Thursday, February 23, 2006

Oh, how I love words
I have a problem with some of the words we use in our daily goings-on. I am continually collecting words I like, and words I don't like. Here is part of my collection:

Words entered since the last post are indicated by an asterisk, not an asterick.

The LIKE list:
crotchety
epiploica
symbiosis
tomasek (a made up word that means to schlep around, randomly searching for something when you can't really remember what you were looking for. Ex: I was tomaseking around the house when I found a dead mouse - also remind me of Kimberlee Tomczak who I think is SUPER!)
SUPER
refrigeradora (my favorite word in Spanish)
architecture (sounds boxy)
poop (short and sweet)
personality disorder
willies (as in "gave me the willies")
gruntmeat (reference to poop)
windbag
angina
pie
Pi
artichoke (i wish this was a verb)
frumpy
dulcinea
voluptuous (it feel voluptuous when you say it)
slash, as in I am I am a DRE/YAYA
skidoo (restaurant speak for a collection of napkins rolled up with talc into a snake, wedged into your arse crack to absorb the sweat of standing in the kitchen all day)
sklerglegerkin (something that I tend to blurt out when I have nothing clever to say)
gnu
conoco, but only if it is mispronounced with all long o's and emphasis on the middle syllable. Otherwise it is pronounced like Monacco, with emphasis on the first syllable. A friend from upstate NY always said it like that and I miss her since she moved to Vermont.
albatross
aubergine
syrple (Thank you Roger Miller for "Roses are red, Violets are purple. Sugar is sweet, and so is maple syrple")
lugubrious
scurvy, especially with dog = scurvy dog
balalaika - a Russian musical instrument with a triangular body and three strings that sounds somewhat like a mandolin
bombed, as in real drunk
hurl - as in puke
piecework - one of the best pals uses this to refer to quilting, knitting, etc, and she uses it in casual conversation
buick, another reference to vomiting
womit - more on vomit
divan - a sofa/couch/davenport
crick - small body of running water
sidle - to scootch up next to
scootch
splendid
banjo
jingo
mantequilla - sounds so much better than "butter"
po-po = police
awnry - ornery
impudent
dooblayvay - W in spanish; short (but not really very short) for "whatever"


The UNLIKED list:
moist
ointment
salve
physician (can't we just use doctor? Physician sounds very windbaggy)
constable
plethora (overused!)
forte (overused AND mispronounced by most folks)
plug
slacks
loosemeat (not a refernce to poop, but to sandwiches. And my friends are always bringing this over so they can annoy me with "loosemeat sandwiches").
hose (especially in reference to pantyhose, which are works of the devil)
sm-...the prefix that people attach to the second rhymey word. Ex: education smeducation.
boquet garni
hottie
Fun Size (see other post on What size?) This infuriates me!
Words spelled with a K that are normally spelled with a C. Ex: We ate lunch at the Kountry Kitchen, where someone was giving away Kute Kittens.
lung cookie
nucyoolar (W just can't say nuclear)
reconstituted family (in the 80's, social workers and sociologists used this to refer to a family that was comprised of people who had been in other relationships, and brought their offspring into a new relationship. I think Blended family is what I heard them last called, although I don't know that they need to be called anything other than a family)
Limerance (a bar in my town that some friends are thinking of buying and changing the name to Limerick's where we can have a proper Irish pub. Limerance is a bad name because most people already call it Limerick's)
sweeeeet - comes out of my son's mouth too often
Missoura - it's pronounced Ma-zoo-ree
supper
panties
warsh - we wash cars, not warsh them
Marry - but only on menues. As in "the balsamic spritz marries the subtleties of the truffles and the kelp in a magical relationship". Whatever!

These are just a handful of the things that people say that stick in my craw (Oh, I love that phrase!) and I will forever be gathering and updating the LIST.
posted by Rosie @ 2/23/2006 10:19:00 AM

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