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“What a Dunderhead!”
Words should be allowed to come out and play.
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Do It with Aplomb
I love the way this word rolls off my tongue.
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Plaudits
plaudit noun. plau·dit \ ˈplȯ-dət \ 1 : an act or round of applause 2 : enthusiastic approval —usually used in plural received the plaudits of the critics Plaudit is one of my favorite words. I wish it were used more often. I love the sound of it, but I especially love the sentiment behind…
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Whelmed
Two of my pet peeves are the words “irregardless” and “orientate”. Why people don’t find the words “regardless” and “orient” sufficient is beyond me. Irregardless wasn’t even considered an official word until quite recently. Then, to my dismay, it slowly started creeping into dictionaries one by one. (Probably because the keepers of dictionaries were getting…
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I Want “Hension”
There’s apprehension, there’s comprehension, there’s even prehension. All of these words relate to a form of understanding, of “getting it”. (And perhaps, in the case of apprehension, being worried about it because you get it.) It occurs to me (I really do have too much time on my hands) that this state of enlightenment is…
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On Being a Hot Mess
A Canadian friend of mine (waving hello to Sim) was telling me of his various health issues, and I replied, “You’re a hot mess!” Every once in a while my Southern comes out of my mouth. I can’t help it. He had never heard the phrase before, and had to look it up. (Which charmed…
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Figments and Smithereens
As a writer I spend a lot of time thinking about words. I pride myself on having a fairly large vocabulary. But some words, even I have to admit, have limited use. Take figment, for example. Have you ever heard this word used in any other context than as a figment of your imagination? If…