Word O’ the Day

Once in a while, I come across a word – like “flânerie” or “cozen” – that is so good it becomes part of my vocabulary. My all-time favourite board game is Balderdash, where players try to guess the definition of a lesser known word. Everyone writes down what they think, and the options are read aloud along with the true meaning. The player who guesses the correct one gets a point. (The same game was known in ye olden days as “Dictionary” and played with, you guessed it, a dictionary and scrap paper.) Some meanings are obvious. Others, not so much. Therein lies the fun of the game.

People are extremely creative when it comes to supposing what a word might mean. One of my favourites was my brother-in-law’s attempt at “costard”: the villainous offspring of an aunt or uncle. Or words to that effect.

Another was my older older brother’s shot at “pyrope”: a rope for lassoing runaway pies.

And incorrect though it is, I still use the word “bagge” when referring to the ground crew who handle luggage at the airport.

Each morning, I open my email to discover Merriam-Webster’s word of the day. Many of them I already know. Others go straight to the delete folder (I am at work, after all). But there are occasions when the WOTD is so intriguing that I have to know what it means.

The best one last week was “crapulous”, an adjective that sounded so applicable to my life of late that I had to pursue it. But does it mean what it sounds to mean? In the tradition of Balderdash, choose one of these three definitions:

“sick from excessive indulgence in liquor”

“requiring skimming, as in a soup or stock”

“the opposite of fabulous”

On your marks, get set … Look it up!

Wordplay

Boy Sister does double duty as my wee sister’s elf. She’s not a particularly harsh master, which means he can get a bit uppity. One day at the Wall, he acted up to the point when she finally demanded to know what was wrong with him. He shrugged and tried to look innocent.

“He’s just being obstreperous,” I said.

“What does ‘obstreperous’ mean?” she asked.

“Difficult,” I said.

She gave me a Why didn’t you just say that? look. Aloud, she muttered, “Writers.”

“Sorry ’bout that, kid.”

“It’s okay,” she said. “I just prefer words with four letters or less. It’s quicker.”

Not to mention more effective.

But it got me thinking. I tend to throw big words into a conversation, mostly to keep it interesting rather than show off, and a recent metaphor likening employee service seniority to divorced parents switching out the kids at Christmas got big laughs at a staff meeting. “I vote for ‘the divorced parents’ model,” one of my more comical colleagues remarked to me the next day. (I’m lucky she thinks I’m hilarious, as she gives me good reviews when new people join the office.)

I don’t restrict myself to conversations in company, either. The title of a favourite CD gave me something to think about while I was waking up one morning. It’s called “Nightbound” (an instrumental collection by David Lindsay now in heavy rotation), and while the train tracks on the cover photo suggest a traveller heading toward night, it occurred to me that the word “nightbound” could also mean one being tied to – or bound by – the night. Or shade or shadow or the Dark Side, or any of the other synonyms for “not day”.

Which gives me an idea for a story ...

I know, I know ... Writers.

Spelchek

My command of the English language is pretty good for someone who didn’t attend college or university. It might even surpass that of someone who did attend college or university—based on what I’ve seen in writing from folks who have important-looking letters trailing after their names, I feel fairly confident in saying this.

My favourite comedian, the late David Brenner, claimed to be a notoriously bad speller. On being caught in a written mistake, he asked his grade school teacher how the word was correctly spelled. She said, “Look it up.” He replied, “How can I look it up if I don’t know how it’s spelled?”

Bwahahahahahahahahaha!

I spell better by hand than I do when typing. Most of my errors are committed by typo—and some of them have been beauties. Drop the “l” in “public”, for example, and you get enough shaming to be extra-diligent for the rest of your life, especially in a professional environment.

Then there’s the “US vs UK” dilemma that has resulted in my turning off the spell checker in every computer I’ve ever used. It’s hardly an act of dare-devilment, either. I know people who run the program and still make mistakes.

My eagle-eyed mother caught a spelling gaffe in a very recent post. I’ve fixed it, so if you missed it the first time, don’t go looking now. But I fear for the future of proper English as a written language. Hypocrite that I am, for I use modern spelling compared to that employed by Samuel Pepys, and his spelling would have been atrocious compared to Shakespeare’s, I cleave to the spelling I learned in elementary school. If I’m dating myself by spelling “colour” instead of “color” or “all right” instead of “alright”, then sow bee it.