milosrdenstvi has adopted no words, looked up 0 words, created 37 lists, listed 2004 words, written 1250 comments, added 0 tags, and loved 1 word.

Comments by milosrdenstvi

  • My delight with this word and eagerness to use it in conversations is sometimes tempered by a sudden and irrational fear that I've forgotten what it means and won't be using it correctly.

    November 11, 2010

  • Wonders: is there still a "list of most listed words"?

    November 11, 2010

  • I believe this word ought not to be pronounced as homonym to shown. My preferred rendering, with shorter o, has been recorded. (This notion has been influenced by certain Irishmen.)

    November 11, 2010

  • And robberse!

    November 11, 2010

  • A jovial chap, drinking icewater,

    Once remarked while regarding a flyswatter,

    "Though a marvelous means

    To smash up insect spleens

    It's terribly bad as a rice-wadder."

    November 10, 2010

  • Even though I already loved this word, its being dialectical rather than slang somehow legitimizes it to me.

    November 9, 2010

  • In the beginning was the Word.

    Superfetation of τὸ ἔν,

    And at the mensual turn of time

    Produced enervate Origen.

    T. S. Eliot

    November 9, 2010

  • "I have even read that various persons have found themselves under toxological symptoms, and, as it were, thunderstricken by black-pudding that had been subjected to a too vehement fumigation. At least, this was stated in a very fine report drawn up by one of our pharmaceutical chiefs, one of our masters, the illustrious Cadet de Gassicourt!"

    Flaubert, Madame Bovary, III.viii

    November 9, 2010

  • A favorite nonce of mine, intended to stand in for synonyms which do not come to mind.

    November 9, 2010

  • Picked up this marvellous euphemism from Ambrose Bierce.

    November 9, 2010

  • "Because lips libertine and venal had murmured such words to him, he believed but little the candor of hers; he thought that exaggerated speeches hiding mediocre affections must be discounted; -- as if the fulness of the soul did not sometimes overflow in the emptiest metaphors, since no one can ever give the exact measure of his needs, nor of his conceptions, nor of his sorrows; and since human speech is like a cracked tin kettle, on which we hammer out tunes to make bears dance when we long to move the stars."

    Flaubert, Madame Bovary, II.xii

    November 9, 2010

  • I'd be fascinated to see what that's translated from.

    November 7, 2010

  • This collection seems a little dubious but is nevertheless rather cute and even somewhat impressive.

    www.savethewords.com

    November 5, 2010

  • indolent and laconic added by request of someone at the NaNoWriMo site.

    I'm debating whether I allow myself to change adjectives to adverbs or not. I can handle it either way, really.

    November 4, 2010

  • You know, the terrestrial and the sylvestrial.

    November 4, 2010

  • This sentence brought to you by the letter E:

    "Ever believed that there was some elementarily educable essence in everyone."

    (Ever is a proper noun, and the name of who appears to be my main character.)

    Also added two of my own, one from an almost definite mishearing of celestial.

    November 4, 2010

  • Still talking about the plinth:

    "Sneakers more often than bare feet would scale the graven faces of the stone, to dislodge and return a frisbee to its duties of making the young merry, or sometimes even in mere adventurousness to conquer, as it were, whatever titan of self-abnegation a disturbance in the normality of one’s environment threatened, and from there to observe the grand and heady vistas conferred by being spatially five feet above the common ruck."

    November 4, 2010

  • *stirs the Hottentottenottenpot*

    November 4, 2010

  • Again, would take the form of moustachio. I do love the word mustache - it just becomes magnificently cooler with the o.

    November 4, 2010

  • If I manage to work it in, it will be in the form handlebar moustache.

    November 4, 2010

  • "But the plinth, I was mentioning the plinth – the famous Plinth of Walburg, pointed out to every stranger as the town’s monument to & remembrance of the brave veterans and soldiers of Walburg who gave their lives, etc. If it had contained three dozen fossilized cats, or memorialized the invention of the bowling pin, it would have been pointed out just the same and probably with a deal more fervor and interest. "

    November 4, 2010

  • After some writing today, I think I'm about to make the plinth into a major plot point.

    November 4, 2010

  • I'll do what I can :)

    November 3, 2010

  • FB -- how about as verb?

    November 2, 2010

  • Is there a good word for flowing slowly that isn't as earthy as ooze?

    November 2, 2010

  • I absolutely abominate this word when used in the sense of "inquire into or learn about". Such a pretentious metaphor!

    November 2, 2010

  • Apparently I've not only looked this one up before but also listed it. Apparently eleven months ago was the last time I looked at the ending of the Faerie Queene.

    October 28, 2010

  • Were you looking for chop chop train?

    October 27, 2010

  • I use this word as distinguished from phlegmatic, to refer to a physical rather than emotional state (i.e. to be replete with phlegm, as opposed to being staid and calm).

    October 26, 2010

  • Observed in the lead article of this week's Time Magazine. Even though there's hardly any stigma of vulgarity in such an adjective, still a little surprising to me at least.

    October 26, 2010

  • Next, when I cast mine eyes and see

    That brave vibration each way free

    O how that glittering taketh me!

    October 26, 2010

  • Usually translated "virtue", pronounced with three syllables.

    October 25, 2010

  • In Greek grammar, the phenomenon of the appearance or disappearance of the letter ν at the end of some verb forms dependent upon whether the subsequent word begins or not with a vowel.

    October 23, 2010

  • He uses it roughly in the same context one might use shirty. Like I said, it doesn't make terrible sense, but it enjoys a certain undefinable in me.

    October 23, 2010

  • A friend of mine has a wonderful phrase "No need to get previous about this." I have no idea where he gets it from, but it is a delightful usage.

    October 23, 2010

  • I think perhaps the idea of popularity is misleading. For example, The Anatomy of Melancholy is hardly read by anyone who is not a devotee of Elizabethan literature, but neither is it disliked in the sense that the word "unpopular" might convey. It's just very rarely heard of outside of a given academic or historical field. I would call it "classic" for much the same reasons that I would call Shakespeare's near-contemporary but much more "popular" sonnets "classic": it is renowned in its genre as a superlative work of its time, not that it is a widely read book today that happened to be written long ago. Thus we can also have science fiction classics from less than fifty years ago, as for example A Canticle for Leibowitz.

    October 22, 2010

  • NO, LUDDITE.

    October 22, 2010

  • And then I'll rise and fight again.

    October 21, 2010

  • Somehow this word portrays the yearning depth of its definition far better than its synonyms.

    October 21, 2010

  • But we went back to the Abbey, and sat on,

    So much the gathering darkness charmed: we sat

    But spoke not, rapt in nameless reverie,

    Perchance upon the future man: the walls

    Blackened about us, bats wheeled, and owls whooped,

    And gradually the powers of the night,

    That range above the region of the wind,

    Deepening the courts of twilight broke them up

    Through all the silent spaces of the worlds,

    Beyond all thought into the Heaven of Heavens.

    Tennyson, The Princess

    October 20, 2010

  • Don't forget ecsetera.

    October 19, 2010

  • I think it may have started out as "bowless, stringless" and devolved from there.

    October 15, 2010

  • A few friends of mine and I once toyed with starting a band by this name (also considered: Mendelssohn and the Yellow Peas). It would include players upon the boneless, skinless violin, the glockenspiel d'amore, the underwater tuba, and the golden ratio. We never did come up with album names, but we decided the compilation would certainly be called The Wurst of Mendel's Peas.

    October 15, 2010

  • Am I missing something, or do lists no longer tell us how many words there are in them?

    October 15, 2010

  • Today I was suddenly struck with the fear that I may have sometime in the past misspelt this word sans e.

    October 14, 2010

  • I pop in and provide a detailed etymology of all words involved, deriving each one from Greek, of course.

    October 12, 2010

  • The "recent pronunciations" at this moment reads "heart-wrenching sexual reproduction. What a capital euphemism!

    October 12, 2010

  • I've more commonly heard "the thick plottens".

    October 4, 2010

  • I experienced it as referring to both.

    October 2, 2010

  • In Peru, the word is completely different -- palta.

    October 2, 2010

  • I was your agelast June, I think.

    October 1, 2010

  • That is kind of awesome.

    September 30, 2010

  • Somebody mentioned this word in conversation today and I spent 25 minutes at my wits' end trying to spell it to myself. I think this is my problem:

    catechism

    catechumen

    catechesis

    Why on earth are the vowels different?

    September 30, 2010

  • Yay! I was just wondering today my dating-to-high-school question of whether a g in monger is hard or soft (it's hard, apparently). Etymologies, anyone?

    September 30, 2010

  • bounder.

    September 29, 2010

  • Comes in handy sometimes.

    September 24, 2010

  • AH THE LIST NAME HAS AN APOSTROPHE TOO MANY

    September 15, 2010

  • Excellent words & etymologies! Hope to see more of these.

    September 14, 2010

  • I think there is an extant word for someone who is overly excited about the future or technological achievement. Can anyone think of one or make one up whose intent is clearly realised?

    September 14, 2010

  • Any examples that don't survive in modern English?

    August 27, 2010

  • "One who bothers God" seems a simpler and more natural definition than "one who bothers by means of God". Also, the second definition has excellent synonyms in the form of fanatic or fundamentalist, while the first seems a very clever way to say in one word what we do not have the English capacity for otherwise.

    August 27, 2010

  • As in a cuck in the liver.

    August 26, 2010

  • "Telofies" sounds like some unfortunate brand of tissue paper!

    August 26, 2010

  • I was reading Sir Gawain and the Green Knight the other day and was really delighted to run across the word yye-lyddes.

    August 22, 2010

  • There's been a decent amount of Italian influence in that part of South America (more in Argentina and Chile, though) -- at any rate, I wouldn't at all be surprised.

    *listens for echo* ......egg pasta......egg pasta.......

    *EDIT*: and lo and behold, Wiktionary proclaims:

    "...from Italian tagliarini."

    August 22, 2010

  • I thought that was a pluteus!

    August 22, 2010

  • Neither it nor octopi. Even rhinoceros has been effectively Anglicized by the softening of the c. I find the occasional use of octopodes rather merry and diverting, but platypodes suffers vocalically, in my opinion, because the upsilon has become a short i in the form of y, and thus the archaical forms simply don't flow.

    For some reason, though, English has never seriously adopted Greek plurals for any of its words (that I can think of, at any rate), and thus I would approach any claimed English plurals based on Greek rules in the spirit of anything other that classicism or cheerful play with the tendency to cast aspersions.

    August 22, 2010

  • In fact, I had a non-Cavendish banana, something called "island banana" which was diamond shaped, pink, and rather sweet.

    August 21, 2010

  • Had he been Greek and ancient (to the best of my knowledge) he would have pronounced /ˈkokyges/ for κόκκυγες. Sheldon's pronunciation is typical of loose British-classicist transliterations up to the beginning of the 20th century, which would normalize Greek words into Latin and then normalize the Latin into English, thus giving us soft g's for hard, soft and hard c's for k's, and vowel lengthening. Most words introduced in this way are by now bona fide English words, and are better treated as such than as Greek words. But if they are to be thought of as Greek, they ought (in my opinion) to be thought of so in all aspects.

    I'm afraid I'm not really referencing anything; I just needed something to compare inconsistent pedants to, and the phrase came to my mind -- perhaps because I would hear people say "ajos y cebollas" every now and then in Peru, but I have no idea if this is an appropriate context for that.

    August 19, 2010

  • Etymologyically coccyx pluralises to coccyges, as a type-3 Greek noun (from a word cognate with "cuckoo", apparently). But if one does that, one also ought pronounce it with all c's hard. An inconsistent pedant is merely garlic and onions.

    August 19, 2010

  • Possibly the most interesting words were the ones anomalous to other Spanish. Examples: tallarin for espagueti, chompa for sueter, medias for calzinetas, chanilla for bufanda, chupete for puleta. I also found the first person plural imperfect subjunctive perfect helping verb hubiéramos highly and unintentionally comic.

    Now, somebody needs to tell me where all the good pages happened.

    August 19, 2010

  • Hilo, Hawaii

    June 22, 2010

  • Do any of us have a Mr. Falutin in our lives?

    June 21, 2010

  • Yay! What a wonderful mouthful! თვალჩრელიძე, I'd guess.

    June 20, 2010

  • I want to see a mineral named after a place in Georgia.

    June 20, 2010

  • Haven't really seen this one in a while. Is it sticking?

    June 19, 2010

  • Si ursus essem, ursus fufluns essem.

    June 19, 2010

  • and, html fail. Sorry. (Still can't edit my own comments...)

    June 19, 2010

  • Wait wait wait! I just realized, you're the same rubber as put this out. I loved that! I've been going back to it for years and feeling guilty every time!

    June 19, 2010

  • I think contemner is inferier.

    June 19, 2010

  • Read Epictetus, Marcus Aurelius, Seneca & other Stoic philosophers. Practice their teachings. All will be well.

    Is it important merely to have a boy like you, or does the character of aforementioned boy carry any importance?

    June 18, 2010

  • ...

    A serious house on serious earth it is,

    In whose blent air all our compulsions meet,

    Are recognised, and robed as destinies.

    ...

    Philip Larkin, Church Going

    June 17, 2010

  • As do I - and even my mother, who is an entomologist.

    June 17, 2010

  • Sounds about right.

    June 12, 2010

  • Well, in this case I'd say a woulda is a volition or desire to perform something, of which one is conscious before his ability to perform such, represented by a coulda (with the shoulda, of course, being obligation). The potentiality, of course, is pre-existent, but that is usually irrelevant to anyone's consideration, as it is only pre-existent in time and not in perception.

    June 11, 2010

  • In Georgia it is a ქოლგა (kolga) but the common and colloquial term is პარაშუტი (parashuti).

    June 11, 2010

  • From The Voyages of Milosrdenstvi:

    Departure: June 22

    Return: August 18

    No beautiful alphabet to bring back this time, I'm afraid, but maybe there will be some interesting words in Spanish.

    June 11, 2010

  • Or alternatively, divid*="connect_widget" -- doesn't get the tweet button, but gets the like button on the main page.

    June 11, 2010

  • For Chromers: add divid="share" to the blacklist (it gets the tweet button, too).

    June 11, 2010

  • Also brolly.

    June 10, 2010

  • I've personally always woulda'd before I've coulda'd.

    June 10, 2010

  • Where would this be classified in sweet-tooth-fairy taxonomy?

    June 8, 2010

  • aurochsen? auroxen? our oxen?

    June 8, 2010

  • Peace talks (s.) Peace talksen (pl.)

    June 8, 2010

  • One car has shocks. Two cars have shocksen.

    June 8, 2010

  • Plural of Spock or Spocks.

    June 8, 2010

  • Plural of knocks or Knox.

    June 8, 2010

  • Plural of crocs.

    June 8, 2010

  • To go with many bagels, I suppose.

    June 8, 2010

  • In those the a's seem to create a second vowel (schwa, really) with the l's. I guess one could say that the schwa comes from the l's alone (compare homonyms vile and file) or that they aren't really disyllabic, but I don't think I would agree with either of those assertions.

    June 7, 2010

  • Long i, monosyllabic, is represented here by -ia-. I can't think of any other words that do the same. Can anybody?

    June 7, 2010

  • Gosh, it's late...I'm off to slumbrella...

    June 7, 2010

  • And a chunderbrella...ah, nevermind.

    June 7, 2010

  • I do wonder, though, if nesting parentheses like that is a terribly big deal. It makes me wince a little at my stylistic ineptitude, and my uncertainty of how to use née for people who I think are probably men.

    June 5, 2010

  • And, as prolagus (ne(e) Prolagus), only if it's easy to do, otherwise I'll continue adding new comments to correct any errors of mine, as it's really not a terribly big deal.

    June 5, 2010

  • However, I would like to be able to edit comments again, because I'm certain that I never was Milosrdentsvi, my uncertainty being with respect to Milosrdenstvi, and said ability would save the humiliation of this public record of my gross error.

    :)

    June 5, 2010

  • milosrdenstvi can't remember whether he used to be Milosrdentsvi or not. Humbly request a psychologist to help me discover my true identity.

    June 5, 2010

  • and summer, to go with spring.

    June 5, 2010

  • quarters. and jelly morton

    June 5, 2010

  • Is there a word simply for "someone who is sick"? I'm thinking I may just be excessively tired at 2 in the morning, but my mind is running through sick person, convalescent, patient, sufferer, sicko, victim, none of which quite fit...I can think of plenty of unhealthy or unwell adjectives to modify sick people, and many nouns from which someone can be ill, but nothing just to describe the person himself...who do doctors cure?

    June 4, 2010

  • This marrow would be in the sense of the WordNet definitions 3 or 5.

    June 3, 2010

  • Most of my friends and I call say /wɪkɪ'pidiə/, although I've heard both of yours as well. Neither bothers me too much, I guess.

    June 3, 2010

  • You know, right, that come Erin McKean's birthday, Grandfather Clause will deliver gifts to all deserving little boys and girls who have been good about using their and its correctly, helped of course by his merry and devoted band of subordinate clauses...

    June 1, 2010

  • See Superb Starling.

    June 1, 2010

  • "The Superb Starling has a long and loud song consisting of trills and chatters. At midday it gives a softer song of repeated phrases. There are several harsh calls, the most complex of which is described as 'a shrill, screeching skerrrreeee-cherrrroo-tcherreeeeeet.'" - Wiki

    June 1, 2010

  • A group of lyrebirds is called a musket, according to Wiki.

    June 1, 2010

  • A laterite -- a member of a certain class of perpetually tardy people.

    May 31, 2010

  • Though "brick-coloured", it seems to be only used in description of anatomy, if the examples are anything to follow. (You never know when you'll need some Practical Remarks on Dropsy!)

    May 31, 2010

  • What is the New Zealand (or new Zealand, as the case may be) pronuncation, anyway?

    May 31, 2010

  • Were you looking for attacked new Zealand pronunciation?

    May 31, 2010

  • Apparently there were two separate John MacAdams after whom notable things were named. Fascinating.

    May 30, 2010

  • The slaughter of tubifex tubifex.

    May 29, 2010

  • I *love* those cheese graters!

    May 28, 2010

  • can't edit comments :(

    May 28, 2010

  • Knowing this English pronunciation really confused me when I began French. I knew it was wrong, but I corrected it to /ˈbukoʊ/ instead of /ˈboʊku/.

    May 28, 2010

  • Did I really used to be capitalised? I was trying to remember a few days ago and couldn't for the life of me. Have I truly been decapitated? Do I care? Help me out, pundies :(

    May 28, 2010

  • Well, one of whichbe's words is godge. It has that nice gritty feeling to it, and evokes something that gets lodged in places.

    May 27, 2010

  • I was going to say I found it all a great lark, but I suppose John has spoken :P

    May 27, 2010

  • Mine was italic a few days ago but seems to have righted itself. Still can't edit posts, though. :(

    May 27, 2010

  • Thanks to Google Books I found another Rabelais citation for this phrase:

    "You'll teach me," said Panurge, "how to recognize flies when I see them floating in milk! By all that's holy, the man's a heretic. And I mean a fully developed heretic, a mangy heretic, a heretic who ought to be burned! His soul's going to be fried by thirty thousand cartloads of devils. And do you know where? By God, my friend, he's going to roast right under Queen Prosperpina's shitting stool, right in that infernal pot where she succumbs to the fecal workings of her suppositories, on the left-hand side of that great caldron, just three feet from Lucifer's claws, dragging him down into Demigorgon's black cave! Hah! the scoundrel!"

    May 27, 2010

  • brekekekex koax koax.

    May 27, 2010

  • I should not have clicked on this page.

    May 27, 2010

  • Nope, I'm just a scholarly imitator...

    May 26, 2010

  • Analogous, no doubt, to foeman.

    May 26, 2010

  • Unfortunately, yarb, you are preceded only by an erm.. - this may or may not be disconcerting.

    May 26, 2010

  • Complacencies of the peignoir...

    May 26, 2010

  • Greek en (in) + cheir (hand) + diminutive... in typical use now, a handbook, doubtless influenced by the work by Epictetus of the same name, but originally could mean either handbook or dagger.

    May 25, 2010

  • When I grow up I want to work in the dead letter office.

    May 24, 2010

  • Bartleby!!

    May 24, 2010

  • There's a York in England...

    May 24, 2010

  • We miss you and your illimitable founts of etymological wisdom!

    May 24, 2010

  • Often metathesized to perogative, which is wrong.

    May 24, 2010

  • Is there no mention of topless towers?

    May 23, 2010

  • Doubtless the same fellow who put the harm in harmony.

    May 23, 2010

  • I must admit I am quite impressed. Two of these I switched the case on (Intrigante and phariseeism) - one (Zufulo) didn't appear to be a word - and it was a little weird getting castrato right after sexually - but otherwise this is quite a nice assortment of ordinary words, cool words, and words I've never heard of before.

    May 22, 2010

  • Now who says that "random word" doesn't come up with interesting finds?

    May 22, 2010

  • These quotes are awesome! I've always though that short u had a kind of dirty/grubby feel to it.

    May 22, 2010

  • I foresee a future list: "What I Have In My Pants"

    May 21, 2010

  • Also xebeque.

    May 21, 2010

  • As mentioned, a female Moabite...Ruth, I suppose, being the paramount example.

    May 21, 2010

  • Some rather bad poetry from "Punch", which was, I suppose, the "Onion" of its day. For some reason all the online dictionaries can only come up with the first stanza of this as an example for 'eximious'. I find this deplorable.

    THE HERCULES CHEAP PALETOT.

    You've read the death of Hercules,

    In classic tale related ;

    But there the facts of his decease

    Erroneously are stated :

    Each schoolboy will at large recite

    Fast as his Alphabeta,

    How that eximious man of might

    Departed on Mount Œta.

    The hero, haying ceased to rove,

    'Tis said, his labours ended,

    To sacrifice to Father Jove,

    That mountain steep ascended.

    Desirous proper clothes to don,

    Such as he would look nice in,

    He put a Centaur tunic on,

    To offer sacrifice in.

    This tunic having been imbued

    With Hydra's deadly poison,

    Itself unto the wearer glued,

    Like plaster with Spain's flies on.

    Not to come off—the income-Tax

    A blister of the sort is—

    It stuck to him like cobbler's wax,

    And stung like aqua fortis.

    Such direful pangs convulsed his frame,

    And pierced through bone and marrow,

    That Hercules felt much the same

    As toad beneath a harrow ;

    Such agonies his nerves did rive,

    Did trouble, vex, and tease him ;

    He chose to burn himself alive,

    As thinking fire would ease him.

    Now, this same story is a myth,

    Or mystical narration,

    In which there is of truth a pith,

    Involved in fabrication.

    The vest that poison'd Hercules

    Was bought from a slop-seller ;

    It was the virus of disease

    That rack'd the monster-queller.

    Twas Typhus, which the garment caught

    Of Misery and Famine,

    Hands that for some cheap tailor wrought ;

    The Hydra-story's gammon.

    Such clothes are manufactured still ;

    And you're besought to try 'em

    In poster, puff, placard, and bill -

    — If you are wise, don't buy 'em.

    May 20, 2010

  • I edited my profile a little bit ago, and now I cannot edit my profile or any comments...also, my entire profile is in italics now but I think that's because of the # that I added.

    May 20, 2010

  • Sicut cervus desiderat ad fontes aquarum,

    ita desiderat anima mea ad te, Deus.

    http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Nsw1kdLqfec

    May 20, 2010

  • Welcome to (all of??) you!

    May 20, 2010

  • The examples create a fascinating sketch of a character. A man who takes tickets (except when he's away), who owns a merry-go-round (seriously, who doesn't envy him!) whose potential to be in certain places causes alarm to young girls, and who is somehow and tenuously connected with the absconsion of a lap-robe. Aaron Blipper, indeed!

    "Blipper is my name -- Aaron Blipper," answered the man. —The Bobbsey Twins at the County Fair.

    "I'm in charge of taking the tickets when Blipper is away." —The Bobbsey Twins at the County Fair

    "Don't look!" begged Flossie. "Maybe -- maybe Mr. Blipper is in there!" —The Bobbsey Twins at the County Fair

    "Mr. Blipper is a man who owns a merry-go-round he takes to fairs and circuses." —The Bobbsey Twins at the County Fair

    "Soon after this Blipper and his outfit left, I missed my coat, and, coming home, we found the lap robe gone." —The Bobbsey Twins at the County Fair

    May 19, 2010

  • I guess somebody has to tag this with buotwc10 now, so that we'll remember it when there's voting at the end of the year.

    You know...thingy...doodad...whatsit...craudestopper...

    May 19, 2010

  • I see -- and videlicet, evidently, means 'that is' or 'to wit' or 'namely'...which, I guess, is the meaning of viz. as well.

    May 19, 2010

  • I also love using viz.! I do so in many places, viz. literary essays, school papers, and self-referencing Wordnik comments. Anyone know what it actually stands for?

    May 19, 2010

  • Another strange thing (explained, no doubt, by the vagaries of Unicode) is that the address bar displays it as ⚜, and the "Most Commented On" in Zeitgeist as some bizarre craudestopper faintly resembling an indented wristwatch.

    EDIT: aforementioned craudestopper can be seen in the above paragraph. I had been attempting to say that the address bar displays it rather as the ubiquitous rectangular box, which is also how it appears when I type my comment, but not when I publish it.

    EDIT 2: And, of course, in the Zeitgeist itself, the wee beastie looks like a's version all coloured in and miniaturised.

    EDIT 3: Just realised, also, that probably none of you will see the craudestopper the same way as I do. In which event, the description was worthwhile.

    May 18, 2010

  • May 17, 2010

  • *begins declaiming*

    Have you ever harked to the jackass wild

    Which scientists call the onager?

    It sounds like the laugh of a backward child

    Or a hepcat on a harmonica.

    *glances about suspiciously, and recommences*

    But do not sneer at the jackass wild,

    There is method in his heehaw,

    For with maidenly blush and accent mild

    The jenny-ass answers "shee-haw".

    May 17, 2010

  • The etymology I originally heard was that the Lollards would sing their church music (usually Psalms) without musical accompaniment, rather ubiquitously, and were thus said to be going around constantly singing "lol lol lol lol lol", or something of the sort.

    May 17, 2010

  • I love milk!

    May 17, 2010

  • GLOUCESTER

    Know'st thou the way to Dover?

    EDGAR

    Both stile and gate, horse-way and foot-path. Poor

    Tom hath been scared out of his good wits: bless

    thee, good man's son, from the foul fiend! five

    fiends have been in poor Tom at once; of lust, as

    Obidicut; Hobbididence, prince of dumbness; Mahu, of

    stealing; Modo, of murder; Flibbertigibbet, of

    mopping and mowing, who since possesses chambermaids

    and waiting-women. So, bless thee, master!

    Shakespeare, King Lear IV.i

    May 15, 2010

  • OK, there's half the list fixed. I'll do the rest in another three months.

    May 15, 2010

  • ghvino -- wine. (Georgian wine is amazing!)

    May 15, 2010

  • lamazia - "it is beautiful". One of the first words I was taught, probably before hello even. There were times (and probably, when I return, will be many more times) when, not knowing how to say anything more useful, my communications consisted of pointing at the scenery and repeating this word often. And believe me, I was being honest.

    May 15, 2010

  • dila mshvidobisa - a beautiful, wonderful, and typical Georgian mouthful of consonsants is bidding you "good morning!" The counterpart for "good night" is ღამე მშვიდობისა, ghame mshvidobisa.

    May 15, 2010

  • gamarjoba - hello. გამარჯობათ (gamarjobat) formally.

    May 15, 2010

  • sameditsina - hospital. Here we see the ubiquitous Georgian prefix "sa-" meaning "place of"... making a hospital a "place of meditsin".

    May 15, 2010

  • limonati -- "lemonade", which is actually not lemonade but really really good grape soda. Sodas in Georgia (besides Coke, Pepsi, and Fanta) -- the ones from the local bottler Natakhtari (ნათახთარი... not sure about the transliteration) are fascinatingly flavoured, with varieties commonly drunk such as cherry, raspberry, pear, and tarragon.

    May 15, 2010

  • pepela - butterfly

    May 15, 2010

  • ghrumbeli -- cloud

    May 15, 2010

  • varsklavi - star

    May 15, 2010

  • *fleas*

    May 15, 2010

  • How about a growlery? Or, following Milne, a Wolery?

    May 10, 2010

  • *amasses fire extinguishers in a premeditatory manner*

    May 7, 2010

  • An old circumlocution for pregnant.

    May 7, 2010

  • The idiom in French translates to "have other cats to beat".

    May 7, 2010

  • Most of my family likes asparagus but my mom doesn't. Whenever we cook it, she just sits in the corner, disparaginous.

    May 6, 2010

  • There's a pretty good hot dog joint in Annapolis. They fix the age of ketchup accountability at 12, not 18.

    May 5, 2010

  • "Bread and wine, the pith and nerve of men."

    Homer, The Iliad

    May 4, 2010

  • Bread is just toast in an imperfect state.

    May 4, 2010

  • With the a as in smackdown, not as in awe-inspiring. The same way he pronounced piano, his two of which he always doughtily defended from torch-and-trebuchet-wielding mobs.

    May 4, 2010

  • Gosh, I didn't know that eating vegemite for the first time was such an occasion that called for making a toast to your own food.

    May 3, 2010

  • Often seen in conjunction with elves and backstroke.

    May 2, 2010

  • I think the autoantonym comes more strongly in the idiomatic expression "put something on the table" -- that phrase can equally mean present new information or laying old information aside.

    May 1, 2010

  • My piano teacher, who was also a flute teacher, would say, "I am not a flautist. I do not play the flaut."

    April 30, 2010

  • Strange, because the general use I know for this idiom is a third one still -- when something said with hurtful intend does not bother the person it is addressed to; rather, because of either the inconsequence of the insult or the imperturbability of the addressee, it is "like water off a duck's back".

    April 30, 2010

  • Whoa! AWESOME new feature!

    April 29, 2010

  • a - no, I was just saying that he've as we're using it is generally pronounced disyllabically, as something a little like he'ave. He'd've I was just giving as an example of a 've word with he in it with the vowel completely assimilated, as in I've, we've.

    Colloquially I'm comfortable writing should've, but I've never written or seen he've. It would look as strange to me as Should I've taken the left turn?

    April 29, 2010

  • Awfully useful in French, when I can't think of the right word.

    April 28, 2010

  • Well, every other 've contraction is a standard use of perfect aspect: I've gone crazy, you've gone crazy, they've gone crazy, we've gone crazy. You of course notice now the difference: he's gone crazy, she's gone crazy, it's gone crazy. The use of have here appears to be some hidden English idiom for the conditional mood, past tense. I suspect the infinitive, as when compared with the copula: I am frightened, he is frightened; should I be frightened? should he be frightened? -- and even, in fact, in regular verbs, in the solitary regular English conjugation of third person singular: I eat pizza, s/h/it eats pizza; should I eat pizza? should s/h/it eat pizza?

    So I'd ask, I guess, about how these other abbreviations sound to your ear: Should I've taken the left turn? Should we've taken the left turn? If you're like me, when you try to say those out loud, you slip in a bit of a vowel between the we and the 've, even when you try to glide them together, dissimilar to the ordinary sort of we've. A much easier vocal blend (though never written out) is the past perfect, he'd've, we'd've.

    April 28, 2010

  • Use square brackets.

    And welcome to Wordnik.

    April 23, 2010

  • I've known her all my life, but I always called her Miss Pronunciation.

    April 23, 2010

  • It sounds like it could be plausible in British English.

    April 22, 2010

  • My inner classicist is wincing right now.

    April 22, 2010

  • I love cilantro, myself...

    April 22, 2010

  • Don't throw cupcakes at the ducks! *shocked*

    April 20, 2010

  • Stromboli???

    April 20, 2010

  • I was tempted to complain about those two examples, mostly because I've never heard of either of them before. They seem to belong more to a sort of technical jargon than 'proper English'. I mean, everybody knows what a geyser is.

    On further thoughts, I decided that writing up a rant wasn't worth it. But there you have it, my rant unranted...

    April 19, 2010

  • Low lie the fields of Athenry

    Where once we watched the small free birds fly

    Our love was on the wing

    We had dreams and songs to sing

    It's so lonely round the fields of Athenry

    April 19, 2010

  • I went camping once with this girl who had concocted an ingenious treat she called a 'banana boat'. She slit a banana down the side, scooped out about half of it, filled the resultant empty space with peanut butter, bar chocolate, and marshmellows, folded everything back up, wrapped in aluminum foil and stuck in the coals till it was all mushy and melty. Sweetest, sugariest, stickiest, messiest banana I've had in my life. And Hercules, was it good.

    April 16, 2010

  • Thou whoreson zed, unnecessary letter!

    April 15, 2010

  • Diomedes, master of horses!

    April 15, 2010

  • JM is doing his best to ameliorate the comment to spam ratio!

    April 14, 2010

  • "What do we want of another breed? Isn't one breed enough? Had is had, and your tricking it out in a fresh way of spelling isn't going to make it any hadder than it was before; now you know that yourself."

    "But there is a distinction--they are not just the same Hads."

    "How do you make it out?"

    "Well, you use that first Had when you are referring to something that happened at a named and sharp and perfectly definite moment; you use the other when the thing happened at a vaguely defined time and in a more prolonged and indefinitely continuous way."

    'Why, doctor, it is pure nonsense; you know it yourself. Look here: If I have had a had, or have wanted to have had a had, or was in a position right then and there to have had a had that hadn't had any chance to go out hadding on account of this foolish discrimination which lets one Had go hadding in any kind of indefinite grammatical weather but restricts the other one to definite and datable meteoric convulsions, and keeps it pining around and watching the barometer all the time, and liable to get sick through confinement and lack of exercise, and all that sort of thing, why--why, the inhumanity of it is enough, let alone the wanton superfluity and uselessness of any such a loafing consumptive hospital-bird of a Had taking up room and cumbering the place for nothing. These finical refinements revolt me; it is not right, it is not honorable; it is constructive nepotism to keep in office a Had that is so delicate it can't come out when the wind's in the nor'west--I won't have this dude on the payroll. Cancel his exequator; and look here--"

    From Mark Twain's Italian with Grammar

    April 13, 2010

  • At midnight in the museum hall

    The fossils gathered for a ball

    There were no drums or saxophones,

    But just the clatter of their bones,

    A rolling, rattling, carefree circus

    Of mammoth polkas and mazurkas.

    Pterodactyls and brontosauruses

    Sang ghostly prehistoric choruses.

    Amid the mastodontic wassail

    I caught the eye of one small fossil.

    "Cheer up, sad world," he said, and winked-

    "It's kind of fun to be extinct."

    Ogden Nash (of course)

    April 13, 2010

  • Properly Humperdinck.

    April 13, 2010

  • I see we are expected to tell at sight a Mauser rifle from a javelin.

    April 10, 2010

  • This is why I rarely if ever use 'that' as a conjuction.

    April 10, 2010

  • I think this must be an elaborate setup for an Eastern Orthodox April Fools'.

    April 9, 2010

  • Said list now found at Lavoiſier.

    April 9, 2010

  • I don't think this one is actually Lavoisier, but another really cool term from the same early-modern-chemistry course I took. It was the original term for oxygen (contrary to my original assertion on dephlogisticated), because of the current scientific theory of phlogiston, a substance the combination with which would produce fire. Pure oxygen supports combustion better than normal air; thus it was supposed to have more capacity to combine with phlogiston, and naturally this would be because it didn't have any in the first place.

    April 9, 2010

  • I'll have to look this one up again. It sounds frightful.

    April 9, 2010

  • Venus was classically associated with copper (as the sun with gold, moon with silver, Mars with iron, Jupiter with tin, Saturn with lead, and Mercury with...well, you can guess.) So Venus crystals would be an archaic term for a copper oxide. Which one, I won't be able to tell you till I find my source texts again. (See also lunar caustic.)

    April 9, 2010

  • Sulphuric acid.

    April 9, 2010

  • A kind of iron oxide, I think.

    April 9, 2010

  • And if all else fails, try tenderneffes.

    April 9, 2010

  • Well, I decided at laſt to put up the liſt. After creation and deſcription, however, I realiſed that I had lent my Lavoiſier to my younger brother, and furthermore could not find the companion manual on a brief ſearch. So, I ſhall add the entries I already mentioned from butter of antimony and add the reſt when I can actually find my ſource material.

    April 9, 2010

  • I don't know if you should count y when it's consonantal as in yo-yo.

    Otherwise, wow.

    April 8, 2010

  • I had a class where we read an old version of Lavoisier, the French chemist. Of course he was referred to as Lavoifier. We had much merriment over philofophy, neceffities, and fuchlike... and, of course, when we got to a certain section where he instructed us to suck the air out of a tube...well, I'll let your imagination take over.

    April 8, 2010

  • Not to mention , , , , and .

    April 6, 2010

  • At first I thought this was some strange synonym for Easter!

    April 5, 2010

  • Welcome to Wordnik! Hope you enjoy your stay.

    April 4, 2010

  • lalalalalalalala

    April 4, 2010

  • And, of course the croaking chorus from The Frogs of Aristophanes itself:

    βρεκεκεκὲξ κοὰξ κοάξ,

    βρεκεκεκὲξ κοὰξ κοάξ!

    Brekekekex koax koax,

    Brekekekex koax koax!

    April 4, 2010

  • Also here, for the pretty atmospheric effect.

    April 3, 2010

  • Speaking of "win", excessive use of that word (and its counterpart/nonantonym, "fail") is another sure pathway to morondom. Perhaps a spoken intellectual equivalent to greengrocer's apostrophe.

    April 2, 2010

  • It's a Georgian word too (მაგარი) adjective meaning hard or strong... when used with the -ა ending (it is) -- მაგარია -- it means something like "great!" (Not completely positive about this. Will need to hit up Georgian friends to hammer it down.)

    April 2, 2010

  • There is no surer way to sound like a moron than to use this word in spoken conversation.

    April 2, 2010

  • Not sure re. auto-antonyms in other languages. Certainly can't think of any in Greek. Usually in English the two definitions come from separate root words. In a language etymologically rich but phonologically poor, this creates things like this sometimes.

    The only interesting slightly-related fact about Greek is that past and future have their directions swapped from English. You look 'behind you' into the future and 'in front' into the past. We're walking through life backwards, because (naturally) the past is the only thing we clearly see. Go figure.

    April 1, 2010

  • Never heard the word before, but my instinct's telling me to spell that punctiliar.

    Welcome to Wordnik!

    March 31, 2010

  • Data's only been running for a few months, so an obscurity like girnels is still pretty spotty on the lookups. The singular, girnel, has 45.

    Welcome to Wordnik!

    March 31, 2010

  • Yes, please go.

    March 31, 2010

  • Once, a friend hilariously mispronounced this to rhyme with popsicles.

    March 25, 2010

  • My sister uses day-in-age for day and age.

    March 25, 2010

  • The latest dread disease.

    March 24, 2010

  • eeekkk!

    March 23, 2010

  • Call you 'em stanzos?

    March 23, 2010

  • See shibboleth and sibboleth.

    March 21, 2010

  • O tempura! O morays!

    March 20, 2010

  • Comes from Greek ██, meaning ██, and ███, meaning ████████ -- hence █████.

    March 17, 2010

  • Alternatively, it could be abbreviation for "ammunition"

    March 14, 2010

  • If the definition below is accurate, I would extremely doubt anything but Latin 'amor' "love" for the amo- part..."maxia" prob. from some English source?

    March 14, 2010

  • Cloche hats are elegant! I don't wear them personally, being rather of the male persuasion, but I would instantly approve any wearing of such.

    March 14, 2010

  • All the etymologies given seem to be for litter (group of animals). I was wondering if litter (trash) could be from the same Latin root whence literature?

    March 13, 2010

  • Mithridates, he died old...

    March 13, 2010

  • Also Czech, "slovník", from "slova" -- though I don't know what the -nik does. Rather doubt it has anything to do with -nik as in 'peacenik'. If I knew a little less Czech I'd be tempted to set it down as one of the language's interminable diminutives, but that wouldn't make sense anyway...

    March 11, 2010

  • *throws a few hyphens in hopes to appease the black-tarantula in the ban---an-a-bunch--*

    March 11, 2010

  • *begins baking the banana-bread, making sure to add the chocolate chips and the hyphen*

    March 10, 2010

  • We're reel happy to have you here...

    March 9, 2010

  • No... :(

    March 9, 2010

  • raggle taggle ruminants?

    March 9, 2010

  • Oops, forgot to close a quotation mark.

    March 4, 2010

  • Singular, of course, being megalogos.

    March 3, 2010

  • If any of the rest of you slackers needs a reason to start a hat collection, this list will help.

    March 3, 2010

  • Possible having something to do with the fearsome monads?!

    March 3, 2010

  • This usage surprised me greatly the first time I saw it. I've seen in a few times since, mostly in archaic concepts, for example in this valediction: "Remember me, who am your faithful and obedient servant..." I guess "who is" would be the modern usage, but I'm pressed to find out why. Somehow everything's moved to the 3rd. sg. when the 'who' is thrown in.

    Edit: looking at the examples page there seems distinctly to be "I who am" and "me who am". The former doesn't sound at all odd to my ear, whereas the latter is quite strange.

    March 2, 2010

  • "A small vessel of from fifty to seventy tons, often used in herring fishery."

    March 2, 2010

  • I really really need to take half an hour and fix this list. Sometime in the eternal tomorrow...

    March 1, 2010

  • How about a "cacaphony" of cows?

    February 26, 2010

  • Also the Greek word for dirt.

    February 25, 2010

  • Navy slang for bathroom. See also rears.

    February 25, 2010

  • *eats*

    *shoots*

    *leaves*

    February 23, 2010

  • See also bedinner.

    February 23, 2010

  • See also finish profanity.

    February 20, 2010

  • Love this list!

    February 19, 2010

  • When you're bored with that, you can try killamanjaro.

    February 19, 2010

  • არაფერს!

    February 19, 2010

  • Well, technically it would be Greek for "I march forth". Simple "march forth" would be "exelaune"

    February 19, 2010

  • ფროგაპლოს, ბაყაყი...

    February 19, 2010

  • should be center-top of your profile page, to the right of your name

    February 19, 2010

  • I guess there's no hope of recovery at all now. It's ruined forever. By both of us. And we just keep making it worse.

    Crap.

    February 18, 2010

  • Yarb, you ruined it!

    February 18, 2010

  • Hi!

    February 18, 2010

  • When I play Scrabble with my friends, we keep all our tiles visible to everybody so that we can play cooperatively; scoring is based on subjective decisions about the prettiness of the word. Essential aim is to make the most interesting board possible.

    February 17, 2010

  • Pavlova is amazing. (Although my experience consisted of apples and chocolate as well.)

    February 16, 2010

  • I like this definition: "A nonspatial continuum in which events occur in apparently irreversible succession from the past through the present to the future."

    February 13, 2010

  • My good friend Philip goes by "Pip" sometimes. Also, there's a kind of amusing Sherlock Holmes story called "The Five Orange Pips".

    February 13, 2010

  • *passes out thread*

    *passes out*

    February 10, 2010

  • "Mind, they say, rules the world. But what rules the mind? The body. And the body (follow me closely here) lies at the mercy of the most omnipotent of all mortal potentates — the Chemist."

    -- Wilkie Collins, The Woman in White

    February 10, 2010

  • Look over here, guys! Bilby found some thread. Neither of us have any idea what it's here for...

    February 9, 2010

  • Also, a 3-dimensional pixel "volumetric pixel"

    February 7, 2010

  • 's Peanut Butter Cups

    February 7, 2010

  • *calls the tune*

    February 6, 2010

  • The longest and only 7-letter alphaliteral that I actually recognised as a word. (Also bellowy, which I discount because it sounds stupid, and beefily, which I discount because I don't want to have to write this twice on two words. aegilops is the actual longest.)

    February 6, 2010

  • Distinguished by being the last 6-letter alphaliteral in alphabetical order.

    February 6, 2010

  • Almost reminds me of The Lotos-Eaters.

    February 6, 2010

  • *hugs the cupcakes*

    February 6, 2010

  • *feels left out of the hug*

    February 6, 2010

  • As used in "Charlotte's Web".

    February 5, 2010

  • Actually, I'm not incredibly sure exactly how it's pronounced -- I originated it from literary rather than verbal sources, and my Czech isn't the greatest; rolig would be able to pronounce it much closer to actual than I would. But all that said, I've given it how it sounds in my head at milosrdenstvi.

    February 5, 2010

  • I always thought of it as whipped cream, actually...

    February 4, 2010

  • I have a whole list of songs which are actually about me. Coincidentally enough, some of them are about her, too.

    February 3, 2010

  • Put it on the bilby feedback page!

    February 2, 2010

  • Did bilby just misuse you're?!

    *aghast*

    February 2, 2010

  • February 1, 2010

  • The sea is flecked with bars of gray,

    The dull dead wind is out of tune,

    And like a withered leaf the moon

    Is blown across the stormy bay.

    Etched clear upon the pallid sand

    The black boat lies: a sailor boy

    Clambers aboard in careless joy

    With laughing face and gleaming hand.

    And overhead the curlews cry,

    Where through the dusky upland grass

    The young brown-throated reapers pass,

    Like silhouettes against the sky.

    -- Oscar Wilde

    January 28, 2010

  • I love this turn of phrase; such a wonderful way to express come what may. "I'll have that blueberry by five o'clock tomorrow, and devil take the hindmost."

    January 27, 2010

  • And the 3 pl. of sum.

    January 26, 2010

  • The λοπαδοτεμαχοσελαχογαλεοκρανιολειψανοδριμυποτριμματοσιλφιοκαραβομελιτοκατακεχυμενοκιχλεπικοσσυφοφαττοπεριστεραλεκτρυονοπτοκεφαλλιοκιγκλοπελειολαγῳοσιραιοβαφητραγανοπτερύγων is listed by Liddell & Scott as "the name of a dish compounded of all kinds of dainties, fish, flesh, fowl, and sauces", and is unimaginatively rendered by lazy translators "bill of fare". Other, nobler-hearted classicists render it in paragraph form, and one edition that unfortunately I don't have with me translated it literally with a lot of hyphens. Wiktionary has definitions of the various foods that make it up. The word appears as the climax of the comedy "Assemblywomen" and IMO is even funnier in context.

    January 24, 2010

  • I have a friend who has a mug with a bunch of cows on it. The smallest is indicated with circle and arrow, and labelled "decaf".

    January 24, 2010

  • Oh, Aristophanes. If you hadn't lived, we never would have guessed what we were missing.

    January 24, 2010

  • Gosh, there's an absolutely beautiful piece of classical music by Bach, one of my favorites, called Air on a G String. But I'm always embarrassed to call it that...I end up calling it Air from the Third Suite, which I guess could also be misinterpreted, but not nearly so readily.

    January 24, 2010

  • Philadelphians are fond of it as well. Haven't lived there since I was young but I keep it up out of nostalgia.

    January 23, 2010

  • At my school, this is the affectionate nickname for the gymnasium.

    January 23, 2010

  • I expect it's a full poetic line.

    January 22, 2010

  • I'd never seen this word before reading H. P. Lovecraft. He manages to stick it at least once into each of his stories.

    January 21, 2010

  • What?! A Wordnik paradox!?

    Edit: And one that breaks the front page, too. Goats and monkeys!

    January 21, 2010

  • See also foetor.

    January 21, 2010

  • I can't believe you haven't heard of Milo, either, with all the time I've been around...

    On another note, I just opened a Dove chocolate -- you know, the kind with the really cheesy inspirational messages on the inside of the wrapper. I like to have a chocolate every now and then, but the wrapper told me, "YOU are that superwoman. Enjoy!" Now, I'm a far cry from anything resembling our bizarrely Nietzschean comic character, but it would take a whole lot more to make me a superwoman...I can't help but feel like I'm either under a stigma or the wrong end of a stereotype or something like that...

    January 21, 2010

  • "In coal-mining, a reëntrant corner in a working face."

    I don't get it.

    January 19, 2010

  • Hey, I say 'tis all the time.

    January 19, 2010

  • The etymology is pretty cool -- relation to Latin vir never occurred to me before.

    January 19, 2010

  • SWEET.

    January 18, 2010

  • Eight hours later, the sun is rising, and I really should not have read so much H.P. Lovecraft...

    January 14, 2010

  • By Hercules! You know, I've been coming to Wordienik for all these years practically expiring in my great hope to find a remedy for constipation that isn't as terribly...unnatural...as the one I currently use. And now, my friends, here it is! O, modified rapture!

    January 14, 2010

  • I wonder if these 'unreasonable expectations' include 'not being a discommodious jackanapes and spamming on our website'. Think it over, Matthew.

    January 14, 2010

  • 10. Days on which you find an a in your berth.

    January 13, 2010

  • I seem to remember case-sensitivity being one of the most exciting things that Wordnik would bring...once...

    I wonder if we should have different pages for wound and wound, and the suchlike. That's be clever, eh.

    January 9, 2010

  • Oooh! An old name for a mineral! These are all over Lavoisier (who is great fun to read). Also fun: flowers of zinc, butter of arsenic, martial ethiops, oil of vitriol, Venus crystals, salt of alembroth, phagadenic water, dephlogisticated air, liver ore, magister of bismuth, mineral butter, and lunar caustic.

    Butter of antimony, if memory serves, is antimony trichloride.

    January 7, 2010

  • And briefs in briefcases, no doubt.

    January 7, 2010

  • So I read this phrase a lot in old books. Anybody have a clue as to why they would actually say it this way, instead of "must" or "needs to" as we would in modern syntax?

    January 7, 2010

  • After all, it could be Emily.

    December 31, 2009

  • I nominate wayz-goose (for record at this page)

    December 28, 2009

  • I think he was just jealous, 'cause his name was Wilfred Funk. Things would have been different if his name had been Melody Murmuring...

    December 27, 2009

  • Nominated for woty09.

    December 27, 2009

  • Personally, I prefer Esquimaux. Did you know you can expect to see that spelling around twice a month? Now get out of here and start wondering where the other one's going to be.

    December 25, 2009

  • I don't like having to putter all over the website looking for the feedback page, and there's no search that works for profiles yet, but I don't want to make a bookmark So, for my convenience and that of anyone else who wants to use it, this is a link to the feedback page.

    December 24, 2009

  • See comments on მამაო ჩვენო for further about Georgian letters problem.

    December 24, 2009

  • "mamao chveno", the vocative of "Our Father"; hence the Georgian name for the Lord's prayer.

    I added this to test the ა and ო characters and they seem to have added just fine which suggests to me that they may have just corrupted in the move but aren't incompatible with things newly added. If need be I can reconstruct the words in the list that are messed up...

    December 24, 2009

  • Should we not call it a punctuation-mark?

    December 23, 2009

  • The precocious fruit.

    December 23, 2009

  • All the examples are wrong!

    December 23, 2009

  • I love hyphenating things like this. It makes me feel so wonderfully Victorian.

    December 23, 2009

  • Hah! Love roll morton!

    December 23, 2009

  • See, that one was pretty obvious. I'm relying on the rest of you Wordnikies for the truly outrageous ones!

    December 22, 2009

  • Callicles...

    December 22, 2009

  • Amusing example:

    " To my lorikeet, Buttons, I leave the remaining sum total of all assets in my estate, real and liquid, including cash, securities, land, fine art, jewelry, gold, and McDonald's Monopoly game pieces, because that's the kind of crazy thing that wealthy, mean-spirited old lunatics like me really enjoy."

    December 22, 2009

  • For some reason I always thought a Carol was a bit like a Carmen.

    December 22, 2009

  • Three Letter Acronym.

    December 21, 2009

  • I have two good friends married to nurses. This TLA is very well used among us.

    December 21, 2009

  • Trichobezoars!

    December 21, 2009

  • If it is somewhere, say, like Catan.

    December 21, 2009

  • მხედრული in script. Sort of means "military" -- a more efficient alphabet than was used by the church, which came into universal adoption.

    December 20, 2009

  • Not a particularly big deal -- but my list Words from Georgia has some of its characters messed up since the move. As far as I can tell it's only ა and ო (an and on, Unicode U+10D0 and U+10DD) that don't work. Being vowels, however, they're kinda in almost every word...

    December 20, 2009

  • The story of Sybaris, an ancient and opulent city, is quite amusing. They taught their horses to dance when pipe music was played; and thus their cavalry was utterly useless when they were attacked by a band of musicians.

    December 20, 2009

  • Also a sort of ghost. See the plural lemures.

    December 20, 2009

  • I think, actually, this is supposed to be cicatrizant. I had been hoping for some really cool definition related to the Greek trix, hair, but apparently not.

    December 20, 2009

  • A pretty cool synonym for "weekly".

    December 20, 2009

  • A fascinating etymology for an an annoyingly overused word.

    December 20, 2009

  • A fancy way of saying 'sketch out' or something of the sort

    December 20, 2009

  • Destruction by fire!!!

    December 20, 2009

  • Awesome in the 19th century. Pretentious in the 21st.

    I wonder if I could make a list like that? Probably not; I'm pretty much as pretentious as they come...

    December 20, 2009

  • Added a bunch from "The Name of the Rose". It was kind of useful having both a Latin and English dictionary at hand while going through it!

    December 20, 2009

  • I think my chief objection to this list -- although all of them are very nice words indeed -- is that I could far too easily put them all into one sentence.

    December 19, 2009

  • Incidentally, I love that blog.

    December 18, 2009

  • I think 'passing' might be some shortened form of 'surpassingly'...?

    December 16, 2009

  • I get more picky when responding to the questions "How's it going" or "How are you doing" -- doing good is very different from doing well, just like smelling good is very different from smelling well.

    December 14, 2009

  • I am very confused exactly why this would be pronounced 'gauntlet'??

    December 13, 2009

  • dc -- if you want, I can come by sometime next week and see if I can fix it for you...

    December 13, 2009

  • Added all three. In fact, I'm opening this up. Knock yerselves out.

    December 12, 2009

  • Doubtless they all came from Positionby.

    December 12, 2009

  • Thanks!

    December 12, 2009

  • Spelled archaically as helpmeet, and both spelled and incorrectly pronounced that way, sometimes even as help meet, and even definitionally interpreted from the modern definitions of those words, by people who as far as their practice of Christianity goes never bothered to notice that the 1600s were over. (Those are interesting sorts of people. Quite often they have the best of hearts while being frightfully backward.)

    December 12, 2009

  • Bizarre perhaps for the Northern hemisphere...

    December 12, 2009

  • Nik!

    December 11, 2009

  • Hey, look at me, I notice comments that people put on my profile in...24 days...sorry about that...

    Anyway, I already more or less said the whole of it, but here it is for completeness' sake:

    Q: What international disasters occurred when the waiter dropped the platter in the restaurant?

    A: The fall of Turkey, the ruin of Greece, and the breaking up of China.

    As you can see, kind of a childish joke, but the capitonyms reminded me of it. And it still makes me pretty happy imagining it.

    December 11, 2009

  • Could someone pronounce this? I've been wondering my whole life how to pronounce this.

    December 11, 2009

  • Oush...it *may* be something as simple as clearing the cache or even just pressing F5.

    December 11, 2009

  • It's very unfortunate.

    December 11, 2009

  • We must move some pronunciations here.

    December 10, 2009

  • Seven hundred different kinds of variegated, undulating, phosphorescent shit, no less.

    December 10, 2009

  • Re: marky's comment, I've received some fascinating commentary about that from a friend of mine, one of the smartest people I know, who some time ago stopped being a lesbian and now raises two children... Most of it probably wouldn't fly here, so I won't bother to repeat it; still, as I said, it's a fascinating point of view...

    December 10, 2009

  • "the best greek philosopher", if you actually do want to go for a pun, would be Aristotle. "Ariston" = "best" in Greek.

    This looks more like something akin to popsicles or icicles.

    December 8, 2009

  • I was wondering today how "eleven" came from "one"; certainly not as obvious as "twelve" from "two". The etymologies here didn't help out too much.

    Also, first and second. ???

    December 7, 2009

  • Nor has there been discovered any attested intelligent usage of EVar. Ever. *grump grump*

    December 7, 2009

  • I like it! I need to use this about some people!

    December 6, 2009

  • I realized today I mostly unconsciously cut out this word, especially in its conjunctionary uses, as much as possible. I wonder if this will be cited as Part of My Unique Style someday when I am a famous writer.

    December 6, 2009

  • A sort of sword (see falchion. Almost qualifies for my "Words with aunch in them", but not quite.

    December 5, 2009

  • "While ere", a short time ago, just now.

    December 5, 2009

  • Seems to mean something like "uncompleted". Also written as vnperfite.

    December 5, 2009

  • See look, I have a microphone now. Best decision I've made in at least three days.

    December 5, 2009

  • I always thought Little Bunny Foo Foo bopped instead of bonked.

    December 4, 2009

  • Is neat Nutella like neat whiskey?

    December 4, 2009

  • See crustimoney.

    December 3, 2009

  • First parsed by my brain at least as mic-roast-rology.

    December 3, 2009

  • Then Tabitha Twitchit came down the garden and found her kittens on the wall with no clothes on.

    She pulled them off the wall, smacked them, and took them back to the house.

    "My friends will arrive in a minute, and you are not fit to be seen; I am affronted," said Mrs. Tabitha Twitchit.

    She sent them upstairs; and I am sorry to say she told her friends that they were in bed with the measles; which was not true.

    -- Beatrix Potter, "The Tale of Tom Kitten"

    See also soporific.

    December 2, 2009

  • YES -- and even completely innocent people, when told to "look up umbrage", will spell it a la the Potteress. MDJRKL!

    December 2, 2009

  • Ha, ha, ha!

    December 1, 2009

  • Wasn't there something here about chicken catch-a-tory? Or was that somewhere else?

    December 1, 2009

  • Aren't we all getting a bit high and mighty here! Regular old umbrage ain't good enough for the likes o' ye! Well, now, since you don't want any of it, I'll just take some for myself!

    November 30, 2009

  • It seems that folks have been pretty encyclopaedic, especially bilby, about what feelings are and aren't, so I don't have a whole lot to add. Reiterating that I have faith in y'all that you're going to work things out. I know it. You've all made awesome things before and you're going to make something awesome again. We just need time for it.

    I think, though, that one of the things I liked best about Wordie (or I suppose I should call it YOW) was how practically everything came from the users: the etymologies and examples and often the definitions, as well as the fun conversations and the organisation of everything into lists. What I'm afraid of is that that's going to attenuate on Wordnik, now that we have things pulled from other sources so much more powerfully. I love the Examples -- I've found several awesome books from there already -- and the definitions are so much nicer, if with a little less character, than WeirdNet -- but I don't want to come to see everything that the computers have come up with. I want to see a word and see everything the community's come up with. If I just wanted a pre-written definition or an etymology, I'd go to Merriam-Webster Online.

    Basically: user content more to the front! I know a lot of old Wordies in their hearts want the comment page to be the default page again, and I know that's not our goal, but I'm sure with all the bright minds about we'll wake up to some ingenious solution someday. Anyway, I've said enough.

    November 29, 2009

  • I had to look this one up after the discussion on wordnik. It apparently stands for Big Hairy Audacious Goal.

    November 29, 2009

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Comments for milosrdenstvi

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  • Strangely enough I've not used that word here yet. It doesn't seem to be a very common vegetable in these parts.

    April 23, 2011

  • ავოკადოოო.

    April 22, 2011

  • Greetings to all and to zuzu in particular! Please see account of my peregrinations at შეთანხმდებოდნენ.

    Milo is good. Only ever had it in South America, though; it doesn't seem to be too ubiquitous in the States, or here.

    April 22, 2011

  • Hey- just a question that popped into my head when I was reading some old comments: Do you like Milo?

    As in, this Milo?

    I don't know if you get that a lot around here and I'm just missing something... but it really got me wonderin'. :)

    April 4, 2011

  • ავოკადოოო!!!

    February 25, 2011

  • Wasn't "Homicide: Life on the Street" set in Baltimore?

    Edit: Wait--did they both come from the same source? Never mind.

    January 4, 2011

  • We have been enjoying "The Wire" on DVD. I love that it's such a great show and that it's set in Baltimore--which doesn't get enough attention. The other night was an episode where the gang of cops was all eating crabs at a particularly famous crab restaurant (which I know only from an episode of "No Reservations").

    Sorry if this seems completely out of the blue--your comment about Baltimore on another page reminded me of your geographic-ness. :)

    On further thought, it is depressing how much of my knowledge comes from TV. *sigh*

    January 4, 2011

  • წარმატებები!

    December 31, 2010

  • How would I say "Congratulations--I'm glad you get to go back" in Georgian?

    December 31, 2010

  • I appreciate you adding to my Greek Mythology lists. :D

    December 22, 2010

  • Re: "more good songs in Spanish" - check out the classic "Trio Los Panchos" oeuvre. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Los_Panchos

    December 10, 2010

  • Avocado?

    November 17, 2010

  • არტიშოკი!

    November 16, 2010

  • "milosrdenstvi has added 28 lists containing 1,454 words, 42 comments, 42 tags, 9 favorites, and 59 pronunciations."

    September 5, 2010

  • If you want to use a Greek or Greekish plural without sounding pedantic, you can just momentarily halt amidwords and then give the “-podes” a slightly rising intonation. It’ll sound as if you weren’t sure about the English plural, but inferred it from your extensive knowledge of ancient languages, which is certainly no falsehood.

    August 23, 2010

  • Natural language, it seems, has a penchant for rendering consistency and pedantry antithetical. In Sheldon’s defense I have to remark, however, that I cannot remember his actually maintaining the plural was anything else than an English plural.

    By the way, I’ve just noticed that platypi is not etymologically “correct”. Luckily, I’ve never yet used the term. ^^

    August 21, 2010

  • Lol, thanks! Evidently, it is already possible on Wordnik to look such things up in much more depth than in (regular) dictionaries by just asking the resident etymologists.

    By hard c I assume you mean the /k/–/s/ distinction, or is there something Greek-specific I don’t know about? (Ancient Greek, apparently, differentiates between aspirated and unaspirated k.) The pronunciation Sheldon chose was /ˈkɒksɪˌdʒiz/, if I remember correctly, which is listed second after /kɒkˈsaɪdʒiz/ in Random House. Both could be interpreted as rendering the third c softly. Pronouncing the same sound twice in a row strikes me as rather atypical of English phonotactics, so should he rather have pronounced cc as one /k/ (had he been Greek and ancient)?

    (Sorry, the “garlic and onions” allusion is lost on me. What are you referring to?)

    August 19, 2010

  • Milos: Don't know of a mineral named after a place in Georgia. However, tvalchrelidzeite is a mineral species named for A.A. Tvalchrelidze (b. 1915), an academician at the Georgia Academy of Science, from specimens collected from the Gomi As-Sb-Hg deposit, Oni District, Racha-Lochkhumi-Kvemo Svaneti Region, Georgia.

    June 20, 2010

  • Gosh Milos, if you didn't do it on purpose you're in the same predicament as me (and Pro, as far as I understand). We could start a club for the decapitated! ;-)

    May 28, 2010

  • Just popped by to say I loved your onomatopoeia!

    But what has happened to your captial M?

    May 28, 2010

  • გამარჯობათ! The words you've been adding are fantastic!

    May 15, 2010

  • It really is pretty when you hear it. Thanks.

    February 5, 2010

  • Actually, I'm not incredibly sure exactly how it's pronounced -- I originated it from literary rather than verbal sources, and my Czech isn't the greatest; rolig would be able to pronounce it much closer to actual than I would. But all that said, I've given it how it sounds in my head at milosrdenstvi.

    February 5, 2010

  • Milo, I would very much like to hear you pronounce your name. Do you take requests??

    February 4, 2010

  • Milosrdenstvi, I think if you can reconstruct the messed up list items, that is probably the best course of action.

    December 24, 2009

  • Thanks!

    :D

    I laughed!

    December 11, 2009

  • Do you want to tell that joke you alluded to on ruzuzu's list?

    November 17, 2009

  • I played with your name. 

    October 13, 2009

  • Thank you, Milo.

    August 22, 2008

  • Milo, I enjoy your contributions. I am seeking a new name. I cannot be associated with Jesus as Logos. It was your posting that got me thinking along these lines. And no, I have not risen; I am still around.

    August 16, 2008