Hello Harry. I have read Houellebecq on Lovecraft. Can't say I agree with most of what he says, but as a spectacle of literary nihilism it's just tits.
It's a mixed bag bilby. Eat no chips is still intact. Drink no soda, almost intact. Nose-picking is dscreet, I'm not adept but less inept than formerly with tools.
The spelling one was Ruzuzu I believe. The cats are as bloody lazy buggers as ever.
OK, I'll do it! I'll be getting this show on the road pronto. All interested apply within. Ideas for a trophy? I'm loth to surrender my heavily tea-stained "molotov cocktail waitress" mug, but I'm sure I could arrange for a STF mug of the winner's choosing.
I thought this started as a reference to the supposed origin of some (or all?) of the 9/11 hijackers north of the border. However it does now seem to imply more generally those crazy communistical Canajunisms you mention.
"He was a large, loose, fattish man with unintelligent brown eyes magnified by spectacles; he wore an ill-fitting frock-coat and a paper collar, and he showed me, as his great treasure and interest, a large Bible which he had grangerised with photographs of pictures."
- Wells, Tono Bungay
(I'm not sure if it ought to be "photographs or pictures" instead, but I'm going from the version at gutenberb.org)
'The spade-toothed whale (Mesoplodon traversii) is one of the 21 species of beaked whales, or ziphiids. They’re enigmatic animals. It seems that they spend their time diving to exceptional depths in search of food, so few people have ever seen one.'
While we're on the subject, we got our daughter a toy deinonychus for Christmas a couple of years ago. Of course really it was just a generic pteranodon, but at her age she didn't know any better.
'...excluded by disinclination, weak sight and independent intellect from the boisterous milieu his father had meant him to enter, excluded by poverty, by Catholicism and by unclubbability from the Anglo-Irish milieu in which Yeats cut so distinguished a figure.'
'"Pete's scared of something - I think he got good and scared of himself a long time ago. That's what made him such a wiz as a crystal-reader - for a few years. He wished like all get out that he really could read the future in the ball."'
'The first season is always the best and the worst for a carny. Stan's muscles hardened and his fingers developed great surety, his voice greater volume. He put a couple of coin sleights in the act that he would never have had the nerve to try in public before.'
'From one pocket he drew a bottle, offering it to Stan, who shook his head. Pete took a pull, then another, and corked the bottle. Then he drew the cork out, finished it, and heaved it into the night. "Dead soldier."
'The rain had slackened to a drizzle. In the lights of headlamps the roughnecks were busy tearing canvas from the trucks. Stan threw his slicker over his shoulders, went around to open the rear doors of the truck. He crawled in and gently shook Pete by the ankle. "Pete, wake up. We're here. We've got to put up."'
'The downfall of Rangers and the nature of their eventual recovery matters to Scottish society. Scotland's first minister acknowledged as much when he breenged in at the start of the scandal.'
- "It's not just Rangers' fans who should mourn", The Observer, 1-7-12.
'"Pete was working a crystal act in vaudeville. God, he was handsome. In a soup and fish he looked about two feet taller than in his street clothes. He wore a little black beard and a turban."'
'Stan slipped out of the sweatbox, quietly parted the curtains, stepped into the comparatively cooler air of the main tent, and sauntered over toward the soft drink stand.'
'"Where did they go? You know, day after day I stand here - wondering just where do they go!" That's Thurston's gag. By God, I'm going to use it until I see one face - just one - in this bunch of rubes that gets the point. They never do.'
'He placed the bills in his left hand, slipping them into the vanisher. "Blow on the hand-" The vanisher, released, thudded softly against his hip under his coat. "Lo and behold! Gone!"'
'It was a job with a carny. There was a Hawaiian dance show, what they called a kooch show - two other girls and Molly. The fellow who ran it and did the talking was called Doc Abernathy. Molly didn't like him a bit and he was always trying to make the girls. Only Jeanette, one of the dancers, and Doc were steady and Jeanette was crazy-mad jealous of the other two. Doc used to devil her by horsing around with them.'
'...she started to scream and it was like laughing, only it felt horrible and she couldn't stop and then they came and stuck her arm with a hype gun and she went out again...'
'The cop said, "Your Dad's been hurt, girlie. He's hurt real bad." He wasn't like a shamus now; he was more like the sort of man who might have a daughter himself.'
'She was sixteen and all grown up when things went to smash. Some fellows from Chicago had come down and there was trouble at the place where Dad worked.'
'Only that was the year Centerboard ran out of the money and Dad had the bankroll on him to show and they had to sell everything they had to get a grubstake.'
'Also Dad said it was a shame to go to bed early and miss everything when you could sleep late the next day and catch up - unless you had to be at the track for an early workout, to hold the clock on a horse, and then it was better to stay up and go to bed later.'
'But this brunette kid, Molly, is the nuts. What a pair of bubbies! High and pointed - and that ain't no cupform either, brother; that's God.
I wish to Christ that kraut Bruno would bust a blood vessel some day, bending them horseshoes. Goddamn, that Molly kid's got legs like a racehorse. Maybe I could give her one jump and then blow the show. Jesus, it would be worth it, to get into that.'
'"That night you drag out the lecture and lay it on thick. All the while you're talking he's thinking about sobering up and getting the crawling shakes. You give him time to think it over, while you're talking. Then throw in the chicken. He'll geek."'
'"Listen, kid. Do I have to draw you a damn blueprint? You pick up a guy and he ain't a geek - he's a drunk. A bottle-a-day booze fool. So you tell him like this: 'I got a little job for you. It's a temporary job. We got to get a new geek. So until we do you'll put on the geek outfit and fake it.' You tell him, 'You don't have to do nothing. You'll have a razor blade in your hand and when you pick up the chicken you give it a nick with the blade and then make like you're drinking the blood. Same with rats. The marks don't know any different.'"'
'Against the summer night the ferris wheel lights winked with the gaiety of rhinestones, the calliope's blast sounded as if the very steam pipes were tired.'
"The geek was a thin man who wore a suit of long underwear dyed chocolate brown. The wig was black and looked like a mop, and the brown greasepaint on the emaciated face was streaked and smeared with the heat and rubbed off around the mouth."
'The beer was bitter and he began to feel a little edge from it. This was all right. Keep it at beer for a while. Get a stake, working the mitt camp. Get a good wad in the grouchbag and then try working Mexico. They say the language is a cinch to learn. And the damn country's wide open for ragheads. They advertise in all the papers down there. Give that mess with the cop time to cool and I can come back in a few years and start working California. Take a Spanish name maybe. There's a million chances.'
'The Negro's voice was softer. "Now you talking, brother. You let all that crap alone and come over here and talk. We got a long run ahead of us and ain't no use trying to crap each other up."
'"Dewey sure is a sucker for the hotfoot. This must be a thousand times somebody gives him the hotfoot. It's a dozen times, at least, that I give him the hotfoot myself."'
'The Great Stanton smiled thinly, pointing to the cards before him. "This is the Tarot of the Romany cartomancers. A set of symbols handed down from remote antiquity, preserving in their enigmatic form the ancient wisdom through the ages."'
'With a twist of triumphant glee her mind drew pictures of her two sisters as she had seen them last: Mina, spare and virginal, still proud of a Phi Beta key after all these years of beating Latin into the heads of brats. And Gretel - still looking like a wax angel off a Tannenbaum, with half a lung left to breathe with and a positive Wassermann.'
'"Money doesn't mean anything to that guy. He's willing to give anything - just to get square with his conscience. He's overboard on the spook dodge. He's letting his business run itself. He's living on Dream Street."'
"Molly was so happy she could cry. It had been a long time since they'd had anything like a holiday together. Stan had been acting so screwy she was afraid he was living on Queer Street."
'"You may have the gong - and the table, Mr. Grindle. It never before has rung by an exudation of psychic power - what we call the odylic force as it did just now. Someone must be trying to get through to you."'
"'The switch is what the gypsies call okana borra - the great trick. You have the chump tie a buck up in his hanky. He sleeps on it and in the morning he has two bucks and comes running back with all his savings out of the teapot. Then when he wakes up next time he has nothing in the hank but a stack of paper and he comes back looking for the gypsy."'
Apparently short for handkerchief or hankie. My first encounter with this word was on hotel laundry lists. They would be forever listing "hanks" as an item, and eventually I asked the person at the front desk what the heck a hank was. I knew that the laundry list hadn't changed since the 1970's, since it also listed slacks and sports shirts and had no box for t-shirts. The chap was as lost as I was, or pretended to be, and it was only recently, when I saw the word in Gresham's "Nightmare Alley" (see okana borra), that I twigged the obvious. For who carries a handkerchief nowadays? The custom is from the days when paper was for writing on, not snotting. Handkerchiefs smell irremediably of one's father.
"'The switch is what the gypsies call okanna borra - the great trick. You have the chump tie a buck up in his hanky. He sleeps on it and in the morning he has two bucks and comes running back with all his savings out of the teapot. Then when he wakes up next time he has nothing in the hank but a stack of paper and he comes back looking for the gypsy."'
I like the way there are two kinds of vortex finder. If you're not satisfied with a polyurethane vortex finder, would you consider a ceramic one?
Soon after this visit, or maybe even before (I have visited many warehouses and always enjoy them) I wrote a short story about a warehouse employee who comes across an alien item which alters his consciousness. I lost interest before long but the fact that I even began the thing shows that industrial wareouses (and their contents) are dear to my heart.
So even is translating particles in Hebrew and Greek?
I know zip about Hebrew, but from my scant knowledge of Greek, the "men... de..." construction connotes a sense of internal opposition, sometimes translated as "on the one hand... on the other hand..." or "while... whereas...", but not as strong as these English constructions and much more frequently employed, so often left untranslated.
So I would argue that while even in the Biblical examples is translating a kind of emphatic construction, it would be more appropriate, in this case, not to attempt a translation in English (notwithstanding the timbre the KJB derives from this kind of distinctive usage). However, perhaps there is an equivalent in Arabic?
"That's very important," Westerburg said earnestly. "KR-3 is a major breakthrough. Anyone affected by it is forced to perceive irreal universes, whether they want to or not."
Later, they sat in a booth at a coffee shop, a clean and attractive place with young waitresses and a reasonably loose patronage. The jukebox drummed out Louis Panda's "Memory of Your Nose."
She handed him the keys and crept into the rear seat of the flipflap. Jason, his heart pulsing with relief, got in behind the wheel, stuck the key into the ignition, turned the motor on, and, in a moment, sent the flipflapflipflapping up into the sky, at its maximum speed of forty knots an hour. It was, he noted for some odd reason, a very inexpensive model flipflap: a Ford Greyhound. An economy flipflap. And not new.
...he felt his vision fail and his sense of gravity shift: his middle ear fluctuated in its pressures so that the room caromed around him, silently in perpetual ball motion. Like a pourout of Ferris wheel at a child's circus.
It hadn't even occurred to Jason, and probably not to Ruth Rae either... except perhaps as a heavy, shucky gesture, thought of but never really considered.
No TV sets muttering, no thump of feet against the floor above their heads. Not even a pornochord somewhere, blasting out from a quad. "Are the walls fairly thick in these apartments?" he asked Ruth sharply.
"A woman I knew, married, with three kids; she had two kittens and then she got one of those big gray Belgian rabbits that go lipperty lipperty lipperty on those huge hind legs."
On the screen the features of the nerdish Las Vegas functionary captain formed. "Our thermo-radex shows a male of Taverner's weight and height and general body structure in one of the as yet unapproached remaining apartments."
In her New York apartment at one time she had set up a huge quad system and more or less lived inside it, eating dietetic sandwiches and drinking fake frosty slime drinks made out of nothing. Listening forty-eight hours at a stretch to disc after disc by the Purple People Strings, which he abominated.
...Ruth still had beautiful black hair, all coiled in an upsweep at the back of her head. Featherplastic eyelashes, brilliant purple streaks across her cheek, as if she had been seared by psychedelic tiger claws.
..."you," he said chokingly, "are a reflex machine that diddles itself endlessly like a rat in an experiment. You're wired into the pleasure nodule of your brain and you push the switch five thousand times an hour every day of your life when you're not sleeping. It's a mystery to me why you bother to sleep; why not diddle yourself a full twenty-four hours a day?"
"What was it this time?" he demanded. "Termaline?"
"No." Her speech, of course, came out slurred. "Hexophenophrine hydrolsulphate. Uncut. Subcutaneous. She opened her great pale eyes, stared at him with rebellious displeasure.
With his rank key he opened the building's express descent sphincter, dropped rapidly by chute to his own level, fourteen. Where he had worked most of his adult life.
"He's just one of those little green turtles... not a land tortoise or anything. Have you ever watched the way they snap at food, at a fly floating on their water? It's very small but it's awful. One second the fly's there and the next, glunk. It's inside the turtle."
She held up her right arm, pointing to a section of her sleeve. "I've got a gray pol-ident tab, there; it shows up under their macrolens. So I don't get picked up by mistake."
Once, years ago, when the Reynolds syndicate had tried to buy into the show, he had learned to use - and had carried - a gun: a Barber's Hoop with a range of two miles with no loss of peak trajectory until the final thousand feet.
He had no more quinques. So, at this point, he gave up. That was a stupid thing to say, he realized, that about the phone lines. That would make anybody hang up. I strangled myself in my own word web, right down the old freeber. Straight down the middle. Beautifully flat at both ends, too. Like a great artificial anus.
She peered, one eyebrow cocked. "You're young but not too young. You're good-looking. Your voice is commanding and you have no reluctance about brigging me like this. You're exactly what a twerp fan would look like, sound like, act like. Okay; are you satisfied?"
"I won't meet you at Altrocci's or anywhere. Keep out of my life or I'll have my prive-pols deball you and-"
"You have one private pol," Jason interrupted. "He's sixty-two years old and his name is Fred. Originally he was a sharpshooter with the Orange County Minutemen; used to pick off student jeters at Cal State Fullerton. He was good then, but he's nothing to worry about now."
It happened too fast. He backed away out of instinct, but too slowly and too late. The gelatinlikeCallisto cuddle sponge with its fifty feeding tubes clung to him, anchored itself to his chest. Already he felt the feeding tubes dig into him, into his chest.
He knew that at one time she had been illegally married to a student commune leader, and that for one year she had lived in the rabbit warrens of Columbia University, along with all the smelly, bearded students kept subsurface lifelong by the pols and the nats. The police and the national guard, who ringed every campus, keeping the students from creeping across to society like so many black rats swarming out of a leaky ship.
"He glanced at her, then studied her. Volumes of red hair, pale skin with a few freckles, a strong roman nose. Deep-set huge violet eyes. She was right; she didn't show her age. Of course she never tapped into the phone-grid transex network, as he did. But in point of fact he did so very little. So he was not hooked, and there had not been, in his case, brain damage or premature ageing."
Well, I'd guess it means the structure that surrounds the chimney itself in a living room. Made of brick or stone and usually tapering toward the ceiling. At least this makes sense of the citation, and I don't know any other term for that thing.
Hi Louises - I'm really enjoying your excellent citations from The Last Werewolf. Perhaps you should gather them together in a dedicated list? If you don't, then I might! Keep them coming.
"Most people could weather a fortnight of unpaid work; but once you start talking about three or six months, you basically have to be living with your parents, they have to live in the same city – usually London for the desirable posts – and they have to be able to support you. So pretty soon the point arrives when there's a middle-class stranglehold on the jobs that people want to do – notably in politics, the media and the third sector."
- Zoe Williams, Ripping off young interns is routine, but it's still wrong, guardian.co.uk, 20/03/12.
There used to be a TV advert for Nabob coffee with a cheesy jingle which went "It's a Nabob coffee morning..." implying that people do love the smell of Nabob in the morning.
'Vancouver's iconic cherry blossom festival could also be hit by a lagging spring.
"The really early cherries flower normally, but the ones that would normally come out, say the first of April, come out a week or two later," Justice said. "And everything gets pushed back.
"That creates havoc because the cherry blossom festival is essentially the month of April."'
- Spring brings more cold, snow and rain, Vancouversun.com, 20-03-12.
It would be easier to just rename the colours so they are more easily mnemonicable. For example, instead of red, orange, yellow, green, blue, indigo and violet we could have unphor, mogal, brove, rosp, acetin, gliese and eltic.
It means "travelling", or "in transit". If one is "on the road" then one is away from home, on a journey, staying in hotels, pensions, inns, auberges, hostelries, taverns, roadhouses, motels, lodges, bothies, B&B's, encampments, caravansaries &c.
A caff is a dilapidated British eatery serving English breakfasts, tea and coffee, and sandwiches and maybe a few other unwholesome things for lunch. It is quite distinct from a cafe, in that in the former all the chairs will be of normal height - no stools - and all the colours will be matt. All the tables are wipe-clean, all the condiment-bottles are sticky and all the staff are stuck, gesturing impotently, and so are you.
"The nauseogenic properties of a patterned rug that reputedly caused motion-sickness-like symptoms in those who viewed it was the topic of this study."
Makes me think of the spawn of shell-fish; specifically, the spawn of the oyster; also, a young oyster, or young oysters collectively, up to about the time of their becoming set, or fixed to some support. And a gaiter or legging.
Hi Norm. When I lived in the UK I also noticed this usage in the situations you describe, especially in the Northern part of the country. In fact I picked it up and used it myself sometimes when working behind a bar. My sense is that it's used specifically by younger males when addressing older men; especially, as you point out, by a younger man providing a product or service, or doing a courtesy, to an older one.
It's because the comment-engine of Wordnik comes from what was once a separate site, called Wordie, and devoted more to the social side of words than the technical side. Wordie was quite rudimentary (in the best possible way) and didn't distinguish upper from lower case. So many words which should have an upper case element are replete with old comments on their lower case form.
I'd say ludicrous and laughable have moved closer to parity with ridiculous since the Century's disquisition. I've also noticed that ludicrous (along with the other synonyms discussed here) is often used to mean unbelievable or incredible - to describe a feat of athletic skill, for example, or a long shift of work, or anything generally impressive.
Looking at the examples, and especially the tweets, it seems that when people use travesty in the sense of "disaster" or "disgusting state of affairs" they often do so as a short form of the stock expression travesty of justice. E.g.
“It is too depressing by far to know that Justin Beiber has more hits on Youtube for his version of Somebody to Love than Queen. A travesty” - @jactherat
“If Brighton win this it will be a travesty. Wrexham have been superb.” - @lawrenceVB
“However, the big travesty is that if you live in Manhattan delivery is free – you live in the Bronx and the sale is no sale at all.” - Wine prices - beating the spread online and in-store | Dr Vino's wine blog
I also suspect there to be some confusion with tragedy.
Re: chub-on. It seems to be more often used to describe a slight affection or penchant for something than an actual state of semi-arousal. I quite like it actually.
Well dominatrix is still common, and I've come across interlocutrix and executrix and I think editrix in old books, but I take your point. I'm a big fan of this suffix.
I've come across the singular, I think, probably in books. But I suppose the reason for the preponderance of the plural would be that cloves come whole, not typically ground or as tiny seeds. Just as you 'd say "bay leaves" instead of "bay leaf" when describing the plant generally. On the other hand we say "star anise", not "stars anise", don't we?
This would be the classic British "wanker" gesture: like the "OK" gesture but rotated so the "O" is horizontal and then moved up and down by the wrist. The sort of motion Polonius might make behind the arras while Hamlet rants.
I'd just throw up a craigslist ad. I bet there are more long-haired anchovy lovers in your town than you think. I'd offer my own hair - I'm due to have my ears lowered - but the quantity would only suffice for a thimble-sized sieve, and thus for a ramekin's worth of the fishy elixir.
Then you should make one of those, too. You must know somebody who needs a haircut. Offer to let them have some of the anchovy sauce if they donate their locks.
It's quite a difficult novel to read and I'm not sure if I will read more by Spackman. He has a special talent for dialogue, reproducing all the filler, dislocations and verbal tics of real speech - sort of like Don DeLillo but Spackman's characters have an extra layer of fanciness in their vocabulary. He is fun to read, just not that engaging; not at all gripping. Something to read four or five pages at a time perhaps.
'Here however his lawyer worked his weighty way through the uproar and started holding these dockets up against the cabin wall for him to sign one after another, affably bawling his full-phrased enucleation of each in turn into his ear...'
'And it might have been the Thirties all over again, his cabin jammed, flowers everywhere and the most agreeable urban din, Victoria's man eeling his way through the hubbub with the champagne...'
'He said in an attempt at a lighter tone, "Now Melissa the plain apodeictic fact is nobody is very sensible," but she paid no attention to this truth...'
"...did she suppose at his age he'd be so insensible, or her own word 'irresponsible' dammit, as to disseize a perfectly decent boy, no matter how hulking, of a girl he-"
"He at once replied that while he couldn't say he recalled all this in, uh, quite such unerring detail, still, if a lifetime's delight in the mere look, the mere tournure, of women, in the posed and lovely portraits they always somehow made him half-think they were-"
"'...the day we had lunch champêtre deep in that wonderful grove of beeches stretching on and on and on, by that half-ruined Doric folly with its frusts and columns.'"
'Here,' said he, taking some dice out of his pocket, 'here's the stuff. Here are the implements; here are the little doctors which cure the distempers of the purse. Follow but my counsel, and I will show you a way to empty the pocket of a queer cull without any danger of the nubbing cheat.'"
"Nubbing cheat!" cries Partridge: "pray, sir, what is that?"
"Why that, sir," says the stranger, "is a cant phrase for the gallows; for as gamesters differ little from highwaymen in their morals, so do they very much resemble them in their language.
"...honourable established people who wanted a gleaming properly laid table and good food well served and some delicious creature or other to have dinner with on a fine early-summer evening as the lights came on in the baldachin of dusk and the nightfall murmur of traffic died slowly away uptown along the Avenue..."
"Nicholas instantly resumed, demanding of Mrs. Barclay with amazed innocence other women other women must she be like a pervicacious angel think that because he loved her with every beat of his heart, love and had loved, as she herself well remembered and in this house should remember best of all..."
"...also his lawyer up from Philadelphia with his bulging briefcase, the sheer tax-maneuvering his wife's behaviour had now got him into! his own cursing yeoman forebears hadn't been amerced with a blacker set of reliefs and merchets, church-scot and plough-arms and smoke-farthings and hearthpenny on Holy Thursday, and nowadays who could he tallage in return?"
"In some ways, it appears, the balladist wasn't a bad guy ... aside from an uncontrollable oestrus he turned out to have for neighbourhood-grocers' wives, and one or two low incidents in consequence, Mike had no trouble with him whatever..."
"...and why question in 1932 (or how*?) the credo trained into us of economic propraetorships inevitably to come, the steady steak-fed beating of the Big Board heart, and naturally at the last the opulent, the eupatrid retirement?"
- W.M. Spackman, Heyday
*the text has "or how?" but I think "or now" makes asmuch/more sense given the publication date.
I share rolig's astonishment; I've never once noticed the "sh" pronunciation. If it's so widespread you'd think I'd have heard it on TV, if not on the street.
Now I know how the Luddites felt. I mean it's neat that you can just list a link to a Wordnik search string and Bob's your uncle, but I mourn the loss of human agency. I lament the passing of the human touch in list-making. The days when an actual flesh-and-blood person had to go to Onelook and create their own search string, then type each word into the list. Or at least write a program to do all this.
The theme of the dream is that Ruzuzu has announced that she will be leaving the site, not immediately, but soon - her last day will be in a couple of weeks. Wordie (I'm pretty sure it was -ie, not -nik) is a physical space, roughly mapped onto the hillside neighbourhood where I live. Ruzuzu's "house" / presence on Wordie is at the top of the hill. I make my way by bike through slush and gloom to attend her farewell party.
Ruzuzu's space is a smallish bungalow, decorated haphazardly but not without discernment. Everyone is there, milling around with drinks, even long-gone names like Kewpid and Colleen. The atmosphere is cordial, bordering on fun, but with overtones of a wake. Chained_Bear has a baby with her which is passed around merrily. It says "poop!" while Bilby changes its diaper.
Ruzuzu has made a long list of content for us to create on Wordie after she has gone. One example is 'a page to commemorate Charles Sanders Peirce's upbraiding of Mark Twain at a congressional hearing for his improper pronunciation of deliquesce' (except in the dream, a full-page account of the event is given). I read the list and wonder how she can expect us to create all of this, then realise it doesn't matter because she has already created it in the form of the list.
But I am desperately sad that Ruzuzu is leaving. I implore her to stay, but to no end; things are intractably thus (that's what she says, quoting my favourite poet). Finding myself alone, I break down and sob desolately; I feel completely abandoned. Ruzuzu comes over and consoles me by saying that I can take one item from her house to remember her by. I look around and see nothing that could compensate for the loss of her. Bilby chooses a translucent, ruby-red desktop calculator, shot through with veins of amber. Later, I am persuaded to take a tripodal "postcard-holder" - three spindly wire legs with a crocodile clip at the top for clamping a postcard - on condition that she sends me a postcard from wherever she is bound.
I.e. from a given list, I want to take these particular dozen words, and move, or copy, them, to another list. I just tick those which apply and hit "move" (or "copy"), then chose the target list. You could allow copying from other people's lists, too. The same for multiple deletions.
Very interesting comment, especially that last sentence. You're dead right that the crunchiness of toast - including the sound of the crunch - is an integral part of the experience of eating it. The same applies to the crunching, cracking sound of biting into an apple. This is amplified when you listen to a horse, with its outsized chompers, eating an apple - the whole thing pretty much explodes at once.
"A few white mammal-bellied clouds dandered like plutocrats across the blue floor of the sky, and the reeky old city and many sorts of town and village and farmland were below me, and bleak hills edging the borders behind me, and the blue mountains edging the highlands in front, and the firth between them widening with islands and ships to the sea."
- Looking down on Auld Reekie, in 1982, Janine by Alasdair Gray
Traditionally played by adults? What? So traditionally, adults play this game but kids don't? But right now it's different? Whaddaya mean by "traditionally" here?
Pedantry aside, I believe Wee Willie Winkie and Wynken are in fact the same individual. In his nonage he was given to running through the town, and this incipient wanderlust found an adult outlet in the storied fishing expedition with Blynken and Nod.
A crude mix of uppers and downers (amphetamines, opiates, caffeine etc) formerly used by professional cyclists as a performance enhancer. Fell out of use with the introduction of basic drug testing.
What the Bamiyan Buddhas made me realise is, I don't really object to blowing up statues, but I do very much object to the kind of people who want to blow them up.
I do not recall writing those comments. Sionnach, it hasn't arrived yet! It's being shipped from the UK I think. Can't wait to get stuck into a mess of arboreal erotica.
I also see ent - so I am going now to have intercourse with trees, I'm going into the vast forests of this province. My stride is such that in two days I will be out of Moot distance, and for those of you who don't know what that means - it was a Beta version called the "Tree". - I am surrounded by the bloody things but soon it will just be one vast plain full of escapists and associated Apple ghouls.
I also noticed the words ass, urge and gen - and the backword us, which seem to explain everything, When the great middle-class revolt occurs, this page will be the Rosetta Stone. Or do I mean the Golden Bough? Yes, the latter. Sorry Rosetta Stone!
"The pilot Juan Fernandez procured a deed of the isle named after him, and for some years resided there before Selkirk came. It is supposed, however, that he eventually contracted the blues upon his princely property, for after a time he returned to the main, and as report goes, became a very garrulous barber in the city of Lima."
Much to love in that example. Jujubes. The odd assortment of "small articles". The smokers 'cachous. The moral "ought". The non-specific "dishonest customer" (or does Punch have a specific dishonest customer in mind?) And of course the muff.
"Higher up now we mark the gony, or gray albatross, anomalously so called, an unsightly unpoetic bird, unlike its storied kinsman, which is the snow-white ghost of the haunted Capes of Hope and Horn."
"What outlandish beings are these? Erect as men, but hardly as symmetrical, they stand all round the rock like sculptured caryatides, supporting the next range of eaves above. Their bodies are grotesquely misshapen; their bills short; their feet seemingly legless; while the members at their sides are neither fin, wing, nor arm. And truly neither fish, flesh, nor fowl is the penguin; as an edible, pertaining neither to Carnival nor Lent; without exception the most ambiguous and least lovely creature yet discovered by man. Though dabbling in all three elements, and indeed possessing some rudimental claims to all, the penguin is at home in none. On land it stumps; afloat it sculls; in the air it flops. As if ashamed of her failure, Nature keeps this ungainly child hidden away at the ends of the earth, in the Straits of Magellan, and on the abased sea-story of Rodondo."
Dan: I wonder if French "lieu" is related to Spanish "lugar", place. Seems reasonable. If so, it's great that "loo" is related to the Spanish - and presumably the Latin - for "place".
If someone said they were having their bathroom - or their loo - renovated, then I would indeed assume that the crapper was being ripped from its moorings. Very few houses have a room with a bath but no toilet in it these days, so the sense of "bathroom" as distinct from "loo" is obsolete.
Rolig, there is actually a transatlantic distinction re: "go to the bathroom". The sense of "urinate and/or defecate" is pretty much confined to North America, I think. In the UK one would say "the dog crapped in / shat in the kitchen", or in more polite language, "fouled" or "soiled" the kitchen. So I think in this case the Americans take the periphrasis a step further than the Brits do, as they do also by using the ridiculous term "restroom".
I've never heard it called "the head". Surely there is a list somewhere?
But equally, would one call a room with no toilet a "bathroom"? In your scenario, were "loo" to be replaced with "bathroom", I bet most people would still infer that the person was going to the room with the W.C. Ergo, "bathroom" is a synonym of "loo".
The way the English language tiptoes around this subject is pretty pathetic. We require a polite, specific word for the thing itself (crapper or bog, perhaps) and also for the room (dunny, shithouse?) - words which aren't euphemisms. I'm fed up with restrooms and lavatories and washrooms and privies.
Yes, part of the auditory landscape of London. The reason it's so well imprinted on the London psyche is not just its repetition but the intonation used in the recorded messages. "Mind... the GAP." There's a suspenseful delay before "the gap" which seems to imply that there is more to the gap than we're being told, or that the "the gap" isn't just the gap between the platform and the train, but a more terrible existential gap into which we shall all of us assuredly fall sooner or later.
As a Scottish place name, this may not belong on madmouth's list, but I've had it revolving in my mind for some time now and... well, I wouldn't mind a beef tub of my own.
Oh boy, Ruzuzu, for that you deserve a great, strouting Rabelaisian codpiece, a codpiece so big it obscures your entire person. Ruzuzu that was so much fun. You're lucky there are no Vulcans in Lincoln (at the last census, anyway) because if there were, they'd all be glomming on to you with the mind-melds.
Horrible how this memetic modern-major-general phrase has infected everyday discourse. I heard a cop, naturally, use it on the TV news the other day, along the lines of "our thoughts are with the hearts and minds of the victims..." And today I'm reading a subpar nonfiction book (2010) about earthquakes and I get:
"China's reported success story injected a surge of scientific adrenalin into the hearts and minds of those who saw prediction as the holy grail of the new seismology."
Dasani is pure branding, its success the ultimate expression of form over substance. You could say that about any bottled water, but the meaningless name is the cherry on top.
"To mark territory, hippos spin their tails while defecating to distribute their excrement over a greater area. Likely for the same reason, hippos are retromingent-- that is, they urinate backwards."
Excellent. The first sentence in particular is like a description of some retro-futuristic variation on the ouija board - which is actually how I've always thought of the telephone.
Comments by yarb
Show previous 200 comments...
yarb commented on the list words-lurking-in-lovecraft
Hello Harry. I have read Houellebecq on Lovecraft. Can't say I agree with most of what he says, but as a spectacle of literary nihilism it's just tits.
March 19, 2013
yarb commented on the list things-that-freak-me-out
How are you with hiccupping cows?
March 19, 2013
yarb commented on the word surd
I got into a fight after playing this word in scrabble once.
March 14, 2013
yarb commented on the list resolutions
It's a mixed bag bilby. Eat no chips is still intact. Drink no soda, almost intact. Nose-picking is dscreet, I'm not adept but less inept than formerly with tools.
The spelling one was Ruzuzu I believe. The cats are as bloody lazy buggers as ever.
March 13, 2013
yarb commented on the list identify-the-wordienik
Please email your words to idthewordienik13 at gmail dot com!
March 13, 2013
yarb commented on the word necessary
That's fine for my poop, but what about my tween deck, my orlop and my gun deck?
March 13, 2013
yarb commented on the word snowdrop
I read a novel called "Snowdrops" recently, set in Moscow. Wasn't really my cuppa but I love the snowdrop concept.
March 13, 2013
yarb commented on the word jounce
Looks like normal Twitter fare to me, bilby.
March 13, 2013
yarb commented on the word &c.
I much prefer this to etc and use it frequently.
March 13, 2013
yarb commented on the list identify-the-wordienik
OK, I'll do it! I'll be getting this show on the road pronto. All interested apply within. Ideas for a trophy? I'm loth to surrender my heavily tea-stained "molotov cocktail waitress" mug, but I'm sure I could arrange for a STF mug of the winner's choosing.
March 6, 2013
yarb commented on the word stick a fork in it
I understand the usage, but doesn't one stick a fork in it to determine whether it is in fact done?
January 15, 2013
yarb commented on the word vang
Vang you, Bilby.
January 15, 2013
yarb commented on the word gazzettino
What a coinc-idence!
January 15, 2013
yarb commented on the word poppywash
Sounds like an amalgam of poppycock and hogwash.
January 15, 2013
yarb commented on the word Stop obsessively monitoring global seismic activity
A miserable failure. This one would have been so easy, too.
January 11, 2013
yarb commented on the word On the Sabbath day, communicate only by means of fridge poetry
No problems so far with this one. Thinking of extending it to other days, in fact.
January 11, 2013
yarb commented on the word Start speaking Spanish to Marcelo
Another failure.
January 11, 2013
yarb commented on the word Pick nose more discreetly
Didn't even try to keep this one.
January 11, 2013
yarb commented on the word Drink no soda, except as a mixer
Managing to adhere to this one. Not difficult as I don't really like fizzy drinks (except as mixers).
January 11, 2013
yarb commented on the word Eat no chips
I've broken this once so far but with an excuse.
January 11, 2013
yarb commented on the word Stop speaking Spanish to Wladimir
There was never much hope of keeping this one. Only a fool's hope.
January 11, 2013
yarb commented on the word pogonion
Is that a mental protruberance in your pocket?
January 11, 2013
yarb commented on the list supernatural-creatures-according-to-m-a--denham
Marvellous list!
January 9, 2013
yarb commented on the list distinguishing-marks
Seems obvious, but watermark?
January 6, 2013
yarb commented on the word Canuckistan
I thought this started as a reference to the supposed origin of some (or all?) of the 9/11 hijackers north of the border. However it does now seem to imply more generally those crazy communistical Canajunisms you mention.
January 6, 2013
yarb commented on the word Start speaking Italian to Wladimir
Wladimir says 'quo vadis?'
January 5, 2013
yarb commented on the word Study Latin
Clearly we all already know Latin. I suggest, ruzuzu, you refocus on ancient Greek.
January 5, 2013
yarb commented on the word Study Latin
benigne dicis!
January 5, 2013
yarb commented on the word Study Latin
quid pro quo. ubi sunt reesetee?
January 5, 2013
yarb commented on the word Study Latin
per mer per terris!
January 5, 2013
yarb commented on the word fircmarbles
I like it too. Sounds like a bowdlerized oath.
January 4, 2013
yarb commented on the word Study Latin
in vino veritas
January 4, 2013
yarb commented on the word Study Latin
sic transit gloria mundi
January 4, 2013
yarb commented on the word Start speaking Italian to Wladimir
This is the worst resolution I've ever heard of. There wouldn't be a recombobulation area big enough.
January 4, 2013
yarb commented on the list resolutions
Oh wait, it's here. Bilby, I knew it was you! *shakes fist*
January 4, 2013
yarb commented on the list resolutions
Thanks for alerting me! I've added it to my newest list for safekeeping.
January 4, 2013
yarb commented on the word Study Latin
ars longa, vita brevis
January 4, 2013
yarb commented on the word quantum spin liquid
I believe this is a setting on my new washing machine.
January 4, 2013
yarb commented on the word Shave a peach
Alternatively, peel a grape and bathe in asses milk.
January 4, 2013
yarb commented on the word potential deathtrap
This was a catchphrase from a comedy sketch show of my youth whose name I've forgotten. It was always uttered in a Scottish accent.
January 4, 2013
yarb commented on the word Fear death by water
Tsunamis, puddles... tarns... paddy fields... potential deathtraps, all.
January 4, 2013
yarb commented on the word Study Latin
Introibo ad altare dei?
January 4, 2013
yarb commented on the word Study Latin
Tanto religio potuit suadere malorum.
January 4, 2013
yarb commented on the word Study Latin
Et tu, zuzu?
January 4, 2013
yarb commented on the word Study Latin
Errare humanum est. Alea jacta est.
January 4, 2013
yarb commented on the word Study Latin
Let's speak Latin then. Quo Vadis?
January 4, 2013
yarb commented on the word Study Latin
Who's your favourite Latin writer?
January 4, 2013
yarb commented on the word Stop dreaming about work
Me too, but I fear that resolving to stop will only reinforce this awful habit.
January 4, 2013
yarb commented on the word Stop riding on ice after dark
Ride faster? There must be some way you can continue to ride on ice after dark!
January 4, 2013
yarb commented on the word Stop riding on ice after dark
Shurely "buy studded tires and a bright light"??
January 4, 2013
yarb commented on the list resolutions
Got any resos of your own, zuzu?
January 4, 2013
yarb commented on the list adoption-agency
Thanks, but I already figured i- I mean, yes, well done you passed.
January 4, 2013
yarb commented on the word recombobulation
Now I want to visit the Milwaukee airport. Not Milwaukee, just the airport.
January 4, 2013
yarb commented on the word yeuky
Small island kingdom in the North Atlantic.
January 4, 2013
yarb commented on the word discombobulate
I can't imagine using it professionally, but I use it quite a lot at home.
I did use paramour today in an official report.
January 4, 2013
yarb commented on the list adoption-agency
Happy to oblige. In return, please tell me how one creates a new list. I haven't forgotten, I'm just testing you.
January 4, 2013
yarb commented on the list adoption-agency
Is that a holographic banana boat in your pocket, or are you etc?
January 4, 2013
yarb commented on the word grangerise
"He was a large, loose, fattish man with unintelligent brown eyes magnified by spectacles; he wore an ill-fitting frock-coat and a paper collar, and he showed me, as his great treasure and interest, a large Bible which he had grangerised with photographs of pictures."
- Wells, Tono Bungay
(I'm not sure if it ought to be "photographs or pictures" instead, but I'm going from the version at gutenberb.org)
December 3, 2012
yarb commented on the user toowoombachiro
Anagram of coma, writ, boo-hoo.
Hope Justin and Jason know what they're doing!
November 16, 2012
yarb commented on the user toowoombachiro
I was thinking name, but really either.
November 15, 2012
yarb commented on the user toowoombachiro
Sounds like a Star Wars character...
November 14, 2012
yarb commented on the word abuwtiyuw
I bet you think this song is Abuwtiyuw.
November 8, 2012
yarb commented on the word chorea
These are the en-ed times.
November 8, 2012
yarb commented on the user allamas
Quit probing my llamas!
November 8, 2012
yarb commented on the word cgulppl
You mean children?
November 6, 2012
yarb commented on the list hork-du-jour
At the end of the day, I'm probably guilty of that one myself. But I think we need to draw a line under closure.
November 6, 2012
yarb commented on the word ziphiid
'The spade-toothed whale (Mesoplodon traversii) is one of the 21 species of beaked whales, or ziphiids. They’re enigmatic animals. It seems that they spend their time diving to exceptional depths in search of food, so few people have ever seen one.'
- Discover Magazine, 5-11-12.
November 5, 2012
yarb commented on the word artisanal
Art is anal.
November 2, 2012
yarb commented on the word guybrarian
I do and it is. Thanks.
November 2, 2012
yarb commented on the word illusion
No, the other way round! Only the past is real. The present is a sensation, the future a diversion.
October 6, 2012
yarb commented on the word lingerie
The dictionaries differ. Is lingerie especially, or exclusively, for women? Which? Am I entitled to call my undistinguished nethergarments "lingerie"?
October 6, 2012
yarb commented on the word galloon
I mean that I checked my lingerie for galloons, not that there are checks but no galloons on my lingerie.
Speaking of which, does my underwear count as lingerie? I must check.
October 6, 2012
yarb commented on the word galloon
*checks* no galloons on my lingerie :(
October 6, 2012
yarb commented on the word Vufflens-le-Château
I wonder what they throw there, when they are in the mood for lobbing?
October 6, 2012
yarb commented on the user deinonychus
While we're on the subject, we got our daughter a toy deinonychus for Christmas a couple of years ago. Of course really it was just a generic pteranodon, but at her age she didn't know any better.
September 27, 2012
yarb commented on the word early
ron, that sounds more like Irish to me - was character an immigrant?
hat tip to sionnach's five year-old adverbial definition.
September 27, 2012
yarb commented on the word helicopter
I will never fly in one again.
September 27, 2012
yarb commented on the user nigelpike
wanker!
September 27, 2012
yarb commented on the word unclubbability
'...excluded by disinclination, weak sight and independent intellect from the boisterous milieu his father had meant him to enter, excluded by poverty, by Catholicism and by unclubbability from the Anglo-Irish milieu in which Yeats cut so distinguished a figure.'
- Hugh Kenner, Joyce's Voices
August 26, 2012
yarb commented on the word in all my born days
"I reckon the world is coming to an end. I never see the beat of it, in all my born days."
- Twain, Huckleberry Finn
August 26, 2012
yarb commented on the word crib house
'"He is a sweet man, down deep. Long as he lasts I'll stick to him. If it hadn't been for Pete I'd of probably ended up in a crib house."'
- Nightmare Alley, William Lindsay Gresham
July 8, 2012
yarb commented on the word crib house
CHECK OUT THE VISUAL!
July 8, 2012
yarb commented on the word like all get out
Citation on crystal-reader.
July 8, 2012
yarb commented on the word wiz
Citation on crystal-reader.
July 8, 2012
yarb commented on the word crystal-reader
'"Pete's scared of something - I think he got good and scared of himself a long time ago. That's what made him such a wiz as a crystal-reader - for a few years. He wished like all get out that he really could read the future in the ball."'
- Nightmare Alley, William Lindsay Gresham
July 8, 2012
yarb commented on the word coin sleight
'The first season is always the best and the worst for a carny. Stan's muscles hardened and his fingers developed great surety, his voice greater volume. He put a couple of coin sleights in the act that he would never have had the nerve to try in public before.'
- Nightmare Alley, William Lindsay Gresham
July 8, 2012
yarb commented on the list nightmare-alley
Isn't it! I've made a few cock-ups which I can't correct right now due to a glitch. Still many more citations to come.
July 1, 2012
yarb commented on the word pound one's ear
'"Where's Molly?" he asked after a while.
"Pounding her ear. I talked the old gal that has the house into giving us the two rooms for the price of one."'
- Nightmare Alley, William Lindsay Gresham
July 1, 2012
yarb commented on the word tonk
'Mist hung over the hills beyond the town, and from a slope rising from the other side of the road came the gentle tonk of a cowbell.'
- Nightmare Alley, William Lindsay Gresham
July 1, 2012
yarb commented on the word blind pig
'He started off across the lot toward a shack at the edge of the village. Zeena watched him go.
"I'll bet that joint is a blind pig," she said to Stan.'
- Nightmare Alley, William Lindsay Gresham
July 1, 2012
yarb commented on the word midway
'The floodlights were up and the carny boss had laid out the midway with his marking stakes.'
- Nightmare Alley, William Lindsay Gresham
July 1, 2012
yarb commented on the word dead soldier
'From one pocket he drew a bottle, offering it to Stan, who shook his head. Pete took a pull, then another, and corked the bottle. Then he drew the cork out, finished it, and heaved it into the night. "Dead soldier."
- Nightmare Alley, William Lindsay Gresham
July 1, 2012
yarb commented on the word put up
Citation on roughneck.
July 1, 2012
yarb commented on the word roughneck
'The rain had slackened to a drizzle. In the lights of headlamps the roughnecks were busy tearing canvas from the trucks. Stan threw his slicker over his shoulders, went around to open the rear doors of the truck. He crawled in and gently shook Pete by the ankle. "Pete, wake up. We're here. We've got to put up."'
- Nightmare Alley, William Lindsay Gresham
July 1, 2012
yarb commented on the word breenge
'The downfall of Rangers and the nature of their eventual recovery matters to Scottish society. Scotland's first minister acknowledged as much when he breenged in at the start of the scandal.'
- "It's not just Rangers' fans who should mourn", The Observer, 1-7-12.
July 1, 2012
yarb commented on the word grouchbag
See also grouch bag.
June 30, 2012
yarb commented on the word do-re-mi
See also grouchbag.
June 30, 2012
yarb commented on the word do-re-mi
Citation on do-re-mi.
June 30, 2012
yarb commented on the word grouch bag
'"Any place is grand, so long as you got the old do-re-mi in the grouch bag," Zeena said.'
- Nightmare Alley, William Lindsay Gresham
June 30, 2012
yarb commented on the word mitt camp
'"I do a little tea-leaf reading and one winter I worked a mitt camp in Miami. Palmistry always goes good in a town like Miami."'
- Nightmare Alley, William Lindsay Gresham
June 30, 2012
yarb commented on the word mentalism
'"He began muffing the code and he always needed a few shots before going on. Booze and mentalism don't mix."'
- Nightmare Alley, William Lindsay Gresham
June 30, 2012
yarb commented on the word great sheiks
'"Oh, the gamblers was the great sheiks in my day. Any gal who could knock herself off a gambling man was doing something."'
- Nightmare Alley, William Lindsay Gresham
June 30, 2012
yarb commented on the word crystal act
Citation on soup and fish.
June 30, 2012
yarb commented on the word soup and fish
'"Pete was working a crystal act in vaudeville. God, he was handsome. In a soup and fish he looked about two feet taller than in his street clothes. He wore a little black beard and a turban."'
- Nightmare Alley, William Lindsay Gresham
June 30, 2012
yarb commented on the word rhubarb
Citation (in the sexual sense) on rumdum.
June 30, 2012
yarb commented on the word rumdum
'She's a smart dame, all right. Too bad she's tied to a rumdum like Pete who can't even get his rhubarb up any more, so everybody says.'
- Nightmare Alley, William Lindsay Gresham
June 30, 2012
yarb commented on the word sweatbox
'Stan slipped out of the sweatbox, quietly parted the curtains, stepped into the comparatively cooler air of the main tent, and sauntered over toward the soft drink stand.'
- Nightmare Alley, William Lindsay Gresham
June 30, 2012
yarb commented on the word crick
'The old man's jaw hung open, his eyes frowning with concentration, trying not to miss a single word.
"Yes, green trees. Probably willow trees near a crick. And I see something under those trees. A - it's a wagon."'
- Nightmare Alley, William Lindsay Gresham
June 30, 2012
yarb commented on the word rube
'"Where did they go? You know, day after day I stand here - wondering just where do they go!" That's Thurston's gag. By God, I'm going to use it until I see one face - just one - in this bunch of rubes that gets the point. They never do.'
- Nightmare Alley, William Lindsay Gresham
June 30, 2012
yarb commented on the word vanisher
'He placed the bills in his left hand, slipping them into the vanisher. "Blow on the hand-" The vanisher, released, thudded softly against his hip under his coat. "Lo and behold! Gone!"'
- Nightmare Alley, William Lindsay Gresham
June 30, 2012
yarb commented on the word souse
'...Zeena's husband slept in the tent to watch the props, he said. Really it was because he was a souse and he couldn't make love to Zeena any more.'
- Nightmare Alley, William Lindsay Gresham
June 30, 2012
yarb commented on the word devil
Citation (as verb) on kooch show.
June 30, 2012
yarb commented on the word steady
Citation on kooch show.
June 30, 2012
yarb commented on the word make
Citaion on kooch show.
June 30, 2012
yarb commented on the word carny
Citation on kooch show.
June 30, 2012
yarb commented on the word kooch show
'It was a job with a carny. There was a Hawaiian dance show, what they called a kooch show - two other girls and Molly. The fellow who ran it and did the talking was called Doc Abernathy. Molly didn't like him a bit and he was always trying to make the girls. Only Jeanette, one of the dancers, and Doc were steady and Jeanette was crazy-mad jealous of the other two. Doc used to devil her by horsing around with them.'
- Nightmare Alley, William Lindsay Gresham
June 30, 2012
yarb commented on the word hype gun
'...she started to scream and it was like laughing, only it felt horrible and she couldn't stop and then they came and stuck her arm with a hype gun and she went out again...'
- Nightmare Alley, William Lindsay Gresham
June 30, 2012
yarb commented on the word shamus
'The cop said, "Your Dad's been hurt, girlie. He's hurt real bad." He wasn't like a shamus now; he was more like the sort of man who might have a daughter himself.'
- Nightmare Alley, William Lindsay Gresham
June 30, 2012
yarb commented on the word go to smash
'She was sixteen and all grown up when things went to smash. Some fellows from Chicago had come down and there was trouble at the place where Dad worked.'
- Nightmare Alley, William Lindsay Gresham
June 30, 2012
yarb commented on the word get fresh
'... some of the boys whistled and that made Dad mad because he thought they were getting fresh...'
- Nightmare Alley, William Lindsay Gresham
June 30, 2012
yarb commented on the word softshoe
'Dad could dance a lot of softshoe himself and he never had a lesson.'
- Nightmare Alley, William Lindsay Gresham
June 30, 2012
yarb commented on the word grubstake
'Only that was the year Centerboard ran out of the money and Dad had the bankroll on him to show and they had to sell everything they had to get a grubstake.'
- Nightmare Alley, William Lindsay Gresham
June 30, 2012
yarb commented on the word hold the clock
'Also Dad said it was a shame to go to bed early and miss everything when you could sleep late the next day and catch up - unless you had to be at the track for an early workout, to hold the clock on a horse, and then it was better to stay up and go to bed later.'
- Nightmare Alley, William Lindsay Gresham
June 30, 2012
yarb commented on the word get into
Citation on bubbies.
June 30, 2012
yarb commented on the word jump
Citation on bubbies.
June 30, 2012
yarb commented on the word cupform
Citation on bubbies.
June 30, 2012
yarb commented on the word the nuts
Citation on bubbies.
June 30, 2012
yarb commented on the word bubbies
'But this brunette kid, Molly, is the nuts. What a pair of bubbies! High and pointed - and that ain't no cupform either, brother; that's God.
I wish to Christ that kraut Bruno would bust a blood vessel some day, bending them horseshoes. Goddamn, that Molly kid's got legs like a racehorse. Maybe I could give her one jump and then blow the show. Jesus, it would be worth it, to get into that.'
- Nightmare Alley, William Lindsay Gresham
June 30, 2012
yarb commented on the word equalizer
'Some day I'll blast 'em. I don't keep that equalizer in my trunk to play Boy Scout with.'
- Nightmare Alley, William Lindsay Gresham
June 30, 2012
yarb commented on the word the crawling shakes
'"That night you drag out the lecture and lay it on thick. All the while you're talking he's thinking about sobering up and getting the crawling shakes. You give him time to think it over, while you're talking. Then throw in the chicken. He'll geek."'
- Nightmare Alley, William Lindsay Gresham
June 30, 2012
yarb commented on the word the horrors
Citation on rummy.
June 30, 2012
yarb commented on the word rummy
'"...nothing scares a real rummy like the chance of a dry spell and getting the horrors."'
- Nightmare Alley, William Lindsay Gresham
June 30, 2012
yarb commented on the word booze fool
'"Listen, kid. Do I have to draw you a damn blueprint? You pick up a guy and he ain't a geek - he's a drunk. A bottle-a-day booze fool. So you tell him like this: 'I got a little job for you. It's a temporary job. We got to get a new geek. So until we do you'll put on the geek outfit and fake it.' You tell him, 'You don't have to do nothing. You'll have a razor blade in your hand and when you pick up the chicken you give it a nick with the blade and then make like you're drinking the blood. Same with rats. The marks don't know any different.'"'
- Nightmare Alley, William Lindsay Gresham
June 30, 2012
yarb commented on the word as sore as a bull's ass in fly time
'When Stan came back with the cold bottles, Hoately tilted his gratfeully. "Jesus, my throat's sore as a bull's ass in fly time."'
- Nightmare Alley, William Lindsay Gresham
June 30, 2012
yarb commented on the word calliope
'Against the summer night the ferris wheel lights winked with the gaiety of rhinestones, the calliope's blast sounded as if the very steam pipes were tired.'
June 30, 2012
yarb commented on the word rubber
"The talker waited while the crowd rubbered."
- Nightmare Alley, William Lindsay Gresham
June 30, 2012
yarb commented on the word mark
'The "marks" surged in - young fellows in straw hats with their coats over their arms, here and there a fat woman with beady eyes.'
- Nightmare Alley, William Lindsay Gresham
June 30, 2012
yarb commented on the word geek
"The geek was a thin man who wore a suit of long underwear dyed chocolate brown. The wig was black and looked like a mop, and the brown greasepaint on the emaciated face was streaked and smeared with the heat and rubbed off around the mouth."
- Nightmare Alley, William Lindsay Gresham
June 30, 2012
yarb commented on the word mitt reader
'"Jus' give me chance make a demonstration. Real, old-time, A-number-one mitt reader. Take one look at the mark, read past, present-"'
- Nightmare Alley, William Lindsay Gresham
June 30, 2012
yarb commented on the word cold reading
'A guy who's good at the cold reading will never starve.'
- Nightmare Alley, William Lindsay Gresham
June 30, 2012
yarb commented on the word mitt camp
Citation on grouchbag.
June 30, 2012
yarb commented on the word raghead
Citation (in the sense of a sideshow swami) on grouchbag.
June 30, 2012
yarb commented on the word cinch
Citation on grouchbag.
June 30, 2012
yarb commented on the word grouchbag
'The beer was bitter and he began to feel a little edge from it. This was all right. Keep it at beer for a while. Get a stake, working the mitt camp. Get a good wad in the grouchbag and then try working Mexico. They say the language is a cinch to learn. And the damn country's wide open for ragheads. They advertise in all the papers down there. Give that mess with the cop time to cool and I can come back in a few years and start working California. Take a Spanish name maybe. There's a million chances.'
- Nightmare Alley, William Lindsay Gresham
June 30, 2012
yarb commented on the word hard cookie
Citation on nickle-nurser.
June 30, 2012
yarb commented on the word nickel-nurser
'"You'll make it, kid," Joe said. "McGraw's a hard cookie, but he ain't a nickle-nurser once you got him sold."'
- Nightmare Alley, William Lindsay Gresham
June 30, 2012
yarb commented on the word crap up
'The Negro's voice was softer. "Now you talking, brother. You let all that crap alone and come over here and talk. We got a long run ahead of us and ain't no use trying to crap each other up."
- Nightmare Alley, William Lindsay Gresham
June 30, 2012
yarb commented on the word hand in one's checks
'"You cold, mister? Or you got a fever?"
"Just shaken up. I thought I was going to hand in my checks."'
- Nightmare Alley, William Lindsay Gresham
June 30, 2012
yarb commented on the word hotfoot
'"Dewey sure is a sucker for the hotfoot. This must be a thousand times somebody gives him the hotfoot. It's a dozen times, at least, that I give him the hotfoot myself."'
- Nightmare Alley, William Lindsay Gresham
June 30, 2012
yarb commented on the word cartomancer
'The Great Stanton smiled thinly, pointing to the cards before him. "This is the Tarot of the Romany cartomancers. A set of symbols handed down from remote antiquity, preserving in their enigmatic form the ancient wisdom through the ages."'
- Nightmare Alley, William Lindsay Gresham
June 30, 2012
yarb commented on the word Wassermann
'With a twist of triumphant glee her mind drew pictures of her two sisters as she had seen them last: Mina, spare and virginal, still proud of a Phi Beta key after all these years of beating Latin into the heads of brats. And Gretel - still looking like a wax angel off a Tannenbaum, with half a lung left to breathe with and a positive Wassermann.'
- Nightmare Alley, William Lindsay Gresham
June 30, 2012
yarb commented on the word Dream Street
Citation on spook dodge.
June 30, 2012
yarb commented on the word spook dodge
'"Money doesn't mean anything to that guy. He's willing to give anything - just to get square with his conscience. He's overboard on the spook dodge. He's letting his business run itself. He's living on Dream Street."'
- Nightmare Alley, William Lindsay Gresham
June 30, 2012
yarb commented on the word screwy
Citation on Queer Street.
June 30, 2012
yarb commented on the word Queer Street
"Molly was so happy she could cry. It had been a long time since they'd had anything like a holiday together. Stan had been acting so screwy she was afraid he was living on Queer Street."
- Nightmare Alley, William Lindsay Gresham
June 30, 2012
yarb commented on the word how in the jumping blue merry blazes of hell
"But how in the jumping blue merry blazes of hell did he ever turn that light on and off inside the case?"
- Nightmare Alley, William Lindsay Gresham
June 30, 2012
yarb commented on the word odylic force
'"You may have the gong - and the table, Mr. Grindle. It never before has rung by an exudation of psychic power - what we call the odylic force as it did just now. Someone must be trying to get through to you."'
- Nightmare Alley, William Lindsay Gresham
June 30, 2012
yarb commented on the word do the Dutch
'"Say, y'know that actress, Doree Evarts - the one that did the Dutch night before last in the hotel across the way?"'
- Nightmare Alley, William Lindsay Gresham
June 30, 2012
yarb commented on the word sob sister
'In his pocket was a clipping, the work of a sob sister thirty years ago.'
- Nightmare Alley, William Lindsay Gresham
June 30, 2012
yarb commented on the word okana borra
"'The switch is what the gypsies call okana borra - the great trick. You have the chump tie a buck up in his hanky. He sleeps on it and in the morning he has two bucks and comes running back with all his savings out of the teapot. Then when he wakes up next time he has nothing in the hank but a stack of paper and he comes back looking for the gypsy."'
- Gresham, Nightmare Alley, 1946
June 29, 2012
yarb commented on the word chump
See okana borra for citation.
June 29, 2012
yarb commented on the word hank
Apparently short for handkerchief or hankie. My first encounter with this word was on hotel laundry lists. They would be forever listing "hanks" as an item, and eventually I asked the person at the front desk what the heck a hank was. I knew that the laundry list hadn't changed since the 1970's, since it also listed slacks and sports shirts and had no box for t-shirts. The chap was as lost as I was, or pretended to be, and it was only recently, when I saw the word in Gresham's "Nightmare Alley" (see okana borra), that I twigged the obvious. For who carries a handkerchief nowadays? The custom is from the days when paper was for writing on, not snotting. Handkerchiefs smell irremediably of one's father.
June 29, 2012
yarb commented on the word okanna borra
"'The switch is what the gypsies call okanna borra - the great trick. You have the chump tie a buck up in his hanky. He sleeps on it and in the morning he has two bucks and comes running back with all his savings out of the teapot. Then when he wakes up next time he has nothing in the hank but a stack of paper and he comes back looking for the gypsy."'
- Gresham, Nightmare Alley, 1946
June 29, 2012
yarb commented on the word full of rage
I am full of rage.
June 29, 2012
yarb commented on the word gab angle
"...that would have been a beautiful place to plant a bug if you wanted to work the waiting room gab angle when the doc's secretary came in."
- Gresham, Nightmare Alley, 1946
June 29, 2012
yarb commented on the word hock
Those of us who do not pronounce "hawk" the same as "hock" prefer to "hock" a loogie. Were we to "hawk" one, we would wait in vain for buyers.
May 21, 2012
yarb commented on the word hallux
If a girl were to say that to me I'd be hers forever.
May 21, 2012
yarb commented on the list old-western-slang
Superb list!
May 21, 2012
yarb commented on the list chop
Can I offer saex?
May 21, 2012
yarb commented on the word Memorical Day
I sometimes find the phrase "Moronical Day" in my head.
May 21, 2012
yarb commented on the list we-re-a-band
Has it happened yet? And if so, whidch of the six did you opt for? My vote would be for ugly t-shirt.
May 21, 2012
yarb commented on the word iä
Pronunciation. "Ee-yeah?"
May 11, 2012
yarb commented on the list flanges-c
I like the way there are two kinds of vortex finder. If you're not satisfied with a polyurethane vortex finder, would you consider a ceramic one?
Soon after this visit, or maybe even before (I have visited many warehouses and always enjoy them) I wrote a short story about a warehouse employee who comes across an alien item which alters his consciousness. I lost interest before long but the fact that I even began the thing shows that industrial wareouses (and their contents) are dear to my heart.
May 5, 2012
yarb commented on the word otium
A crafty translation!
May 5, 2012
yarb commented on the word slacks
Just came here in outrage at the New Yorker article, only to find my comment of 4+ years ago. I stand by what I said then!
May 5, 2012
yarb commented on the word beauty factory
That definition has the scent of Century about it.
May 5, 2012
yarb commented on the word interlock
Anthology please.
May 5, 2012
yarb commented on the list the-23-types-of-vagabond
Which are you, zuzu?
May 5, 2012
yarb commented on the word even
So even is translating particles in Hebrew and Greek?
I know zip about Hebrew, but from my scant knowledge of Greek, the "men... de..." construction connotes a sense of internal opposition, sometimes translated as "on the one hand... on the other hand..." or "while... whereas...", but not as strong as these English constructions and much more frequently employed, so often left untranslated.
So I would argue that while even in the Biblical examples is translating a kind of emphatic construction, it would be more appropriate, in this case, not to attempt a translation in English (notwithstanding the timbre the KJB derives from this kind of distinctive usage). However, perhaps there is an equivalent in Arabic?
April 4, 2012
yarb commented on the word gerund
Ha ha! Transvestite verbs.
April 4, 2012
yarb commented on the word even
I have also often wondered about this archaic sense of even. It doesn't seem to be adequately addressed in the definitions given here.
April 1, 2012
yarb commented on the word dactyl
I agree with his reasoning, but to me "Crowley" is more trochaic than spondulic.
March 28, 2012
yarb commented on the word shop
Lady Gaga... where have I heard that name before?
March 28, 2012
yarb commented on the word Marsala
Like a character from a story by Forster or Maugham.
March 28, 2012
yarb commented on the list sound--quiet
Cool list!
March 27, 2012
yarb commented on the word robotrix
Evidently he waited for the robotrix attendant to finish fueling up his ship.
- P.K. Dick, Flow My Tears, The Policeman Said.
March 27, 2012
yarb commented on the word irreal
"That's very important," Westerburg said earnestly. "KR-3 is a major breakthrough. Anyone affected by it is forced to perceive irreal universes, whether they want to or not."
- P.K. Dick, Flow My Tears, The Policeman Said.
March 27, 2012
yarb commented on the word Memory of Your Nose
Later, they sat in a booth at a coffee shop, a clean and attractive place with young waitresses and a reasonably loose patronage. The jukebox drummed out Louis Panda's "Memory of Your Nose."
- P.K. Dick, Flow My Tears, The Policeman Said.
March 27, 2012
yarb commented on the word flipflap
She handed him the keys and crept into the rear seat of the flipflap. Jason, his heart pulsing with relief, got in behind the wheel, stuck the key into the ignition, turned the motor on, and, in a moment, sent the flipflap flipflapping up into the sky, at its maximum speed of forty knots an hour. It was, he noted for some odd reason, a very inexpensive model flipflap: a Ford Greyhound. An economy flipflap. And not new.
- P.K. Dick, Flow My Tears, The Policeman Said.
March 27, 2012
yarb commented on the word pourout
...he felt his vision fail and his sense of gravity shift: his middle ear fluctuated in its pressures so that the room caromed around him, silently in perpetual ball motion. Like a pourout of Ferris wheel at a child's circus.
- P.K. Dick, Flow My Tears, The Policeman Said.
March 27, 2012
yarb commented on the word fantidulous
"Your red," Jason said, "is fantidulous."
- P.K. Dick, Flow My Tears, The Policeman Said.
March 27, 2012
yarb commented on the word pyloric
Ignoring him, Alys continued, "Felix especially likes Basque cuisine, but they cook with so much butter that it gives him pyloric spasms."
- P.K. Dick, Flow My Tears, The Policeman Said.
March 27, 2012
yarb commented on the word balky
Alys shut off the quibble, kicked open a balky door.
- P.K. Dick, Flow My Tears, The Policeman Said.
March 27, 2012
yarb commented on the word styroflex
Jason a moment later found himself seated in a leather-covered chair, leaning back into the softness of styroflex.
- P.K. Dick, Flow My Tears, The Policeman Said.
March 27, 2012
yarb commented on the word shucky
It hadn't even occurred to Jason, and probably not to Ruth Rae either... except perhaps as a heavy, shucky gesture, thought of but never really considered.
- P.K. Dick, Flow My Tears, The Policeman Said.
March 27, 2012
yarb commented on the word pornochord
No TV sets muttering, no thump of feet against the floor above their heads. Not even a pornochord somewhere, blasting out from a quad. "Are the walls fairly thick in these apartments?" he asked Ruth sharply.
- P.K. Dick, Flow My Tears, The Policeman Said.
March 27, 2012
yarb commented on the word lipperty lipperty lipperty
"A woman I knew, married, with three kids; she had two kittens and then she got one of those big gray Belgian rabbits that go lipperty lipperty lipperty on those huge hind legs."
- P.K. Dick, Flow My Tears, The Policeman Said.
March 27, 2012
yarb commented on the word nerdish
Citation on thermo-radex.
March 27, 2012
yarb commented on the word thermo-radex
On the screen the features of the nerdish Las Vegas functionary captain formed. "Our thermo-radex shows a male of Taverner's weight and height and general body structure in one of the as yet unapproached remaining apartments."
- P.K. Dick, Flow My Tears, The Policeman Said.
March 27, 2012
yarb commented on the word unexist
Alys, observing everything, said, "A man who's unexisted himself. Has that ever happened before?"
- P.K. Dick, Flow My Tears, The Policeman Said.
March 27, 2012
yarb commented on the word fake frosty slime drinks made out of nothing
Citation on quad system.
March 26, 2012
yarb commented on the word dietetic
Citation on quad system.
March 26, 2012
yarb commented on the word quad system
In her New York apartment at one time she had set up a huge quad system and more or less lived inside it, eating dietetic sandwiches and drinking fake frosty slime drinks made out of nothing. Listening forty-eight hours at a stretch to disc after disc by the Purple People Strings, which he abominated.
- P.K. Dick, Flow My Tears, The Policeman Said.
March 26, 2012
yarb commented on the word upsweep
Citation on featherplastic.
March 26, 2012
yarb commented on the word featherplastic
...Ruth still had beautiful black hair, all coiled in an upsweep at the back of her head. Featherplastic eyelashes, brilliant purple streaks across her cheek, as if she had been seared by psychedelic tiger claws.
- P.K. Dick, Flow My Tears, The Policeman Said.
March 26, 2012
yarb commented on the word fob jazzy
...a first-rate cocktail lounge. The kind many women go to, with a three-man combo playing fob jazzy, preferably blacks. Well dressed.
- P.K. Dick, Flow My Tears, The Policeman Said.
March 26, 2012
yarb commented on the word hype-up
On the screen McNulty's rumpled hyped-up features appeared.
- P.K. Dick, Flow My Tears, The Policeman Said.
March 26, 2012
yarb commented on the word diddle
Citation on pleasure-nodule.
March 26, 2012
yarb commented on the word pleasure nodule
..."you," he said chokingly, "are a reflex machine that diddles itself endlessly like a rat in an experiment. You're wired into the pleasure nodule of your brain and you push the switch five thousand times an hour every day of your life when you're not sleeping. It's a mystery to me why you bother to sleep; why not diddle yourself a full twenty-four hours a day?"
- P.K. Dick, Flow My Tears, The Policeman Said.
March 26, 2012
yarb commented on the word drug
Citation on fetish.
March 26, 2012
yarb commented on the word fetish
Whenever she had been heavily fetishing and/or drugging she crashed her in his main office.
- P.K. Dick, Flow My Tears, The Policeman Said.
March 26, 2012
yarb commented on the word hexophenophrine hydrosulphate
"What was it this time?" he demanded. "Termaline?"
"No." Her speech, of course, came out slurred. "Hexophenophrine hydrolsulphate. Uncut. Subcutaneous. She opened her great pale eyes, stared at him with rebellious displeasure.
- P.K. Dick, Flow My Tears, The Policeman Said.
March 26, 2012
yarb commented on the word Dixie cup
...at the coffee machine, a female officer drinking from a Dixie cup.
- P.K. Dick, Flow My Tears, The Policeman Said.
March 26, 2012
yarb commented on the word express descent sphincter
With his rank key he opened the building's express descent sphincter, dropped rapidly by chute to his own level, fourteen. Where he had worked most of his adult life.
- P.K. Dick, Flow My Tears, The Policeman Said.
March 26, 2012
yarb commented on the word bloblike
Large tears slid down her cheeks and dropped, bloblike, onto her blouse.
- P.K. Dick, Flow My Tears, The Policeman Said.
March 26, 2012
yarb commented on the word glunk
"He's just one of those little green turtles... not a land tortoise or anything. Have you ever watched the way they snap at food, at a fly floating on their water? It's very small but it's awful. One second the fly's there and the next, glunk. It's inside the turtle."
- P.K. Dick, Flow My Tears, The Policeman Said.
March 26, 2012
yarb commented on the word four-dimensional living room
Citation on infinity ceiling.
March 26, 2012
yarb commented on the word rotating bath
Citation on infinity ceiling.
March 26, 2012
yarb commented on the word floating house
Citation on infinity ceiling.
March 26, 2012
yarb commented on the word infinity ceiling
I have a floating house in Malibu, he thought, with eight bedrooms, six rotating baths and a four-dimensional living room with an infinity ceiling.
- P.K. Dick, Flow My Tears, The Policeman Said.
March 26, 2012
yarb commented on the word macrolens
She held up her right arm, pointing to a section of her sleeve. "I've got a gray pol-ident tab, there; it shows up under their macrolens. So I don't get picked up by mistake."
- P.K. Dick, Flow My Tears, The Policeman Said.
March 26, 2012
yarb commented on the word van-quibble
Citation on thungly.
March 26, 2012
yarb commented on the word thungly
...the man, gripped by four thungly pols, disappeared into a parked van-quibble, ominously gray and black: police colors.
- P.K. Dick, Flow My Tears, The Policeman Said.
March 26, 2012
yarb commented on the word Barber's Hoop
Once, years ago, when the Reynolds syndicate had tried to buy into the show, he had learned to use - and had carried - a gun: a Barber's Hoop with a range of two miles with no loss of peak trajectory until the final thousand feet.
- P.K. Dick, Flow My Tears, The Policeman Said.
March 26, 2012
yarb commented on the word anus
Citation on freeber.
March 26, 2012
yarb commented on the word freeber
He had no more quinques. So, at this point, he gave up. That was a stupid thing to say, he realized, that about the phone lines. That would make anybody hang up. I strangled myself in my own word web, right down the old freeber. Straight down the middle. Beautifully flat at both ends, too. Like a great artificial anus.
- P.K. Dick, Flow My Tears, The Policeman Said.
March 26, 2012
yarb commented on the word sic
"She's probably sicced the pols and nats both on me."
- P.K. Dick, Flow My Tears, The Policeman Said.
March 26, 2012
yarb commented on the word twerp
Citation on brig.
March 26, 2012
yarb commented on the word brig
She peered, one eyebrow cocked. "You're young but not too young. You're good-looking. Your voice is commanding and you have no reluctance about brigging me like this. You're exactly what a twerp fan would look like, sound like, act like. Okay; are you satisfied?"
- P.K. Dick, Flow My Tears, The Policeman Said.
March 26, 2012
yarb commented on the word deball
Citation on prive-pol.
March 26, 2012
yarb commented on the word jeter
Citation on prive-pol.
March 26, 2012
yarb commented on the word prive-pol
"I won't meet you at Altrocci's or anywhere. Keep out of my life or I'll have my prive-pols deball you and-"
"You have one private pol," Jason interrupted. "He's sixty-two years old and his name is Fred. Originally he was a sharpshooter with the Orange County Minutemen; used to pick off student jeters at Cal State Fullerton. He was good then, but he's nothing to worry about now."
- P.K. Dick, Flow My Tears, The Policeman Said.
March 26, 2012
yarb commented on the word quinque
He found a public phone booth, entered, shut the door against the noise of traffic, and dropped a gold quinque into the slot.
- P.K. Dick, Flow My Tears, The Policeman Said.
March 26, 2012
yarb commented on the word blep
"When you blep away," he said abruptly, trying to catch her off guard, "how do you do it?"
- P.K. Dick, Flow My Tears, The Policeman Said.
March 26, 2012
yarb commented on the word schmalch
"You get a lot of bills," he said, "for a girl living in a one-room schmalch."
- P.K. Dick, Flow My Tears, The Policeman Said.
March 24, 2012
yarb commented on the word micromag
Citation on crampedly.
March 24, 2012
yarb commented on the word crampedly
He prowled, crampedly, about the room, examining a book here, a cassette tape, a micromag.
- P.K. Dick, Flow My Tears, The Policeman Said.
March 24, 2012
yarb commented on the word hot-compart
...Kathy had a single room with a hot-compart in which to fix one-person meals.
- P.K. Dick, Flow My Tears, The Policeman Said.
March 24, 2012
yarb commented on the word quibble
...the clerk drove his old-time quibble slowly and noisily down the street...
- P.K. Dick, Flow My Tears, The Policeman Said.
March 24, 2012
yarb commented on the word gelatinlike
Citation on Callisto cuddle sponge.
March 24, 2012
yarb commented on the word Callisto cuddle sponge
It happened too fast. He backed away out of instinct, but too slowly and too late. The gelatinlike Callisto cuddle sponge with its fifty feeding tubes clung to him, anchored itself to his chest. Already he felt the feeding tubes dig into him, into his chest.
- P.K. Dick, Flow My Tears, The Policeman Said.
March 24, 2012
yarb commented on the word six
Like all sixes she had enormous recuperative ability. It had been carefully built into each one of them.
- P.K. Dick, Flow My Tears, The Policeman Said.
March 24, 2012
yarb commented on the word nat
Citation on pol.
March 24, 2012
yarb commented on the word pol
He knew that at one time she had been illegally married to a student commune leader, and that for one year she had lived in the rabbit warrens of Columbia University, along with all the smelly, bearded students kept subsurface lifelong by the pols and the nats. The police and the national guard, who ringed every campus, keeping the students from creeping across to society like so many black rats swarming out of a leaky ship.
- P.K. Dick, Flow My Tears, The Policeman Said.
March 24, 2012
yarb commented on the word phone-grid transex network
"He glanced at her, then studied her. Volumes of red hair, pale skin with a few freckles, a strong roman nose. Deep-set huge violet eyes. She was right; she didn't show her age. Of course she never tapped into the phone-grid transex network, as he did. But in point of fact he did so very little. So he was not hooked, and there had not been, in his case, brain damage or premature ageing."
- P.K. Dick, Flow My Tears, The Policeman Said.
March 24, 2012
yarb commented on the word chimney breast
Well, I'd guess it means the structure that surrounds the chimney itself in a living room. Made of brick or stone and usually tapering toward the ceiling. At least this makes sense of the citation, and I don't know any other term for that thing.
March 24, 2012
yarb commented on the word glop
You're welcome.
March 23, 2012
yarb commented on the word besnotted
I'm infatuated right down to your boogers. I'm completely besnotted.
March 23, 2012
yarb commented on the user Louises
Hi Louises - I'm really enjoying your excellent citations from The Last Werewolf. Perhaps you should gather them together in a dedicated list? If you don't, then I might! Keep them coming.
March 23, 2012
yarb commented on the word Afghanistan Banana Town
See afghanistanbananastan.
March 21, 2012
yarb commented on the list afghanistanbananastan
Brackets required: Afghanistan Banana Town.
March 21, 2012
yarb commented on the word pseudomantid
A truly magisterial summation by mollusque.
March 21, 2012
yarb commented on the word third sector
"Most people could weather a fortnight of unpaid work; but once you start talking about three or six months, you basically have to be living with your parents, they have to live in the same city – usually London for the desirable posts – and they have to be able to support you. So pretty soon the point arrives when there's a middle-class stranglehold on the jobs that people want to do – notably in politics, the media and the third sector."
- Zoe Williams, Ripping off young interns is routine, but it's still wrong, guardian.co.uk, 20/03/12.
March 21, 2012
yarb commented on the word nabob
There used to be a TV advert for Nabob coffee with a cheesy jingle which went "It's a Nabob coffee morning..." implying that people do love the smell of Nabob in the morning.
March 21, 2012
yarb commented on the word a priori
What an awesome first comment!
March 21, 2012
yarb commented on the word havoc
Cry havoc and let slip the cherry blossom.
March 20, 2012
yarb commented on the word havoc
'Vancouver's iconic cherry blossom festival could also be hit by a lagging spring.
"The really early cherries flower normally, but the ones that would normally come out, say the first of April, come out a week or two later," Justice said. "And everything gets pushed back.
"That creates havoc because the cherry blossom festival is essentially the month of April."'
- Spring brings more cold, snow and rain, Vancouversun.com, 20-03-12.
March 20, 2012
yarb commented on the word sidereal
Oh, Century! Most romantic of lexicons.
March 14, 2012
yarb commented on the word terpomo
Joking aside, Griza, you have already entered this wonderful word on Wordnik. Thank you and congratulations.
March 14, 2012
yarb commented on the word terpomo
Or perhaps you have a particularly impressive potato and you want to enter it in a competition?
March 14, 2012
yarb commented on the word terpomo
How to enter a potato? I'll let someone else google that for you.
March 14, 2012
yarb commented on the word Umbra, G.E.
Mnemonic for the colours of the rainbow, superior alternative to Roy G. Biv (after some modifications to the names of the colours).
March 14, 2012
yarb commented on the word Roy G. Biv
Wait, isn't umber a colour? So we could have Umber, GA.
Come to think of it there is also the word umbra, the dark part of a shadow. So Umbra, G.E. is also a possibility.
March 14, 2012
yarb commented on the word Roy G. Biv
I was thinking of "emu grab" but yours is better.
March 14, 2012
yarb commented on the word Roy G. Biv
It would be easier to just rename the colours so they are more easily mnemonicable. For example, instead of red, orange, yellow, green, blue, indigo and violet we could have unphor, mogal, brove, rosp, acetin, gliese and eltic.
March 14, 2012
yarb commented on the word Roy G. Biv
Although I suppose for bigrovy to gain acceptance would require some rearrangement of the visible spectrum.
March 14, 2012
yarb commented on the word Roy G. Biv
bigrovy would be much more fun and just as coherent.
March 14, 2012
yarb commented on the list the-non-event-horizon
Ha, yes. I can only add to this list by not adding to it.
March 14, 2012
yarb commented on the word Roy G. Biv
Probably the stupidest mnemonic in common use.
March 14, 2012
yarb commented on the list red--4
russet, ruddy, rubicund, rufous, erubescent?
March 12, 2012
yarb commented on the word never put your banana in the refrigerator
I can confirm that I have not been pelted with any bananas lately - at least not any of a ruddy hue.
March 12, 2012
yarb commented on the word porching
To sleep, porching to dream?
March 12, 2012
yarb commented on the word nebraksa
The first photo looks kind of like the end-times (which like all good things, I'm sure will begin in Nebraksa).
March 12, 2012
yarb commented on the word iroquois
I find that concept rather iffacle to imagine, fbh.
March 12, 2012
yarb commented on the word national sleep awareness week
Wee Willie Winkie? Rip van Winkle? Winken, Blinken and Nod? Or Wee Willie Rip van Winken Bliken and Nod?
March 12, 2012
yarb commented on the word world kidney day
I'm celebrating with a steak and kidney pie.
March 9, 2012
yarb commented on the word three pipe problem
...but only 50 minutes for Holmes.
March 8, 2012
yarb commented on the word semantic satiation
Happened to me this morning in the shower with the word blame.
February 29, 2012
yarb commented on the word screechy
Insects have six feet and are sometimes screechy.
February 29, 2012
yarb commented on the word bogart
No! That's quite charming if true! Well spotted.
February 29, 2012
yarb commented on the list the-masses--the-common-or-ordinary-people
the great unwashed?
February 27, 2012
yarb commented on the user Emmanuel
It means "travelling", or "in transit". If one is "on the road" then one is away from home, on a journey, staying in hotels, pensions, inns, auberges, hostelries, taverns, roadhouses, motels, lodges, bothies, B&B's, encampments, caravansaries &c.
February 24, 2012
yarb commented on the word almost Solveig
*initiates wardrobe malfunction sequence*
February 6, 2012
yarb commented on the list children’s-clothing
Ideas for spam-related children's clothing welcomed (or anything else spam-related)
February 3, 2012
yarb commented on the word polysplenia
Come on deinonynchus, I want to know the word for the condition of having seventeen lungs.
February 3, 2012
yarb commented on the word pisspoor
British. Execrable.
February 3, 2012
yarb commented on the user rightshopping1986
You are pisspoor even for a spammer.
February 3, 2012
yarb commented on the word tractor
Where was I on Feb 15th, 2007?!
February 3, 2012
yarb commented on the word polysplenia
Two spleen, or not two spleen?
February 3, 2012
yarb commented on the word commatology
Comma gain, ruzuzu?
February 2, 2012
yarb commented on the word list out
Or, to arrange several things into a list.
February 1, 2012
yarb commented on the word hork
Interesting, brian. What you say about hork, I would say defines bork.
February 1, 2012
yarb commented on the list impossible-wind-up-toys
Me too!
January 31, 2012
yarb commented on the word tagatose
Look at its ickle pwetty taga toes!
January 30, 2012
yarb commented on the list the-measure-of-man
That vague "in some places" paired with the precise "formerly 4¾ cubic yards" is classic Century!
January 30, 2012
yarb commented on the word madent
Madent may be wet, but it will never be moist.
January 29, 2012
yarb commented on the word vernepator
Where can I get one?!
January 29, 2012
yarb commented on the user per2013
Alert! These pills make your penis smaller, not bigger, and one side-effect is inflammation of the node.
January 29, 2012
yarb commented on the word caff
A caff is a dilapidated British eatery serving English breakfasts, tea and coffee, and sandwiches and maybe a few other unwholesome things for lunch. It is quite distinct from a cafe, in that in the former all the chairs will be of normal height - no stools - and all the colours will be matt. All the tables are wipe-clean, all the condiment-bottles are sticky and all the staff are stuck, gesturing impotently, and so are you.
January 28, 2012
yarb commented on the list places-for-eating-and-drinking
I'm not saying you need to get multilingual here - far from it, in fact - but I think pulquería deserves a spot.
You could also add caff, which is different from a cafe.
January 28, 2012
yarb commented on the word Dam troll
Dam troll!
January 27, 2012
yarb commented on the word nauseogenic
"The nauseogenic properties of a patterned rug that reputedly caused motion-sickness-like symptoms in those who viewed it was the topic of this study."
- discoblog, 26-1-12
January 27, 2012
yarb commented on the list panvocalics
I ran across nauseogenic here and immediately went looking for a version with one less 'e'.
January 27, 2012
yarb commented on the list panvocalics
nausogenic gets plenty of hits, though perhaps you'd consider it a misspelling of nauseogenic.
January 27, 2012
yarb commented on the word spat
Makes me think of the spawn of shell-fish; specifically, the spawn of the oyster; also, a young oyster, or young oysters collectively, up to about the time of their becoming set, or fixed to some support. And a gaiter or legging.
January 26, 2012
yarb commented on the word woven
I agree, very cool.
January 26, 2012
yarb commented on the word spat
I think it's dialectical, isn't it? Depends where you're from.
I suppose it could be spreading by analogy with hit, fit and quit.
January 26, 2012
yarb commented on the word boss
I'm sure I've noticed it in London, too.
January 25, 2012
yarb commented on the word oracle machine
That's uncanny. How could it know that I habitually lunch on fresh drupes and schizocarps of a Tuesday?
January 24, 2012
yarb commented on the word boss
Hi Norm. When I lived in the UK I also noticed this usage in the situations you describe, especially in the Northern part of the country. In fact I picked it up and used it myself sometimes when working behind a bar. My sense is that it's used specifically by younger males when addressing older men; especially, as you point out, by a younger man providing a product or service, or doing a courtesy, to an older one.
January 24, 2012
yarb commented on the word oracle machine
I asked the Wordnik oracle/random word feature to describe itself in one word and it came up with... genie! So it must be real.
January 24, 2012
yarb commented on the list fig-shaped
Insanity.
January 22, 2012
yarb commented on the word blue rubber bleb syndrome
Well, someone made it up.
January 22, 2012
yarb commented on the word Zagros fold and thrust belt
A wardrobe essential for the interstellar gigolo.
January 22, 2012
yarb commented on the word λοπαδοτεμαχοσελαχογαλεοκρανιολειψανοδριμυποτριμματοσιλφιοκαραβομελιτοκατακεχυμενοκιχλεπικοσσυφοφαττοπεριστεραλεκτρυονοπτοκεφαλλιοκιγκλοπελειολαγῳοσιραιοβαφητραγανοπτερύγων
Worth knowing.
January 22, 2012
yarb commented on the word witling
"But if witlings should be inclined to attack this account, let them have the candour to quote what I have offered in my defence."
- Boswell, in Life of Johnson
January 21, 2012
yarb commented on the word Vegetable Lamb of Tartary
For what it's worth, I still think there should be a redirect to the correctly-cased version of a word, with disambiguation for genuine discrepancies.
January 21, 2012
yarb commented on the word Vegetable Lamb of Tartary
It's because the comment-engine of Wordnik comes from what was once a separate site, called Wordie, and devoted more to the social side of words than the technical side. Wordie was quite rudimentary (in the best possible way) and didn't distinguish upper from lower case. So many words which should have an upper case element are replete with old comments on their lower case form.
January 21, 2012
yarb commented on the word Vegetable Lamb of Tartary
See comments on barometz.
January 21, 2012
yarb commented on the word MVEMJSUNP
You're right, R: P is a dwarf planet these days. As it happens, I'm currently very interested in dwarf planets, plutoids and trans-Neptunian objects, the Kuiper belt, scattered disc and Oort cloud and all that kind of stuff.
January 20, 2012
yarb commented on the word Manuel Moschopoulos
Known to his pals as moschops.
January 20, 2012
yarb commented on the word MVEMJSUNP
Personally I think it's easier to just remember the names of the planets than to remember MVEMJSUNP.
January 20, 2012
yarb commented on the word handle with care
*hork*
January 20, 2012
yarb commented on the word afterworld
Ha ha. Wordnet is the Beavis and Butthead of internet lexicons.
January 20, 2012
yarb commented on the word pope lick monster
I don't have issues with popes, licking, or monsters, but I find the pope lick monster profoundly disturbing.
January 20, 2012
yarb commented on the list monsters
One of my favourites is the pope lick monster.
January 19, 2012
yarb commented on the list shaped-like-a-pair-of-scissors
I love these highly specific lists.
January 19, 2012
yarb commented on the word beetlestomper
Sounds like a cool kind of footwear. Like winklepicker.
January 19, 2012
yarb commented on the word ludicrous
I'd say ludicrous and laughable have moved closer to parity with ridiculous since the Century's disquisition. I've also noticed that ludicrous (along with the other synonyms discussed here) is often used to mean unbelievable or incredible - to describe a feat of athletic skill, for example, or a long shift of work, or anything generally impressive.
January 19, 2012
yarb commented on the word travesty
The ngram data is (as so often) interesting. Before about 1880 there is nothing but a whole lot of mockery of justice. But then comes the rise of the travesty of justice, usurping mockery of justice around 1910 and now more than twice as common.
Of the other options offered by the Century, only parody of justice has any support in the corpus, and is at best a minority choice.
January 19, 2012
yarb commented on the word travesty
Looking at the examples, and especially the tweets, it seems that when people use travesty in the sense of "disaster" or "disgusting state of affairs" they often do so as a short form of the stock expression travesty of justice. E.g.
“It is too depressing by far to know that Justin Beiber has more hits on Youtube for his version of Somebody to Love than Queen. A travesty” - @jactherat
“If Brighton win this it will be a travesty. Wrexham have been superb.” - @lawrenceVB
“However, the big travesty is that if you live in Manhattan delivery is free – you live in the Bronx and the sale is no sale at all.” - Wine prices - beating the spread online and in-store | Dr Vino's wine blog
I also suspect there to be some confusion with tragedy.
January 18, 2012
yarb commented on the word lend
The ngram data bears you out, ptero. I share your dejection; this is a such a pleasant, well-seeming word.
January 18, 2012
yarb commented on the user feedback
I think it was pig-Latin.
January 17, 2012
yarb commented on the list stuffie-you-haven-t-lived
Re: chub-on. It seems to be more often used to describe a slight affection or penchant for something than an actual state of semi-arousal. I quite like it actually.
January 16, 2012
yarb commented on the word smell fungus
See smellfungus.
January 15, 2012
yarb commented on the list stuffie-you-haven-t-lived
I believe "to have a chub-on" means to have an incipient erection, jenn.
January 15, 2012
yarb commented on the list the-beerhunter
We found a third of them, in the end.
January 14, 2012
yarb commented on the word fatigue life
Poignant.
January 14, 2012
yarb commented on the word euendolith
Get out of that rock, you bloody endolith!
January 14, 2012
yarb commented on the user Prolagus
When I think of you, I think cu<3'ltivated and thoroughly pleasa'nt.
January 13, 2012
yarb commented on the user Prolagus
Hi! I hope your Friday 13th was <3' not in the least bit' unlucky.
January 13, 2012
yarb commented on the user ruzuzu
Perhaps I'm <3' not' as smart as I think I am.
January 13, 2012
yarb commented on the user ruzuzu
Hmm.
January 13, 2012
yarb commented on the user ruzuzu
Dear ruzuzu,
You are <3' the opposite of' a terrible bore.
Yours with no <3' thing but' fondness,
Yarb.
January 13, 2012
yarb commented on the word trending words
The cat came back!
January 13, 2012
yarb commented on the list joshee-word-list
Penny for your thoughts.
January 13, 2012
yarb commented on the list outcasts
Good one! I think it would be just as funny, though, to see the "not a" words which Wordnik does have definitions for.
January 13, 2012
yarb commented on the list impossible-snow-globes
Right-o, I'll fire away then.
January 12, 2012
yarb commented on the word egg you on
See also egg on.
January 12, 2012
yarb commented on the list impossible-snow-globes
Whoops, I added a duplicate Moses scene. Sorry about that.
January 12, 2012
yarb commented on the word -trix
Well dominatrix is still common, and I've come across interlocutrix and executrix and I think editrix in old books, but I take your point. I'm a big fan of this suffix.
January 12, 2012
yarb commented on the word postum
"There’s a Skaverbacked Gritchen
who lives in my kitchen
and makes his home under the sink.
And he lives upon Gipes
that crawl out of the pipes
and he takes only Postum to drink."
- Shel Silverstein, There's a Gritchen in my Kitchen
January 12, 2012
yarb commented on the list herbs-and-spices
I've come across the singular, I think, probably in books. But I suppose the reason for the preponderance of the plural would be that cloves come whole, not typically ground or as tiny seeds. Just as you 'd say "bay leaves" instead of "bay leaf" when describing the plant generally. On the other hand we say "star anise", not "stars anise", don't we?
January 11, 2012
yarb commented on the list pigs-on-parade
Your younger readers will note the omission of Peppa Pig.
January 9, 2012
yarb commented on the word jacking-motion
This would be the classic British "wanker" gesture: like the "OK" gesture but rotated so the "O" is horizontal and then moved up and down by the wrist. The sort of motion Polonius might make behind the arras while Hamlet rants.
January 6, 2012
yarb commented on the word halching
It has a name?!
January 6, 2012
yarb commented on the word washroom
Quaint? In my experience it's the standard (in polite conversation).
January 6, 2012
yarb commented on the word whoremasterly
Marvellous!
January 6, 2012
yarb commented on the word fly-half
I think of rugby. You win.
January 6, 2012
yarb commented on the word anchovy
I'd just throw up a craigslist ad. I bet there are more long-haired anchovy lovers in your town than you think. I'd offer my own hair - I'm due to have my ears lowered - but the quantity would only suffice for a thimble-sized sieve, and thus for a ramekin's worth of the fishy elixir.
January 5, 2012
yarb commented on the word anchovy
Then you should make one of those, too. You must know somebody who needs a haircut. Offer to let them have some of the anchovy sauce if they donate their locks.
January 5, 2012
yarb commented on the word anchovy
That sounds horrible. You should make it, ruzuzu.
January 5, 2012
yarb commented on the word nonic
Thanks for pointing this out, h. Really the only acceptable type of glass for bitter.
January 4, 2012
yarb commented on the word brain tsunami
“and your brain juices are rising in your skull bowl to form a tsunami that is drowning your actual brain” @Kibasaur
- from the tweets
January 4, 2012
yarb commented on the word elder-rob
I wonder what the etymology of the -rob/-roob bit is?
January 4, 2012
yarb commented on the word ladies-putting
Wow - authoritative.
January 3, 2012
yarb commented on the word shode-pit
If I read this in a text I'd assume it was a synonym for latrine.
January 3, 2012
yarb commented on the word may-hill
Why is May a trying month for invalids?
January 3, 2012
yarb commented on the word fromage
Ha ha. Did the inspector pronounce it to rhyme with rummage?
January 3, 2012
yarb commented on the word bliegger
Roughly the noise I uttered upon seeing it.
January 3, 2012
yarb commented on the word tournure
It's quite a difficult novel to read and I'm not sure if I will read more by Spackman. He has a special talent for dialogue, reproducing all the filler, dislocations and verbal tics of real speech - sort of like Don DeLillo but Spackman's characters have an extra layer of fanciness in their vocabulary. He is fun to read, just not that engaging; not at all gripping. Something to read four or five pages at a time perhaps.
January 3, 2012
yarb commented on the word bouleversement
Came here to say "cool word!" only to find my comment from three and a half years ago.
January 3, 2012
yarb commented on the word enucleation
'Here however his lawyer worked his weighty way through the uproar and started holding these dockets up against the cabin wall for him to sign one after another, affably bawling his full-phrased enucleation of each in turn into his ear...'
- W.M. Spackman, An Armful of Warm Girl
January 2, 2012
yarb commented on the word eel
'And it might have been the Thirties all over again, his cabin jammed, flowers everywhere and the most agreeable urban din, Victoria's man eeling his way through the hubbub with the champagne...'
- W.M. Spackman, An Armful of Warm Girl
January 2, 2012
yarb commented on the word apodeictic
'He said in an attempt at a lighter tone, "Now Melissa the plain apodeictic fact is nobody is very sensible," but she paid no attention to this truth...'
- W.M. Spackman, An Armful of Warm Girl
January 2, 2012
yarb commented on the word loquat
Citation on impluvium.
January 2, 2012
yarb commented on the word impluvium
"...a snapshot of loquat trees and a dirty impluvium."
- W.M. Spackman, An Armful of Warm Girl
January 2, 2012
yarb commented on the word femalize
"...she nuzzled and cooed and femalized at him in general."
- W.M. Spackman, An Armful of Warm Girl
January 2, 2012
yarb commented on the word disseize
"...did she suppose at his age he'd be so insensible, or her own word 'irresponsible' dammit, as to disseize a perfectly decent boy, no matter how hulking, of a girl he-"
- W.M. Spackman, An Armful of Warm Girl
January 2, 2012
yarb commented on the word tournure
"He at once replied that while he couldn't say he recalled all this in, uh, quite such unerring detail, still, if a lifetime's delight in the mere look, the mere tournure, of women, in the posed and lovely portraits they always somehow made him half-think they were-"
- W.M. Spackman, An Armful of Warm Girl
January 2, 2012
yarb commented on the word tenue
'"Only then you began grumbling about their tenue, these girls', Bermuda shorts and so on, you said where had all the baroque charm gone?'"
- W.M. Spackman, An Armful of Warm Girl
January 2, 2012
yarb commented on the word champêtre
Citation on frust.
January 2, 2012
yarb commented on the word frust
"'...the day we had lunch champêtre deep in that wonderful grove of beeches stretching on and on and on, by that half-ruined Doric folly with its frusts and columns.'"
- W.M. Spackman, An Armful of Warm Girl
January 2, 2012
yarb commented on the word elsewhither
"With Strickland the sexual appetite took a very small place. It was unimportant. It was irksome. His soul aimed elsewhither."
- Somerset Maugham, The Moon and Sixpence
December 30, 2011
yarb commented on the word The Two Ronnies
Ronnie Barker and Ronnie Corbett
December 29, 2011
yarb commented on the word cull
Citation (sense of fool, dupe) on nubbing cheat.
December 23, 2011
yarb commented on the word nubbing cheat
'Here,' said he, taking some dice out of his pocket, 'here's the stuff. Here are the implements; here are the little doctors which cure the distempers of the purse. Follow but my counsel, and I will show you a way to empty the pocket of a queer cull without any danger of the nubbing cheat.'"
"Nubbing cheat!" cries Partridge: "pray, sir, what is that?"
"Why that, sir," says the stranger, "is a cant phrase for the gallows; for as gamesters differ little from highwaymen in their morals, so do they very much resemble them in their language.
- Fielding, Tom Jones, VIII. xii.
December 23, 2011
yarb commented on the word aboiement
Mooooo!
December 23, 2011
yarb commented on the word satchel of shite
Did you mean satchel of shire?
December 23, 2011
yarb commented on the word jingleweed
Excellent, thanks H. It struck me as appropriate for the season (though I guess not really suited to the decking of halls).
December 22, 2011
yarb commented on the word baldachin
"...honourable established people who wanted a gleaming properly laid table and good food well served and some delicious creature or other to have dinner with on a fine early-summer evening as the lights came on in the baldachin of dusk and the nightfall murmur of traffic died slowly away uptown along the Avenue..."
- W.M. Spackman, An Armful of Warm Girl
December 22, 2011
yarb commented on the word pervicacious
"Nicholas instantly resumed, demanding of Mrs. Barclay with amazed innocence other women other women must she be like a pervicacious angel think that because he loved her with every beat of his heart, love and had loved, as she herself well remembered and in this house should remember best of all..."
- W.M. Spackman, An Armful of Warm Girl
December 22, 2011
yarb commented on the word tallage
"...also his lawyer up from Philadelphia with his bulging briefcase, the sheer tax-maneuvering his wife's behaviour had now got him into! his own cursing yeoman forebears hadn't been amerced with a blacker set of reliefs and merchets, church-scot and plough-arms and smoke-farthings and hearthpenny on Holy Thursday, and nowadays who could he tallage in return?"
- W.M. Spackman, An Armful of Warm Girl
December 22, 2011
yarb commented on the word jingleweed
What plant does Spackman mean by this? Google is no help.
December 22, 2011
yarb commented on the word jingleweed
"In the meadows, in the flash and dazzle of the morning, his fat black cattle grazed through the jingleweed, his white guineas ran huddling."
- W.M. Spackman, An Armful of Warm Girl
December 22, 2011
yarb commented on the word oestrus
"In some ways, it appears, the balladist wasn't a bad guy ... aside from an uncontrollable oestrus he turned out to have for neighbourhood-grocers' wives, and one or two low incidents in consequence, Mike had no trouble with him whatever..."
- W.M. Spackman, Heyday
December 22, 2011
yarb commented on the word eupatrid
"...and why question in 1932 (or how*?) the credo trained into us of economic propraetorships inevitably to come, the steady steak-fed beating of the Big Board heart, and naturally at the last the opulent, the eupatrid retirement?"
- W.M. Spackman, Heyday
*the text has "or how?" but I think "or now" makes asmuch/more sense given the publication date.
December 22, 2011
yarb commented on the word pibroch
"...all around us, under the orderly bucolic antiphonies of drunken argument, I could hear swelling wild, swift, and ominous the pibroch of hysteria."
- W.M. Spackman, Heyday
December 22, 2011
yarb commented on the word grocery
Having said that, I almost never watch TV. Or, for that matter, spend time "on the street".
December 22, 2011
yarb commented on the word grocery
I share rolig's astonishment; I've never once noticed the "sh" pronunciation. If it's so widespread you'd think I'd have heard it on TV, if not on the street.
December 21, 2011
yarb commented on the word trending words
Lost: one cat.
December 20, 2011
yarb commented on the list the-gods-must-be-crazy
What a beast this list is!
December 20, 2011
yarb commented on the list king-in-uruk
Would you say this is a happy list, ruzuzu?
December 20, 2011
yarb commented on the list words-from-the-big-lebowski
I tear up at the scattering of Donny's ashes.
December 16, 2011
yarb commented on the word Never let a time traveler have his picture taken with you if you don't know why he's smiling.
I bet the older gentleman was Mark Twain.
edit: or Jean-Luc Picard.
December 16, 2011
yarb commented on the word reverse boustrophedon
Duly tagged.
December 16, 2011
yarb commented on the list words-with-uu--1
Now I know how the Luddites felt. I mean it's neat that you can just list a link to a Wordnik search string and Bob's your uncle, but I mourn the loss of human agency. I lament the passing of the human touch in list-making. The days when an actual flesh-and-blood person had to go to Onelook and create their own search string, then type each word into the list. Or at least write a program to do all this.
December 15, 2011
yarb commented on the word pi-stachio
Ha ha! *tries vainly to think of more Greek letters that could come before "-stachio"*
December 15, 2011
yarb commented on the word mazzafegati
Time for a list of sausages, I think. God I love sausages.
December 15, 2011
yarb commented on the word slinzega
This stuff sounds delicious.
December 15, 2011
yarb commented on the list 50-k-for-50k
Kongratulations.
December 15, 2011
yarb commented on the word zany
That sentence is equally true when preceded by the words "Calling your opponent..."
December 15, 2011
yarb commented on the word union
Surely that would be ioff?
December 9, 2011
yarb commented on the word union
Not an onion.
December 9, 2011
yarb commented on the word articulatio genus
We are the knights who say "articulatio genus".
December 9, 2011
yarb commented on the word Wordnik dreams
The theme of the dream is that Ruzuzu has announced that she will be leaving the site, not immediately, but soon - her last day will be in a couple of weeks. Wordie (I'm pretty sure it was -ie, not -nik) is a physical space, roughly mapped onto the hillside neighbourhood where I live. Ruzuzu's "house" / presence on Wordie is at the top of the hill. I make my way by bike through slush and gloom to attend her farewell party.
Ruzuzu's space is a smallish bungalow, decorated haphazardly but not without discernment. Everyone is there, milling around with drinks, even long-gone names like Kewpid and Colleen. The atmosphere is cordial, bordering on fun, but with overtones of a wake. Chained_Bear has a baby with her which is passed around merrily. It says "poop!" while Bilby changes its diaper.
Ruzuzu has made a long list of content for us to create on Wordie after she has gone. One example is 'a page to commemorate Charles Sanders Peirce's upbraiding of Mark Twain at a congressional hearing for his improper pronunciation of deliquesce' (except in the dream, a full-page account of the event is given). I read the list and wonder how she can expect us to create all of this, then realise it doesn't matter because she has already created it in the form of the list.
But I am desperately sad that Ruzuzu is leaving. I implore her to stay, but to no end; things are intractably thus (that's what she says, quoting my favourite poet). Finding myself alone, I break down and sob desolately; I feel completely abandoned. Ruzuzu comes over and consoles me by saying that I can take one item from her house to remember her by. I look around and see nothing that could compensate for the loss of her. Bilby chooses a translucent, ruby-red desktop calculator, shot through with veins of amber. Later, I am persuaded to take a tripodal "postcard-holder" - three spindly wire legs with a crocodile clip at the top for clamping a postcard - on condition that she sends me a postcard from wherever she is bound.
December 8, 2011
yarb commented on the word Wordnik dreams
Is there a list or a place somewhere for discussion of Wordie/nik-related dreams? I had a zinger last night.
December 8, 2011
yarb commented on the word wears
You should probably check another 1,000 examples, just to be sure.
December 7, 2011
yarb commented on the word mumchance
"There had been school days like this when teachers sent questions thudding on some dream. And you sat mumchance."
- J.P. Donleavy, Franz F
December 7, 2011
yarb commented on the word who loves this list
See who has favourited a given word or list (possibly with opt-out on profile screen).
December 6, 2011
yarb commented on the word multiple-checkboxes to add-move-delete words in one go
I.e. from a given list, I want to take these particular dozen words, and move, or copy, them, to another list. I just tick those which apply and hit "move" (or "copy"), then chose the target list. You could allow copying from other people's lists, too. The same for multiple deletions.
December 6, 2011
yarb commented on the user Reader
Ouch, a stinging critique.
December 6, 2011
yarb commented on the word mouthfeel
Very interesting comment, especially that last sentence. You're dead right that the crunchiness of toast - including the sound of the crunch - is an integral part of the experience of eating it. The same applies to the crunching, cracking sound of biting into an apple. This is amplified when you listen to a horse, with its outsized chompers, eating an apple - the whole thing pretty much explodes at once.
November 30, 2011
yarb commented on the word Longwangmiao
*snigger*
November 30, 2011
yarb commented on the word almost almost almost Solveig
See new new interface.
November 30, 2011
yarb commented on the word new new interface
It's almost almost almost Solveig.
November 30, 2011
yarb commented on the word avuncular
Neither vuncular nor its opposite. That to which the concept of vuncularity does not apply.
November 29, 2011
yarb commented on the word hatekillpuke
Ha ha!
November 28, 2011
yarb commented on the word Auld Reekie
Edinburgh.
November 26, 2011
yarb commented on the word dander
"A few white mammal-bellied clouds dandered like plutocrats across the blue floor of the sky, and the reeky old city and many sorts of town and village and farmland were below me, and bleak hills edging the borders behind me, and the blue mountains edging the highlands in front, and the firth between them widening with islands and ships to the sea."
- Looking down on Auld Reekie, in 1982, Janine by Alasdair Gray
November 26, 2011
yarb commented on the word thole
"...those Stalinist crimes imputed to you by your most ardent admirers and which the intelligently decent have NEVER been able to thole."
- Alasdair gray, 1982, Janine.
November 26, 2011
yarb commented on the word galvanic
... or nostalgic for the era of galvanism.
November 20, 2011
yarb commented on the word lahal
Traditionally played by adults? What? So traditionally, adults play this game but kids don't? But right now it's different? Whaddaya mean by "traditionally" here?
November 20, 2011
yarb commented on the word semicolon
"They are transvestite hermaphrodites representing absolutely nothing."
- surely this is a reason to use semicolons?
November 18, 2011
yarb commented on the word jealous
Jealousy can have that meaning, but I think it's most often used synonymously with envy. But it's a nice distinction.
I'm a fan of the word envy. It's all scrunched-up and spiteful-sounding.
November 18, 2011
yarb commented on the word faluns
They banned it, but it still hasn't falun out of fashion.
November 16, 2011
yarb commented on the word faluns
In China, their serving is announced by the faluns-gong.
November 16, 2011
yarb commented on the word abscond
I think that must be a Wordie Pro feature, my friend.
November 14, 2011
yarb commented on the word Penny in Italy
Thanks sionnach. Panel and poem both very much in the spirit of Alf.
November 11, 2011
yarb commented on the word shoofly pie
Shoofly? Don't bother me.
November 11, 2011
yarb commented on the word Penny in Italy
Sounds exactly like "A Room with a View".
Give me the Bash Street Kids any day. Or Alf Tupper, Tough of the Track.
November 10, 2011
yarb commented on the word If Ruzuzu is infinitely powerful, can she also be infinitely good
*commences bacchanalia*
November 10, 2011
yarb commented on the word Londons under siege
Pedantry aside, I believe Wee Willie Winkie and Wynken are in fact the same individual. In his nonage he was given to running through the town, and this incipient wanderlust found an adult outlet in the storied fishing expedition with Blynken and Nod.
November 10, 2011
yarb commented on the word Londons under siege
Did you mean Wynken, Blynken, and Nod?
November 10, 2011
yarb commented on the word If Ruzuzu is infinitely powerful, can she also be infinitely good
*press*
November 10, 2011
yarb commented on the word If Ruzuzu is infinitely powerful, can she also be infinitely good
*press*
November 10, 2011
yarb commented on the word Londons under siege
He's the poet who guided Dante through the undervorld.
November 10, 2011
yarb commented on the word If Ruzuzu is infinitely powerful, can she also be infinitely good
Oh look! A tasty food pellet.
November 10, 2011
yarb commented on the word If Ruzuzu is infinitely powerful, can she also be infinitely good
*presses*
November 10, 2011
yarb commented on the word pot belge
A crude mix of uppers and downers (amphetamines, opiates, caffeine etc) formerly used by professional cyclists as a performance enhancer. Fell out of use with the introduction of basic drug testing.
November 8, 2011
yarb commented on the word chain
It is evident!
November 8, 2011
yarb commented on the word Kelvin-Helmholtz instability
Lord Kelvin and Hermann von Helmholtz: one person, or two?
November 8, 2011
yarb commented on the word strapline
I did.
November 8, 2011
yarb commented on the word path
Bleurgh.
November 8, 2011
yarb commented on the word tsunamis
I suppose I've had the odd tooth-loss dream, but no, they're no fun; evidently I'm as anxious about potential penury as the rest of us.
HH, I think an evening of old-time fiddle and banjo music in Indiana is an excellent idea for the inaugural global Wordie con.
November 8, 2011
yarb commented on the word tsunamis
Mine seem to be about relief and oblivion... I usually wake up feeling relaxed.
November 7, 2011
yarb commented on the word tsunamis
I have a lot of tsunami dreams, perhaps because of my obsessive earthquake monitoring via the USGS global alert feed.
November 7, 2011
yarb commented on the word we possess very few authentic details about a people whose written annals were burnt by the ignorant "conquistadores"
My condolences on your dire rear.
November 3, 2011
yarb commented on the word we possess very few authentic details about a people whose written annals were burnt by the ignorant "conquistadores"
Note to file: swaddling has never been my objective. Sionnach's calumniations lack objectivity. This page is an object lesson in objectionableness.
November 3, 2011
yarb commented on the word we possess very few authentic details about a people whose written annals were burnt by the ignorant "conquistadores"
Sionnach, I hereby appoint you as the object of my derision.
November 3, 2011
yarb commented on the word we possess very few authentic details about a people whose written annals were burnt by the ignorant "conquistadores"
I find that epithet objectionable, but have no objection to it.
November 3, 2011
yarb commented on the word someone
Just who does he think he is?
November 3, 2011
yarb commented on the word we possess very few authentic details about a people whose written annals were burnt by the ignorant "conquistadores"
Yes, and I also object to people on the internet who object to my objections, but not to the objections themselves.
November 3, 2011
yarb commented on the word tongueworm
I'd prefer a tongue, in my earworm.
November 3, 2011
yarb commented on the word we possess very few authentic details about a people whose written annals were burnt by the ignorant "conquistadores"
What the Bamiyan Buddhas made me realise is, I don't really object to blowing up statues, but I do very much object to the kind of people who want to blow them up.
November 3, 2011
yarb commented on the word hagiolatry
I worship St. Gertrude of Nivelles, patron saint of mice, so it is a word after all.
November 2, 2011
yarb commented on the word hectopron
I think you'll need a bigger unit to measure what was lost during the gong-show of a transition to this new interface.
November 2, 2011
yarb commented on the word pyewipe
It's a game.
October 31, 2011
yarb commented on the word narb
And of course, "Yarb" is a dog in Gogol's "Dead Souls". Like most dogs, Yarb is four-footed.
October 31, 2011
yarb commented on the word bunburying
Name them.
October 29, 2011
yarb commented on the word Bunburying
Me too. Listing Capitalized words seems somehow wrong... undemocratic.
What the hell. Crypto-fascist!
October 29, 2011
yarb commented on the word roomate
Breakfast of champignons!
October 29, 2011
yarb commented on the word comments
Great idea, hh! I'm surprised nobody thought of that before.
October 27, 2011
yarb commented on the word superstrong
Also, 3rd person singular of the verb 'to supertrong'. 'Ghibbs habitually superstrong the system'.
October 25, 2011
yarb commented on the word clownery
Ophelia pain, ruzuzu.
October 25, 2011
yarb commented on the word Animal Spirits are the Invisible Hand.
Ha ha! The funny thing is, it sort of works with both "ate" and "are" (but I'm no economist).
October 25, 2011
yarb commented on the word botox
Wordplayer: so why are there no square drums?
October 22, 2011
yarb commented on the word unslinging
If a gunslinger unslings a gun,
what does an unslinger do to have fun?
Does he unholster his gun super-quickly
or does he insert it therein with a sickly
grin and a word of appeasement?
And for his easement,
what's there to bolster a
pseudo-upholsterer,
the last of his cover being blown?
October 22, 2011
yarb commented on the word Gond
A land on the margins of Middle Earth, ruled by Centaurs.
October 22, 2011
yarb commented on the word conger
The conga is a sophisticated art form!
October 21, 2011
yarb commented on the word conger
Conger is tasty. I like to eat it with congee.
October 21, 2011
yarb commented on the word my hovercraft is full of eels
I like how in the first visual, the phrases are in the order you'll need them.
October 20, 2011
yarb commented on the word jelly shoes
She doesn't look Belgian to me, in any case.
What is that thing? She looks like she's about to hurl it at a politician.
October 20, 2011
yarb commented on the word Belgian kiss
I will confess to a having a fetish for Belgians.
October 20, 2011
yarb commented on the word incent
This vile word incentses me.
October 16, 2011
yarb commented on the word ghost chile
I've been working my way through this guy's Youtube videos. They really are works of art. I love the refrain of "my tongue... back of my throat...".
For relevance, I link to the Bhut Jolokia or ghost chile, but my favourite so far is the Dorset Naga.
October 16, 2011
yarb commented on the word swishcheese
Ha ha!
October 15, 2011
yarb commented on the word lucky
You're lucky I like the taste of SPAM, dude!
October 15, 2011
yarb commented on the word unbrick
Black Cat, yeah! A frightening word.
October 15, 2011
yarb commented on the word yarb
One of my favourite books, "Holiday Tales Christmas in the Adirondacks".
- "Yis, the yarb be good fur a woman when things go crosswise, and the box'll be a great help to her many and many a night, beyend doubt."
October 12, 2011
yarb commented on the word Rolig
"'Twas rolig! And the slithey toves..."
October 12, 2011
yarb commented on the word mohr's egg
That is a sorry pun, bilby. And I laughed at it, mohr's the pity.
October 12, 2011
yarb commented on the word blueberry, pepper, eucalyptus, jerky, and menthol
I have assembled a cutup, but I'm not sure the writing gains anything. Sometimes a plain list is the best medium for poetry.
October 11, 2011
yarb commented on the word blueberry, pepper, eucalyptus, jerky, and menthol
This list is pure poetry. Magnificent ludic stuff. Actually it's something I've thought about before, but I can't improve on your selections.
October 11, 2011
yarb commented on the word barrow-coat
*lies down on railway tracks*
October 11, 2011
yarb commented on the word barrow-coat
I suppose it's so-named because it makes children easily portable by wheelbarrow.
October 11, 2011
yarb commented on the word get into itness with our gym lasses
Wednesday night Jazzercise with Duns Scotus.
October 11, 2011
yarb commented on the word get into itness with our gym lasses
Boxercise classes with Simone de Beauvoir.
October 11, 2011
yarb commented on the word assurgent
I do not recall writing those comments. Sionnach, it hasn't arrived yet! It's being shipped from the UK I think. Can't wait to get stuck into a mess of arboreal erotica.
October 11, 2011
yarb commented on the word assurgent
I also see ent - so I am going now to have intercourse with trees, I'm going into the vast forests of this province. My stride is such that in two days I will be out of Moot distance, and for those of you who don't know what that means - it was a Beta version called the "Tree". - I am surrounded by the bloody things but soon it will just be one vast plain full of escapists and associated Apple ghouls.
October 9, 2011
yarb commented on the word assurgent
I also noticed the words ass, urge and gen - and the backword us, which seem to explain everything, When the great middle-class revolt occurs, this page will be the Rosetta Stone. Or do I mean the Golden Bough? Yes, the latter. Sorry Rosetta Stone!
October 9, 2011
yarb commented on the word pseudol
See also the wildly popular pseudolist, one who engages in this old-time hobby.
October 9, 2011
yarb commented on the word dive
And then she gafe you the shofe?
October 6, 2011
yarb commented on the word sustainism
I'd rather be among Old Ones than Great Old Ones.
October 5, 2011
yarb commented on the word pseudol
To yodel pretentiously.
October 4, 2011
yarb commented on the word Google’s Favorite Wordnik Lists
Is a pseudolist one who pseudols?
October 4, 2011
yarb commented on the word 4M2-200709210919
Frightening stuff!
October 4, 2011
yarb commented on the word fessways
whelks?!
October 3, 2011
yarb commented on the word Godspeed and may life give you sausages
I believe this is a Canadian post-rock band.
October 3, 2011
yarb commented on the word iff
Interesting to see widespread use of this bit of philosophical jargon on the Twitter.
Who said Twitter was an intellectual desert?
October 1, 2011
yarb commented on the word breeze
I'll have the house-sweepings please, waiter.
October 1, 2011
yarb commented on the word oncom
As prolagus alludes, this is an oncomatopoeia.
September 29, 2011
yarb commented on the word vampire pumpkins and watermelons
Imagine being savaged by a watermelon. Bilby I'm surprised you treat the subject so lightly.
September 29, 2011
yarb commented on the word the blues
Citation on blue.
September 28, 2011
yarb commented on the word blue
"The pilot Juan Fernandez procured a deed of the isle named after him, and for some years resided there before Selkirk came. It is supposed, however, that he eventually contracted the blues upon his princely property, for after a time he returned to the main, and as report goes, became a very garrulous barber in the city of Lima."
- Melville, The Encantadas, Sketch Seventh
September 28, 2011
yarb commented on the word appanage
"So they told him he might have his pick of the Enchanted Isles, which were then, as they still remain, the nominal appanage of Peru."
- Melville, The Encantadas, Sketch Seventh
September 28, 2011
yarb commented on the word meow
You're probably right. I prefer it with the 'r' though.
September 28, 2011
yarb commented on the word meow
Were you looking for mrkgnao, sionnach?
September 28, 2011
yarb commented on the word new interface
*marginalizes bilby's discourse*
September 28, 2011
yarb commented on the word sausage fest
Waiter! There's a girl in my sausage fest!
September 28, 2011
yarb commented on the word sausage party
"So, is new-style atheism the sausage party that media coverage would suggest?"
- Why the New Atheism is a boys' club, guardian.co.uk, 26-9-11.
September 27, 2011
yarb commented on the word fig-pecker
Sure it's not a spoonerism?
September 26, 2011
yarb commented on the word penguin
I'm sure he will live Apsley ever after.
September 25, 2011
yarb commented on the word manjak
Yet more CD genius (which I'm sure every manjak of you will appreciate).
September 25, 2011
yarb commented on the word steamer
I'll have the clam, please.
September 23, 2011
yarb commented on the word beef creature
See kip.
September 22, 2011
yarb commented on the word kip
I think that young or small beef creature needs some consolatory brackets.
September 22, 2011
yarb commented on the word rhetoric
Ha ha!
September 22, 2011
yarb commented on the word cachous
You are the walrus?
September 22, 2011
yarb commented on the word manicure
Much to love in that example. Jujubes. The odd assortment of "small articles". The smokers 'cachous. The moral "ought". The non-specific "dishonest customer" (or does Punch have a specific dishonest customer in mind?) And of course the muff.
September 22, 2011
yarb commented on the word penguin
What is its name?
September 21, 2011
yarb commented on the word penguin
Perhaps Melville was looking at penguins the wrong way, i.e. horizontally.
n.b. that is a handsome, and very symmetrical, penguin.
September 21, 2011
yarb commented on the word penguin
Sometimes I think of Melville as the evil twin of Charles Sanders Peirce.
September 21, 2011
yarb commented on the word penguin
Haven't you noticed how awfully asymmetric penguins are?
September 21, 2011
yarb commented on the word gony
"Higher up now we mark the gony, or gray albatross, anomalously so called, an unsightly unpoetic bird, unlike its storied kinsman, which is the snow-white ghost of the haunted Capes of Hope and Horn."
- Melville, The Encantadas, Sketch Third
September 20, 2011
yarb commented on the word penguin
"What outlandish beings are these? Erect as men, but hardly as symmetrical, they stand all round the rock like sculptured caryatides, supporting the next range of eaves above. Their bodies are grotesquely misshapen; their bills short; their feet seemingly legless; while the members at their sides are neither fin, wing, nor arm. And truly neither fish, flesh, nor fowl is the penguin; as an edible, pertaining neither to Carnival nor Lent; without exception the most ambiguous and least lovely creature yet discovered by man. Though dabbling in all three elements, and indeed possessing some rudimental claims to all, the penguin is at home in none. On land it stumps; afloat it sculls; in the air it flops. As if ashamed of her failure, Nature keeps this ungainly child hidden away at the ends of the earth, in the Straits of Magellan, and on the abased sea-story of Rodondo."
- Melville, The Encantadas, Sketch Third
September 20, 2011
yarb commented on the word mondegreen
I think there's a name for sentence-length mondegreens like that - a French word maybe?
The big challenge is to find two such sentences which both make sense individually.
September 20, 2011
yarb commented on the word mote-mote
I've come across these buggers before - I think William Boyd mentions them in an essay on his West African nonage.
September 19, 2011
yarb commented on the word sucurujú
Great word and great quotations.
September 18, 2011
yarb commented on the word semitorque
I suppose it amounts to the same thing...
September 18, 2011
yarb commented on the word pickmaw
Sure it's not a plane?
September 18, 2011
yarb commented on the word semitorque
Do you like mushrooms?
September 18, 2011
yarb commented on the word pathogenetic Rabelaisianism
I think this pathogen is already epidemic on Wordnik. We just have to try and infect the rest of the world.
September 17, 2011
yarb commented on the word opportune mouthfeel closes in
You can't fight it!
September 17, 2011
yarb commented on the word kurunj
Just watching that scene mentally, and laughing - though not, I'm ashamed to say, out loud.
September 17, 2011
yarb commented on the word semitorque
I have a question.
September 17, 2011
yarb commented on the word loo
Dan: I wonder if French "lieu" is related to Spanish "lugar", place. Seems reasonable. If so, it's great that "loo" is related to the Spanish - and presumably the Latin - for "place".
September 17, 2011
yarb commented on the word loo
You Aussies must be terrible prudes if you won't take a shower while your missus lays a cable. I'm surprised.
September 17, 2011
yarb commented on the word knapbottle
It sounds like an advertising slogan. "The bladder champion!"
September 17, 2011
yarb commented on the word minbar
Ha ha! I might have known!
Actually, it's possible your GR review was how it got on my wishlist in the first place - I can't remember how I heard of it.
September 16, 2011
yarb commented on the word minbar
Speaking of sex and trees, I recently ordered a copy of this novel. Has anyone read it?
September 16, 2011
yarb commented on the word dwarfism scheduler
The consultant will see you shortly.
September 16, 2011
yarb commented on the word black hawthorn
Thank you for being can-did.
September 16, 2011
yarb commented on the word sarcocele
I don't see what the Little Prince has to do with Johnson's ballsack.
September 16, 2011
yarb commented on the word cucumber
Johnson's always popping up where you least expect him.
September 16, 2011
yarb commented on the word sarcocele
This is worse than it sounds. I would have thought a sarcocele to be some quaint Provençal country dance.
September 16, 2011
yarb commented on the word loo
If someone said they were having their bathroom - or their loo - renovated, then I would indeed assume that the crapper was being ripped from its moorings. Very few houses have a room with a bath but no toilet in it these days, so the sense of "bathroom" as distinct from "loo" is obsolete.
Rolig, there is actually a transatlantic distinction re: "go to the bathroom". The sense of "urinate and/or defecate" is pretty much confined to North America, I think. In the UK one would say "the dog crapped in / shat in the kitchen", or in more polite language, "fouled" or "soiled" the kitchen. So I think in this case the Americans take the periphrasis a step further than the Brits do, as they do also by using the ridiculous term "restroom".
I've never heard it called "the head". Surely there is a list somewhere?
September 16, 2011
yarb commented on the word loo
My money is on the W.C.
But equally, would one call a room with no toilet a "bathroom"? In your scenario, were "loo" to be replaced with "bathroom", I bet most people would still infer that the person was going to the room with the W.C. Ergo, "bathroom" is a synonym of "loo".
The way the English language tiptoes around this subject is pretty pathetic. We require a polite, specific word for the thing itself (crapper or bog, perhaps) and also for the room (dunny, shithouse?) - words which aren't euphemisms. I'm fed up with restrooms and lavatories and washrooms and privies.
September 16, 2011
yarb commented on the word rotavate
See ya later, rotavator.
September 15, 2011
yarb commented on the word cobaltic orchards
Fantastic list, hh!
September 15, 2011
yarb commented on the word kurunj
Tall, erect and leguminous, that's me.
September 15, 2011
yarb commented on the word loo
Bilby, in my experience "loo" can refer to both the bathroom and the toilet. One can be on the loo or in the loo.
September 15, 2011
yarb commented on the word GHibbs
lol
September 15, 2011
yarb commented on the word Surtsey
Excellent!
September 15, 2011
yarb commented on the word earthle
To snuffle, scratch and sniff at the ground. Like a truffle pig.
See earthling.
September 15, 2011
yarb commented on the word ravager
The Vikings were great nourishers. Always suckling babbies, them Norsemen.
September 15, 2011
yarb commented on the word kurunj
It's a tough call, but I think I'd rather be a tree than a valid scrabble word.
September 15, 2011
yarb commented on the word mind the gap
Yes, part of the auditory landscape of London. The reason it's so well imprinted on the London psyche is not just its repetition but the intonation used in the recorded messages. "Mind... the GAP." There's a suspenseful delay before "the gap" which seems to imply that there is more to the gap than we're being told, or that the "the gap" isn't just the gap between the platform and the train, but a more terrible existential gap into which we shall all of us assuredly fall sooner or later.
September 13, 2011
yarb commented on the word nails
Are you seriously going to leave this comment on every noun which is also a verb??
September 13, 2011
yarb commented on the word Devil's Beef Tub
As a Scottish place name, this may not belong on madmouth's list, but I've had it revolving in my mind for some time now and... well, I wouldn't mind a beef tub of my own.
September 8, 2011
yarb commented on the word aquilon
Oh boy, Ruzuzu, for that you deserve a great, strouting Rabelaisian codpiece, a codpiece so big it obscures your entire person. Ruzuzu that was so much fun. You're lucky there are no Vulcans in Lincoln (at the last census, anyway) because if there were, they'd all be glomming on to you with the mind-melds.
September 8, 2011
yarb commented on the word spermatorrhoea
NSFW but high genius - The Gush, from Chris Morris's legendary Radio 1 show "Blue Jam".
September 7, 2011
yarb commented on the word jimson weed
I omitted it because I felt it was essentially the same as jimson weed. I am a bit of a fascist like that.
September 6, 2011
yarb commented on the word emerald
See mangold for verbing.
September 6, 2011
yarb commented on the word mangold
emeralding - lovely.
September 6, 2011
yarb commented on the word rusty steppe moss
I wonder if there's ever been a man called Rusty Steppe-Moss.
September 6, 2011
yarb commented on the word cow pie
For me this brings to mind neither muck nor moss, but the magnificient horned pies beloved of Desperate Dan.
September 6, 2011
yarb commented on the word succorrhea
I'd rather suck a kiwi or a moa.
September 6, 2011
yarb commented on the word new interface
Until something is done about the bile salt, nothing will ever get better.
August 17, 2011
yarb commented on the word fateful day
The surefire sign of bad writing.
August 17, 2011
yarb commented on the word hearts and minds
Horrible how this memetic modern-major-general phrase has infected everyday discourse. I heard a cop, naturally, use it on the TV news the other day, along the lines of "our thoughts are with the hearts and minds of the victims..." And today I'm reading a subpar nonfiction book (2010) about earthquakes and I get:
"China's reported success story injected a surge of scientific adrenalin into the hearts and minds of those who saw prediction as the holy grail of the new seismology."
August 17, 2011
yarb commented on the word parontogenese
You'll have to add a pronunciation so that I don't embarrass myself when I use it.
August 10, 2011
yarb commented on the word parontogenese
This is a superb word. Could it be something geometrical? Some sort of inbred dog, maybe?
August 9, 2011
yarb commented on the word purple loosestrife
Either or both. I've been seeing a ton of Giant Hogweed by the roads lately.
August 9, 2011
yarb commented on the word rattler
Term apparently still in use in the Black Country, bilby, judging from the tweet by @seanoliver86.
August 8, 2011
yarb commented on the word stenoderma
...or your loved ones shall die of lice?
August 8, 2011
yarb commented on the word stenocephaly
Narrowness of the skull is fine in moderation, but one certainly wouldn't want it to become excessive.
August 8, 2011
yarb commented on the word kitchen table
Wordnet 3.0 living up to its lineage here.
August 8, 2011
yarb commented on the word purple loosestrife
If you're knowledgeable about invasive species, biocon, I'd love to see a list of them (non-scientific names preferred).
August 8, 2011
yarb commented on the word nemophila
nemophila, nemophila, nemophila. There, I did it. *checks world still turning*
August 8, 2011
yarb commented on the word Dasani
Dasani is pure branding, its success the ultimate expression of form over substance. You could say that about any bottled water, but the meaningless name is the cherry on top.
August 8, 2011
yarb commented on the word perruquier
Especially the one from "Story-Lives of Great Musicians".
August 5, 2011
yarb commented on the word new interface
Thanks for all the recent improvements and bug-fixes.
August 5, 2011
yarb commented on the word skim-colter
Then stop wearing it.
August 5, 2011
yarb commented on the word foyle's further philavery (christopher foyle)
It is precisely by not being "of benefit to our community" that this phrase, and countless others like it, benefit our community.
August 5, 2011
yarb commented on the word The Monty Hall Problem
You should change your answer to door #3, because a goat is better than a car.
Goats have personalities, cars don't. And as dontcry notes, you can get cheese out of a goat, but I never heard of anyone getting cheese out of a car.
August 4, 2011
yarb commented on the word slaw
Same eggcorn here rolig!
July 29, 2011
yarb commented on the word Grindr
Ha ha.
July 28, 2011
yarb commented on the word retromingent
"To mark territory, hippos spin their tails while defecating to distribute their excrement over a greater area. Likely for the same reason, hippos are retromingent-- that is, they urinate backwards."
- From the Wikipedia article on the hippo.
July 28, 2011
yarb commented on the word telephone
Excellent. The first sentence in particular is like a description of some retro-futuristic variation on the ouija board - which is actually how I've always thought of the telephone.
July 28, 2011
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