moving around. Also means philosophical.

Word of the Day - April 4, 2018.

I have been AWOL on the WOTD for a bit.

AWOL. acronym for Absent without leave.

But that's not the word of the day.

Mumbletypeg, sometimes Mumblety Peg - A game we used to start playing when I was a kid. As soon as we'd start, I'd say "no f.....ing way," or the1961 equivalent for 10 year olds, and quit. You play by throwing a knife into the ground as close to your foot as you can. Closest wins. Muh, buh, peh. All those bilabial stops.

Word of the day: Archduchy — Count Radetzky von Radetz

Is 'archduchy' adjectival the way that 'crunchy', 'raunchy', and 'frosty' are, or is it more nouny like 'flunky', 'donkey', or kennedy? (The Mcdougall clan was very Kennedy, really, and the Kenneds were more like the mafia.)

I'm totally in favor of using hunks rather than hags to teach grammar.