Well Afterworders what was the last word you ‘looked up’.
For me, it was’ languorous’.
Lingo init!
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Musings on the byways of popular culture
Musings on the byways of popular culture
Well Afterworders what was the last word you ‘looked up’.
For me, it was’ languorous’.
You must be logged in to post a comment.
‘Fiduciary’, to make sure I was using it correctly, and not just as a fancy way of saying ‘financial’.
Acting
I challenge anyone to spell bureaucracy correctly without looking it up. Can’t be done.
unless you have a spell-checker
Not a word but the correct spelling for TV’s Fred Dinenage.
How
HOW!
I looked up “soignee” having seen it used in thread about Spiral … perhaps a thread on the AW, I can’t remember.
I never was very good at French, but I do like Spiral.
verisimilitude – the appearance of being true or real
Not had a chance yet to lever it into conversation
Lachrymose, after Chris Morris used it on the Adam Buxton podcast.
Bellicose, because it always makes me think of that word after hearing the word lachrymose. And because, until now, it is a word I have used without really knowing the meaning of it.
Materiality, to see if it was a real word and not just artspeak bollocks, which my life happens to be rather full of at the moment. To my irritation, it is.
Ped (‘a natural soil aggregate’). And before that, admonishment (or rather whether admonishment is a proper word – it is, apparently, and not the same as admonition).
Lissom for me. I read it in a theatre review, where the actress was described as ‘the lissom leading lady’. It’s ‘(of a person or their body) thin, supple and graceful.’ So the exact opposite of me, then.
None recently, but if I did I would go to http://www.oed.com and logon using my library card.* I still find it astonishing that one can do this.
*I don’t work in a library but I love our language.
Just had a look. Thanks MC, that might nudge me back to my local library. I’m reminded that I used to be a fairly regular visitor until the internet and Kindle took over.
Neurodiversity.
Another recent one, ‘biodynamic’. On Franco Manca’s placemats they describe all of their wines as ‘organic or biodynamic’.
According to biodynamics.com ‘Biodynamics is a holistic, ecological, and ethical approach to farming, gardening, food, and nutrition’, which sounds all very nice but didn’t leave me much the wiser.
Agistment. A friend on Instagram is the horsey type
Vainglory.
This morning, just after I got up.
“Vainglorious” was in my head as a remnant from whatever I had been dreaming and I wondered if vainglory was actually a word in it’s own right (it is) and what it meant.
When you looked it up did you find a picture of Boris Johnson?
Not an illustrated OED, fortunately. His phizzog did come to mind as I read the definition. I shuddered and closed the book quickly.
Here is a list of allegedly obscure words used by Bercow during his time as Speaker – and (allegedly again) by none of his predecessors. Anybody feel the need to look any of them up? Anybody who doesn’t know what ‘chuntering’ means doesn’t belong in the Massive, I would venture. https://twitter.com/maximcolch/status/1189923022360186880?s=21
I’ve started to use chuntering myself in the last couple of years, and it hadn’t occurred to me that I might have picked it up from Bercow.
You didn’t. We’ve been chuntering since the C16, apparently.
Yes I saw that and I think it’s made-up bollocks. .
Not so much made-up as assembled by people with small vocabularies.
I don’t mind admitting to looking up ‘Chuntering’. Yes Mikethep I’m with you and safely back in The Massive.
I heard Dick Clement and Ian La Frenais on a radio chat show a couple of weeks ago, and one of the other guests mentioned scrumping for some reason. Neither of them knew what the word meant. I’ve never heard anyone say it in real life, but it seemed to be commonplace in children’s jolly adventure books like the Famous Five when I was growing up. I was surprised that two men, born in the thirties, from the North East and South East of England, had never come across it.
Heard of scrumping? I used to do it, quite regularly when I was but a lad.
There were several good orchards within walking/cycling distance of where I lived. Even a cherry orchard not far away. All with easily-climbable fences.