Words, words, words

Liam1965 · Post by **Liam1965** » Tue May 03, 2005 11:25 am

LDuyer wrote:Can you think of a Gordian knot or two you could cut in your own life, at work or at home? This week we look at that and other allusions and metaphors.

I'm glad you got to this example, because I was going to say, the word Gordian is most often used with regard to the "Gordian Knot" or thorny, difficult to unravel, problem.

But you got it, so now I'm just posting this in a vain attempt to keep slightly ahead of you in post count.

Liam, falling back into the pack.

LDuyer · Post by **LDuyer** » Tue May 03, 2005 11:46 am

Liam1965 wrote: But you got it, so now I'm just posting this in a vain attempt to keep slightly ahead of you in post count.

Liam, falling back into the pack.

Haha!
Liam, why do you think I keep this topic going anyway? It's so I have another means of TRYING to catch up to you. I suspect it will never happen.

Linda,
who is tripping over herself trying to out run Liam. Luckily for Liam, I've got bad knees and ankles.

Liam1965 · Post by **Liam1965** » Tue May 03, 2005 1:25 pm

You're only 12 behind. (Well, 13, now), and you've been WAY more active than I of late.

It'll happen. I predict within a week.

Liam, slowing down with age.

LDuyer · Post by **LDuyer** » Wed May 04, 2005 2:27 am

I've never heard this one either. Is it supposed to be capitalized?

A.Word.A.Day--

mammon
(MAM-uhn) noun

1. Wealth; money.

2. The personification of wealth and of inordinate desire for it; the material wealth considered having an evil influence.

[From Middle English, from Late Latin mammona, from Greek mammonas, from Aramaic mamona (riches). Mammon was personified as a false god in the New Testament.]

"Ironically, [David] Denby has just been talking about the virtues of savouring time and the 'slower gracious life' he writes about at the end of American Sucker, his memoir about the two years in which he surrendered his soul and sanity to the Mammon of the dotcom-delirious Nasdaq stock market." Guy Somerset; Going for Broke; Dominion Post (Wellington, New Zealand); Mar 12, 2005.

LDuyer · Post by **LDuyer** » Wed May 04, 2005 3:26 pm

Gosh, mess up on the spelling of a frequently-used word, and LOOK what you get!
A.Word.A.Day--

quean

(kween) noun

1. A woman regarded as being disreputable, especially a prostitute.

2. Scots. A young woman.

[Middle English quene, from Old English cwene, woman.]

"A witch, a quean, an old cozening quean! Have I not forbid her my house?"
Shakespeare, William, The Merry Wives of Windsor: Act IV, Scene II.

theme: Words with slightly different spellings from some everyday
words.

LDuyer · Post by **LDuyer** » Wed May 04, 2005 3:33 pm

...an "orgiastic religion"? "Dionysiac naughtiness"?
Liam, have you ever exhibited Dionsyiac naugtiness?

A.Word.A.Day--

Dionysiac
(die-uh-NIS-ee-ak) adjective

1. Of or relating to Dionysus, the god of wine and of an orgiastic
religion celebrating the power and fertility of nature.
Of or relating to Dionysia, ancient Greek festivals held seasonally,
chiefly at Athens, in honor of Dionysus.

2. Often dionysiac. Ecstatic or wild; Dionysian.

[Latin Dionysiacus, from Greek Dionusiakos, from Dionusios.]

"Its `heady cocktail of flippancy, camp sensibility and Dionysiac
naughtiness' are among the attributes New York critic Clive Barnes
admired in a recent Broadway production of Noel Coward's `Private Lives.'"
Nadine Goff, Rep's `Private Lives' to Unfold, Wisconsin State Journal,
5 Jan 1995.

LDuyer · Post by **LDuyer** » Wed May 04, 2005 3:37 pm

Anyone here named "Fletcher"? ....

A.Word.A.Day--

fletcher

fletch.er n [ME fleccher, fr. OF flechier, fr. fleche arrow -- more at fleche
: 14th c. : a maker of arrows

theme: professions of yesterday that now exist mostly as surnames.

LDuyer · Post by **LDuyer** » Wed May 04, 2005 3:44 pm

tongue-twisters:

How many boards
Could the Mongols hoard
If the Mongol hoards got bored?

from the comic Calvin & Hobbes, by Bill Waterson

..............................................................

Anyone named Fisher?

There was a fisherman named Fisher
who fished for some fish in a fissure.
Till a fish with a grin,
pulled the fisherman in.
Now they're fishing the fissure for Fisher.

LDuyer · Post by **LDuyer** » Wed May 04, 2005 3:55 pm

more tongue-twisters:

I'd be careful saying this one, if I were you....

I'm not the fig plucker,
Nor the fig plucker's son,
but I'll pluck your figs
till the fig plucker comes.

LDuyer · Post by **LDuyer** » Wed May 04, 2005 4:01 pm

Here's another.....

I bought a bit of baking powder and baked a batch of biscuits. I brought a big basket of biscuits back to the bakery and baked a basket of big biscuits. Then I took the big basket of biscuits and the basket of big biscuits and mixed the big biscuits with the basket of biscuits that was next to the big basket and put a bunch of biscuits from the basket into a biscuit mixer and brought the basket of biscuits and the box of mixed biscuits and the biscuit mixer to the bakery and opened a tin of sardines.

Said to be a diction test for would-be radio announcers: To be read clearly, without mistakes, in less than 20 seconds (from Coronet Magazine, August 1948).

BuffaloAl · Post by **BuffaloAl** » Wed May 04, 2005 6:01 pm

One of my favorites is by Ogden Nash

A Tutor who tooted the flute
Tried to tutor two tooters to toot
Said the two to the tutor
" Is it better to toot or
To tutor two tooters to toot?"

And found on the menu at TGI Fridays

A noisy noise annoys an oyster

say it out loud

LDuyer · Post by **LDuyer** » Wed May 04, 2005 6:11 pm

Those are cool, BuffaloAl.
Loved them.

So tell me, who is shown in that photo avatar of yours?
....Inquiring minds.......

Linda,
who is plenty nosy

glassgal · Post by **glassgal** » Wed May 04, 2005 7:36 pm

My grandfather taught me this:

Theophilius Thistle, the wonderful thistle sifter,
while sifting a sieve full of unsifted thistles,
ran three thousand thistles through the thick of his thumb!

LDuyer · Post by **LDuyer** » Wed May 04, 2005 7:39 pm

Goodness glassgal,

That sure is hard to say. And even when you get it right, it sounds like lisping. Ha!

Thanks!

Linda,
lisping....

BuffaloAl · Post by **BuffaloAl** » Thu May 05, 2005 3:34 pm

Those would be my two photogenic children, taken last summer at Buttermilk Falls in Ithaca NY. Even if you have reason at all to go to Ithaca, you should go there anyway. Ithaca is, as they say "gorges"

Machine	Mask

Machine	Mask

Words, words, words

Old tongue twister