Rudy Waltz from Kurt Vonnegut's Deadeye Dick explains how this word would fit in a parade of neuters:
“These were my people—as used as I was to wanting love from nowhere, as certain as I was that almost anything desirable was likely to be booby-trapped. I had a fairly funny idea. Someday all we neuters would come out of our closets and form a parade. I even decided what banner our front rank should carry, as wide as Fifth Avenue. A single word would be printed on it in letters four feet high:
EGREGIOUS.
Most people think that word means terrible or unheard of or unforgivable. It has a much more interesting story than that to tell. It means ‘outside the herd.’ Imagine that—thousands of people, outside the herd.”
Plural: acheiropoieta. Also known as “icons made without hands” in reference to images which supposedly have not been created by human hands such as the Veil of Veronica and the Shroud of Turin.
I like how Geoffrey K. Pullum plans to use it: “I think I'm going to adapt it for making reference to particularly ignorant paraphrase that displays a birdbrained level of literacy.”
Comments by rebeca
rebeca commented on the word Mitty
After the title character in The Secret Life of Walter Mitty, a short story by James Thurber, later made into a movie (1947) of the same name, with a remake released in 2013.
June 6, 2018
rebeca commented on the word ereuthophobia
Fear of blushing or the color red.
January 15, 2013
rebeca commented on the word ter in die
Latin for “three times a day.” Used in prescriptions.
December 18, 2012
rebeca commented on the word egregious
Rudy Waltz from Kurt Vonnegut's Deadeye Dick explains how this word would fit in a parade of neuters:
“These were my people—as used as I was to wanting love from nowhere, as certain as I was that almost anything desirable was likely to be booby-trapped. I had a fairly funny idea. Someday all we neuters would come out of our closets and form a parade. I even decided what banner our front rank should carry, as wide as Fifth Avenue. A single word would be printed on it in letters four feet high:
EGREGIOUS.
Most people think that word means terrible or unheard of or unforgivable. It has a much more interesting story than that to tell. It means ‘outside the herd.’ Imagine that—thousands of people, outside the herd.”
December 10, 2012
rebeca commented on the word swain
“Who is Celia? What is she? That all her swains commend her?” -- Otto Waltz. From Deadeye Dick by Kurt Vonnegut.
If you ever want to scare people the way Otto Waltz did, this word should be in your vocabulary.
December 9, 2012
rebeca commented on the word blousy
It can also be a variant of blowzy.
October 26, 2012
rebeca commented on the word acheiropoieton
Plural: acheiropoieta. Also known as “icons made without hands” in reference to images which supposedly have not been created by human hands such as the Veil of Veronica and the Shroud of Turin.
October 17, 2012
rebeca commented on the word parrot phrasing
Eggcorn for “paraphrasing.”
I like how Geoffrey K. Pullum plans to use it: “I think I'm going to adapt it for making reference to particularly ignorant paraphrase that displays a birdbrained level of literacy.”
March 28, 2012