Opuscula Words that Make my day

I LOVE LESS-USED WORDS.

I’m not a Hubert Horatio Humphrey Jr. or Wm. Frank Buckley Jr.; my command of the language, compared to theirs, is sorely lacking.

But I have Merriam-Webster’s (M-W) Word of the day in my inbox (in box? in-box?) to add to my personal treasury of words. In Hebrew, “vocabulary” is “otzer meleem” or treasury (otzer) of words (meleem). I like that

A few of the words M-W sends to me I already know. I remember the admonishment from my primary (elementary, grade) school days: “Use a word three times and it is yours.”

Back in the day, if you used some words even one time you got your mouth washed out – back in the day.

I once worked with a fellow I nicknamed “Third Definition Gregory.” Jess and I worked on a small town newspaper. He often reached down to a word’s third definition for his reports, ergo “Third Definition Gregory.”

A few readers might have thought ol’ ’’Third Definition” was inconsiderate, using words which which they were not familiar. I, on the other hand, considered part of being a good “journalist” was gently educating the readers. To be honest, educating some readers is akin to leading that proverbial horse to water.

There are a few words that I use so often I probably should be arrested for their abuse: picayunish and ubiquitous are two that sit at the top of the list. Because I was for many years “in journalism,” I know about the New Orleans Times-Picayune, and by extension, picayunish. The Picayune used to be a fine daily but, as with many newspapers, it became a victim of both tv and the Internet. Now it lingers on as NOLA.com.

When I labored as an Enterprise Risk Management practitioner, all of my “risk lists” included the ubiquitous other, the risk my client and I failed to discover but had to prepare to avoid or, at least, mitigate. Not an easy task.

IN ANY EVENT, I subscribe to M-W’s Word of the Day and when a word of particular interest to this scrivener (amanuensis) pops up I do a quick copy-n-paste of the word and its definition (sometimes “daffy-nition”) into a file I titled simply as “Favorites” - in my case, followed by LibreOffice’s Writer extension: “odt.”

The file has more than “just” words. It also has HTML codes I use once in a blue moon¹. Don’t be too confident that you can correctly define “blue moon.” In truth, Favorites.odt is a catch-all for things I want at hand “in the event of.” One of these day I may get around to organizing the contents, One of these days.

My grand-daughter, too young to have any interests other than social media, learned to love – at 7 years old – a Webster’s desk dictionary. I promised it to her to keep her hands off my unabridged. (It is so heavy she could barely lift it.) Hopefully she will sign up for the free M-W Word of the Day – I intend to encourage her.

Why hang on to an Unabridged when a word can be correctly spelled and defined by keying the word in a browser’s address field? Because a. The word may not be on line (unlikely, but …) b. There may be yet another definition c. (The REAL reason) While looking for the word in the unabridged other interesting words are discovered.

Dictionaries can be as fascinating as encyclopedias. Ask any child who has been given the opportunity to sit with real books. (Or adults who have a child’s curiosity. Here I raise my hand.)

The Internet is a wonderful thing for the curious.

The problem – my problem – is that unlike sitting down with a real book, my Internet searches normally are highly focused. I don’t get to see whatever entry came before or after the entry I sought; there are fewer “ah ha” moments when you may sit back and, in the words of Dick Martin², admit that “I didn’t know that.”

When I lived overseas I used to listen to a BBC program on Friday mornings called My Word. It was panel format where the wordsmiths on the panel were challenged to define a word. The definitions were often comical, albeit in the end accurate.

Words have been the tools of my trades – plural – for years. First as a reporter, then as a PR flack, later as a technical writer, and finally as a Enterprise Risk Management practitioner writing reports to everyone from executive management to the folks charged with doing the actual tasks. The executive summaries often were written in simple terms management could comprehend; the instructions for responders were written in terms they used daily. (Know your audience.)

While I no longer write for a living, I still enjoy encountering new-to-me words. When my grandkids (grand-kids, grand kids) are close by, we sit and “read” the dictionary. When they are distant, I have M-W’s Word of the Day. (I’d prefer to sit with the grands.)

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Sources

1. http://tinyurl.com/ybpezsha

2. http://tinyurl.com/ybpm3q3y

PLAGIARISM is the act of appropriating the literary composition of another, or parts or passages of his writings, or the ideas or language of the same, and passing them off as the product of one’s own mind.

Truth is an absolute defense to defamation. Defamation is a false statement of fact. If the statement was accurate, then by definition it wasn’t defamatory.

Comments on Words

Omnium-gatherum

I like words.

I can happily sit and read an unabridged dictionary.

Trouble is, I cannot spell very well, which means I sometimes reach a desired word via a most circuitous route.

Digging into a word's origins almost always is rewarding with interesting trivia.

For examples:

Fillet (fil-lay) is Latin via French. The British pronounce it "fil-it." The French and cultured Americans say fil-lay. Who is correct? According to the Latin root, the word is fil-it. Point to the Brits. But perhaps only in the U.K.

Pedant (pee-dant), which I insisted on mispronouncing as pendant, a thing to hang around a neck, is now a negative term for a person with OCD; a person who is picayunish to the enth degree. Mispronouncing the word creates a catachresis. Pedant in its Greek and Latin beginnings meant "teacher" or someone (a Greek's slave) who escorted children to their studies.

I don't know when I acquired "picayune" and its variations (ibid.); possibly on a Greyhound rest stop in New Orleans, a/k/a NOLA or Crescent City, home of the Times-Picayune newspaper.

I am without a doubt a curmudgeon - Sesame Street's Oscar the Grouch has nothing on me.

When I was an honest reporter (read "print" vs. "electronic" [tv] ) I used to pick up new and useful words from many and sundry sources.

A judge in Red Bluff CA gave me "recidivistic," the condition of a miscreant who appeared before him too many times. When I asked him to define the word for me he responded, forcefully: "Look it up." I did.

A fellow who wrote a column for Philadelphia's Jewish Exponent wrote to me via his amanuensis about how he came to have the same last name as this scrivener.

When I was documenting risks, I always included the "ubiquitous other," the one no one identified. Some folks call the "ubiquitous other" a "black swan," but I don't believe in black swans (as risks) any more than I believe in Santa Claus, the Easter bunny laying eggs, or the tooth fairy. Some might say failure to identify a risk was the hamartia of my plan. I may not have identified a risk, but I should have covered how to respond if any risk occurs despite my best efforts.

I suppose I can be considered superannuated , but I'm copacetic with that. Copacetic has been a favorite, and once oft-used word, of mine for some time. Still, superannuated or not, I can never be accused of having misocainea

M words and women: Misogamy , misogyny , miscegenation

Misology simply is unreasonable.

I'll never a have command of the language near that of Wm. Buckley or Abba Eban, but - and it is sad to report - I probably have a better vocabulary than most folks with Masters degrees. How did it happen?

I read and I read.

Words were the tools of my trade.