What bilby and mollusque suggested. Also, I'd like to voice my disappointment that a listmaster (i.e., creator/owner of a list) can no longer be determined at a glance by the list URL. I always found it handy to look up at the location bar to find out who's responsible for the page I'm reading, particularly if there are multiple people involved in the discussion there. Under the new format, I have to scroll all the way back to the top of the page.
A fake bride or groom, intended to deceive his or her counterpart in the wedding (and the guests), resulting in a rather embarrassing case of oopsigamy.
Also, Ante Meridiem (the period between midnight and noon) and Amplitude Modulation (one of two standard techniques for transmitting information via radio waves).
They're renaming this one, because as it turns out, Albert Einstein wasn't nearly so amazingly smart. Starting in 2010 this element will be known as uselessnessium.
Nah, anyone who's ever played The Curse of Monkey Island knows that all you need to make syrup of ipecac is an ipecac flower and a bottle of maple syrup. The two combine splendidly.
I always thought this word should be pronounced "GAA luh" or maybe "GAH luh," but "GAY luh" sounded wrong to me. Then, WordNET cleared it up, and all is well again.
This thread is decidedly morbid. From now on, I've decided, it refers to the family of one Beaver. There, aren't we all happier for it? Now put that knife away.
Haha, reminds me of my boss at the company where I maintain the corporate web site...
Him: "Print out every page of the site, I'll write the changes I want on the printouts and give them to you, and then you can type what I wrote and upload the revisions."
Me: "How about if I just e-mail you the digital files and let you modify them in Word? Then you can e-mail them back to me."
Him: "But I want to use Sharpies and highlighters in lots of pretty colors!"
Me: "Word has bold text and lots of pretty colors."
Sheesh. Fine, I get the "50-word list genre" thing. That's cool. Just don't call it "forced closure." And, um, I think you have to put "in 50 words" in the list title. Rules is rules. :-P
Fair enough, kewpid. I don't know where you live, but my particular government tends to lean more towards slow, bureaucratic, and inept, and away from almighty. ;-)
Money that has no inherent value, only perceived value held by those who exchange it. When people realize that all of their wealth is represented by worthless pieces of paper, their confidence in the currency collapses, and so does the currency itself. The alternative is commodity-backed currency, the most common of which is known as the gold standard. Nobel laureate Milton Friedman was a vocal critic of fiat money, along with other notable economists like Ludwig von Mises and Murray Rothbard.
A back-up vocalist in a hip-hop group. Usually this means working the crowd to keep the energy going, and freestyling about how ill the "star" is. In other words, the hype man is the annoying sidekick.
This is totally a man-who story, but a friend of mine told me about third nerds. Apparently at the Christian college she attended, the administration had some particularly strict rules regarding male-female fraternization. Whenever a couple went off-campus together, a mutual friend was required to accompany them and make sure everything stayed on the up-and-up. I'm guessing the use of third nerd to describe such a friend is purely colloquial, not an "official" college phrase.
My friend explained this to me with surprise that I had never heard the term before. Supposedly it's quite common to describe someone who awkwardly tags along during a date. But I have no firsthand knowledge of its use. Still, I like it. :-)
But I can't STAND the writing/editing culture of Wikipedia, and I avoid doing anything but reading the darn thing. Occasionally I'll anonymously correct a typo or punctuation error, but only because my pedantry cannot be tamed.
Do most logical people think in terms of those kinds of structured rules? I consider myself extremely logical but spelling it all out in a step-by-step tautology is a terrific bore. In my mind, either something makes sense or it doesn't; I don't need to run through a checklist of conditions to evaluate it. I had assumed I was normal in that regard...
If y'all haven't noticed, I've been away from Wordie for about a week (give or take). I'm sort of back now, maybe, but I'm sure I'll never get caught up on comments again. ;-) Anyway, glad I saw this discussion.
Yeah, I tagged this one. I don't even remember why. I guess I wasn't terribly impressed with it. It's nothing personal. All I know is that if I did it unabashedly, it must have seemed important to at the time. So the tag stays. :-P
In all fairness, it's much easier to pronounce in acronym form than all spelled out. Of course, I'd think a Z for zero would be preferable to the number 0 itself. THACZ. Still overly 1337-sounding, but not quite as offensive in my opinion.
The context isn't so much in reference to Huck Finn himself, but the ignorant redneck archetype as a whole. Mike Huckabee is the governor of Arkansas, and there are those who would think that's enough to disqualify him from the White House. (Arkansas is an enigma of its own, lots of jokes about it.) Of course, Bill Clinton was once governor of Arkansas too, so whatever. And then there are those who just thing Huckleberry is fun to say. :-)
Huckleberry Hound was an old cartoon, I think. I don't know so much about that one, personally, but I've heard people refer to Huckabee as such, too.
I just have to wonder what the parents' general attitude is. Are they saying "go on, son, be a wild man, deny yourself nothing, live it up... and then come crying back to us when you can't take it anymore"?
Or is it more like "doing this stuff is wicked and terrible, and we don't want you to, but we can't stop you... and sooner or later when you come around we'll be here for you"?
Haha! And that Rudy ferret radio interview was great! I seriously, seriously hope that man doesn't get anywhere. Incidentally, I have a new Election 2008 list...
Talk about a specific word. Is this like chained_bear's list, where there are a bunch of different words referring to the neutered varieties of different animals?
I can't stand when people nominate themselves for stuff, but my old Festival of Randomness list should probably be considered. It's the weirdest thing I've seen on the site, anyway.
Jeesh, that was nine frigging months ago, and I'm a different person now. Um, I also plead the fifth. If that doesn't work, I'm deeply sorry and hope from the bottom of my heart that you can find it within yourself to forgive me. Or at least give me some eye wash so I can purge the excremental photoresidue from my corneas.
Great link! My sophomore year in college I joined the debate circuit. Which was fun in its own right, but it also (for better or worse) empowered me to BS my way through anything. It's how I got through college, and I still do it to this day. I'm shameless. But I'd hate for a prof to call my bluff like this!
Agreed. I think we should have WOTY categories, because there are plenty of more "fun" words, but this is best described as newsworthy or tragedy or something.
The shade of black, presumably, that is the darkest. Do you mean that ebony refers to a lighter color? For me it conjures up thoughts of ebony and ivory, and the colors of black piano keys are probably as dark as they can get. Besides, wouldn't CMYI be easier to pronounce as a word? Maybe?
So John, did you remove the subject line field for comments? I guess that always was a bit extraneous, and a point of confusion for new users... but pages look so weird without it now! .;-)
Yes, I'm quite sure cougars are required to wear last year's business attire, and alternate between scotch and mimosa, depending on the day of the week.
In the future, merely reading about viruses will infect you with them through the Power Of The Internet. The United States government will lead the charge against Google for its contribution to "digital biological warfare." Mankind will be forced into illiteracy to prevent the spread of the epidemic. It has been prophesied.
Hey, I'm a designer and I resent that! ;-) I still think a better convention could have been used; after all, it is designers who say CMYK and RGB, and they know full well what cyan is. But using K for black isn't helpful at all.
It's an American thing, bilby. ;-) FEMA is the Federal Emergency Management Agency, tasked with responding to disasters and the like. My personal commentary (and apparently c_b's as well) is that they are woefully bureaucratic and inept, as seen in their miserable handling of the Hurricane Katrina debacle. FEMA builds little relief towns of mobile homes (trailers) for victims to live in, and it's these towns that my old roommate inappropriately referred to as FEMAtown. And I'm just as guilty for singing along. Gotta love humor centered around horrible tragedies.
Of course, it's not as funny when you have to explain the joke... ;-)
Do you have particular cities in mind? I don't think I could handle living in, say, NYC... but I do currently live in the downtown area of a considerably smaller (but still populated) city and it's pretty great. :-)
Okay, I was just using the "search comments" feature and I discovered that on the results page, the search form at the top does not work -- it searches for a null string, rather than the value I type. So if I want to perform a second search, I have to go back to the main search page.
I do find it sad, though, that these days the word liberty is seldom heard apart from the word statue. Once upon a time it was a pretty earth-shaking concept, and in the 21st century it has become known mainly as a tourist attraction.
Seems I kicked off a discussion and then disappeared before it really got going! My original suggestion, of course, opts for a human-controlled mechanism over an automated one, so I don't think mollusque's concern applies. And the issue about accidentally deleting "legitimate" or intentional misspellings is, I think, moot... because if it's an uncommented ghost, frankly, no one will miss it.
I'm a natural packrat, John, so I understand your aversion to deleting anything from the database. But isn't it safe to say that the benefits outweigh the costs of allowing us to manually clean up uncommented ghosts? It'll make the word count a more accurate figure, it'll stop auto-suggest from feeding typos to unsuspecting searchers, and I guarantee no one will be offended that "their" word got deleted. Think about it. ;-)
I like legitimate ghosts. I think of them as little nuggets of surprise that will turn up far in the future, when somebody either discovers them via the random word feature, or else adds something s/he thought was new, yet already bears comments.
Dead typos just floating around out there, on the other hand, are stupid. I figure if a ghost doesn't have any comments on it, that's a good gauge of keepability. No comments means no one cares. If you find it and you do care, leave a comment. ;-)
So, how about a way for us to clean up the database a little? I'm thinking a "delete this word" button that only appears on ghosts that don't have any comments. There are a lot of these floating around on the site, and we ought to be able to do our part to weed them out. :-)
Haha! I actually got the opportunity to use madeupical in a business meeting yesterday... unfortunately my coworkers didn't exactly get the reference. :-P
FEMAtown. Much less funky than Funkytown. Coined by my old college roommate while driving past the impromptu villages of FEMA mobile homes erected in the wake of Hurricane Charley. He would always burst into inappropriate song at the sight of the refugees... and I would join him.
It's one of my favorite books ever. I don't know why I've been referencing it lately; must be my subconscious telling me it's time to read it again (it's been a couple years)...
I have never grieved my ghosts. Actually I'm pretty sure I was the first person on the to create ghosts regularly, on purpose. It's something like a trademark. :-P
Everything you just said is duly noted in my book, jennarenn. Even the thing about my list that I don't really like, because, well, you have a good point. :-P
Yes, I saw that after I posted here. I've been slowly trying to catch up after the weekend. I swear, people here are commenting faster and I'm reading slower. And now the comments page is back to showing 100 at a time (but with pagination) so I've been making my way through it, page by page. I'm finally back on the first page at last, but now I'm exhausted. I'll never survive at this rate. Can we close for weekends? ;-)
I recently discovered Gold Bond Medicated Foot Powder. I was fully prepared for disgust, but actually it's quite mentholly. Makes your feet all cold and tingly, and nice-smelling. I can't wait to cover my feet in it again tonight.
Aye, the Identify the Wordie game invited each user to submit one self-describing word, and then we all had to guess who had picked each one. Not as easy as it sounds. :-)
I was just learning about this a couple days ago, particularly in reference to the Mersenne Twister. I still don't understand it, but I think it's cool (in the dorkiest possible way, of course).
For the record, my comment wasn't meant to be condescending; I'm sure there are plenty of people who in all sincerity just aren't acclimated with the concept of tags. It's a very Web 2.0 thing, and a tutorial would be nice for those who haven't used them before. I was assuming that peregrina thought they had a different purpose, like attributing other pages as reference or something.
This is such a colorful word. I always imagined it was coined by someone who realized that these people are not dullards; often they're intelligent, interesting people and with a little coaxing they really blossom. Of course, I just tell myself that because the wallflower is usually me. ;-)
I'm not really a phone phreak kind of guy, personally, but usually because I hate the additional charges associated with doing anything beyond talk. Any idea what kind of fees I might incur if I tried managing lists via SMS?
Yes. It annoys me to no end. Admittedly, there are times when we need a good neuter singular pronoun, but that's not it. I guess I'm rather politically incorrect these days, but I think using he is a good old standard that people understood. It's not really worth getting upset about, in my opinion, but then again I'm a man. ;-)
I think part of the problem is also the increasing frequency of addressing collective units in the plural. When Microsoft does something, for example, it does it as one entity, not as "them" or "they."
Great point. With the internet I can find an immediate answer to nearly every question I have. When I can't, I become surprised and frustrated by the internet's "failure" to deliver. That's probably a lot different from the past, when people spent long hours in pursuit of information, and likely often resigned themselves to never knowing certain things. But ignorance is bliss, right? Information overload is a problem in its own right.
It is curious. I think seek refers to searching outwardly for something, while search refers to a more introspective examination, or looking within something. If you're in need of a needle, you will seek one out. Unless you're positive there's one contained somewhere within this haystack, in which case you'll search the haystack for it. Your finding process is now heavily focused on one space, rather than open-ended.
So, originally in computers the term "search" correctly referred to finding a given string of text within a single file. Actually the needle/haystack analogy has been used for years in reference to that kind of search. Later, the database allowed similar functionality, only instead of searching within one file, you searched within a larger array of associated data. And of course, the modern search engine is little more than a really massive database, so it's easy to see why we still say "search."
Because technically speaking, we're searching for something within Google's database, rather than a less-focused seeking of the same. Hey, it's been too long since I wrote a madeupical etymology, that felt good!
Wordie? Never heard of it. Isn't that the thing "jennarenn" was shilling? Nah, I just opened my thesaurus and picked the most impressive words I could find. ;-)
It's hilarious! It has some scenes of over-the-top violence, ridiculous to the point of just adding to the humor, but if you're squeamish you might want to avoid it. Otherwise, it's highly recommended. ;-)
If I recall correctly, one of the characters in the movie Hot Fuzz only has one word in his vocabulary: yarb, pronounced the way I described. Maybe that's where I get the image. He wasn't a pirate, though.
I've never heard of this "jennarenn" before, she seems to be a spammer. I checked out that site and it's just a bunch of words -- don't waste your time on it. I think we should ban her IP.
Of course, someone has to nominate Conversations because of its dashing thoroughness, so it might as well be me. :-) I'll also nominate the old classic, It Has a Name?? Thanks, jennarenn, of course, for nominating my list but I hate that one and will have to cancel out your yea with my nay. ;-)
Oh I hate when that happens, blasted comment overflow. Truth be told, that's why I've been so quiet this week, I've been slowly trying to catch up ever since Monday!!
I can see I'm outnumbered, and I'll step down gracefully(?). *mutters something about democracy sucking* But mollusque's trick is duly noted, and I should mention that if right-clicking "normal" links and choosing "open link in new tab" is too much trouble, you can middle-click links to get a new tab instead. It takes exactly as much time as a regular left-click. If you don't have a middle button, your scroll wheel should work (it clicks, too).
I know you didn't want me to chime in again, but I'm gonna. ;-) chained_bear mentions the ability to right-click a link to open in a new tab... but there is no ability to right-click a link and open it in *this* tab. In other words, if the link is hard-coded to do that, there's no way to force it not to, while the opposite is possible. Food for thought, anyway.
That's what I meant too, kewpid, and I'm pretty sure that's what dahnielson had in mind as well. I remember building my own finicky CMSs with PHP and duct tape back in the day. It's so good to be living in the future, at last. ;-)
Never heard of that site, but I'll have to check it out. Sounds handy. I also never use the links on Wordie, for two reasons. First, they open in a new tab/window, which annoys me; and second, I already have dictionary and thesaurus bookmarklets that I use all over the internet, and I use them here too out of habit.
I wish I knew Japanese. Every time someone mentions things like this I get the idea that it's a delightful language, seemingly designed with wordplay in mind. I love the nuances, the layers of meaning. Even in silly cartoons. ;-)
Hmm, I have yet to contribute to this discussion. So I will now.
My first reaction was "heavens no, the s-word will just end up winning!" And then I realized that this is our noble chance to circumvent popular opinion and knock it off its pedestal. I'm in.
I agree that two categories (real and madeupical) would be great. Actually I think I might vote for madeupical itself... Where do we vote and who's the officiator?
When you're born, and, you know, you've been all up in that belly for like months and DANG SON, you're hongry. Like eat a horse hongry. You don't want no milk, you want a friggin' T-bone steak and some corndogs. And maybe a towel to wipe off all o'that womb juice after yeet.
I pray no corndog virgins actually exist in the world, and plan to feed my newborn child corndogs as the only sane (and ethical) response to postnatal hunger.
Champ (can I call you champ?) that's probably the only thing I ever really found funny in that show. And I really wished they made a real Bamboozled game show. :-)
Aww darn, I just shaved my mustache (and beard) and cut my hair super-short last month. I alternate between hairy gross and squeaky clean, and November is my month for the latter. Oh well.
Same here. I was meaning to ask the film crew yesterday, when I was surrounded by all manner of gaffers and best boys and grips, but they were frightfully busy (and a little on the rude side). Only one guy took the time to chat with me, and I don't think he would have known anyway.
The years from 2013 to 2019 can be called the teens, but 2010, 2011, and 2012 are left in the cold. Then again, only time will tell if maybe they deserve it. ;-)
Haha, yes, that's like a D-list celebrity... no wait, probably more like Y or Z. Actually, I don't think there are enough letters in the alphabet to identify the list I'm on. ;-)
And yes, a large portion of the movie Sushine Cleaning is filmed on the block I live on, and they shot the final scene of the movie in my front door yesterday. So if you see the film, try not to get all stalkerish when you've identified the famed home of uselessness.
Hmm, those are all very awkward numbers, clearly this unit isn't part of any western measurement standards. I just wonder if it's equivalent to five of a smaller denomination in the same Japanese system. Oh well, I assume it's obsolete now?
I remember back in '99 there was a "Name the Decade" web site that took votes to decide what the "official" name would be. This word (Naughties) won. But now nobody's ever heard of the site, and apparently it didn't have much authority over such matters anyway. ;-)
Actually, I find it interesting that before 2000, decade names were common in regular speech: I always heard people talking about "the '90s" or whatever decade it was at the time. Now, not so much. Because nobody can figure out what to call this decade, nobody does. Occasionally you'll hear "the new millennium" or "the 21st century" used in that place, or in some cases even "the post-9/11 world." But it's almost as if society collectively just stopped naming decades.
I suspect we'll start again in the '20s, but that'll just seem wrong to me after experiencing much higher numbers. It's like a step backwards to me, it doesn't seem like progress or "the future." Maybe that's because it conjures up thoughts of the Roaring Twenties and I'll always associate it with talkies and flappers.
There's one of these near the Mechanics Training Institute in northern Wyoming known as Socket Tuya. Across the valley, in a historically German part of the state, is its sister volcano, Göttehandett Tuya. Local legends tell of a third one in the vicinity, known by the Navajo name Watappenhd Tuya, but every expedition that set out in search of it disappeared under mysterious circumstances.
I haven't even mentioned the one in rural Pennsylvania, Whatsit Tuya. But nobody cares about that one anyway.
I'm a legendary necromancer. I deliberately summon ghost words all the time. They shouldn't be ignored, it'll only make them feel bad. And when my ghosties feel bad, I feel bad.
Because I'm really not a fan of historical revisionism, I'd prefer that users can't edit comments left by other users. Actually, I might even add a time limit for commenting so that people can't even edit their own comments after, say, an hour. Changing things after they've been said in conversation only confuses things and shoos away whatever historicity might be lingering on the pages here. But I'm not opposed to deleting one's own comments, which can be useful, and I still think a comment ranking system (of some sort) would be nice.
Capitalization is a trickier issue than tags, I think, for words with multiple capitals in them. Particularly in the case of capitonyms: shall we have separate pages for Thanksgiving the holiday and thanksgiving the act of gratitude? And if so, what's the best way to ensure people are adding the one they think they want? Could lead to lots of head-scratching.
I agree that flags for acronyms and abbreviations would be great.
I don't know the exact rate at which he added words, but stpeter had something like 3000 words not long after the web site was created. And of course, they were all in one huge, browser-crashing list -- a little separation never hurt anybody!! ;-)
Looks good, John! But on multi-word phrases it only defines the first word (see hilarious misunderstanding for an example. Would be nice if it could either define every word in the phrase, or define the whole phrase (if it knows it), or not define anything at all.
For those who are interested, we've begun a collective novel over on Ficlets. I doubt we'll get anywhere near 50,000 words, but writing with others is more fun than going it alone (and some of us have lives that, you know, occupy our time). :-P If you have a Ficlets account, or want to sign up for a free one, feel free to join in the story.
I used to use it in reference to classic video games and the sounds they made, before the word took on the current definition. Actually I used the phrase bling bling, which was just a weird coincidence I guess.
Also, I first mistyped "reference" as "reverence," which is a sad but true Freudian slip. :-P
Yeah, I guess you could say it that way too. There is a difference between the way the two sound, but to my ears it's negligible. Maybe you speak with a dialect that makes it more pronounced?
Wait, I thought cheese was made of milk? Come to think of it, I have no idea what cheese is, except for the decidedly non-specific "dairy." Maybe that should concern me. But I eat the stuff every day, and rather like it.
There's a great scene in A Beautiful Mind where Charles, the "prodigal roommate," defenestrates the desk of a collegiate John Nash. The best part is (not to spoil the movie for those who haven't seen it) discovering what that scene really means later on.
Haha, aren't nicknames supposed to be short? Few words are as awkward to type as "uselessness," but well, you found one. I can fully understand people shortening it to just u. ;-)
That's disgusting. But why do they call it "cheese?" There's nothing cheesy about it. I hate when names of things are obviously wrong like that, it seems like intentional misdirection.
Eww, I hate that particular phrase too, because I can never remember what it means, and it has thrown my schedule into confusion on multiple occasions.
Ugh. Variation in writing is one thing; throwing around extraneous utilizes to accomplish that is another. The best way to avoid saying use over and over is to structure sentences differently, perhaps with different tenses. "Use" is so generic anyway, which makes for poor writing in the first place.
It's similar to the "be" verb rule: Always avoid using being, is, was, are, am, and been. Active voice is always preferable. Finally, if you do have to find a synonym for "use," try implement, activate, apply, or some other more descriptive verb.
Hmmm... perhaps I've found a second meaning for my username?
Okay, I'm back. Lots of Google hits. Guess my college wasn't as clever as it purported to be. But y'all will be happy to know that the fifth search result is the Wordie page. :-P
I have no idea who Eilonwy is in real life, but I wasn't personally in the college theatre group... I meant, rather, the theatre group of the college which I attended. And I watched them perform Tartuffe. I did have a friend who was in that show. Perhaps Eilonwy is my friend? Alas, s/he seems to have moved on from Wordie and I may never find out...
Nevertheless, I am going to Google Tartuffified and see what I can see.
Funny play. My college theatre group did a (modernized, I think) run of it and promoted it with fliers emblazoned with with "Get Tartuffified!" across the top.
Edit: I am surprised to see that my linked word above is already listed, which leads me to believe my college didn't, in fact, make it up. I am crestfallen.
Hey, I feel just as bad for affirming your innaccuracy about Troi! But I'm not changing my comment. It's a matter of principle. Plus, I was quoting you verbatim and somebody's gotta preserve the historical record. ;-)
You'd have to ask the Raccoonnookkeeper Association of America (RAA) about that one. Truth be told, my school isn't accredited, so individual mileage may vary. :-P
Yes. But not just fashion. I was struck with a serious case of buyer's remorse when I bought my rust-bucket of a Thunderbird recently. What was I thinking?
Yep. Do you want to make more money? Of course, we all do. All exams are take-home tests with open-ended deadlines, submitted via Wordie comments. Grades are based on a threefold rubric: creativity, plausibility, and madeupicality.
Graduation ceremony TBA, most likely it will be held in cyberspace. Thanks to a grant from a certain useless individual (who wishes to remain anonymous) tuition is free for all new students. You will be earning your M.E. degree, which certifies you as a professional Madeupical Etymologist.
How about "universal health care?" I can think of a dozen more accurate labels. Of course they involve scary concepts like socialism, but then again that's the truth. Universal means nothing but bread and circuses for everyone, which, come to think of it, sounds rather nice. ;-)
You reminded me of a Snopes page(warning: offensive racial language) about unfortunate-baby-name urban legends. This one is included there, along with the famous Latrine and Pajama. Also mentioned is Ima Hogg, recently discussed here.
That's a good point. "Illegal immigration" is a perfectly valid term; labeling the people who do it as "illegal immigrants," not so much. Of course, it loses its subtlety when you start hearing them referred to as just illegals. To some, it seems, that's their defining characteristic. To the point of nouning them that way.
Here's a curiosity I just found about the name of the LPA: "Originally to be called 'Midgets of America,' the folks who could afford to attend the early meetings were as likely to be non-midgets as midgets. So a compromise was made to call the group 'Midgets and Dwarfs of America' (notice who came first). It didn't take long, however, for the fledgling members to notice that the non-midgets (by P.T. Barnum's standards) were greatly out-numbering the midgets. So a second compromise was struck to call the group 'Little People of America.'" Quoted from this page.
Note the distinction between dwarfs and midgets, which is meant to differentiate between little people who have childlike proportions, and those who have "normal" adult proportions. Medically speaking, the two have today come to be recognized as simply different variations of dwarfism.
It seems the notorious showman P.T. Barnum is credited with popularizing the word midget, which applies a suffix to midge (a small fly). Its offensiveness is debatable, and there are plenty of people with dwarfism who even prefer to be identified by that word. It's also used to describe any small object or trinket. There are also those who find dwarf to be an empowering label rather than pejorative, and advocate for its use.
I look it up because I'm bored, and mildly curious. ;-)
That's a whole other issue altogether -- today's definitions of "conservative" and "liberal" are a good deal different from those of a hundred years ago. In the past few decades alone there's been a dramatic shift. To a certain degree, the two ends of the spectrum appear to have completely swapped positions several times in history, yet from another angle they are actually pretty similar to each other in approach today (they disagree over various issues, but not in how to enact the changes they desire).
Hmm, according to the internets there's an organization called LPA, or Little People of America. The medical condition they represent is formally known as dwarfism, but it seems they reject the word dwarf as a noun. They prefer "people with dwarfism," or the aforementioned "little people" as a more light-hearted reference. Their web site also mentions the "short-statured community," which is going on a list of mine posthaste.
Additionally, there is a Restricted Growth Association in the U.K., which suggests different terminology is used across the pond.
That's a good one too, is there a counterpart on the conservative side? Maybe traditional, but that doesn't have quite the same strong implications as "if you're not a liberal, you're AGAINST progress!" :-) It would be nice if advocacy groups on all sides of the political spectrum could embrace a little truth-in-advertising.
I'm not clear on what the accepted alternative is. Isn't dwarf rather demeaning as well? I've also heard little people but I would consider that even worse. I'm not big into political correctness, but I've always felt awkward about using the words I've heard, because if I were short of stature any of them would offend me. And short of stature or just short are better, but inaccurate.
I just love how rhetoric-steeped both of them are: if you're not pro-life, you must be anti-life, or pro-death, and if you're not pro-choice you must be anti-choice or perhaps pro-slavery. I do wish people could be objective and not have to propagandize all the labels. Only confuses the masses, really. If only to a certain degree, making it harder to put oneself in the shoes of the opposing side because of the vilification.
Actually, the word chasing refers to the pursuit of pleasure. Similar to the modern-day pleasure cruise, which is much slower than one might expect from "cruising." Of course the root of such phrases stems from Solomon's book of wisdom, Ecclesiastes, in which he declares that "everything is vanity, a chasing after the wind," inexorably tying the pleasures of the world to the breeze, and by extension, sailboats.
I don't think Ima has ever been a nice name. I've only ever heard it in jokes about terrible ones. Is it short for a traditional name, or was it just invented for the sake of bad puns?
Rita: What's wrong with the Groundhog Festival? In San Diego, I covered the swallows returning to Capistrano six years.
Phil: Someday somebody will see me interviewing a groundhog, and think I don't have a future.
Rita: I think it's a nice story. He comes out, and he looks around. He wrinkles up his little nose. He sees his shadow or he doesn't see it, it's nice. People like it.
Phil: You are new, aren't you? People like blood sausage too. People are morons.
That's okay, teaching others the basic tags is pretty much the cross I've borne for years as punishment for learning HTML in 1995. I don't even think about it anymore. I build web sites in my sleep. :-P
That explains it! I remember a while back when somebody (reesetee, I think) noticed that the text on the home page said Wirdee, and assumed it was some April Fools joke or something. Shortly thereafter it seemed to correct itself, and we never did get closure... ;-)
Edit: I just looked up the word page for Wirdee and it seems I was wise to things even back then!
Don't worry, it's not like it'll run out of room or anything. Space is big. You just won't believe how vastly, hugely, mind-bogglingly big it is. I mean, you may think it's a long way down the road to the chemist's, but that's just peanuts to space.
It was certainly a step up from the TOS uniforms and their sparkly chest stickers... though I don't know that using the bathroom needed to be a factor. Everybody knows that in the future there are no bathrooms; you just beam the waste out from your body and into space. No muss, no fuss.
Isn't that an oxymoron? The whole point of flash mobs is that they're spontaneous and random, and they dissolve just as suddenly as they form. But don't people usually plan far ahead for conferences, and then stick around once they've begun?
Crazy logic those rom coms have! I admit having been tempted to do mean things ("accidents," of course) to various cute girls I've known, in hopes that real life would turn out to be just like a movie. But alas, real life ain't.
Hey, that's a very good connection, skipvia! That phrase never did make sense to me. But I've gotta say, what a despicable deed is this bishoping. I'm not exactly what you might call an "animal person," but this sounds incredibly cruel even to me. Then again, I think I have an abnormal fear of scraping/filing body parts: teeth, toenails, elbowbones, jawbones... yeesh...
You have emerged victorious from Identify the Wordie. You are an astute observer of people on the internet! I mean that in a good way! Make sure to come back for the next game so you can retain your title, champion.
This comment is your trophy. Display it with love for all the world to see.
You have emerged victorious from Identify the Wordie. You are an astute observer of people on the internet! I mean that in a good way! Make sure to come back for the next game so you can retain your title, champion.
This comment is your trophy. Display it with love for all the world to see.
You have emerged victorious from Identify the Wordie. You are an astute observer of people on the internet! I mean that in a good way! Make sure to come back for the next game so you can retain your title, champion.
This comment is your trophy. Display it with love for all the world to see.
If you're looking for a good introduction, a lot of people have found this video (Flash) to be a terrific overview. It's pretty short too. The nice thing about libertarianism is it's grounded in basic principles and is consistent in every situation, and the video explains what they are in a no-nonsense way. :-)
I suddenly just got the mental picture of John sitting in a large control room, surrounded by knobs and switches, occasionally pulling random levers, and passing the time by watching our respective odometers with breathless anticipation. ;-)
Mr. Cooper, apparently. That is, according to Wikipedia. Oh, and Jim Cramer is also partially to blame. It's a corruption of booyeah, which I guess is a corruption of boo! Yeah! Or something.
*WARNING: Etymologies in mirror are most likely more madeupical than they appear*
Sad but true. There are a lot of good political-type words that I wish I could cling to, but their definitions have shifted and they now have negative connotations. Oh well. That's language, right? ;-)
Awkwardly, yes. Conservative and liberal are weird words that have changed meanings so many times over the years that they're hard to pin down meanings for today. Libertarianism can be defined both as "traditional conservatism" and as "classical liberalism." Some people say that we're economically conservative and socially liberal, but even that's hard to quantify. When I refer to myself as a conservative, I'm referring to my positions on limited government, which used to be a mainstay of conservatism but is seldom seen in the Republican party today. Nowadays the GOP is all about neoconservativism, which is another beast altogether.
As for the "compassionate" part, it's a common misconception that libertarianism is uncompassionate. I hear it all the time and it's really annoying because it stems from not understanding the principles of liberty. Once a person discovers what liberty is really all about, it becomes clear that libertarianism is the most altruistic political position, and arguable the most compassionate as well.
I love to think about philosophy but don't like reading it. One of the few "greats" that I've spent any time on at all was Thoreau, who espoused a similar view of the evils of civilization. He was very poetic, which is nice, but he was still wrong. :-P
Haha, that's alright, I think there are about six or seven versions of this word on the site, but only one (the one I linked to) is "correct." Not that correctness really matters here, since it's admittedly a joke word, but whatever. ;-)
The phrase based on refers to the basis of something. If someone writes a book on the basis of factual events, the book is "based on a true story."
I think the new, mangled idiom assumes that the root word is base, i.e., the bottom surface of something, or a floor. The floor serves as a "launching point" for new content, which leaps "off of" it. So in the example above, the book is not entirely true, but it uses reality as its anchor as it explores new dramatic possibilities. Not to justify the new phrase, which is really awkward to say. And besides that, this etymological study, as usual, is totally madeupical.
I'm also late. But I agree, too. It's John's site, and he should always have the last word in iffy situations like this one. I think he ought to reserve the right to censor even text in extreme situations, at his own discretion. We're a very good-natured community here, and I think the closest we've come to such a point was one offensive list that caught some attention back in the day.
Considering that's the worst/most controversial incident that I'm aware of, we're in pretty good shape. But the nature of this kind of site makes it ripe for abuse, and John should be prepared to take action should it become necessary. I'm not a fan of frivolous habitual censorship, of course, but it must be an option in some rare situations.
I prefer the name curds and whey. Perfectly sums up the congealed chunky-runniness of the food. Wait, food? No, it's not food at all. It's barely edible fungus.
(A note from Reese: Keith used to only eat four things - meat, bread, cheese, and candy. Then I made him go to this Chinese restaurant with me and he started eating vegetables. Now, he's gone way overboard and WON'T eat meat at all, and he goes to all these war protests. And he burns incense and wears a muumuu. Okay, maybe it's just a dress.)
(A note from Keith: Hey, I look good in that dress.)
Before Orbitz the dotcom travel agency, there was Orbitz the drink. It was fruit-flavored, and thick nearly to the point of gelatin. The drink was clear, with many little colored globs perfectly suspended throughout it. The drink was strongly disliked and went out of production shortly after it launched. It could be considered a precursor to today's bubble tea.
Hey johayrae! The site doesn't have a "purpose" per se -- it's just a place to talk about words. We're very laid-back here and a lot more fun than you'd expect a bunch of grammarians and wordinistas to be.
You can make lists of words (or phrases) and categorize them however you like... words you love, hate, words that remind you of New Zealand, whatever. :-) Check out lists made by other people, share ideas, tell jokes. Though words are our foundation we end up talking about pretty much everything eventually. It's a fun site to just dork out on.
I think Boba is just the brand name of the local company that sells it here. But that's what my friends call it. The strangest drink I've had since Orbitz.
Good call on rapprochemental, I corrected the spelling. And maybe for future guesses, just pick one word per person or it'll be hard to find a winner. :-P
Most every time I hear the phrase, it's used in one of two ways: it's either substituting for might, or it's substituting for could. In those situations, I get the impression the speaker doesn't know which one is correct, so he goes with both just to cover all the bases. That's BAD.
But to be fair, there are other times it's used as an abbreviated form of "might be able to" and that's a little more acceptable. Grammatically atrocious, of course, but shorthand is reasonable in response to a mouthful of a phrase.
Okay, I think I get it. Because ayuntar means "to join" or "to meet," I see how it could be taken either way. Similar to the word intercourse in English, which originally meant "discussion" but has come mean "coitus" in most every case. Also similar are conjugation and union.
Sure beats Sega, which is an abbreviation for "Service Games," or Sony, which is Japanese slang for "child prodigy," or Microsoft, which means "small and mushy."
I'm not super-attached to the embedded media thing. I like finding the occasional YouTube video on a word page because it often adds context (see: like) but it's true that it breaks the flow of the text we've come to expect. And a link would be nearly as effective, anyway. However, without embedded media, we wouldn't have earworm, which may or may not be a good thing.
Ah, that could be. I don't read much of anything. :-P Mostly non-fiction these days, anyway. But yeah, I expect the motif is present in more than two movies, I just couldn't find any specific examples.
As the first person to ever embed media on Wordie, of course I'm a little biased... but I do like having the ability to post that kind of stuff. :-P
However, I'm probably at odds with everyone else here when I say that I would appreciate some color and design elements around the site. I mean, it's perfectly functional as-is (and I love it!) but a little on the bland side for my tastes. Just because we're pro-words doesn't mean we have to be anti-everything else. Now, the only reason I've brought this up is that embedded media would not seem nearly so out-of-place on a more colorful site; I think it's only because of the simpler design we currently have that their presence seems a little jarring.
Maybe the motif isn't as common as I thought. Some Googling tells me it was used in The Godfather and Children of Men, but maybe those are the only places? And perhaps not in books at all. Oh well, still interesting irregardless.
Hey! It's something I've on-and-off-again wanted, but never bugged you about it directly because you have so many other things on your plate. But yeah, if you made it, I wouldn't complain. ;-)
No, oranges do. In literature, the appearance of an orange often signals that something really awful is about to happen. It's a kind of foreshadowing, or something.
Hey Jen! (Yikes, now there's two Jens around here *tries not to get confused*)
So there's really no way to send private messages on Wordie yet, but yeah, a note on a profile is cool. Thanks for the kind words! I also enjoy rummaging through your letter-lists and finding nuggets of randomness. :-D
Of course, had you never posted that comment, we never would have come here, and the need for an alert would never have existed. I think you're feigning care by "warning" us of earworms, but in reality hoping beyond hope that the dreaded beast will infect every last one of us with unending musicality. Thanks, bub.
I guess that would be a matter of opinion. They may have thought that it's not immediately clear how to pronounce Danone ("dan OWN"? "dah NUN"?) and decided to go with something more phonetic in English. It's perfectly clear, this way, that it's meant to rhyme with cannon. To my ears, it connotes strength and vitality; that is some tough yogurt! Contrast that with their primary competitor, Yoplait, which sounds foofy and pretty and French. :-P
Ahh, brilliant, John, I'll keep that in mind next time I make an on-Wordie link!
So yeah, lots of ideas here to consider... but in the meantime, perhaps a good priority is pagination on any page where comments can go? Because the active ones (like, say this page) fill up fast, and that's a lot of scrolling. AJAX and pagination go together like birds of a feather, so a little XMLHttpRequest magic could do wonders. ;-)
Agreed, they should be consistent, I would think. But I don't really like the two forms you cited, personally, because x-ing is what you see on railroad crossing signs, and so I just head-pronounce it crossing. And x ing is totally weird: where else do you find a space between a verb and its -ing suffix? That can't be right!
Yes, as you've defined those pronunciations, although I usually pronounce a hard "G" in iguana. I'm entirely gringo and only say marijuana with a strong accent when I'm in the right (read: silly) mood. All other times I sound much more uncultured and American. ;-)
I'm also opposed to favoriting users, but I don't think favoriting comments is bad. At least on MetaFilter (my inspiration for the idea) there's no sense of competition. The "favorites" aren't really worth anything, except as a placemark to return to good conversation points. It has the side benefit of encouraging people to post substantial comments, though "substantial" remains plenty vague so it could mean educational or weird or funny or whatever. It's very free-form.
I love all the "conversations" lists but I think it's only a short-term solution for keeping track of good stuff. I'm just looking for better ways to do that, and while favoriting comments may or may not help, maybe there are other things that will work better in the long-term. Wordie's getting bigger, and faster, and more complicated, and anything that improves the way it's organized is a big plus in my book.
So here's an idea I just had. At the moment, we can create lists of words. But what if we could make lists of other things too? For example, lists of lists. Lists of tags. Lists of users. Lists of comments. I think that would add many layers of interconnectivity, and provide new ways to organize stuff as well.
Finally, John, how the heck did you link to a list page without the icon showing up after it?
The philosophy of liberty transcends politics. It is about maximizing the natural rights of all people equally. According to libertarianism, every human being is born with three inherent rights:
1. Ability to own property. A person's belongings are the fruit of his labor (and the product of rights #2 and #3), therefore control over his property is the way to retain the meaning of his past. To take a person's property without his consent is theft.
2. Personal freedom, or liberty. Every individual carries the responsibility of self-ownership and self-determination; only he may make the decisions of where he will go, what he will do, and how he will live his life. Liberty represents the worth of one's present. To take a person's liberty without his consent is slavery.
3. Life. No human being is entitled to harm or take the life of another, because a person's life represents hope for the future. To deprive someone of life without his consent is murder.
These three rights are the foundation of healthy society and may never be infringed by anyone, under any circumstance. Any additional "rights" that do infringe on the three rights listed above are not really rights at all. Additionally, laws which cause any of those rights to be infringed are immoral laws and should be opposed.
The three cornerstone rights listed above form an invaluable gift that every person possesses in equal quantities. Libertarianism is about defending that gift from anyone who would take it from another by force. In many cases, the enemy of individual rights is the common thug; in many others it is a tyrannical government. Regardless of the circumstance, there is never any justification for violating other humans' rights. In modern democracies, libertarians stand against the tyranny of the majority to prevent the rights of the minority from being unwillingly wrested away.
Libertarianism is an oft-ridiculed, oft-misunderstood philosophy, but a highly principled one as well. For a more detailed explanation, you may be interested in watching this short video.
Person 2: "I agree, rain is wonderful. Nice and wet."
Person 1: "(Of course/By the way), while I enjoy the wetness, I hate the dark sky rain brings."
Person 2: "I'll, uh, make a note of that."
Okay, it's a stretch. They're similar, though not fully interchangeable. I concede this battle to you, but not without a whole lot of points scored for my team first. ;-)
LOL, nice way of diagramming it. :-) I just wish accent marks weren't so tricky to type. I'm not usually one to deliberately misspell things out of laziness, but I admit in the case of avoiding unusual characters, I'm pretty notorious.
I like to think of it as a spiritual battle royale, starring Jesus and Satan as luchadores in a ginormous wrestling ring of fire. And the devil done got his hide whupped something fierce.
Correcting for unhealthy psychological frameworks in one's mind by deconstructing them and replacing them with normal ones. The term usually refers to the process needed to extract a loved from an abusive cult that indoctrinates followers. It is also a staple of post-traumatic counseling, and of helping harrowed soldiers recover from shell shock or brainwashing that they may have endured as prisoners of war.
Unlearning is needed to excel in a lot of fields, because it leads to "thinking outside the box." See also: deprogramming for a related concept of mind-renewal.
Fascinating. Who would have thought that such an old technology term would still be so relevant today? Well, it's old with regards to the internet/computer revolution, anyway.
Sounds like it could be short for either word, seeing as how one is a noun and one is a verb. I mean heck, isn't divide really just the verb form of dividend anyway?
I use my pinky toe! You know, for counting. Four toes on a foot would be wrong wrong wrong. But when I hear this word, I also think of the appendix, and tonsils. :-)
I have to wonder about people who go out of their way to insert unnecessary punctuation. It's easier to type your than you're! It's easier to type locals than local's! It's a two-for-one deal: save yourself the trouble of typing extra characters, AND get the added bonus of being correct. Who wouldn't want that?
A frightened part of me suspects that these people assume using more letters and punctuation marks equals being more grammatically intelligent. Like refusing to acknowledge that its really is the possessive form of it, because it's not as "complete" as it could be.
You know, it really is a pretty word. Guess it depends on how you pronounce it. Gotta use a strong fake accent and exaggerate the H sound: "mahdeeHHUUWWanna!"
Here in New Mexico (that is, provided I'm really located there) we have a popular dish called huevosrancheros. If the slang connotation is so strong in Spanish, I wonder if that name is intended as innuendo. Seems innocent enough in the literal sense. There's got to be a way to order eggs without implying something else, right?
I'm always late to these parties, but here's my two cents. I like my Wordie existential. You know, so it just is what it is.
Maybe it's my pseudonym taking over, but I think attempts to make the site more useful are not so good. At least academically speaking. I'm all in favor of making it more usable, and more efficient to do what we already do. But let's not kid ourselves that we're making some kind of purposeful dictionary/Wikipedia clone. That may be right for Lingoz, but it's not who we are. Wordie is primarily about fun (vis-Ã -vis word appreciation, admittedly).
Yes, the site is educational. But mostly in the "gosh, I wasn't planning to learn that today but I'm glad I did" way. There's no way to differentiate between fun comments and informative comments, and comments are frequently both. Often a regular definition comment will spawn a whole conversation that could be considered "fun" or "off-topic" but is also thought-provoking and enlightening. We should make no attempts to corral comments into one category or another. In my opinion.
On the other hand, I'd be up for other ways to add value to comments. Perhaps comment-favoriting? MetaFilter has a nice way to both give kudos for good contributions to a discussion and save them for recall later. Favorited comments are noted with a little "14 users marked this comment as a favorite" blurb. Food for thought.
I just want to say, though I've heard the tune for years I never knew the lyrics. This is one bizarre, hilarious song, and the fact that Verse 6 mentions Albuquerque makes it even better. Granted, my Spanish is muy terrible but I liked the parts I could figure out.
Even in English, there's crossover there. I mean, should the phrase "of course" literally mean what we use it for? I'm pretty sure it's a shortened form of "it's a matter of course," meaning that the course of logic inevitably leads to some obvious conclusion. But the same phrase is also often used to mean "by the way" in colloquial speech; it's a conversational segue that refers to the same "course of logic," which in this case will lead the discussion into a natural transition. Similar to the way indeed is used, or in olden days, verily.
For more examples of this kind of phrasal crossover in slang, see duh and eh. ;-)
I like it because it's just a bunch of vowels, preceded by the bizarrest letter in the alphabet. Plus, it should be impossible to pronounce but is instead deceptively easy.
Agreed, to my knowledge there's not an honest man in Washington except Ron Paul. Would be nice to see him become president, if only for the breath of fresh air to make the corruption more bearable everywhere else.
I learned to say it fast back in third grade, and thought I had "arrived" in the world of intelligence. After a while I realized that doing so is an impressive -- but hollow -- way to dork out, and serves little purpose beside that. It's also an extremely effective way to make your friends think you're a pretentious snot. :-P
Hmm. Not sure about that. It's probably heavier than plain dirt, but I imagine there were plenty of unmined heavy metals underground. There's probably no way to calculate which would be heavier.
It's called "Popcorn," originally recorded by the band Hot Butter. Because of its notoriety as an obnoxious earworm, it's been covered probably more than any other song ever. There are so many versions floating around, it's not even funny. Here are 79 of them you can download. I have no idea what version is playing on this page, they're all the same to me. More information (and still more versions to download) available here.
So I'm curious. When all the continents were together on one side of the earth, wouldn't that off-centeredness have caused the planet to rotate in a wobbly fashion? That's a lot of weight in one place. And if so, would it affect our orbit around the sun? I'm assuming not, in frictionless space. Still, makes you wonder.
I'm going to assume that's a BTTF reference, reesetee, and no one's a bigger BTTF dork than me. Therefore, I must correct your years to 1955 and 2015. ;-)
There really isn't a problem with transporters. Safety mechanisms like the aforementioned pattern buffers and Heisenberg compensators have made the risk negligible. Beaming down to a planet surface is far safer than piloting a shuttlecraft down there, and has been for several hundred years (we're in the 24th century, right?).
Occasionally you'll have some freak thing happen, like a duplicate you running around, or you turn into a ghost, or you discover that old crewmen have been hiding in suspended animation for years in the matter stream. Or any number of other weird anomalies. But for the most part, it's perfectly safe. The major limitations are the 40,000 km range, the fact that you can't transport through raised shields or during warp travel. Certain hacks have overcome some of those, but can't be relied upon in everyday use.
Free Rice! Not for you, silly, for starving people around the world. All you have to do is show your vocabluaric prowess (no shortage of that around here), and you can help end hunger.
Exactly 1/16? I'm not sure that race can be calculated that specifically. Besides, I'd expect that most people have some small portion of every race in their blood. That is, providing race even exists at all.
Hmm, I'm not sure about pattern loss on a trip through a planet. You're probably right. But the transporter doesn't only work line-of-sight either. I assume there's a threshold of several meters of matter that you could beam through safely, more or less depending on what the material is. My guess is that if you wanted to transport from one point on the earth's surface to another, you'd only be able to go a little further than the horizon; eventually the planet's curvature becomes an issue.
Of course, that's assuming you're using the wireless protocol they install on starships. That's pretty impractical on land. I expect you could send the signal through the internet on earth, and get just about anywhere there's web access.
You can't transport things long-range because the pattern will degrade. Transporters have a maximum range of 40,000 km, which is nothing in the hugeness of space.
Dating Deanna Troi would be a field trip to hell. Besides the mind-reading, her emotional sensitivity makes her a regular drama queen. And then there's her mother. I don't envy Riker.
A clever edit, reesetee, changing the name there, so future generations of Wordies will read this page and think I'm the crazy one...which I am, but that's beside the point.
Holy crap, you're lucky I wasn't around last night. Few men have said those kinds of things to my face and... um... avoided rumors being spread about their mothers behind their backs.
Rule #1 of Wordie: Don't ban uselessness.
Rule #2 of Wordie: Conventional books are overrated.
Rule #3 of Wordie: You don't have to be as smart as uselessness, if you make up for it with commentiness.
I need to watch that DVD again. A friend of mine held a "screening" of it a few years ago, and I forgot how funny it was! Of course, if I had the opportunity to see it live... well screw the DVD. ;-)
Comments by uselessness
Show previous 200 comments...
uselessness commented on the word einsteinium
Well, who doesn't? I mean, if that's the criterion, we might as well call it everybodybuteinsteinium.
December 18, 2007
uselessness commented on the word listmaster
The creator/owner of a Wordie list. Especially helpful in the age of collaborative listing.
December 18, 2007
uselessness commented on the word features
What bilby and mollusque suggested. Also, I'd like to voice my disappointment that a listmaster (i.e., creator/owner of a list) can no longer be determined at a glance by the list URL. I always found it handy to look up at the location bar to find out who's responsible for the page I'm reading, particularly if there are multiple people involved in the discussion there. Under the new format, I have to scroll all the way back to the top of the page.
December 18, 2007
uselessness commented on the word matrimpostor
A fake bride or groom, intended to deceive his or her counterpart in the wedding (and the guests), resulting in a rather embarrassing case of oopsigamy.
December 18, 2007
uselessness commented on the word opsigamy
Don't you hate it when you get duped by a matrimpostor at the altar?
December 18, 2007
uselessness commented on the word tsar
Haha! I scratched my head about those two totally different spellings for years! :-P
December 18, 2007
uselessness commented on the word han't
I'm with bilby. Problem is, when it's spelled like that, I'm more likely to pronounce it "haint."
December 18, 2007
uselessness commented on the word perfect-bound
It doesn't seem so "perfect" when the glue starts to come apart and the pages fall out... ;-)
December 18, 2007
uselessness commented on the word cougargamy
I make ghosts. It's what I do.
December 18, 2007
uselessness commented on the word ipecacuanha
Oh, I see. Monkey Island is much more, uh, vernacular, in its description of plants. ;-)
December 18, 2007
uselessness commented on the word qzerty
Sounds like a list to me -- Dvorak, anyone?
December 18, 2007
uselessness commented on the word am
Also, Ante Meridiem (the period between midnight and noon) and Amplitude Modulation (one of two standard techniques for transmitting information via radio waves).
December 17, 2007
uselessness commented on the word features
Surprises await me on Wordie this week! I must be digging into this stuff...
December 17, 2007
uselessness commented on the word hs
Abbreviation for high school.
December 17, 2007
uselessness commented on the list oh-puck
Hmm, how about Phoenix Wright's sidekick, Maya Fey? Or Big Bird's sidekick, Mr. Snuffleupagus? Or Satan's sidekick, Bill Gates?
December 17, 2007
uselessness commented on the word aluminum
See also: aluminium.
December 17, 2007
uselessness commented on the word einsteinium
They're renaming this one, because as it turns out, Albert Einstein wasn't nearly so amazingly smart. Starting in 2010 this element will be known as uselessnessium.
December 17, 2007
uselessness commented on the word backspaceware
Now THAT is lame.
December 17, 2007
uselessness commented on the word cougargamy
Marriage between an older woman and a much younger man.
December 17, 2007
uselessness commented on the word anilojuvenogamy
Also known as cougargamy.
December 17, 2007
uselessness commented on the word antithetical
I'm pretty logical (and stuff). ;-)
December 17, 2007
uselessness commented on the word ipecacuanha
Nah, anyone who's ever played The Curse of Monkey Island knows that all you need to make syrup of ipecac is an ipecac flower and a bottle of maple syrup. The two combine splendidly.
December 17, 2007
uselessness commented on the word gala
I always thought this word should be pronounced "GAA luh" or maybe "GAH luh," but "GAY luh" sounded wrong to me. Then, WordNET cleared it up, and all is well again.
December 17, 2007
uselessness commented on the word tinker
I'm not sure about that, but one probably wouldn't want to be a tinker without a tinkerbell around. To stay alert, or something.
December 15, 2007
uselessness commented on the word antithetical
I shall have to join this cartel. I expect my blog will be a prime candidate, once I, you know, start writing it again.
December 15, 2007
uselessness commented on the word dear john
Um. I'm just here to say one thing:
See also: John Deere.
That's all. Harry Dunne made me do it.
December 15, 2007
uselessness commented on the list proof-that-marketers-are-idiots
I would favorite this list, but I really can't bring myself to do it.
December 15, 2007
uselessness commented on the word boomlet
Perhaps this refers to the world's smallest nuclear explosion or the effects of the atomic toaster?
Anyone? Anyone? Bueller?
December 15, 2007
uselessness commented on the list oh-puck
bilby, you're terrible. In a good way, of course. ;-)
December 15, 2007
uselessness commented on the list contest-match-the-onomatopoeia
I like this game. If I had more time, I would play. And I'm sure it will be over by the time I get back here next. :-(
December 15, 2007
uselessness commented on the word hui
Don't mess with the Hui, they're not the types you want to mess with.
Don't mess with the Hui, or else you're gonna get your butts kicked.
- The W's
December 15, 2007
uselessness commented on the word horslips
I have one of their albums. Despite the odd name, it's pretty decent music. :-P
December 15, 2007
uselessness commented on the word tinker
It can't make mistakes. It's a machine, that's not its way. Clearly, you're confusing it with its cousin, WrongNET.
December 15, 2007
uselessness commented on the word fiat
bilby, what's that article about? By the way, that's the third definition of fiat on this page, for those keeping score at home.
December 15, 2007
uselessness commented on the word annus horribilis
Literally "horrible year." Reminds me of Alexander and the Terrible, Horrible, No Good, Very Bad Day.
December 15, 2007
uselessness commented on the word danger: avoid death
See also: SafeNow.org
December 15, 2007
uselessness commented on the word danger: avoid death
Thanks for the tip. I will start avoiding death now. Your advice is most helpful.
December 15, 2007
uselessness commented on the word demurred
I have a new favorite Tom Swiftie.
December 15, 2007
uselessness commented on the word does things with birds
Yeah, if anyone is, it's bilby... ;-)
December 15, 2007
uselessness commented on the word abracadabra
Is there an echo in here?
December 14, 2007
uselessness commented on the word cleavagram
This thread is decidedly morbid. From now on, I've decided, it refers to the family of one Beaver. There, aren't we all happier for it? Now put that knife away.
December 14, 2007
uselessness commented on the word theocon
Won't somebody please think of the children words!!
December 14, 2007
uselessness commented on the word fangornhails
See: fingernails.
December 14, 2007
uselessness commented on the word anagram
Hmmm...
Anaerobic Dunce Herders?
Burdened Cocaine Sharer?
Cancerous Reared Behind?
Caddie Nurse Abhorrence?
Bread Endurance Heroics?
Bra Redundancies Cohere?
Burros Hernia Decadence?
Reader Heard Concubines?
Hardened Cubic Reasoner?
Bacon Researched, Ruined? (OH NO!)
December 14, 2007
uselessness commented on the word paper-use
Haha, reminds me of my boss at the company where I maintain the corporate web site...
Him: "Print out every page of the site, I'll write the changes I want on the printouts and give them to you, and then you can type what I wrote and upload the revisions."
Me: "How about if I just e-mail you the digital files and let you modify them in Word? Then you can e-mail them back to me."
Him: "But I want to use Sharpies and highlighters in lots of pretty colors!"
Me: "Word has bold text and lots of pretty colors."
Him: "Oh? Really? Show me."
December 14, 2007
uselessness commented on the list snoopy
Sheesh. Fine, I get the "50-word list genre" thing. That's cool. Just don't call it "forced closure." And, um, I think you have to put "in 50 words" in the list title. Rules is rules. :-P
December 14, 2007
uselessness commented on the word fiat
Fair enough, kewpid. I don't know where you live, but my particular government tends to lean more towards slow, bureaucratic, and inept, and away from almighty. ;-)
December 14, 2007
uselessness commented on the word patriotic snowman
Yay! If I buy two, can I get a free Jingoistic Snowman?
December 14, 2007
uselessness commented on the list snoopy
Yeah, what's with the contrived word limit? We don't "force closure" around here! That is so unWordie!!
December 14, 2007
uselessness commented on the word anagram
I like. A lot. Though I have to wonder how I've struck you as crude...
December 14, 2007
uselessness commented on the word anagram
Beach_Rained
Carbine_Head
Ache_Brained
Bean_Chaired
A Race_Behind
Cheer_Din, Baa
Bed_Chi Arena
Hard_Ice Bean
Bare_Acne Hid
Each_Dare Bin
Be Each_Drain
Rabid_Cane, Eh
Earache_Bind
Benched_Aria
Behead_Cairn
A Beach_Diner
(Okay, so I added spaces and commas liberally. Sue me.)
December 14, 2007
uselessness commented on the word cleavagram
Who exactly are you trying to get, skipvia? Should somebody warn her?
December 14, 2007
uselessness commented on the word theocon
I'm afraid to ask. Every year brings new surprises.
December 14, 2007
uselessness commented on the word use less ness
GOOD GRIEF. :-P
December 14, 2007
uselessness commented on the word theocon
A theocratic neocon.
December 14, 2007
uselessness commented on the word anagram
Morbid, but painless. Don't be coining awesome new words and not linking them, you!!
December 14, 2007
uselessness commented on the word fiat
Well, yes. Likely it was worth more than unbacked money... ;-)
December 14, 2007
uselessness commented on the word anagram
Hmm, I guess they are rather endangered, aren't they? Gosh, now I'll never be able to look at my username the same way again...
December 14, 2007
uselessness commented on the word anagram
So it seems the best anagram of uselessness is "senseless us."
December 14, 2007
uselessness commented on the word poke
And through Facebook. I never said I liked it! ;-)
December 14, 2007
uselessness commented on the word fiat
Money that has no inherent value, only perceived value held by those who exchange it. When people realize that all of their wealth is represented by worthless pieces of paper, their confidence in the currency collapses, and so does the currency itself. The alternative is commodity-backed currency, the most common of which is known as the gold standard. Nobel laureate Milton Friedman was a vocal critic of fiat money, along with other notable economists like Ludwig von Mises and Murray Rothbard.
December 14, 2007
uselessness commented on the word literature
Or perhaps figuratively?
December 14, 2007
uselessness commented on the word poke
No wonder I'm never hungry.
December 14, 2007
uselessness commented on the word hype man
Yay!
December 14, 2007
uselessness commented on the word undinist
That's so gross. I'm leaving this page and never coming back.
December 14, 2007
uselessness commented on the word hype man
Here 'tis.
December 13, 2007
uselessness commented on the word mc
Master of Ceremonies. Alternately, Microphone Controller. Also a common Scottish surname prefix, and the first initials of artist M.C. Escher.
December 13, 2007
uselessness commented on the word hype man
A back-up vocalist in a hip-hop group. Usually this means working the crowd to keep the energy going, and freestyling about how ill the "star" is. In other words, the hype man is the annoying sidekick.
December 13, 2007
uselessness commented on the word bint
Are they of the moistened variety?
December 13, 2007
uselessness commented on the list do-the-locomotion
I like it! Still looking for gallop, step, hike, and traverse. :-)
December 13, 2007
uselessness commented on the word manifesto
Ouch. That's a chilling quote. Chilling because it's so true.
December 13, 2007
uselessness commented on the word alack
Ihave alack ofspaces betweenwords.
December 13, 2007
uselessness commented on the word as useful as a screen-door on a submarine
Nah, it's more like a broken interrobang.
December 13, 2007
uselessness commented on the list bird-wirds-nicknames
Somehow I knew my lists, none of which include birds or sports, were useless. Carry on.
December 13, 2007
uselessness commented on the list extraordinary-ordinals
This is totally a man-who story, but a friend of mine told me about third nerds. Apparently at the Christian college she attended, the administration had some particularly strict rules regarding male-female fraternization. Whenever a couple went off-campus together, a mutual friend was required to accompany them and make sure everything stayed on the up-and-up. I'm guessing the use of third nerd to describe such a friend is purely colloquial, not an "official" college phrase.
My friend explained this to me with surprise that I had never heard the term before. Supposedly it's quite common to describe someone who awkwardly tags along during a date. But I have no firsthand knowledge of its use. Still, I like it. :-)
December 12, 2007
uselessness commented on the word as useful as a screen-door on a submarine
I wish I had. I'm a huge BttF nerd. :-P
But I can't STAND the writing/editing culture of Wikipedia, and I avoid doing anything but reading the darn thing. Occasionally I'll anonymously correct a typo or punctuation error, but only because my pedantry cannot be tamed.
December 12, 2007
uselessness commented on the word as useful as a screen-door on a submarine
I love that the very joke I quoted here (or very bad joke, as it were) is also listed on that Wikipedia page. Who'da thunk it?
December 12, 2007
uselessness commented on the list extraordinary-ordinals
First look? Third nerd? Second life?
December 11, 2007
uselessness commented on the list comparative-utility
How about as useful as a solar-powered flashlight?
December 11, 2007
uselessness commented on the word as useful as a screen-door on a submarine
Or if you're Biff Tannen, as useful as a screen-door on a battleship. Now make like a tree and get out of here!!
December 11, 2007
uselessness commented on the word mulgara
Aww geez, you guys... *blush*
December 11, 2007
uselessness commented on the word rightshore
Oh, I've decided catching up is hopeless. If I left any direct queries unanswered, please try not to hate me. :-)
December 11, 2007
uselessness commented on the word as much use as a hedgehog in a condom factory
I don't know about all that, but I'm certainly crying out for one, at least.
December 11, 2007
uselessness commented on the word man-who story
Do most logical people think in terms of those kinds of structured rules? I consider myself extremely logical but spelling it all out in a step-by-step tautology is a terrific bore. In my mind, either something makes sense or it doesn't; I don't need to run through a checklist of conditions to evaluate it. I had assumed I was normal in that regard...
December 11, 2007
uselessness commented on the word rightshore
No, no, no, it's quite simple really. Those last five are what is known as wrongshore.
(I keed, I keed!) :-P
December 11, 2007
uselessness commented on the list guten-tag-the-original-five-star-system
So do I. Don't tell anyone! ;-)
December 11, 2007
uselessness commented on the word entomochronometrically
Okay, that's going too far... ;-)
December 11, 2007
uselessness commented on the word librartarian
See also.
December 11, 2007
uselessness commented on the word libertarianism
What kewpid said. :-)
December 11, 2007
uselessness commented on the word libertarian
I can enlighten you further, if you like... ;-)
December 11, 2007
uselessness commented on the word mulgara
If y'all haven't noticed, I've been away from Wordie for about a week (give or take). I'm sort of back now, maybe, but I'm sure I'll never get caught up on comments again. ;-) Anyway, glad I saw this discussion.
Yeah, I tagged this one. I don't even remember why. I guess I wasn't terribly impressed with it. It's nothing personal. All I know is that if I did it unabashedly, it must have seemed important to at the time. So the tag stays. :-P
December 11, 2007
uselessness commented on the word glee
From The Ladykillers:
"This is perfect. This is more than perfect. I can scarcely contain my glee."
December 7, 2007
uselessness commented on the word tapir
I'm offended by its smell.
December 5, 2007
uselessness commented on the word wheatloaf
Isn't that just... bread?
December 5, 2007
uselessness commented on the word anal spur
I think I'll pass.
December 5, 2007
uselessness commented on the word taser
So, bilby... you live really far away, don't you? ;-)
December 5, 2007
uselessness commented on the word wow
Um... Isn't MOM in the mirror just... MOM? If you want WOW, you need only turn it upside down, no mirror needed.
December 5, 2007
uselessness commented on the word pus
Yes, yes it were.
December 5, 2007
uselessness commented on the word thac0
In all fairness, it's much easier to pronounce in acronym form than all spelled out. Of course, I'd think a Z for zero would be preferable to the number 0 itself. THACZ. Still overly 1337-sounding, but not quite as offensive in my opinion.
December 1, 2007
uselessness commented on the word taser
Is one of the requirements of WOTY that a word must be new this year? I think we might be able to have a little more flexibility there...
December 1, 2007
uselessness commented on the word pus
Hmm, I wonder what the record is for most lists by the same person a single word appears in...?
December 1, 2007
uselessness commented on the word thac0
Me say thay-ay-ay-co.
Daylight come and me wanna go home.
December 1, 2007
uselessness commented on the word cheerful
Ah, yes yes, perfectly understandable, as it were.
December 1, 2007
uselessness commented on the word wordierobe
The time is ripe! Now! Right now! Now! Go!
December 1, 2007
uselessness commented on the word pus
I was glancing though the list at right:
Disgusting words
Least favorites
Words I absolutely can NOT stand
Unpleasant words for unpleasant things
Words I don't like very much
...and then...
Really Cool Three-Letter Words, by chained_bear
:-P
December 1, 2007
uselessness commented on the list suicides
Aww, she was dark, but I liked her. ;-)
December 1, 2007
uselessness commented on the word froworker
Or, an inner-city hairdresser.
December 1, 2007
uselessness commented on the word bright
A kinder, gentler atheist naturalist person who doesn't believe in supernatural occurrences. And is demanding special rights as a minority group.
December 1, 2007
uselessness commented on the list election-2008
The context isn't so much in reference to Huck Finn himself, but the ignorant redneck archetype as a whole. Mike Huckabee is the governor of Arkansas, and there are those who would think that's enough to disqualify him from the White House. (Arkansas is an enigma of its own, lots of jokes about it.) Of course, Bill Clinton was once governor of Arkansas too, so whatever. And then there are those who just thing Huckleberry is fun to say. :-)
Huckleberry Hound was an old cartoon, I think. I don't know so much about that one, personally, but I've heard people refer to Huckabee as such, too.
December 1, 2007
uselessness commented on the word hob
December 1, 2007
uselessness commented on the list election-2008
Mike Huckabee. It's offensive because it makes him sound like a stupid backwoods redneck, Ã la Huckleberry Finn or Huckleberry Hound.
December 1, 2007
uselessness commented on the word jibajator
Sounds like it, foo.
December 1, 2007
uselessness commented on the word rumspringa
I just have to wonder what the parents' general attitude is. Are they saying "go on, son, be a wild man, deny yourself nothing, live it up... and then come crying back to us when you can't take it anymore"?
Or is it more like "doing this stuff is wicked and terrible, and we don't want you to, but we can't stop you... and sooner or later when you come around we'll be here for you"?
December 1, 2007
uselessness commented on the word hob
Haha! And that Rudy ferret radio interview was great! I seriously, seriously hope that man doesn't get anywhere. Incidentally, I have a new Election 2008 list...
December 1, 2007
uselessness commented on the word hob
Talk about a specific word. Is this like chained_bear's list, where there are a bunch of different words referring to the neutered varieties of different animals?
December 1, 2007
uselessness commented on the word apple
I don't get it...
December 1, 2007
uselessness commented on the word bugs
Hmm, I must seize this opportunity to do some damage before the curtain falls on my nefariousness... ;-)
December 1, 2007
uselessness commented on the list simply-divine
How about omphalomancy?
December 1, 2007
uselessness commented on the word rumspringa
Wow, that's fascinating. I thought the Amish were zero-tolerance folk... it's strange to seem them allowing that.
December 1, 2007
uselessness commented on the word scatomancy
Specific excrement, or just the ordinary kind?
December 1, 2007
uselessness commented on the list technobabble-3
Nice list! But how is robot psuedoscience?
December 1, 2007
uselessness commented on the word nair
Unless it's, you know, raspberries. They are teh yum.
December 1, 2007
uselessness commented on the list compass-rose
Hey, I like the first two. So the criteria for this list are expanding... but I'm not complaining. ;-)
December 1, 2007
uselessness commented on the word tapir
WeirdNet is the new Miss Manners!
December 1, 2007
uselessness commented on the word ghouliani
See also: Nosferatu
December 1, 2007
uselessness commented on the word honky
I'm so offended.
November 30, 2007
uselessness commented on the word crotels
ABC.
November 30, 2007
uselessness commented on the word loty07 most likely to be found staring at the grass off in left field
I can't stand when people nominate themselves for stuff, but my old Festival of Randomness list should probably be considered. It's the weirdest thing I've seen on the site, anyway.
November 30, 2007
uselessness commented on the list compass-rose
Sure, why not? I've never heard of "down east" though, so I'm just gonna have to take your word for it.
November 30, 2007
uselessness commented on the word marle
Chrono Trigger! I love that game!!
November 30, 2007
uselessness commented on the word werderobe
Yes, yes, I get it. My suggestions will forever be labeled as alleged 'cause you can't trust a liar like me. I'm crying here. Cascades of tears.
Crap, I'm not really crying. It was hyperbole, or something. Which means I was lying again. Maybe I should work on that?
November 30, 2007
uselessness commented on the word crotels
No, it's totally the place Cro-Magnons stopped for a good night's sleep while on family vacation to Yosemite. Not poo. You're so gross.
November 30, 2007
uselessness commented on the word nair
Not. Gonna. Ask. (But I really want to...)
November 30, 2007
uselessness commented on the word spraints
Jeesh, that was nine frigging months ago, and I'm a different person now. Um, I also plead the fifth. If that doesn't work, I'm deeply sorry and hope from the bottom of my heart that you can find it within yourself to forgive me. Or at least give me some eye wash so I can purge the excremental photoresidue from my corneas.
November 30, 2007
uselessness commented on the word plunderbunny
Again, I defer you to the legendary Ron Gilbert for coinage. :-P
November 30, 2007
uselessness commented on the word cheerful
I THOUGHT I DID!!
ON SECOND READ, IT TURNS OUT I DID'NT!!
OOPS, I DID (NOT) IT AGAIN.
MY OUTRAGED, EXTREMELY UPPERCASE DEFENSE OF GRAMMAR HAS COLLAPSED UNDER ITS OWN WEIGHT.
and i have no recourse but to shut up now
November 30, 2007
uselessness commented on the word gullible
Made you look!
November 30, 2007
uselessness commented on the word psychoterminality
Uh... maybe. *glances around nervously*
November 30, 2007
uselessness commented on the word cheerful
I AM FULLY AWARE OF THIS, BUT STILL IRREPRESSIBLE.
'TIS'NT RIGHT, LAD, NOT ONE MITE!!
November 30, 2007
uselessness commented on the word psychoterminality
Great link! My sophomore year in college I joined the debate circuit. Which was fun in its own right, but it also (for better or worse) empowered me to BS my way through anything. It's how I got through college, and I still do it to this day. I'm shameless. But I'd hate for a prof to call my bluff like this!
November 30, 2007
uselessness commented on the word brass monkey
Who, me? I've certainly fallen victim to the old infinite loop of recursion trap multiple times. See also: gullible.
November 30, 2007
uselessness commented on the word cheerful
DO YE HAVE ANY IDEA WHAT YE'RE SAYING?!?!
WON'T SOMEBODY PLEASE THINK OF THE GRAMMAR?!?!
November 30, 2007
uselessness commented on the word maggot-pie
Hey, watch your tongue, there are starving kids in Uganda who would kill for a taste of this stuff!
Nah, who am I kidding? That's nasty.
November 30, 2007
uselessness commented on the word taser
Agreed. I think we should have WOTY categories, because there are plenty of more "fun" words, but this is best described as newsworthy or tragedy or something.
November 30, 2007
uselessness commented on the word cmyk
The shade of black, presumably, that is the darkest. Do you mean that ebony refers to a lighter color? For me it conjures up thoughts of ebony and ivory, and the colors of black piano keys are probably as dark as they can get. Besides, wouldn't CMYI be easier to pronounce as a word? Maybe?
November 30, 2007
uselessness commented on the word wessel
Yessir. :-P
November 30, 2007
uselessness commented on the word c.h.u.d.
Isn't there a reason we* decided not to embed images anymore?
*By "we," I mean that I'm pretty sure you were one of "us," John. :-P
November 30, 2007
uselessness commented on the word ignospection
Well I can't say that watching Bill O'Reilly is necessarily going to be a solution to that ignorance problem...
November 30, 2007
uselessness commented on the word bilby
Oh. All this time I thought his name was Bill, and he was just playing off that.
Now I'm starting to doubt he's even a he. I mean, who knows? Bilby is a real word? Whoops.
I actually stumbled across this page via the random word feature, of all things. :-)
November 29, 2007
uselessness commented on the word walmart
What is a tramlaw?
November 29, 2007
uselessness commented on the word rhapsody
As did I. Actually, I still agree. :-P
November 29, 2007
uselessness commented on the word peeler
Don't worry, someday my ghosts will be found (but hopefully not busted) and all will be revealed at last...
November 29, 2007
uselessness commented on the word buttocks
I just love the way this definition is worded, as if I keep body parts around the house, but reserve the fleshy ones in particular for sitting on.
November 29, 2007
uselessness commented on the word cankles
Flow might not be the best verb... :-P
November 29, 2007
uselessness commented on the word buttocks
Three cheers for WeirdNet!
November 29, 2007
uselessness commented on the word hearing
You know, haversack is strangely absent here.
November 29, 2007
uselessness commented on the word malanga
Haha, I was thinking the same thing!
November 29, 2007
uselessness commented on the word peeler
chained_bear: You would be surprised to learn half of the words I've listed. *strange smile*
November 29, 2007
uselessness commented on the word lemniskate
How about lollerskates, do those count?
November 28, 2007
uselessness commented on the word chubby
Here, WeirdNet seems to be correct, but never more enjoyably so. ;-)
November 28, 2007
uselessness commented on the word vasilopita
Ewww, I don't care how luscious the food it covers is, I'm not eating Vaseline!
November 28, 2007
uselessness commented on the word weirdnet
I secretly wondered if this might be the case, but dared not question thee.
November 28, 2007
uselessness commented on the word vasilopita
I wouldn't be able to eat it without thoughts of petroleum jelly.
November 28, 2007
uselessness commented on the word faggot
It's decided. If we're doing a List of the Year award, we also need something for the Most Unexpected WeirdNet Definition.
November 28, 2007
uselessness commented on the word sopapilla
Okay, it's definitely spelled sopaipilla. ;-)
November 28, 2007
uselessness commented on the word pan de muertos
That's a fun holiday. We also have festivities here in Nuevo Mexico, or wherever it is I live.
November 28, 2007
uselessness commented on the word banal
The word everyone knows but no one is quite sure how to pronounce. Seems it's only ever presented in written form.
November 28, 2007
uselessness commented on the word bugs
So John, did you remove the subject line field for comments? I guess that always was a bit extraneous, and a point of confusion for new users... but pages look so weird without it now! .;-)
November 28, 2007
uselessness commented on the word pulpatoon
Hmm, I had in mind a particular breed of tacky fiction, brought to glorious animated direct-to-DVD life.
November 28, 2007
uselessness commented on the word has grasshoppers springing from his or her head
Oh good heavens, you're putting me to sleep again. ;-)
November 28, 2007
uselessness commented on the word peeler
Or, um, that utensil you, uh, peel stuff with.
November 28, 2007
uselessness commented on the word jove
I think there's grasshoppers springing Minerva-like from your head, by Jove!
November 28, 2007
uselessness commented on the word frownie
Nobody is listing "frownie?"
Awww. :-(
November 28, 2007
uselessness commented on the word bro
Don't tase me!
November 28, 2007
uselessness commented on the word woodworm
Jove. Minerva sprang from Jove. Reesetee is Jove. ;-)
November 28, 2007
uselessness commented on the list lees
Oh, good. Forget I ever said anything, then.
No really. Forget I ever said anything.
November 28, 2007
uselessness commented on the word porquerÃa
Literally, a "because shop"? My Spanish is muy awful.
November 27, 2007
uselessness commented on the word stollen
*snicker*
November 27, 2007
uselessness commented on the list a-crumb-of-comfort
How about sopaipilla?
November 27, 2007
uselessness commented on the list bizarre-exclamations
Great Scott!
November 27, 2007
uselessness commented on the word suffering succotash
More like pthuffering pthuccotash. ;-)
November 27, 2007
uselessness commented on the word chimichurri
Uh oh, that's particularly hard to get out. Have you tried Oxy Clean?
November 27, 2007
uselessness commented on the word scorcery
A nefarious technique employed by certain sports teams to become unnaturally good at scoring goals.
November 27, 2007
uselessness commented on the word matilda
Well, it's also quite possibly the greatest book Roald Dahl ever wrote.
November 27, 2007
uselessness commented on the word bra
Pants: Two legs.
Scissors: Two blades.
Politics: One is quite enough, thankyouverymuch.
November 27, 2007
uselessness commented on the word chimichurri
Chim chim-in-ey, chim chim-in-ey
Chim chim cher-oo!
I does what I likes and I likes what I do
Today I'm a screever and as you can see
A screever's an artist of highest degree
And it's all me own work
From me own memory
Chim chim-in-ey, chim chim-in-ey
Chim chim cher-oo!
I draws what I likes and I likes what I drew
No remuneration do I ask of you
But me cap would be glad of a copper or two
November 27, 2007
uselessness commented on the word ciabatta
*major groan*
November 27, 2007
uselessness commented on the word ciabatta
Can you wear it?
November 27, 2007
uselessness commented on the word minnow
I wouldn't think the flat bill would be very conducive to catching or swallowing fish, but I'm no biologist...
November 27, 2007
uselessness commented on the list what-is-a-reesetee-anyhow
Is that a rebus? ;-)
November 27, 2007
uselessness commented on the word skyscarper
Hahaha!
November 27, 2007
uselessness commented on the word wiener
That was James Dyson.
No, I don't know these things. I just use Wikipedia. :-P
November 27, 2007
uselessness commented on the word wiener
No, that was Freeman Dyson. Miles invented Skynet.
November 27, 2007
uselessness commented on the word decay
To declare your undismay,
Put de O before de K.
November 27, 2007
uselessness commented on the word cougar
Yes, I'm quite sure cougars are required to wear last year's business attire, and alternate between scotch and mimosa, depending on the day of the week.
November 27, 2007
uselessness commented on the word cougar
So an older woman who likes younger men (and is in a reciprocating relationship) wouldn't qualify then?
November 27, 2007
uselessness commented on the word sharpener
Any Irishman would tell you that decaf is blasphemy to all things good and pure, least of all coffee.
November 27, 2007
uselessness commented on the list what-is-a-reesetee-anyhow
Quiet, r, you bore me. ;-)
November 27, 2007
uselessness commented on the word zumstein
American sausage: "..."
Australian sausage: "..., mate."
November 27, 2007
uselessness commented on the list lees
Gross. Can I anonymously suggest smegma? I can't? Crap.
November 27, 2007
uselessness commented on the word cmyk
Hey, I also majored in Communication! Good thing, too: we haven't had many interesting coinkydinks around here in a while... :-P
Anyway, they should have used E for ebony. Problem solved! ;-)
November 27, 2007
uselessness commented on the word sharpener
Unless the sharpener is an Irish coffee, in which, depending on the strength of the brew, the net stimulatory effect is a zero sum...
November 27, 2007
uselessness commented on the list human-powered-vehicles
In the future, merely reading about viruses will infect you with them through the Power Of The Internet. The United States government will lead the charge against Google for its contribution to "digital biological warfare." Mankind will be forced into illiteracy to prevent the spread of the epidemic. It has been prophesied.
November 27, 2007
uselessness commented on the word cougar
Preys? Is it nearly so diabolical?
November 26, 2007
uselessness commented on the word wiener
Funny, I thought that was Miles Dyson. Though I guess he was kind of a wiener too, wasn't he?
November 26, 2007
uselessness commented on the word objection
Hold it!
November 26, 2007
uselessness commented on the word weiner
Or vice versa. ;-)
November 26, 2007
uselessness commented on the word cmyk
Hey, I'm a designer and I resent that! ;-) I still think a better convention could have been used; after all, it is designers who say CMYK and RGB, and they know full well what cyan is. But using K for black isn't helpful at all.
So who deemed that cyan and magenta would be the names of the blue-green and pink? Why not aquamarine and fuchsia? Or teal and amaranth? Or maybe turquoise and cerise?
November 26, 2007
uselessness commented on the word shandy
*cough*
November 26, 2007
uselessness commented on the word td
Bwahahaha!! Get that on c_b's list already! :-D
November 26, 2007
uselessness commented on the word kit-kat
Why am I not surprised that Reese's Peanut Butter Tee is the one providing clarification here? ;-)
November 26, 2007
uselessness commented on the word cmyk
Not to mention the fact that this isn't RGB, and there's no B here. ;-)
November 26, 2007
uselessness commented on the word saiban
Yes. I am a HYUGE fan of these games, known in America as Phoenix Wright: Ace Attorney. Who knew lawyering could be so much fun?
November 26, 2007
uselessness commented on the word trailer
Agreed, and this page has been tagged appropriately. :-P
November 26, 2007
uselessness commented on the word rgb
Smells like a Triad. ;-)
November 26, 2007
uselessness commented on the word cmyk
This one has annoyed me for years. Whose bright idea was it to have K represent "black"? Why not B?
November 26, 2007
uselessness commented on the word in cahoots
It's a hostile takeover of Wordie! Who are you working for??
November 26, 2007
uselessness commented on the word td
*groan* :-P
November 26, 2007
uselessness commented on the word td
Is it readily found in nature, or just in my office?
November 26, 2007
uselessness commented on the word uuu
Yeah right. Just... yeah right.
Edit: Oh. It would seem you are right. Hmph. But now it's called Rg, because that's much saner.
November 26, 2007
uselessness commented on the word sixth
So is thirty-sixth, and forty-sixth, and... it would seem this word is not remotely rhymeless. It has infinite rhymes. It boggles the mind. :-P
November 26, 2007
uselessness commented on the word trailer
It's an American thing, bilby. ;-) FEMA is the Federal Emergency Management Agency, tasked with responding to disasters and the like. My personal commentary (and apparently c_b's as well) is that they are woefully bureaucratic and inept, as seen in their miserable handling of the Hurricane Katrina debacle. FEMA builds little relief towns of mobile homes (trailers) for victims to live in, and it's these towns that my old roommate inappropriately referred to as FEMAtown. And I'm just as guilty for singing along. Gotta love humor centered around horrible tragedies.
Of course, it's not as funny when you have to explain the joke... ;-)
November 26, 2007
uselessness commented on the list triads
I was thinking of "easy as one, two, three," maybe...
November 26, 2007
uselessness commented on the word flowbee
Weren't these really popular in the '80s? Or was it just my family that was mesmerized by them?
November 26, 2007
uselessness commented on the word thanks
As today is the official first birthday of Wordie, I just want to say congratulations and such. A monumental occasion.
November 26, 2007
uselessness commented on the list the-incredible-shrinking-list
The infamous spammer jennarenn gets her comeuppance? ;-)
November 26, 2007
uselessness commented on the word wiggy
Is that like wiggedy wack?
November 26, 2007
uselessness commented on the word trailer
Do do do do
Do do do dooo...
Won't you take me to...
FEMAtown?
November 26, 2007
uselessness commented on the word geico
Also, gecko poop.
November 26, 2007
uselessness commented on the list triads
Okay, I'm going to be really lame, but shouldn't one, two, three be on this list?
November 26, 2007
uselessness commented on the word urbanophobia
Do you have particular cities in mind? I don't think I could handle living in, say, NYC... but I do currently live in the downtown area of a considerably smaller (but still populated) city and it's pretty great. :-)
November 25, 2007
uselessness commented on the word bugs
Okay, I was just using the "search comments" feature and I discovered that on the results page, the search form at the top does not work -- it searches for a null string, rather than the value I type. So if I want to perform a second search, I have to go back to the main search page.
November 25, 2007
uselessness commented on the word features
Oh, here's another request I just thought of... I love the random word feature, but how about a random list feature?
November 25, 2007
uselessness commented on the word trailer
Yes, WeirdNet nailed this definition.
November 25, 2007
uselessness commented on the word loty07 most innovative
I nominate Journey of a 300-Year-Old House. I love how it tells a story in such a simple format.
November 25, 2007
uselessness commented on the word gingko
Because if I did, it would surely scare the children (as ghosts are wont to do). ;-)
November 25, 2007
uselessness commented on the word life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness
Happyness? :-P
November 25, 2007
uselessness commented on the word gingko
I believe the word you're looking for is Geico. But I may be wrong.
November 25, 2007
uselessness commented on the word cur
According to Orson Scott Card (by way of Guybrush Threepwood), this is the end of the road, and you are a gutter-crawling cur.
November 25, 2007
uselessness commented on the word liberty
Cool story.
I do find it sad, though, that these days the word liberty is seldom heard apart from the word statue. Once upon a time it was a pretty earth-shaking concept, and in the 21st century it has become known mainly as a tourist attraction.
November 25, 2007
uselessness commented on the word dairy farmer
According to Orson Scott Card (by way of Guybrush Threepwood), dairy farmers are notoriously bad at swordfighting.
November 25, 2007
uselessness commented on the word dead fish
Gross!
November 25, 2007
uselessness commented on the word buggeration
In the world of buggers, only the best of the best can become buggernauts.
November 25, 2007
uselessness commented on the word amaranth
Caress the one, the Never-Fading
Rain in your heart - the tears of snow-white sorrow
Caress the one, the hiding amaranth
In a land of the daybreak
-Nightwish
November 25, 2007
uselessness commented on the word ayepod
Or pirate shanties.
November 25, 2007
uselessness commented on the word lolcat
They're lolcatting the Bible? I can has feer?
November 25, 2007
uselessness commented on the word thanks
What reesetee said. Er, smiled. :-P
November 25, 2007
uselessness commented on the word features
Seems I kicked off a discussion and then disappeared before it really got going! My original suggestion, of course, opts for a human-controlled mechanism over an automated one, so I don't think mollusque's concern applies. And the issue about accidentally deleting "legitimate" or intentional misspellings is, I think, moot... because if it's an uncommented ghost, frankly, no one will miss it.
I'm a natural packrat, John, so I understand your aversion to deleting anything from the database. But isn't it safe to say that the benefits outweigh the costs of allowing us to manually clean up uncommented ghosts? It'll make the word count a more accurate figure, it'll stop auto-suggest from feeding typos to unsuspecting searchers, and I guarantee no one will be offended that "their" word got deleted. Think about it. ;-)
November 25, 2007
uselessness commented on the word features
I like legitimate ghosts. I think of them as little nuggets of surprise that will turn up far in the future, when somebody either discovers them via the random word feature, or else adds something s/he thought was new, yet already bears comments.
Dead typos just floating around out there, on the other hand, are stupid. I figure if a ghost doesn't have any comments on it, that's a good gauge of keepability. No comments means no one cares. If you find it and you do care, leave a comment. ;-)
November 22, 2007
uselessness commented on the word features
So, how about a way for us to clean up the database a little? I'm thinking a "delete this word" button that only appears on ghosts that don't have any comments. There are a lot of these floating around on the site, and we ought to be able to do our part to weed them out. :-)
November 22, 2007
uselessness commented on the word lost comments
I don't have to take your word for it!
November 22, 2007
uselessness commented on the word flatulist
Hey, when have I intentionally added misspellings? When I spawn ghosts, I at least spell them right. :-)
November 22, 2007
uselessness commented on the word madeupical
Haha! I actually got the opportunity to use madeupical in a business meeting yesterday... unfortunately my coworkers didn't exactly get the reference. :-P
November 22, 2007
uselessness commented on the user uselessness
That sounds good! Bet the guy made for interesting conversation, too... :-)
November 22, 2007
uselessness commented on the list wordie-up
There's weirdie. I know there are others but I'm drawing a blank at the moment. :-)
November 22, 2007
uselessness commented on the word hypocritic oath
The oath taken by hypocritical police officers.
November 22, 2007
uselessness commented on the word inner thesaurus
Better than FEMAtown, I guess...
November 22, 2007
uselessness commented on the word fematown
FEMAtown. Much less funky than Funkytown. Coined by my old college roommate while driving past the impromptu villages of FEMA mobile homes erected in the wake of Hurricane Charley. He would always burst into inappropriate song at the sight of the refugees... and I would join him.
November 22, 2007
uselessness commented on the word nsfbsk
On Snopes, this is an acronym for "Not Safe For British School Kids."
November 22, 2007
uselessness commented on the word nsfw
Or if you've spent any time around Snopes, there's always NSFBSK.
November 22, 2007
uselessness commented on the list on-the-border-of-imagination-and-reality
Sounds like a portmanteau of orifice and fornication. At least I think so, anyway.
Woredaho? Ionois? Okancolor? Louissippisas?
November 22, 2007
uselessness commented on the word inner thesaurus
Haha, will do! :-) I really wish we all lived in the same small town...
November 22, 2007
uselessness commented on the word mangosteen
The name conjures up images of Chris Kattan and Bruce Springsteen. *shiver*
November 22, 2007
uselessness commented on the word inner thesaurus
It's one of my favorite books ever. I don't know why I've been referencing it lately; must be my subconscious telling me it's time to read it again (it's been a couple years)...
November 22, 2007
uselessness commented on the word tennessucky
*milksnort*
November 22, 2007
uselessness commented on the word delmar
My favorite line in the whole movie, c_b. I quote it at random times to random people, but nobody else seems to appreciate it. :-(
November 22, 2007
uselessness commented on the word inner thesaurus
You do know that's another Phantom Tollbooth reference, right? :-)
November 22, 2007
uselessness commented on the word inner thesaurus
Yes. Bingo. Correct. Affirmative. Right.
Where are the Duke of Definition, Minister of Meaning, Count of Connotation, Earl of Essence, and the Undersecretary of Understanding when you need them? :-P
November 22, 2007
uselessness commented on the word delmar
That movie is classic. I've gotta watch it again. Like, tonight.
November 22, 2007
uselessness commented on the word curriculum vitae
Curiously, I'm beginning to see CV used more often than resume (or résumé, even) on the internet. The latter is distinctly America, but the former may be gaining traction.
November 22, 2007
uselessness commented on the word deretartratered
I want to pronounce this, but my tongue refuses to cooperate.
November 22, 2007
uselessness commented on the list not-quite-the-real-thang
You may also find some inspiration on this old, old list of mine. It's slightly related. :-)
November 22, 2007
uselessness commented on the word chassepot
Lunch can't come soon enough. :-)
November 22, 2007
uselessness commented on the word chassepot
I also read cheesepot. Today is a bad day for reading in the world of uselessness.
November 22, 2007
uselessness commented on the word chassepot
For some reason I read that as "bread-loading rifle" and thought it would be tremendously handy at Roman circuses.
November 22, 2007
uselessness commented on the list what-is-a-reesetee-anyhow
I think you should add carrier of an internal thesaurus. :-P
November 22, 2007
uselessness commented on the word flatulist
I have never grieved my ghosts. Actually I'm pretty sure I was the first person on the to create ghosts regularly, on purpose. It's something like a trademark. :-P
November 21, 2007
uselessness commented on the word doubt-sowing
Smells like a list to me... ;-)
November 21, 2007
uselessness commented on the word delmar
Also the name of a character in O Brother, Where Art Thou?
November 21, 2007
uselessness commented on the word flatulist
I would want it why? ;-)
November 21, 2007
uselessness commented on the word disme
Is the S silent, like in island?
November 21, 2007
uselessness commented on the list triads
Phillips, Craig, and Dean? Georgie Porgie, pudding and pie?
November 21, 2007
uselessness commented on the word numen
*groan* :-P
November 21, 2007
uselessness commented on the list i-m-terrible-with-names
I'll take 'em! Thanks!
November 21, 2007
uselessness commented on the list not-quite-the-real-thang
You impostor!
November 21, 2007
uselessness commented on the word doubt-sowing
NEVAR! :-P
November 21, 2007
uselessness commented on the word loty07
Thirded.
November 21, 2007
uselessness commented on the word flatulist
A professional farter. Thanks (um, I guess) to John for introducing me to this fascinating trade on the queef page.
November 21, 2007
uselessness commented on the word mathlete
Apparently the people who compete in the Rubik's cube world championship are mathletes of the highest caliber.
November 21, 2007
uselessness commented on the word wordie blogs
My blog, The Insanity Farm, is closed until further notice. But I am relaunching it eventually, and it will be alsome.
November 21, 2007
uselessness commented on the word tags
"Not I," said the pig.
November 21, 2007
uselessness commented on the word wordiemobile
Well, we already have commandments. ;-)
November 21, 2007
uselessness commented on the word powder
Sir yes sir!
November 21, 2007
uselessness commented on the list your-number-s-up
Phew, glad someone got the reference. ;-)
November 21, 2007
uselessness commented on the list at-least-two-apostrophes-or-your-money-back
Here's a vote for 'tain't. :-)
November 21, 2007
uselessness commented on the word tags
Further proof that we need a tagging tutorial of some sort.
November 21, 2007
uselessness commented on the word loty07
Everything you just said is duly noted in my book, jennarenn. Even the thing about my list that I don't really like, because, well, you have a good point. :-P
November 21, 2007
uselessness commented on the word doubt-sowing
Yes, I saw that after I posted here. I've been slowly trying to catch up after the weekend. I swear, people here are commenting faster and I'm reading slower. And now the comments page is back to showing 100 at a time (but with pagination) so I've been making my way through it, page by page. I'm finally back on the first page at last, but now I'm exhausted. I'll never survive at this rate. Can we close for weekends? ;-)
November 21, 2007
uselessness commented on the word mongrel
Oh can't I please see your session ID? ;-)
November 21, 2007
uselessness commented on the word powder
I recently discovered Gold Bond Medicated Foot Powder. I was fully prepared for disgust, but actually it's quite mentholly. Makes your feet all cold and tingly, and nice-smelling. I can't wait to cover my feet in it again tonight.
Have I shared too much?
November 21, 2007
uselessness commented on the word edamame
And it's so tasty too!
November 21, 2007
uselessness commented on the word queef
Yeah right. I have a very hard time believing that. Who is this Jeff, so I may find him and threaten him?
November 21, 2007
uselessness commented on the word wordiemobile
It had better look like a big W.
And there had better be a large sum of money buried underneath it.
November 21, 2007
uselessness commented on the list bear-with-me
Ring? Pall? Jason? Naked? ;-)
November 21, 2007
uselessness commented on the word alchemy
I really like this word. In fact, I think I'm going to favorite it.
November 21, 2007
uselessness commented on the list cakemix-s-words
Aye, the Identify the Wordie game invited each user to submit one self-describing word, and then we all had to guess who had picked each one. Not as easy as it sounds. :-)
November 21, 2007
uselessness commented on the word antidote
What say we don't go there? ;-)
November 21, 2007
uselessness commented on the list your-number-s-up
In the war between the cities of Dictionopolis and Digitopolis, who will emerge victorious?
November 21, 2007
uselessness commented on the list triads
Okay, I keep coming back with more... but does rub-a-dub-dub count?
November 21, 2007
uselessness commented on the word mersenne primes
I was just learning about this a couple days ago, particularly in reference to the Mersenne Twister. I still don't understand it, but I think it's cool (in the dorkiest possible way, of course).
November 21, 2007
uselessness commented on the word tagging tutorial
For the record, my comment wasn't meant to be condescending; I'm sure there are plenty of people who in all sincerity just aren't acclimated with the concept of tags. It's a very Web 2.0 thing, and a tutorial would be nice for those who haven't used them before. I was assuming that peregrina thought they had a different purpose, like attributing other pages as reference or something.
November 21, 2007
uselessness commented on the list triads
There's also Zip, Zap, Zop, a silly game to play when you're bored with a group of people.
November 21, 2007
uselessness commented on the list triads
Does cha cha cha count?
November 21, 2007
uselessness commented on the word doubt-sowing
Say what? I'm starting to doubt y'all identities...
November 21, 2007
uselessness commented on the word mongrel
Ooohhh, secrety.
November 21, 2007
uselessness commented on the list triads
How about bippety, boppity, boo?
November 21, 2007
uselessness commented on the word gong show
Have you ever seen The Gong Show? Classic. I'm sure that's where this phrase originates from.
November 17, 2007
uselessness commented on the word wallflower
This is such a colorful word. I always imagined it was coined by someone who realized that these people are not dullards; often they're intelligent, interesting people and with a little coaxing they really blossom. Of course, I just tell myself that because the wallflower is usually me. ;-)
November 17, 2007
uselessness commented on the word features
I'm not really a phone phreak kind of guy, personally, but usually because I hate the additional charges associated with doing anything beyond talk. Any idea what kind of fees I might incur if I tried managing lists via SMS?
November 17, 2007
uselessness commented on the word get stoned
Isn't this referring to an altogether different kind of intoxication?
November 17, 2007
uselessness commented on the word uselessnessian
IMMORTALIZED. :-P
November 17, 2007
uselessness commented on the word they
Yes. It annoys me to no end. Admittedly, there are times when we need a good neuter singular pronoun, but that's not it. I guess I'm rather politically incorrect these days, but I think using he is a good old standard that people understood. It's not really worth getting upset about, in my opinion, but then again I'm a man. ;-)
I think part of the problem is also the increasing frequency of addressing collective units in the plural. When Microsoft does something, for example, it does it as one entity, not as "them" or "they."
November 17, 2007
uselessness commented on the list kraut-rocks
Aye that. I think zeitgeisty signifies the official tipping point for that one.
November 17, 2007
uselessness commented on the word features
I want an option to ignore comments by reesetee. Guy talks too much. ;-)
November 17, 2007
uselessness commented on the word sought
Great point. With the internet I can find an immediate answer to nearly every question I have. When I can't, I become surprised and frustrated by the internet's "failure" to deliver. That's probably a lot different from the past, when people spent long hours in pursuit of information, and likely often resigned themselves to never knowing certain things. But ignorance is bliss, right? Information overload is a problem in its own right.
November 17, 2007
uselessness commented on the word sought
It is curious. I think seek refers to searching outwardly for something, while search refers to a more introspective examination, or looking within something. If you're in need of a needle, you will seek one out. Unless you're positive there's one contained somewhere within this haystack, in which case you'll search the haystack for it. Your finding process is now heavily focused on one space, rather than open-ended.
So, originally in computers the term "search" correctly referred to finding a given string of text within a single file. Actually the needle/haystack analogy has been used for years in reference to that kind of search. Later, the database allowed similar functionality, only instead of searching within one file, you searched within a larger array of associated data. And of course, the modern search engine is little more than a really massive database, so it's easy to see why we still say "search."
Because technically speaking, we're searching for something within Google's database, rather than a less-focused seeking of the same. Hey, it's been too long since I wrote a madeupical etymology, that felt good!
November 17, 2007
uselessness commented on the list kraut-rocks
Well, it's not that bad... ;-)
November 17, 2007
uselessness commented on the word fount of useless knowledge
"Come thou fount of every blessing..."
Or, what sionnach said. :-P
November 17, 2007
uselessness commented on the word gastroetymologist
I can't stomach the thought of such a thing.
November 17, 2007
uselessness commented on the list lend-me-your-name
Oh, I think you forgot uselessnessian.
November 17, 2007
uselessness commented on the list kraut-rocks
Wordie? Never heard of it. Isn't that the thing "jennarenn" was shilling? Nah, I just opened my thesaurus and picked the most impressive words I could find. ;-)
November 17, 2007
uselessness commented on the word sought
Correct me if I'm wrong (I probably am) but isn't sought the past-tense form of seek? Therefore...
After you seek, you have sought.
After you search, you have searched.
Right?
November 17, 2007
uselessness commented on the word glass teat
Ouch. But yes, it's true.
November 17, 2007
uselessness commented on the list kraut-rocks
I don't hate it. I detest its foul loathsomeness with a burning abhorrence unmatched by any earthly revilement.
November 17, 2007
uselessness commented on the list i-live-a-sowpods-hardscrabble-life
Holy carp.
November 17, 2007
uselessness commented on the user refined_rilo
Okay, I'll give you the benefit of the doubt. ;-)
November 17, 2007
uselessness commented on the word yarb
It's hilarious! It has some scenes of over-the-top violence, ridiculous to the point of just adding to the humor, but if you're squeamish you might want to avoid it. Otherwise, it's highly recommended. ;-)
November 17, 2007
uselessness commented on the word caesar
Also, my favorite kind of salad, and my least favorite hairstyle.
November 17, 2007
uselessness commented on the word yarb
If I recall correctly, one of the characters in the movie Hot Fuzz only has one word in his vocabulary: yarb, pronounced the way I described. Maybe that's where I get the image. He wasn't a pirate, though.
November 17, 2007
uselessness commented on the list triads
I favorited this list, it's great! No suggestions are really coming to mind right now except the line from The Truman Show -- "Good afternoon, good evening, and good night."
November 17, 2007
uselessness commented on the list state-of-the-union
Hmm, how about Florida cracker? Utahraptor? Kentucky Fried Chicken? Um, George Washington Carver?
November 17, 2007
uselessness commented on the word surreal
So you're saying these surreal numbers are really close to real numbers, as in "closer than infinitely close?" Uhm.
November 17, 2007
uselessness commented on the word bibliomancy
I've had great success using Wordie's random word feature for prophetic purposes.
November 17, 2007
uselessness commented on the word astroturfing
I've never heard of this "jennarenn" before, she seems to be a spammer. I checked out that site and it's just a bunch of words -- don't waste your time on it. I think we should ban her IP.
November 17, 2007
uselessness commented on the word loty07
Of course, someone has to nominate Conversations because of its dashing thoroughness, so it might as well be me. :-) I'll also nominate the old classic, It Has a Name?? Thanks, jennarenn, of course, for nominating my list but I hate that one and will have to cancel out your yea with my nay. ;-)
November 17, 2007
uselessness commented on the user refined_rilo
Ah yes, that is how I greet strangers too.
November 17, 2007
uselessness commented on the word yarb
I always thought (hoped?) that it was meant as a quizzical pirate exclamation, said with rising intonation and a question mark at the end. :-P
November 17, 2007
uselessness commented on the word bookworm
Next thing you know, they'll be telling us that poindexter is meant to have a negative connotation too.
November 16, 2007
uselessness commented on the word shiver of sharks
A shiver of sharks. A shiver of sharks. I can't stop shivering, that shiver of sharks.
November 16, 2007
uselessness commented on the word shiver
That makes for great alliteration. A shiver of sharks. A shiver of sharks. Screw plinth, this is the eyeworm of tomorrow.
November 16, 2007
uselessness commented on the word kaleidoscope
Just chiming in to ditto that. Most evocative animal flock name I've heard yet.
November 16, 2007
uselessness commented on the word regards
Or you can end every letter with "love" and see what happens. ;-)
November 16, 2007
uselessness commented on the list kraut-rocks
...there...is...no...justification...for...that...word...
November 16, 2007
uselessness commented on the list i-live-a-sowpods-hardscrabble-life
Yes. You do.
November 16, 2007
uselessness commented on the word trapper keeper
Where'd I put my Yikes pencils?
November 16, 2007
uselessness commented on the word hobo
Not just in Hobotopia, I like it too. ;-)
November 15, 2007
uselessness commented on the word wordieternity
Oh I hate when that happens, blasted comment overflow. Truth be told, that's why I've been so quiet this week, I've been slowly trying to catch up ever since Monday!!
November 15, 2007
uselessness commented on the word postnatal hunger
...ceebee is watching you...
November 15, 2007
uselessness commented on the list stuffie-and-the-green-grass-grows-all-around
Great ones!
November 15, 2007
uselessness commented on the user john
I can see I'm outnumbered, and I'll step down gracefully(?). *mutters something about democracy sucking* But mollusque's trick is duly noted, and I should mention that if right-clicking "normal" links and choosing "open link in new tab" is too much trouble, you can middle-click links to get a new tab instead. It takes exactly as much time as a regular left-click. If you don't have a middle button, your scroll wheel should work (it clicks, too).
November 15, 2007
uselessness commented on the word captionym
As a rule of thumb, I never click links that have "myspace" in the URL. :-P
November 15, 2007
uselessness commented on the user john
I know you didn't want me to chime in again, but I'm gonna. ;-) chained_bear mentions the ability to right-click a link to open in a new tab... but there is no ability to right-click a link and open it in *this* tab. In other words, if the link is hard-coded to do that, there's no way to force it not to, while the opposite is possible. Food for thought, anyway.
November 15, 2007
uselessness commented on the word cms
That's what I meant too, kewpid, and I'm pretty sure that's what dahnielson had in mind as well. I remember building my own finicky CMSs with PHP and duct tape back in the day. It's so good to be living in the future, at last. ;-)
November 15, 2007
uselessness commented on the word cms
I'm with dahnielson, but it's not so much of a curse word as it is a hallelujah chorus. ;-)
November 15, 2007
uselessness commented on the word postnatal hunger
I'm not a doctor, I speak in the vernacular. ;-)
November 15, 2007
uselessness commented on the word word of the year
But a word can only be given a particular tag once. That's great for nomination, but not so good for voting.
November 15, 2007
uselessness commented on the list freerice-words-to-learn
It pays to enrich your word power. ;-)
November 14, 2007
uselessness commented on the user john
Never heard of that site, but I'll have to check it out. Sounds handy. I also never use the links on Wordie, for two reasons. First, they open in a new tab/window, which annoys me; and second, I already have dictionary and thesaurus bookmarklets that I use all over the internet, and I use them here too out of habit.
November 14, 2007
uselessness commented on the word postnatal hunger
It's also possibly the most disgusting thing I've ever been covered in, but that's another story. ;-)
November 14, 2007
uselessness commented on the word go
I wish I knew Japanese. Every time someone mentions things like this I get the idea that it's a delightful language, seemingly designed with wordplay in mind. I love the nuances, the layers of meaning. Even in silly cartoons. ;-)
November 14, 2007
uselessness commented on the word context
Okay. :-P
November 14, 2007
uselessness commented on the list she-blinded-me-with-pseudoscience
Hey, I had never heard of either of those, thanks for the suggestions!
November 14, 2007
uselessness commented on the word word of the year
Hmm, I have yet to contribute to this discussion. So I will now.
My first reaction was "heavens no, the s-word will just end up winning!" And then I realized that this is our noble chance to circumvent popular opinion and knock it off its pedestal. I'm in.
I agree that two categories (real and madeupical) would be great. Actually I think I might vote for madeupical itself... Where do we vote and who's the officiator?
November 14, 2007
uselessness commented on the word corndog virginity
You can't go back no never. ;-)
November 14, 2007
uselessness commented on the word postnatal hunger
When you're born, and, you know, you've been all up in that belly for like months and DANG SON, you're hongry. Like eat a horse hongry. You don't want no milk, you want a friggin' T-bone steak and some corndogs. And maybe a towel to wipe off all o'that womb juice after yeet.
November 14, 2007
uselessness commented on the word boring
Reminds me of Normal, Illinois. *pronounces Illinois as "eely nwah"*
November 14, 2007
uselessness commented on the word unchurched
Oh goodness gracious, somebody needs a tagging tutorial*!
*Link thoughtfully provided so somebody else can write a tutorial on that page. ;-)
November 14, 2007
uselessness commented on the word corndog virginity
I pray no corndog virgins actually exist in the world, and plan to feed my newborn child corndogs as the only sane (and ethical) response to postnatal hunger.
November 14, 2007
uselessness commented on the word bamboozled
Champ (can I call you champ?) that's probably the only thing I ever really found funny in that show. And I really wished they made a real Bamboozled game show. :-)
November 14, 2007
uselessness commented on the list my-little-_____
Oh, I don't mind. 'Twas Ron Gilbert what made it up, anydanghow. :-P
November 14, 2007
uselessness commented on the word donkey
A particularly juvenile Mother Goose poem-thing:
"I am a gold lock."
"I am a gold key."
"I am a silver lock."
"I am a silver key."
"I am a brass lock."
"I am a brass key."
"I am a lead lock."
"I am a lead key."
"I am a don lock."
"I am a don key!"
Reminds me of the old (equally lame) joke...
"How do you spell spot?"
"S-P-O-T."
"How do you spell spot?"
"S-P-O-T."
"How do you spell spot?"
"S-P-O-T."
"What do you do at a green light?"
"Stop!"
"You stop? At a green light?" (cue Nelson: "Ha ha!")
November 14, 2007
uselessness commented on the word movember
Aww darn, I just shaved my mustache (and beard) and cut my hair super-short last month. I alternate between hairy gross and squeaky clean, and November is my month for the latter. Oh well.
November 14, 2007
uselessness commented on the word womonym
jennarenn, I can take a hint. :-P
I'll see what I can whip up, if John is interested... :-D
November 14, 2007
uselessness commented on the word ye
That's pretty wild. Source?
November 13, 2007
uselessness commented on the list quiz-time-3
Good grief! When I have more time, I'll see what I can come up with. :-)
November 12, 2007
uselessness commented on the list s-words
Oh, I thought this was going to be a list about the S-word. ;-)
November 12, 2007
uselessness commented on the list my-little-_____
Snugglecakes? Plunder bunny?
November 12, 2007
uselessness commented on the word morning star
I prefer mine of the flail variety. Yikes!
November 10, 2007
uselessness commented on the word eye cap
Ewww. Ewww! EWWWWW!!!
(also, owww!)
November 10, 2007
uselessness commented on the user yarb
Great movie.
November 10, 2007
uselessness commented on the word butt rock
Hmm, probably in the late '90s. As I recall at that time it was used in reference to cheesy video game music of the butt-rock variety. :-)
November 10, 2007
uselessness commented on the word oilseed rape
That sounds terrible. Who names this stuff?
November 10, 2007
uselessness commented on the word madeupical
Particularly hilarious ones.
November 9, 2007
uselessness commented on the word butt rock
I've certainly heard both. They're synonymous. But I've always preferred this one, for some reason. ;-)
November 9, 2007
uselessness commented on the word flashing
How indecent!
November 9, 2007
uselessness commented on the list words-that-are-also-tv-shows
Seconded. How about Taxi, Cops, and Wings? Also, don't forget about B.S., which I'm too polite to spell out in mixed company. ;-)
November 9, 2007
uselessness commented on the word whopping
It's a gerund from the verb "to whop," which means to produce a noise like a hundred thousand people saying "whop." And trivet, isn't that whup?
November 9, 2007
uselessness commented on the word paua
Nothing like mass hallucinations to brighten up a web site.
November 9, 2007
uselessness commented on the list superheroes
Mmmm, Alicia Silverstone. Oh sorry, was I thinking aloud again? ;-)
November 9, 2007
uselessness commented on the word paua
I think, therefore I am madeupical. So much for pleading my case.
November 9, 2007
uselessness commented on the word polydactyly
Oh dear, I don't like the direction this is headed...
Look, a distraction!!
November 9, 2007
uselessness commented on the word gaffer
Same here. I was meaning to ask the film crew yesterday, when I was surrounded by all manner of gaffers and best boys and grips, but they were frightfully busy (and a little on the rude side). Only one guy took the time to chat with me, and I don't think he would have known anyway.
November 9, 2007
uselessness commented on the list quiz-time-2
I like these a lot. This second one was easier than the first one, which is a good thing. :-) I much prefer this difficulty level.
November 9, 2007
uselessness commented on the list quiz-time-2
One. Minute. Too. Late. Argh. ;-)
November 9, 2007
uselessness commented on the list quiz-time-2
Oh, duh! Simony!
November 9, 2007
uselessness commented on the list quiz-time-2
1. Lemony
2. Parsimony
3. Testimony?
4. Antimony
5. Avgolemony?
6. Persimmony - is that the answer in your hint?
And they all share the -mony ending...
November 9, 2007
uselessness commented on the word piratical madeupical etymologist
Yo ho. Har.
November 9, 2007
uselessness commented on the word polydactyly
They make dandy antennae. How many radio stations can you pick up at once?
November 9, 2007
uselessness commented on the word wrong
Oh, sure. But I was talking about Robin Wright. Er, Robin Wright Penn, a.k.a. Buttercup. See my links below. ;-)
November 9, 2007
uselessness commented on the word ninja madeupical etymologist
Bah! All my minions are pirates. :-P
November 9, 2007
uselessness commented on the word paua
Quick, grasshopper. We've been discovered. Strike swiftly!
November 9, 2007
uselessness commented on the word wrong
*groan*
November 9, 2007
uselessness commented on the word wrong
What does Batman have to do with being wright?
November 9, 2007
uselessness commented on the word naughties
Ugh, I certainly hope not. What a terrible word.
November 9, 2007
uselessness commented on the word paua
Heavens yes! We totally should. :-P
November 9, 2007
uselessness commented on the word polydactyly
Yes, my head. Normal, normal, normal.
November 9, 2007
uselessness commented on the word rice cup
Yes! That is the logical explanation I was looking for! :-)
November 9, 2007
uselessness commented on the word front door
Alas, the film crew was quite proficient at shooing me out of the way. :-P
November 9, 2007
uselessness commented on the word wrong
It is for Orville and Wilbur. And, er, Robin.
November 9, 2007
uselessness commented on the word naughties
The years from 2013 to 2019 can be called the teens, but 2010, 2011, and 2012 are left in the cold. Then again, only time will tell if maybe they deserve it. ;-)
November 9, 2007
uselessness commented on the word chocolate mint
It must be from New Jersey.
November 9, 2007
uselessness commented on the word paua
Heavens no! The trick is to make your etymologies more subtly plausible, so no one but you knows what a filthy rotten liar you are. ;-)
(See also: archerent)
November 9, 2007
uselessness commented on the word front door
Haha, yes, that's like a D-list celebrity... no wait, probably more like Y or Z. Actually, I don't think there are enough letters in the alphabet to identify the list I'm on. ;-)
And yes, a large portion of the movie Sushine Cleaning is filmed on the block I live on, and they shot the final scene of the movie in my front door yesterday. So if you see the film, try not to get all stalkerish when you've identified the famed home of uselessness.
November 9, 2007
uselessness commented on the word posslq
Andre the Giant has a POSSLQ?
November 8, 2007
uselessness commented on the word listlessness
(props)
November 8, 2007
uselessness commented on the word isometric
See eboy for lots of random, colorful, Japanese-ish isometric goodness.
November 8, 2007
uselessness commented on the list zippity-doo-dah
Oh... nice list, and they are some evocative (if patronizing) names. It's amazing to see the effort some people put forth into fashioning stereotypes.
November 8, 2007
uselessness commented on the word polydactyly
Well, I do have ten fingers and ten toes. Ain't that all it takes?
November 8, 2007
uselessness commented on the word rice cup
Hmm, those are all very awkward numbers, clearly this unit isn't part of any western measurement standards. I just wonder if it's equivalent to five of a smaller denomination in the same Japanese system. Oh well, I assume it's obsolete now?
November 8, 2007
uselessness commented on the word naughties
I remember back in '99 there was a "Name the Decade" web site that took votes to decide what the "official" name would be. This word (Naughties) won. But now nobody's ever heard of the site, and apparently it didn't have much authority over such matters anyway. ;-)
Actually, I find it interesting that before 2000, decade names were common in regular speech: I always heard people talking about "the '90s" or whatever decade it was at the time. Now, not so much. Because nobody can figure out what to call this decade, nobody does. Occasionally you'll hear "the new millennium" or "the 21st century" used in that place, or in some cases even "the post-9/11 world." But it's almost as if society collectively just stopped naming decades.
I suspect we'll start again in the '20s, but that'll just seem wrong to me after experiencing much higher numbers. It's like a step backwards to me, it doesn't seem like progress or "the future." Maybe that's because it conjures up thoughts of the Roaring Twenties and I'll always associate it with talkies and flappers.
November 8, 2007
uselessness commented on the word front door
Yesterday Alan Arkin and Amy Adams walked through mine. It's famous now. I, however, have yet to be discovered.
November 8, 2007
uselessness commented on the word arithmomania
Obsessive-compulsive counting of everything: ceiling tiles, vertical blinds, paper clips.
November 8, 2007
uselessness commented on the word paua
I'm uselessness and I approve this message. ;-)
November 8, 2007
uselessness commented on the word slug
There's nothing wrong with slugs in the bed. Now, a lot of slugs, that's another thing entirely. I dare say I might lose my temper too.
November 8, 2007
uselessness commented on the word dollar
Is that where the DDR songs like "Boom Boom Dollar" come from? I always thought that sounded strange.
November 8, 2007
uselessness commented on the word worcestershire
seanahan: See featherstonehaugh.
November 8, 2007
uselessness commented on the word arrow slit
Aren't those archer ents? Totally different beast. ;-)
November 8, 2007
uselessness commented on the word stirrup
Hear hear.
November 8, 2007
uselessness commented on the word listlessness
Are you tired, run-down, listless? Do you poop out at parties?
November 8, 2007
uselessness commented on the word crapple
You're making me F'ing cry.
November 8, 2007
uselessness commented on the word dung
It's quite fashionable here in New Mexico. I thought everyone dressed with it?
November 8, 2007
uselessness commented on the word madeupical
"Made. Up. Ickle." :-P
November 8, 2007
uselessness commented on the word archerent
An opening in a castle wall (usually a long, vertical slit) designed for archers to shoot through whilst remaining protected themselves.
November 8, 2007
uselessness commented on the word arrow slit
I believe the word you're looking for is archerent.
November 8, 2007
uselessness commented on the list zippity-doo-dah
Wait, I'm confused. What is this?
November 8, 2007
uselessness commented on the word tuya
There's one of these near the Mechanics Training Institute in northern Wyoming known as Socket Tuya. Across the valley, in a historically German part of the state, is its sister volcano, Göttehandett Tuya. Local legends tell of a third one in the vicinity, known by the Navajo name Watappenhd Tuya, but every expedition that set out in search of it disappeared under mysterious circumstances.
I haven't even mentioned the one in rural Pennsylvania, Whatsit Tuya. But nobody cares about that one anyway.
November 8, 2007
uselessness commented on the word butt
Clearly this word most commonly refers to the "thick end of the handle," and not, as I mistakenly believed, a person's posterior. Thank you, WordNet!
November 8, 2007
uselessness commented on the list pidgin-or-urban-legend
Whether or not they're real, they're worth a laugh or two million. I approve. ;-)
November 8, 2007
uselessness commented on the word polydactyly
I believe I am the standard of normalcy around here.
Not usefulness though, that would be reesetee's area of expertise. ;-)
November 8, 2007
uselessness commented on the word interrobang
Nothing like typing seven characters just for the convenience of getting two-in-one. ;-)
November 8, 2007
uselessness commented on the word machturtle
Surely this is another word for infinity?
November 8, 2007
uselessness commented on the word rice cup
Curious, in Japanese the word go means five. I wonder if that has anything to do with the size of this measurement.
November 8, 2007
uselessness commented on the word listlessness
What an awkward word. It would make a terrible username. ;-)
November 8, 2007
uselessness commented on the word features
I'm a legendary necromancer. I deliberately summon ghost words all the time. They shouldn't be ignored, it'll only make them feel bad. And when my ghosties feel bad, I feel bad.
Because I'm really not a fan of historical revisionism, I'd prefer that users can't edit comments left by other users. Actually, I might even add a time limit for commenting so that people can't even edit their own comments after, say, an hour. Changing things after they've been said in conversation only confuses things and shoos away whatever historicity might be lingering on the pages here. But I'm not opposed to deleting one's own comments, which can be useful, and I still think a comment ranking system (of some sort) would be nice.
Capitalization is a trickier issue than tags, I think, for words with multiple capitals in them. Particularly in the case of capitonyms: shall we have separate pages for Thanksgiving the holiday and thanksgiving the act of gratitude? And if so, what's the best way to ensure people are adding the one they think they want? Could lead to lots of head-scratching.
I agree that flags for acronyms and abbreviations would be great.
November 8, 2007
uselessness commented on the user perhapsolutely
Interesting... how do you know that's what he did?
November 8, 2007
uselessness commented on the word all up in
Or better still: "why you getting all up in my grill?"
November 6, 2007
uselessness commented on the word wella, wella, wella
Notice: This word has been tagged for the protection of future visitors.
November 6, 2007
uselessness commented on the word sudoku
I like Sudoku. Not that it's the greatest thing ever, but it's a fun way to pass the time when you're bored..
November 6, 2007
uselessness commented on the word gingerly
Sounds British. "Agnes was a gingerly gal with milky-white hands and a face like cherry velvet."
November 6, 2007
uselessness commented on the word dick
According to dictionary.com, the definition you're thinking of is #2. That can't be right, either.
November 6, 2007
uselessness commented on the user perhapsolutely
I don't know the exact rate at which he added words, but stpeter had something like 3000 words not long after the web site was created. And of course, they were all in one huge, browser-crashing list -- a little separation never hurt anybody!! ;-)
November 6, 2007
uselessness commented on the word menopause : the musical
I laughed, I cried, I got hot flashes.
November 6, 2007
uselessness commented on the word panhead
Fans of the rock band Skillet are called panheads.
November 6, 2007
uselessness commented on the word therein
You can't count therein! That's like saying that my hand is holding my hand. :-P
November 6, 2007
uselessness commented on the word rhubarb
Well lately I've been thinkin'
About some good home cookin'
Just like I haven't eaten in the longest time
Now I like potato chips, now please don't get me wrong
But I haven't tasted Mama's rhubarb pie in so very long
(Chorus)
Rhubarb pie in the summer
Rhubarb pie made by my mother
Nothing better in the winter
Than rhubarb pie after dinner
Twinkies may be better
Than a hole in the sweater
And the hole in the sweater
Beats a poke in the eye
If I had my choice I'd leave this
Gas station store
And then I'd travel back in time and
I'd sit down and have some more
(Chorus)
Looking at the picture
In the Sunday paper
Of the politician he's talkin' to the press
And he looks like he's been eating lemons all his life
Well, I think Mama's rhubarb pie could solve
More problems overnight
(Chorus 2x)
Ah take me home... whoa
I like it with a crispy crust... whoa
And the sugar on top... whoa
Oh it makes my mouth water... whoa
I'm comin' home, Mama... whoa
-Five Iron Frenzy, Rhubarb Pie
November 6, 2007
uselessness commented on the word economical
That is very depressing, seanahan. When the deficit is worded that way it sounds very big, indeed.
November 3, 2007
uselessness commented on the list writer-writer
I have more...
fantasist, drafter, stenographer(?), penman, scribbler, scrawler, graffitist(?), cub, scrivener...
November 3, 2007
uselessness commented on the word bu
Ghost comment? Boo!
I mean, bu! :-P
November 2, 2007
uselessness commented on the word cheetah
Looks good, John! But on multi-word phrases it only defines the first word (see hilarious misunderstanding for an example. Would be nice if it could either define every word in the phrase, or define the whole phrase (if it knows it), or not define anything at all.
November 2, 2007
uselessness commented on the word pisser
I'm pretty sure that's just a Masshole phrase. ;-)
November 2, 2007
uselessness commented on the word prebuttal
"I love Monty Python."
"No you don't."
November 2, 2007
uselessness commented on the word pustule
*groan*
November 1, 2007
uselessness commented on the word nanowrimo
And they're off!!
For those who are interested, we've begun a collective novel over on Ficlets. I doubt we'll get anywhere near 50,000 words, but writing with others is more fun than going it alone (and some of us have lives that, you know, occupy our time). :-P If you have a Ficlets account, or want to sign up for a free one, feel free to join in the story.
November 1, 2007
uselessness commented on the word mynah
Before my time. Was that show as innuent as it sounds?
November 1, 2007
uselessness commented on the list kenno-s-words
Fascinating. Thanks for posting this, kenno, I learned a lot.
November 1, 2007
uselessness commented on the word pseudopseudohypoparathyroidism
Double pseudo-? That just ain't right.
November 1, 2007
uselessness commented on the word oprah
That's the rumor. I can't vouch for its truthiness though.
November 1, 2007
uselessness commented on the word defenestrate
Pragmatists?
November 1, 2007
uselessness commented on the word potted heid
Wait, I don't know nothing about Scottish. Is this meant to be literal, like "potted head?" That's just gross.
November 1, 2007
uselessness commented on the word prebuttal
So is that like saying "I know what you're thinking, and don't even say it because you're wrong"?
November 1, 2007
uselessness commented on the word ♖☞
Somebody help rocks! She's gone blind!!
November 1, 2007
uselessness commented on the word supercalafragalisticexpialladocious
Cool. That means I was right, the one time I tried to spell it. I guess I win. Or something.
November 1, 2007
uselessness commented on the word rising star
Peter. What's happening.
November 1, 2007
uselessness commented on the word quadriliteral
Oh, well that changes the pronunciation considerably, doesn't it. "quad ruh LEET er ull" :-P
November 1, 2007
uselessness commented on the word ♖☞
"The castle is that way!"
November 1, 2007
uselessness commented on the word quadriliteral
A syntactically correct four-word sentence. Happy? ;-)
November 1, 2007
uselessness commented on the word supercalafragalisticexpialladocious
So what's the right spelling? We should note it on here, which, of course, Wordie is for. :-P
November 1, 2007
uselessness commented on the word rising star
Oh come on, we're the upper echelon of Wordies! That's gotta count for something! Revel a little! :-P
November 1, 2007
uselessness commented on the word rising star
I'm guessing a lot of the gangsters around here will know it... ;-)
November 1, 2007
uselessness commented on the word bookmark
Check out above the fold, and don't forget that comments are searchable now. ;-)
November 1, 2007
uselessness commented on the word bling
I used to use it in reference to classic video games and the sounds they made, before the word took on the current definition. Actually I used the phrase bling bling, which was just a weird coincidence I guess.
Also, I first mistyped "reference" as "reverence," which is a sad but true Freudian slip. :-P
November 1, 2007
uselessness commented on the list opposites-without-commonly-used-opposites
I vote yes on all accounts. :-)
November 1, 2007
uselessness commented on the word crayon
Yeah, I guess you could say it that way too. There is a difference between the way the two sound, but to my ears it's negligible. Maybe you speak with a dialect that makes it more pronounced?
November 1, 2007
uselessness commented on the word utilize
Well said. That is a good rule of thumb.
November 1, 2007
uselessness commented on the word head cheese
Wait, I thought cheese was made of milk? Come to think of it, I have no idea what cheese is, except for the decidedly non-specific "dairy." Maybe that should concern me. But I eat the stuff every day, and rather like it.
November 1, 2007
uselessness commented on the word defenestrate
There's a great scene in A Beautiful Mind where Charles, the "prodigal roommate," defenestrates the desk of a collegiate John Nash. The best part is (not to spoil the movie for those who haven't seen it) discovering what that scene really means later on.
November 1, 2007
uselessness commented on the word utilize
Haha, aren't nicknames supposed to be short? Few words are as awkward to type as "uselessness," but well, you found one. I can fully understand people shortening it to just u. ;-)
November 1, 2007
uselessness commented on the word crayon
Pronounced "cran," or maybe "cray-un," but certainly never "crown."
October 31, 2007
uselessness commented on the word color crayon
What always bugged me is when people pronounced crayon as "crown."
October 31, 2007
uselessness commented on the word topiary
As popularized by Edward Scissorhands, maybe?
October 31, 2007
uselessness commented on the word fuzzy logic
That's the one. Enormous. He did a little bit of acting, look for him in Tim Burton's Big Fish.
October 31, 2007
uselessness commented on the word bookmark
Books will dwindle, but I doubt people will ever forget about them entirely...
October 31, 2007
uselessness commented on the word euthanasia
Don't forget the P.O.D. song "Youth of the Nation," which is about school shootings.
October 31, 2007
uselessness commented on the word fuzzy logic
And Matthew McGrory is 1.3.
October 31, 2007
uselessness commented on the word van gogh
Thank you, Mr. Pronunciation.
October 31, 2007
uselessness commented on the word vittersweet
See also: epicaricacy, karma, and the s-word.
October 31, 2007
uselessness commented on the word conswervative
So true! (sadly)
October 31, 2007
uselessness commented on the word colbertine
...used in the intricately designed petticoats of one Stephen Colbert.
October 31, 2007
uselessness commented on the word camelcase
So wait... is CamelCase only capitalizing the first letter of each word? I thought it was capitalizing every other letter. Hmm.
Edit: Wikipedia says it's the former. Guess I was mistaken. Sorry for hurting your eyes, reesetee. So does tHiS have a name (besides obnoxious)?
October 31, 2007
uselessness commented on the word head cheese
That's disgusting. But why do they call it "cheese?" There's nothing cheesy about it. I hate when names of things are obviously wrong like that, it seems like intentional misdirection.
October 31, 2007
uselessness commented on the word really
Do you really? ;-)
October 31, 2007
uselessness commented on the word circle back
Eww, did you just use touch base as a noun? That's even worse than the verb form.
October 31, 2007
uselessness commented on the word ping
I'm pretty sure the word originally comes from naval jargon. A ping is a sound emitted by a ship to find submarines via echolocation, I think.
October 31, 2007
uselessness commented on the list beauty
While they're not as evocative as the other ones on this list, how about attractive and glamorous?
October 31, 2007
uselessness commented on the word might could
Eww, I hate that particular phrase too, because I can never remember what it means, and it has thrown my schedule into confusion on multiple occasions.
October 31, 2007
uselessness commented on the word pick your brain
Corporate zombies! How appropriate for Halloween.
If not zombies, then little Sylars mayhaps.
October 31, 2007
uselessness commented on the word equestrian quartet
Sionnach's phrase for the four horsemen of the apocalypse. Discussion on tagyoureit's Cringeworthy Corporate Buzzwords list.
October 31, 2007
uselessness commented on the word utilize
Ugh. Variation in writing is one thing; throwing around extraneous utilizes to accomplish that is another. The best way to avoid saying use over and over is to structure sentences differently, perhaps with different tenses. "Use" is so generic anyway, which makes for poor writing in the first place.
It's similar to the "be" verb rule: Always avoid using being, is, was, are, am, and been. Active voice is always preferable. Finally, if you do have to find a synonym for "use," try implement, activate, apply, or some other more descriptive verb.
Hmmm... perhaps I've found a second meaning for my username?
October 31, 2007
uselessness commented on the word full-on monet
This conversation is Van Goghing nowhere.
October 31, 2007
uselessness commented on the word tartuffe
Okay, I'm back. Lots of Google hits. Guess my college wasn't as clever as it purported to be. But y'all will be happy to know that the fifth search result is the Wordie page. :-P
October 31, 2007
uselessness commented on the word tartuffe
I have no idea who Eilonwy is in real life, but I wasn't personally in the college theatre group... I meant, rather, the theatre group of the college which I attended. And I watched them perform Tartuffe. I did have a friend who was in that show. Perhaps Eilonwy is my friend? Alas, s/he seems to have moved on from Wordie and I may never find out...
Nevertheless, I am going to Google Tartuffified and see what I can see.
October 31, 2007
uselessness commented on the word tartuffe
Funny play. My college theatre group did a (modernized, I think) run of it and promoted it with fliers emblazoned with with "Get Tartuffified!" across the top.
Edit: I am surprised to see that my linked word above is already listed, which leads me to believe my college didn't, in fact, make it up. I am crestfallen.
October 31, 2007
uselessness commented on the word illeist
uselessness has be known to do this on occasion.
October 31, 2007
uselessness commented on the word dork out
Hey, I feel just as bad for affirming your innaccuracy about Troi! But I'm not changing my comment. It's a matter of principle. Plus, I was quoting you verbatim and somebody's gotta preserve the historical record. ;-)
October 31, 2007
uselessness commented on the word ordotic
Tellurian's word for when a system's order-chaos balance leans more toward order. See chaordic.
October 31, 2007
uselessness commented on the word dork out
Hooray for historical revisionism! Now I wonder what other old comments you have changed, and didn't tell anyone about... ;-)
October 31, 2007
uselessness commented on the word canon
I think it's approaching mainstream vocabulary, especially after the recent Dumbledore thing.
October 31, 2007
uselessness commented on the word freshie
Steve Irwin's term for a freshwater crocodile. He probably didn't coin the word, but he made it popular.
October 31, 2007
uselessness commented on the word fresher
As opposed to the Crocodile Hunter's freshie. :-)
October 31, 2007
uselessness commented on the word buyer's remorse
Whoops, did you mean to add that as a new word?
October 31, 2007
uselessness commented on the word madeupical etymology
You'd have to ask the Raccoonnookkeeper Association of America (RAA) about that one. Truth be told, my school isn't accredited, so individual mileage may vary. :-P
October 31, 2007
uselessness commented on the word buyer's remorse
Yes. But not just fashion. I was struck with a serious case of buyer's remorse when I bought my rust-bucket of a Thunderbird recently. What was I thinking?
October 31, 2007
uselessness commented on the word infamous
Haha, with the likes of Paris Hilton and Lindsay Lohan running around, famous and infamous have become interchangeable. ;-)
October 31, 2007
uselessness commented on the word full-on monet
What, do you find the puns unpalettable?
October 30, 2007
uselessness commented on the word tom swiftie
Argh, these are killing me!!
**can't...breathe...puns...too...thick**
October 30, 2007
uselessness commented on the word madeupical etymology
Yep. Do you want to make more money? Of course, we all do. All exams are take-home tests with open-ended deadlines, submitted via Wordie comments. Grades are based on a threefold rubric: creativity, plausibility, and madeupicality.
Graduation ceremony TBA, most likely it will be held in cyberspace. Thanks to a grant from a certain useless individual (who wishes to remain anonymous) tuition is free for all new students. You will be earning your M.E. degree, which certifies you as a professional Madeupical Etymologist.
October 30, 2007
uselessness commented on the word national security
I'm sorry, SoG, I'm going to need to take down your Visa number. It's a matter of national security, you see. And I need a new wardrobe.
October 30, 2007
uselessness commented on the word twopointopian
Guess that's me. :-P
October 30, 2007
uselessness commented on the list computer-connection-outlets
"Video" could easily be split into VGA and DVI, among others... also, there's the notorious old keyboard and mouse standard, PS/2.
October 30, 2007
uselessness commented on the word antivitruvian
Well, I rather enjoy it, personally.
October 30, 2007
uselessness commented on the word madeupical etymology
Second semester classes now enrolling! ;-)
October 30, 2007
uselessness commented on the list the-color-perple
Hey, that's a good one! I had never heard of it before. Fun to say, too. :-)
October 30, 2007
uselessness commented on the word sofa pillows
Mmm, but I think it's actually spelled sopaipilla. :-P
October 30, 2007
uselessness commented on the word full-on monet
I was going to say something, but reesetee took the words right out of my mouth. I'll just brush this one off.
October 30, 2007
uselessness commented on the word vajayjay
Gross! I rather wish I hadn't clicked that link...
October 30, 2007
uselessness commented on the word seamen
‽
October 30, 2007
uselessness commented on the word dog-whistle
How about "universal health care?" I can think of a dozen more accurate labels. Of course they involve scary concepts like socialism, but then again that's the truth. Universal means nothing but bread and circuses for everyone, which, come to think of it, sounds rather nice. ;-)
October 30, 2007
uselessness commented on the word shithead
You reminded me of a Snopes page (warning: offensive racial language) about unfortunate-baby-name urban legends. This one is included there, along with the famous Latrine and Pajama. Also mentioned is Ima Hogg, recently discussed here.
October 30, 2007
uselessness commented on the word dog-whistle
That's a good point. "Illegal immigration" is a perfectly valid term; labeling the people who do it as "illegal immigrants," not so much. Of course, it loses its subtlety when you start hearing them referred to as just illegals. To some, it seems, that's their defining characteristic. To the point of nouning them that way.
October 30, 2007
uselessness commented on the word serial comma
Oh, we had a lovely discussion about this...
October 30, 2007
uselessness commented on the word seasteading
Mark Twain, 1800's: "Buy land. They've stopped making it"
Seasteaders, 2003: "Memo: Production Resuming"
October 30, 2007
uselessness commented on the word midget
Here's a curiosity I just found about the name of the LPA: "Originally to be called 'Midgets of America,' the folks who could afford to attend the early meetings were as likely to be non-midgets as midgets. So a compromise was made to call the group 'Midgets and Dwarfs of America' (notice who came first). It didn't take long, however, for the fledgling members to notice that the non-midgets (by P.T. Barnum's standards) were greatly out-numbering the midgets. So a second compromise was struck to call the group 'Little People of America.'" Quoted from this page.
Note the distinction between dwarfs and midgets, which is meant to differentiate between little people who have childlike proportions, and those who have "normal" adult proportions. Medically speaking, the two have today come to be recognized as simply different variations of dwarfism.
It seems the notorious showman P.T. Barnum is credited with popularizing the word midget, which applies a suffix to midge (a small fly). Its offensiveness is debatable, and there are plenty of people with dwarfism who even prefer to be identified by that word. It's also used to describe any small object or trinket. There are also those who find dwarf to be an empowering label rather than pejorative, and advocate for its use.
I look it up because I'm bored, and mildly curious. ;-)
October 30, 2007
uselessness commented on the word dog-whistle
That's a whole other issue altogether -- today's definitions of "conservative" and "liberal" are a good deal different from those of a hundred years ago. In the past few decades alone there's been a dramatic shift. To a certain degree, the two ends of the spectrum appear to have completely swapped positions several times in history, yet from another angle they are actually pretty similar to each other in approach today (they disagree over various issues, but not in how to enact the changes they desire).
October 29, 2007
uselessness commented on the word midget
Hmm, according to the internets there's an organization called LPA, or Little People of America. The medical condition they represent is formally known as dwarfism, but it seems they reject the word dwarf as a noun. They prefer "people with dwarfism," or the aforementioned "little people" as a more light-hearted reference. Their web site also mentions the "short-statured community," which is going on a list of mine posthaste.
Additionally, there is a Restricted Growth Association in the U.K., which suggests different terminology is used across the pond.
October 29, 2007
uselessness commented on the word ad nauseum
Only the sickening ones. ;-)
October 29, 2007
uselessness commented on the word dog-whistle
That's a good one too, is there a counterpart on the conservative side? Maybe traditional, but that doesn't have quite the same strong implications as "if you're not a liberal, you're AGAINST progress!" :-) It would be nice if advocacy groups on all sides of the political spectrum could embrace a little truth-in-advertising.
October 29, 2007
uselessness commented on the word dog-whistle
Ideologies aside, I think they're both baddies for participating in such a practice.
October 29, 2007
uselessness commented on the word yacht
What's the point? When not even death can stop true love, why bother? ;-)
October 29, 2007
uselessness commented on the word midget
It may be. I've heard it plenty. But if I were one, I don't think I'd appreciate being called that very much.
October 29, 2007
uselessness commented on the word yacht
What, every word of that was true! ;-)
October 29, 2007
uselessness commented on the word midget
I'm not clear on what the accepted alternative is. Isn't dwarf rather demeaning as well? I've also heard little people but I would consider that even worse. I'm not big into political correctness, but I've always felt awkward about using the words I've heard, because if I were short of stature any of them would offend me. And short of stature or just short are better, but inaccurate.
October 29, 2007
uselessness commented on the word dog-whistle
I just love how rhetoric-steeped both of them are: if you're not pro-life, you must be anti-life, or pro-death, and if you're not pro-choice you must be anti-choice or perhaps pro-slavery. I do wish people could be objective and not have to propagandize all the labels. Only confuses the masses, really. If only to a certain degree, making it harder to put oneself in the shoes of the opposing side because of the vilification.
October 29, 2007
uselessness commented on the word star mangled banner
Or when broadcast every Friday morning over the elementary school P.A. system. Just tragic.
October 29, 2007
uselessness commented on the word pleasure cruise
(She doesn't get eaten at this time.)
October 29, 2007
uselessness commented on the word cochran
Also, a notorious attorney named Johnny, right up there with the likes of one Phoenix Wright.
October 29, 2007
uselessness commented on the word sloops
Was the John B. one of them?
October 29, 2007
uselessness commented on the word yacht
Actually, the word chasing refers to the pursuit of pleasure. Similar to the modern-day pleasure cruise, which is much slower than one might expect from "cruising." Of course the root of such phrases stems from Solomon's book of wisdom, Ecclesiastes, in which he declares that "everything is vanity, a chasing after the wind," inexorably tying the pleasures of the world to the breeze, and by extension, sailboats.
October 29, 2007
uselessness commented on the list real-names
I don't think Ima has ever been a nice name. I've only ever heard it in jokes about terrible ones. Is it short for a traditional name, or was it just invented for the sake of bad puns?
October 29, 2007
uselessness commented on the word mojo
Wow, a different nose for every occasion... lucky guy.
October 29, 2007
uselessness commented on the word diaeresis
Aww, I wish this word didn't make me think of diarrhea... :-(
October 29, 2007
uselessness commented on the word blood sausage
Rita: What's wrong with the Groundhog Festival? In San Diego, I covered the swallows returning to Capistrano six years.
Phil: Someday somebody will see me interviewing a groundhog, and think I don't have a future.
Rita: I think it's a nice story. He comes out, and he looks around. He wrinkles up his little nose. He sees his shadow or he doesn't see it, it's nice. People like it.
Phil: You are new, aren't you? People like blood sausage too. People are morons.
- Groundhog Day
October 29, 2007
uselessness commented on the list quiz-time
Jeesh, could you be any more cryptic? ;-) How about Humperdinck, am I on the right track?
October 28, 2007
uselessness commented on the word bugs
That's okay, teaching others the basic tags is pretty much the cross I've borne for years as punishment for learning HTML in 1995. I don't even think about it anymore. I build web sites in my sleep. :-P
October 28, 2007
uselessness commented on the word mojo
At the ISP I work for, we have a server room with computers named after various characters. One is called Mojo, and its sibling server is called Jojo.
We also have Blossom, Buttercup, Gilligan, Skipper, and, um, a bunch of others that I can't remember because I don't really work with any o' them.
October 28, 2007
uselessness commented on the word bugs
Regular HTML should do the trick. In the case of creating links, try the following code:
<a href="URL-GOES-HERE">TEXT-GOES-HERE</a>I'm assuming that's what you were looking for, if not... *screams for John's attention*
October 28, 2007
uselessness commented on the word pwn
Sounds like you got pwned by pronunciation.
October 28, 2007
uselessness commented on the word bishop
I'm never speaking to you again.
Oh wait, I just did. Nevermind then.
October 28, 2007
uselessness commented on the word immoralist
That, of course, depends on your definition of "bad." ;-)
October 28, 2007
uselessness commented on the list make-it-so
What? Since when can anything pertaining to it be called proper? :-P
October 27, 2007
uselessness commented on the word pwn
Yes, it's definitely pronounced like "poned," and in an ironic, knowing manner.
October 27, 2007
uselessness commented on the list quiz-time
Not in the least. ;-)
October 27, 2007
uselessness commented on the word unbelievable terrible
What can I say? I think it's horrible perfect.
October 27, 2007
uselessness commented on the word bishop
That's all very interesting and stuff, but remind me never to ask you out. ;-)
October 27, 2007
uselessness commented on the list bird-wirds-adjectives
That explains it! I remember a while back when somebody (reesetee, I think) noticed that the text on the home page said Wirdee, and assumed it was some April Fools joke or something. Shortly thereafter it seemed to correct itself, and we never did get closure... ;-)
Edit: I just looked up the word page for Wirdee and it seems I was wise to things even back then!
October 27, 2007
uselessness commented on the list make-it-so
Don't worry, it's not like it'll run out of room or anything. Space is big. You just won't believe how vastly, hugely, mind-bogglingly big it is. I mean, you may think it's a long way down the road to the chemist's, but that's just peanuts to space.
October 27, 2007
uselessness commented on the list quiz-time
Sri Lanka? So... um... Colombo?
October 27, 2007
uselessness commented on the list make-it-so
It was certainly a step up from the TOS uniforms and their sparkly chest stickers... though I don't know that using the bathroom needed to be a factor. Everybody knows that in the future there are no bathrooms; you just beam the waste out from your body and into space. No muss, no fuss.
October 27, 2007
uselessness commented on the word sophistical
I'm so confuzzled.
October 27, 2007
uselessness commented on the list quiz-time
Did I say bumbershoot? And the question is about raincoats? Whoops, stupid me. It's Friday and my thoughts are already on the weekend. ;-)
October 27, 2007
uselessness commented on the word unbelievable terrible
The title of the thread was "Rudy Giuliani is Unbelievable Terrible." Politics aside, I love the phrase. :-P
October 27, 2007
uselessness commented on the word grammatics
"I'd be happy to checkorate that for you!"
October 27, 2007
uselessness commented on the word grip tape
"They should put this on babies."
October 27, 2007
uselessness commented on the word sophistical
Hey now, I didn't add or comment on this word until after the game was over. But I fully intended to. :-P
October 27, 2007
uselessness commented on the word butt paste
Aww jeez, did I draw the short straw this week? ;-)
October 27, 2007
uselessness commented on the list winners-don-t-use-drugs
I fear what Google's giant computer brain will have to say about this page.
October 27, 2007
uselessness commented on the list make-it-so
No, the Picard-jerk would definitely have to be Wesley "Gosh, Captain, I wanna be just like you when I grow up" Crusher. ;-)
And you'd think Starfleet would issue more practical uniforms at some point...
October 27, 2007
uselessness commented on the word flashconf
Isn't that an oxymoron? The whole point of flash mobs is that they're spontaneous and random, and they dissolve just as suddenly as they form. But don't people usually plan far ahead for conferences, and then stick around once they've begun?
October 27, 2007
uselessness commented on the user skipvia
Haha, like any good game show, I did what I could to generate the ratings. It's all about the ratings!
October 27, 2007
uselessness commented on the word meet cute
Crazy logic those rom coms have! I admit having been tempted to do mean things ("accidents," of course) to various cute girls I've known, in hopes that real life would turn out to be just like a movie. But alas, real life ain't.
October 27, 2007
uselessness commented on the list quiz-time
I'm still stumped, but here are a couple wild guesses...
3. bumbershoot?
4. stumble?
7. Dido?
8. absolutely no idea
10. ditto that
October 27, 2007
uselessness commented on the list prosie-the-crisis
Yes. Yes, and yes. Thank you for posting this. I chilled.
October 26, 2007
uselessness commented on the list make-it-so
Yes, the Picard-jerk! So that's what it's called... I love how even the little things from that show have become famous.
October 26, 2007
uselessness commented on the word bishop
All I know is if you filed my teeth down, I would be indignant. And you would be in the hospital for a very long time. ;-)
October 26, 2007
uselessness commented on the word bishop
Hey, that's a very good connection, skipvia! That phrase never did make sense to me. But I've gotta say, what a despicable deed is this bishoping. I'm not exactly what you might call an "animal person," but this sounds incredibly cruel even to me. Then again, I think I have an abnormal fear of scraping/filing body parts: teeth, toenails, elbow bones, jawbones... yeesh...
October 26, 2007
uselessness commented on the list quiz-time
I'm pretty clueless, but...
1. mamba
9. bomb bus?
10. amblers?
October 26, 2007
uselessness commented on the list word-guidelines-for-wordie
Oh no, you're corrupting my list ads!!
October 26, 2007
uselessness commented on the word it's all good
Whyagottahate?
October 26, 2007
uselessness commented on the word sophistical
And it's totally me. Haha!
October 26, 2007
uselessness commented on the word compassionate conservatism
Well said. :-) I think libertarianism's pretty great, but I wouldn't want to use Wordie as my soapbox. Lots of better places for that.
October 26, 2007
uselessness commented on the list make-it-so
If ever there was a reason for censorship on Wordie... ;-)
October 26, 2007
uselessness commented on the user skipvia
You have emerged victorious from Identify the Wordie. You are an astute observer of people on the internet! I mean that in a good way! Make sure to come back for the next game so you can retain your title, champion.
This comment is your trophy. Display it with love for all the world to see.
October 26, 2007
uselessness commented on the user rocksinmypockets
You have emerged victorious from Identify the Wordie. You are an astute observer of people on the internet! I mean that in a good way! Make sure to come back for the next game so you can retain your title, champion.
This comment is your trophy. Display it with love for all the world to see.
October 26, 2007
uselessness commented on the user reesetee
You have emerged victorious from Identify the Wordie. You are an astute observer of people on the internet! I mean that in a good way! Make sure to come back for the next game so you can retain your title, champion.
This comment is your trophy. Display it with love for all the world to see.
October 26, 2007
uselessness commented on the list identify-the-wordie
Thanks for playing! Results have been posted!
October 26, 2007
uselessness commented on the word compassionate conservatism
If you're looking for a good introduction, a lot of people have found this video (Flash) to be a terrific overview. It's pretty short too. The nice thing about libertarianism is it's grounded in basic principles and is consistent in every situation, and the video explains what they are in a no-nonsense way. :-)
October 26, 2007
uselessness commented on the user chained_bear
I suddenly just got the mental picture of John sitting in a large control room, surrounded by knobs and switches, occasionally pulling random levers, and passing the time by watching our respective odometers with breathless anticipation. ;-)
October 26, 2007
uselessness commented on the list soldier-s-words
Mr. Cooper, apparently. That is, according to Wikipedia. Oh, and Jim Cramer is also partially to blame. It's a corruption of booyeah, which I guess is a corruption of boo! Yeah! Or something.
*WARNING: Etymologies in mirror are most likely more madeupical than they appear*
October 26, 2007
uselessness commented on the list writer-writer
Hmm, how about secretary, copywriter, spin doctor, transcriptionist, letterer, muse? Not sure if any of those are general enough for you, but take your pick. :-)
October 26, 2007
uselessness commented on the list soldier-s-words
Wikipedia has some interestingish articles on the Marines' oorah and the Army's hooah. I don't think the Air Force or Navy have equivalents.
October 26, 2007
uselessness commented on the word air force
Superman? ;-)
October 26, 2007
uselessness commented on the word compassionate conservatism
Sad but true. There are a lot of good political-type words that I wish I could cling to, but their definitions have shifted and they now have negative connotations. Oh well. That's language, right? ;-)
October 26, 2007
uselessness commented on the list soldier-s-words
You're no Marine! ;-)
October 26, 2007
uselessness commented on the word compassionate conservatism
Awkwardly, yes. Conservative and liberal are weird words that have changed meanings so many times over the years that they're hard to pin down meanings for today. Libertarianism can be defined both as "traditional conservatism" and as "classical liberalism." Some people say that we're economically conservative and socially liberal, but even that's hard to quantify. When I refer to myself as a conservative, I'm referring to my positions on limited government, which used to be a mainstay of conservatism but is seldom seen in the Republican party today. Nowadays the GOP is all about neoconservativism, which is another beast altogether.
As for the "compassionate" part, it's a common misconception that libertarianism is uncompassionate. I hear it all the time and it's really annoying because it stems from not understanding the principles of liberty. Once a person discovers what liberty is really all about, it becomes clear that libertarianism is the most altruistic political position, and arguable the most compassionate as well.
October 26, 2007
uselessness commented on the list calgon-take-me-away
Great list! You might find some inspiration in my list of names for the afterlife because a lot of them are similarly evocative and mystical. :-)
October 26, 2007
uselessness commented on the word compassionate conservatism
Hey, we do exist! We're just filed under "L" for libertarian. :-P
October 26, 2007
uselessness commented on the list soldier-s-words
Oorah!
October 26, 2007
uselessness commented on the list identify-the-wordie
Any more guesses? I'll end the game tomorrow. Anyone is welcome to play. :-)
October 26, 2007
uselessness commented on the word adam
Don't forget Adam West, star of...
na na na na na na na na
na na na na na na na na
BATMAN!!
*adds tag to page* :-P
October 25, 2007
uselessness commented on the word noble savage
I love to think about philosophy but don't like reading it. One of the few "greats" that I've spent any time on at all was Thoreau, who espoused a similar view of the evils of civilization. He was very poetic, which is nice, but he was still wrong. :-P
October 25, 2007
uselessness commented on the word madeupical etymology
You flatter me. :-P
October 25, 2007
uselessness commented on the word coprophagia
That might be a good way to handle it. And maybe a similar feature for marking tags as irrelevant? ;-)
October 25, 2007
uselessness commented on the word mute
British spelling never ceases to amaeze me.
October 25, 2007
uselessness commented on the word necessarium
That is pretty great. Added!
October 25, 2007
uselessness commented on the word pneumonoultramicroscopicsilicovocanoconiosis
Haha, that's alright, I think there are about six or seven versions of this word on the site, but only one (the one I linked to) is "correct." Not that correctness really matters here, since it's admittedly a joke word, but whatever. ;-)
October 25, 2007
uselessness commented on the word based off of
The phrase based on refers to the basis of something. If someone writes a book on the basis of factual events, the book is "based on a true story."
I think the new, mangled idiom assumes that the root word is base, i.e., the bottom surface of something, or a floor. The floor serves as a "launching point" for new content, which leaps "off of" it. So in the example above, the book is not entirely true, but it uses reality as its anchor as it explores new dramatic possibilities. Not to justify the new phrase, which is really awkward to say. And besides that, this etymological study, as usual, is totally madeupical.
October 25, 2007
uselessness commented on the word coprophagia
I'm also late. But I agree, too. It's John's site, and he should always have the last word in iffy situations like this one. I think he ought to reserve the right to censor even text in extreme situations, at his own discretion. We're a very good-natured community here, and I think the closest we've come to such a point was one offensive list that caught some attention back in the day.
Considering that's the worst/most controversial incident that I'm aware of, we're in pretty good shape. But the nature of this kind of site makes it ripe for abuse, and John should be prepared to take action should it become necessary. I'm not a fan of frivolous habitual censorship, of course, but it must be an option in some rare situations.
October 25, 2007
uselessness commented on the word snarkasm
A portmanteau of snark and sarcasm. Perfect for the modern web user.
October 25, 2007
uselessness commented on the word ostrichsize
Or maybe leaving everyone else out because your head is stuck in the sand. :-P
October 25, 2007
uselessness commented on the list what-is-a-reesetee-anyhow
Pharaoh Moohlah! Pharaoh Moohlah! :-P
October 25, 2007
uselessness commented on the word orbitz
A more appropriate seat has never existed.
October 25, 2007
uselessness commented on the word might could
Haha, nice example! :-P Yes, that's the third usage I mentioned, which I don't have (as much of) a problem with.
October 25, 2007
uselessness commented on the word orbitz
I prefer the name curds and whey. Perfectly sums up the congealed chunky-runniness of the food. Wait, food? No, it's not food at all. It's barely edible fungus.
October 25, 2007
uselessness commented on the word aggressive mediocrity
Keith is a vegetarian
Not vegan 'cause he drinks his dairy and
He's not like me who also eats meat
He protests the war with the sandals on his feet
Omnivores for mediocrity!
Omnivores for mediocrity!
Omnivores for mediocrity!
Helpless vegetables are trapped
For killing only them you should be slapped
At least a cow can run and be free
Omnivores for mediocrity!
(A note from Reese: Keith used to only eat four things - meat, bread, cheese, and candy. Then I made him go to this Chinese restaurant with me and he started eating vegetables. Now, he's gone way overboard and WON'T eat meat at all, and he goes to all these war protests. And he burns incense and wears a muumuu. Okay, maybe it's just a dress.)
(A note from Keith: Hey, I look good in that dress.)
October 25, 2007
uselessness commented on the word poop
Gross. Never, never feed me on the poop.
October 25, 2007
uselessness commented on the word orbitz
On second thought, it is more pleasant than eating cottage cheese.
October 25, 2007
uselessness commented on the word orbitz
It's like drinking maple syrup, with chewy lumps throughout.
October 25, 2007
uselessness commented on the word poop
Wow, in that way it's almost onomatopoeic. *does that finger-in-cheek popping noise thing*
October 25, 2007
uselessness commented on the word placelessness
Dad?
October 25, 2007
uselessness commented on the word poop
I just had a revelation concerning the word poop... it's a lousy noun but a kick-awesome verb.
October 25, 2007
uselessness commented on the word ftw
For the win!
October 25, 2007
uselessness commented on the word cold reboot
Technology ftw!
October 25, 2007
uselessness commented on the word orbitz
Before Orbitz the dotcom travel agency, there was Orbitz the drink. It was fruit-flavored, and thick nearly to the point of gelatin. The drink was clear, with many little colored globs perfectly suspended throughout it. The drink was strongly disliked and went out of production shortly after it launched. It could be considered a precursor to today's bubble tea.
October 25, 2007
uselessness commented on the word johayra
Oh, we play games occasionally, too. :-P
October 25, 2007
uselessness commented on the word grammarian
Wait, this isn't listed yet? What the heck?
October 25, 2007
uselessness commented on the word johayra
Hey johayrae! The site doesn't have a "purpose" per se -- it's just a place to talk about words. We're very laid-back here and a lot more fun than you'd expect a bunch of grammarians and wordinistas to be.
You can make lists of words (or phrases) and categorize them however you like... words you love, hate, words that remind you of New Zealand, whatever. :-) Check out lists made by other people, share ideas, tell jokes. Though words are our foundation we end up talking about pretty much everything eventually. It's a fun site to just dork out on.
October 25, 2007
uselessness commented on the word bubble tea
I think Boba is just the brand name of the local company that sells it here. But that's what my friends call it. The strangest drink I've had since Orbitz.
October 25, 2007
uselessness commented on the word bubble tea
What is that? Is it like boba tea? I'm so uncultured when it comes to food...
Edit: Wikipedia tells me they are one and the same. A lot of my friends like that stuff. I think it tastes decent, but the floating blobs are gross.
October 25, 2007
uselessness commented on the word voice of binky
Haha, the context makes all the difference! I love it!
October 24, 2007
uselessness commented on the word scat
nested...quotes...headache...
October 24, 2007
uselessness commented on the list identify-the-wordie
Good call on rapprochemental, I corrected the spelling. And maybe for future guesses, just pick one word per person or it'll be hard to find a winner. :-P
Oh, and I think you forgot John.
October 24, 2007
uselessness commented on the list identify-the-wordie
Yeah, just post your guesses in a comment. :-)
October 24, 2007
uselessness commented on the list complicated-complexes
*smirks at trivet*
October 24, 2007
uselessness commented on the list words-that-rhyme-with-larynx
Um... air inks? fair angst? ;-)
October 24, 2007
uselessness commented on the list identify-the-wordie
Game on!
October 24, 2007
uselessness commented on the word cephalopygian
That. Is. Perfect.
October 24, 2007
uselessness commented on the word pneumonoultramicroscopicsilicovocanoconiosis
It's also frequently misspelled. See: pneumonoultramicroscopicsilicovolcanoconiosis. :-P
October 24, 2007
uselessness commented on the word ogle
This word always reminds me of Stranger Than Fiction. If you haven't seen it, you must. It was *made* for Wordies.
October 24, 2007
uselessness commented on the word might could
Most every time I hear the phrase, it's used in one of two ways: it's either substituting for might, or it's substituting for could. In those situations, I get the impression the speaker doesn't know which one is correct, so he goes with both just to cover all the bases. That's BAD.
But to be fair, there are other times it's used as an abbreviated form of "might be able to" and that's a little more acceptable. Grammatically atrocious, of course, but shorthand is reasonable in response to a mouthful of a phrase.
October 24, 2007
uselessness commented on the word murcielago
Okay, I think I get it. Because ayuntar means "to join" or "to meet," I see how it could be taken either way. Similar to the word intercourse in English, which originally meant "discussion" but has come mean "coitus" in most every case. Also similar are conjugation and union.
October 24, 2007
uselessness commented on the word nintendo
Sure beats Sega, which is an abbreviation for "Service Games," or Sony, which is Japanese slang for "child prodigy," or Microsoft, which means "small and mushy."
October 24, 2007
uselessness commented on the word features
I'm not super-attached to the embedded media thing. I like finding the occasional YouTube video on a word page because it often adds context (see: like) but it's true that it breaks the flow of the text we've come to expect. And a link would be nearly as effective, anyway. However, without embedded media, we wouldn't have earworm, which may or may not be a good thing.
October 24, 2007
uselessness commented on the word nintendo
Woah, a Japanese-to-Spanish translation, posted on an English web site. I can't even begin to quantify the cool.
October 24, 2007
uselessness commented on the word thick skin
Ah, that could be. I don't read much of anything. :-P Mostly non-fiction these days, anyway. But yeah, I expect the motif is present in more than two movies, I just couldn't find any specific examples.
October 24, 2007
uselessness commented on the word features
As the first person to ever embed media on Wordie, of course I'm a little biased... but I do like having the ability to post that kind of stuff. :-P
However, I'm probably at odds with everyone else here when I say that I would appreciate some color and design elements around the site. I mean, it's perfectly functional as-is (and I love it!) but a little on the bland side for my tastes. Just because we're pro-words doesn't mean we have to be anti-everything else. Now, the only reason I've brought this up is that embedded media would not seem nearly so out-of-place on a more colorful site; I think it's only because of the simpler design we currently have that their presence seems a little jarring.
October 24, 2007
uselessness commented on the word thick skin
Maybe the motif isn't as common as I thought. Some Googling tells me it was used in The Godfather and Children of Men, but maybe those are the only places? And perhaps not in books at all. Oh well, still interesting irregardless.
October 24, 2007
uselessness commented on the word mos def
He'll always be known as Left Ear to me.
October 23, 2007
uselessness commented on the word clacksome
Actually that's pretty disgusting, if evocatively so.
October 23, 2007
uselessness commented on the user rickdog
So... uh... what happened here?
October 23, 2007
uselessness commented on the word features
Hey! It's something I've on-and-off-again wanted, but never bugged you about it directly because you have so many other things on your plate. But yeah, if you made it, I wouldn't complain. ;-)
October 23, 2007
uselessness commented on the word thick skin
No, oranges do. In literature, the appearance of an orange often signals that something really awful is about to happen. It's a kind of foreshadowing, or something.
October 23, 2007
uselessness commented on the word altar ego
What? Tom Swift?
October 23, 2007
uselessness commented on the word shootme green
The shade of green found on many sports cars, as named by my brother. The most dangerous car color in the world.
October 23, 2007
uselessness commented on the word arrestme red
The shade of red found on many sports cars, as named by my brother.
October 23, 2007
uselessness commented on the word pullmeover yellow
The shade of yellow found on many sports cars, as named by my brother.
October 23, 2007
uselessness commented on the word disgusting
Haha, I know what you mean! When you say the word, you can taste it funking in your mouth.
October 23, 2007
uselessness commented on the user uselessness
Hey Jen! (Yikes, now there's two Jens around here *tries not to get confused*)
So there's really no way to send private messages on Wordie yet, but yeah, a note on a profile is cool. Thanks for the kind words! I also enjoy rummaging through your letter-lists and finding nuggets of randomness. :-D
October 23, 2007
uselessness commented on the word alter ego
But why Clark Kent? I mean, I'd at least be Donald Trump or somebody. Now Batman, there's a super with panache!
October 23, 2007
uselessness commented on the word thick skin
But isn't that traditionally a symbol for impending danger? That would totally defeat the purpose! Give me some mithril any day.
October 23, 2007
uselessness commented on the word cephalopod
seanahan,
Better a foothead than a butthead.
Insincerely,
uselessness
October 23, 2007
uselessness commented on the word blue suede shoes
Of course, had you never posted that comment, we never would have come here, and the need for an alert would never have existed. I think you're feigning care by "warning" us of earworms, but in reality hoping beyond hope that the dreaded beast will infect every last one of us with unending musicality. Thanks, bub.
October 23, 2007
uselessness commented on the word vestigial
Oh hey guys, I'm back and I forgive you. So I lied.
October 23, 2007
uselessness commented on the word vestigial
Wordie offends me. I'm leaving and NEVAR COMING BACK.
October 23, 2007
uselessness commented on the word arch enemy
I need to see Galaxy Quest again. That's an awesome movie! I love all the little Star Trek references and parodies.
October 23, 2007
uselessness commented on the word murcielago
Holy cow, what an unlikely pair of definitions ayuntamiento has. Just how exactly are the two related?
October 23, 2007
uselessness commented on the word brephophagist
Tagged. And that's all I have to say about that.
October 23, 2007
uselessness commented on the word thrust mechanics
How random, somebody in the office was playing that very skit earlier today. Turd Ferguson is a funny name.
October 23, 2007
uselessness commented on the word s-word
It was my doppelganger! I was in a trance! Under duress! The terrorists made me do it! They were going to cut off my earlobes!
October 23, 2007
uselessness commented on the word circumsuperüberpostex-antiantefaux-semiavideluxerificalificnesserosity
Wow, between the auto-complete and the random word feature, I've discovered a number of strange things on this site...
October 23, 2007
uselessness commented on the word yogurt
I guess that would be a matter of opinion. They may have thought that it's not immediately clear how to pronounce Danone ("dan OWN"? "dah NUN"?) and decided to go with something more phonetic in English. It's perfectly clear, this way, that it's meant to rhyme with cannon. To my ears, it connotes strength and vitality; that is some tough yogurt! Contrast that with their primary competitor, Yoplait, which sounds foofy and pretty and French. :-P
October 23, 2007
uselessness commented on the list names-of-actual-pets-i-have-known
The guy I bought my car from has a 250+ lb dog/wolf crossbreed named Sue. It's a boy.
Mark Edge, a talk radio host I enjoy, has a cat named Señor Grouchy Pants.
October 23, 2007
uselessness commented on the word features
Ahh, brilliant, John, I'll keep that in mind next time I make an on-Wordie link!
So yeah, lots of ideas here to consider... but in the meantime, perhaps a good priority is pagination on any page where comments can go? Because the active ones (like, say this page) fill up fast, and that's a lot of scrolling. AJAX and pagination go together like birds of a feather, so a little XMLHttpRequest magic could do wonders. ;-)
October 23, 2007
uselessness commented on the word o
That's true, Xing is also a common Chinese name, and it's pronounced "zing." So, I guess we can't win either way. ;-)
October 23, 2007
uselessness commented on the word o
Agreed, they should be consistent, I would think. But I don't really like the two forms you cited, personally, because x-ing is what you see on railroad crossing signs, and so I just head-pronounce it crossing. And x ing is totally weird: where else do you find a space between a verb and its -ing suffix? That can't be right!
October 23, 2007
uselessness commented on the word skinnymalinks
Good heavens, this site is becoming a veritable earworm minefield!
October 23, 2007
uselessness commented on the word tragedy of the commons
Yes. Uh, yes indeed. You caught me. :-P
October 23, 2007
uselessness commented on the word caspian wimblewether
Haha, that was Caspar Weinberger, but you have to wonder...
October 23, 2007
uselessness commented on the word nosebuds
Jeepers, what a letdown.
October 23, 2007
uselessness commented on the list ships-of-fame
Oh, Horatio Hornblower's ship was the Indefatigable. It's fiction, but noteworthy fiction. :-)
October 23, 2007
uselessness commented on the word marihuana
Yes, as you've defined those pronunciations, although I usually pronounce a hard "G" in iguana. I'm entirely gringo and only say marijuana with a strong accent when I'm in the right (read: silly) mood. All other times I sound much more uncultured and American. ;-)
October 23, 2007
uselessness commented on the word spelling
In that case, you'll "love" the Gallery of "Misused" Quotation Marks. ;-)
October 23, 2007
uselessness commented on the word features
I'm also opposed to favoriting users, but I don't think favoriting comments is bad. At least on MetaFilter (my inspiration for the idea) there's no sense of competition. The "favorites" aren't really worth anything, except as a placemark to return to good conversation points. It has the side benefit of encouraging people to post substantial comments, though "substantial" remains plenty vague so it could mean educational or weird or funny or whatever. It's very free-form.
I love all the "conversations" lists but I think it's only a short-term solution for keeping track of good stuff. I'm just looking for better ways to do that, and while favoriting comments may or may not help, maybe there are other things that will work better in the long-term. Wordie's getting bigger, and faster, and more complicated, and anything that improves the way it's organized is a big plus in my book.
So here's an idea I just had. At the moment, we can create lists of words. But what if we could make lists of other things too? For example, lists of lists. Lists of tags. Lists of users. Lists of comments. I think that would add many layers of interconnectivity, and provide new ways to organize stuff as well.
Finally, John, how the heck did you link to a list page without the icon showing up after it?
October 23, 2007
uselessness commented on the word libertarianism
The philosophy of liberty transcends politics. It is about maximizing the natural rights of all people equally. According to libertarianism, every human being is born with three inherent rights:
1. Ability to own property. A person's belongings are the fruit of his labor (and the product of rights #2 and #3), therefore control over his property is the way to retain the meaning of his past. To take a person's property without his consent is theft.
2. Personal freedom, or liberty. Every individual carries the responsibility of self-ownership and self-determination; only he may make the decisions of where he will go, what he will do, and how he will live his life. Liberty represents the worth of one's present. To take a person's liberty without his consent is slavery.
3. Life. No human being is entitled to harm or take the life of another, because a person's life represents hope for the future. To deprive someone of life without his consent is murder.
These three rights are the foundation of healthy society and may never be infringed by anyone, under any circumstance. Any additional "rights" that do infringe on the three rights listed above are not really rights at all. Additionally, laws which cause any of those rights to be infringed are immoral laws and should be opposed.
The three cornerstone rights listed above form an invaluable gift that every person possesses in equal quantities. Libertarianism is about defending that gift from anyone who would take it from another by force. In many cases, the enemy of individual rights is the common thug; in many others it is a tyrannical government. Regardless of the circumstance, there is never any justification for violating other humans' rights. In modern democracies, libertarians stand against the tyranny of the majority to prevent the rights of the minority from being unwillingly wrested away.
Libertarianism is an oft-ridiculed, oft-misunderstood philosophy, but a highly principled one as well. For a more detailed explanation, you may be interested in watching this short video.
October 23, 2007
uselessness commented on the word tragedy of the commons
A good argument for libertarianism. :-)
October 23, 2007
uselessness commented on the word caspian wimblewether
Did he leave a note?
October 23, 2007
uselessness commented on the word por cierto
Person 1: "I love rain."
Person 2: "I agree, rain is wonderful. Nice and wet."
Person 1: "(Of course/By the way), while I enjoy the wetness, I hate the dark sky rain brings."
Person 2: "I'll, uh, make a note of that."
Okay, it's a stretch. They're similar, though not fully interchangeable. I concede this battle to you, but not without a whole lot of points scored for my team first. ;-)
October 23, 2007
uselessness commented on the word yogurt
I wonder if that's related to the Dannon yogurt brand we have in the United States.
October 23, 2007
uselessness commented on the word passable
See my similar experience at linguistical deafblindness. At least you got to duel it out; I fouled up the first word they gave me. ;-)
October 23, 2007
uselessness commented on the word si
LOL, nice way of diagramming it. :-) I just wish accent marks weren't so tricky to type. I'm not usually one to deliberately misspell things out of laziness, but I admit in the case of avoiding unusual characters, I'm pretty notorious.
October 23, 2007
uselessness commented on the word s-word
I'm only going to say it once. For the record. The S-word is schadenfreude. Never speak it in my presence. That is all.
October 23, 2007
uselessness commented on the word zeitgeist
It's the new S-word! Something about obscure German words that attracts the trendies, I guess.
October 23, 2007
uselessness commented on the word harrowing of hell
I like to think of it as a spiritual battle royale, starring Jesus and Satan as luchadores in a ginormous wrestling ring of fire. And the devil done got his hide whupped something fierce.
October 23, 2007
uselessness commented on the word coprophagia
That's disgusting! I can't believe there's actually a word for this.
*tries to forget*
October 23, 2007
uselessness commented on the word deprogramming
Correcting for unhealthy psychological frameworks in one's mind by deconstructing them and replacing them with normal ones. The term usually refers to the process needed to extract a loved from an abusive cult that indoctrinates followers. It is also a staple of post-traumatic counseling, and of helping harrowed soldiers recover from shell shock or brainwashing that they may have endured as prisoners of war.
October 23, 2007
uselessness commented on the word unlearn
Unlearning is needed to excel in a lot of fields, because it leads to "thinking outside the box." See also: deprogramming for a related concept of mind-renewal.
October 23, 2007
uselessness commented on the word social shaping
Fascinating. Who would have thought that such an old technology term would still be so relevant today? Well, it's old with regards to the internet/computer revolution, anyway.
October 23, 2007
uselessness commented on the word divvy
Sounds like it could be short for either word, seeing as how one is a noun and one is a verb. I mean heck, isn't divide really just the verb form of dividend anyway?
October 23, 2007
uselessness commented on the word dismember
It should be Frankenstein, which is totally a verb by the way.
October 23, 2007
uselessness commented on the word vestigial
I use my pinky toe! You know, for counting. Four toes on a foot would be wrong wrong wrong. But when I hear this word, I also think of the appendix, and tonsils. :-)
October 23, 2007
uselessness commented on the list ships-of-fame
Okay, where the heck is the S.S. Minnow?
October 23, 2007
uselessness commented on the word voice of binky
See also: distraction. Binky comes in many forms. ;-)
October 23, 2007
uselessness commented on the word spelling
I have to wonder about people who go out of their way to insert unnecessary punctuation. It's easier to type your than you're! It's easier to type locals than local's! It's a two-for-one deal: save yourself the trouble of typing extra characters, AND get the added bonus of being correct. Who wouldn't want that?
A frightened part of me suspects that these people assume using more letters and punctuation marks equals being more grammatically intelligent. Like refusing to acknowledge that its really is the possessive form of it, because it's not as "complete" as it could be.
October 23, 2007
uselessness commented on the word marihuana
You know, it really is a pretty word. Guess it depends on how you pronounce it. Gotta use a strong fake accent and exaggerate the H sound: "mahdeeHHUUWWanna!"
October 23, 2007
uselessness commented on the word huevo
Here in New Mexico (that is, provided I'm really located there) we have a popular dish called huevos rancheros. If the slang connotation is so strong in Spanish, I wonder if that name is intended as innuendo. Seems innocent enough in the literal sense. There's got to be a way to order eggs without implying something else, right?
October 22, 2007
uselessness commented on the word features
I'm always late to these parties, but here's my two cents. I like my Wordie existential. You know, so it just is what it is.
Maybe it's my pseudonym taking over, but I think attempts to make the site more useful are not so good. At least academically speaking. I'm all in favor of making it more usable, and more efficient to do what we already do. But let's not kid ourselves that we're making some kind of purposeful dictionary/Wikipedia clone. That may be right for Lingoz, but it's not who we are. Wordie is primarily about fun (vis-Ã -vis word appreciation, admittedly).
Yes, the site is educational. But mostly in the "gosh, I wasn't planning to learn that today but I'm glad I did" way. There's no way to differentiate between fun comments and informative comments, and comments are frequently both. Often a regular definition comment will spawn a whole conversation that could be considered "fun" or "off-topic" but is also thought-provoking and enlightening. We should make no attempts to corral comments into one category or another. In my opinion.
On the other hand, I'd be up for other ways to add value to comments. Perhaps comment-favoriting? MetaFilter has a nice way to both give kudos for good contributions to a discussion and save them for recall later. Favorited comments are noted with a little "14 users marked this comment as a favorite" blurb. Food for thought.
October 22, 2007
uselessness commented on the word like
Oh, there's an obscure usage you missed: "I like ice cream."
It indicates favor. Mostly obsolete.
October 22, 2007
uselessness commented on the word cucaracha
I just want to say, though I've heard the tune for years I never knew the lyrics. This is one bizarre, hilarious song, and the fact that Verse 6 mentions Albuquerque makes it even better. Granted, my Spanish is muy terrible but I liked the parts I could figure out.
October 22, 2007
uselessness commented on the word o
Kind of like Xing, or however you spell that? Like when you X something out?
October 22, 2007
uselessness commented on the word por cierto
Even in English, there's crossover there. I mean, should the phrase "of course" literally mean what we use it for? I'm pretty sure it's a shortened form of "it's a matter of course," meaning that the course of logic inevitably leads to some obvious conclusion. But the same phrase is also often used to mean "by the way" in colloquial speech; it's a conversational segue that refers to the same "course of logic," which in this case will lead the discussion into a natural transition. Similar to the way indeed is used, or in olden days, verily.
For more examples of this kind of phrasal crossover in slang, see duh and eh. ;-)
October 22, 2007
uselessness commented on the word mr. owl ate my metal worm
I hope he didn't hurt himself.
October 22, 2007
uselessness commented on the word earworm alert
A most helpful tag.
October 22, 2007
uselessness commented on the word teh
Software that corrects intentional typos is teh evil. Also, I have the sudden desire to post my picture on studnet, whatever that is.
October 22, 2007
uselessness commented on the word dilettante
I'm a fan of bastardaster, personally. Nothing like adding insult to... er, insult.
October 22, 2007
uselessness commented on the word mariology
Awww, I am most definitely a student of the latter.
October 22, 2007
uselessness commented on the word parturient amnesia
Every mother's ideal Christmas present?
October 22, 2007
uselessness commented on the word johnian
Also: an adherent to the Wordie Commandments, and by extension, John himself.
October 22, 2007
uselessness commented on the word epicaricacy
What? Koani? No, say it isn't true! There is nothing... beautiful... about that, that, "word." Please, take it back!
October 22, 2007
uselessness commented on the word boustrophedon
I'm sure to the trained reader this sort
esuaceb ,tneiciffe ylbirret si gnitirw fo
it reduces the work of the eye by 50%.
redner ot lacitcarpmi rehtar si ti ,llitS
since most computer software doesn't
eb tsum txet dna noisrevni enil troppus
flipped manually. And since the format is
tnemngila ,epyt deifitsuj rof detius-tseb
also becomes an issue. Not to mention the
eurT .gniht sdrawkcab gnidaer elohw
boustrophedon may not even be possible with
sretcarahc derorrim sa ygolonhcet tnerruc
are not supported for the entire alphabet
.dradnats edocinU eht ni
October 22, 2007
uselessness commented on the word hyperhedonia
I really, really like hanging out at this one web site that doesn't have pictures and is all about words.
October 22, 2007
uselessness commented on the word queue
I like it because it's just a bunch of vowels, preceded by the bizarrest letter in the alphabet. Plus, it should be impossible to pronounce but is instead deceptively easy.
October 22, 2007
uselessness commented on the word simaphor
People who don't understand the difference between similes and metaphors probably shouldn't use analogies at all.
October 22, 2007
uselessness commented on the word honest politician
Agreed, to my knowledge there's not an honest man in Washington except Ron Paul. Would be nice to see him become president, if only for the breath of fresh air to make the corruption more bearable everywhere else.
October 22, 2007
uselessness commented on the word comcastrophe
Haha, I love the blue! Gotta agree with the comments in the thread though, that article sucked. :-)
October 20, 2007
uselessness commented on the list loonie
Love this one! How about cuckoo? (Kisholi made a nice list too...)
October 20, 2007
uselessness commented on the word complaint
I'm confused, do you mean compliant? Or perhaps just pliant? This word, "complaint," is a noun.
October 20, 2007
uselessness commented on the word earworm
See discussion at shirt. It means we want earworm merch. :-)
October 19, 2007
uselessness commented on the word awful
Interesting that both of those Spanish words are English words too.
October 19, 2007
uselessness commented on the word pneumonoultramicroscopicsilicovolcanoconiosis
I learned to say it fast back in third grade, and thought I had "arrived" in the world of intelligence. After a while I realized that doing so is an impressive -- but hollow -- way to dork out, and serves little purpose beside that. It's also an extremely effective way to make your friends think you're a pretentious snot. :-P
October 19, 2007
uselessness commented on the word pneumonoultramicroscopicsilicovolcanoconeosis
Nice breakdown, but I think you mean pneumonoultramicroscopicsilicovolcanoconiosis. ;-)
October 19, 2007
uselessness commented on the list out-with-the-verbs
Oh, now I see that one on the noun list. Guess I had thought of it as a verb. Ah well, still a nifty song.
October 19, 2007
uselessness commented on the word semicolon
What is this "book" thing of which you speak? I like the idea of portable literature, but unless the battery life is good I can't be bothered.
October 19, 2007
uselessness commented on the word pangea
Hmm. Not sure about that. It's probably heavier than plain dirt, but I imagine there were plenty of unmined heavy metals underground. There's probably no way to calculate which would be heavier.
October 19, 2007
uselessness commented on the list out-with-the-verbs
Le freak, c'est chic.
October 19, 2007
uselessness commented on the word earworm
It's called "Popcorn," originally recorded by the band Hot Butter. Because of its notoriety as an obnoxious earworm, it's been covered probably more than any other song ever. There are so many versions floating around, it's not even funny. Here are 79 of them you can download. I have no idea what version is playing on this page, they're all the same to me. More information (and still more versions to download) available here.
October 19, 2007
uselessness commented on the word jeez
Better an icky insect than, um, nothing. Remember, Pinocchio was a blockhead.
October 19, 2007
uselessness commented on the word rice
There are fifty levels. I couldn't stay consistently above 47.
October 19, 2007
uselessness commented on the word semicolon
Precisely. I had a second meaning in mind too: "Made of sheets of paper bound together." :-P
October 19, 2007
uselessness commented on the word pangea
So I'm curious. When all the continents were together on one side of the earth, wouldn't that off-centeredness have caused the planet to rotate in a wobbly fashion? That's a lot of weight in one place. And if so, would it affect our orbit around the sun? I'm assuming not, in frictionless space. Still, makes you wonder.
October 19, 2007
uselessness commented on the word dork out
I'm going to assume that's a BTTF reference, reesetee, and no one's a bigger BTTF dork than me. Therefore, I must correct your years to 1955 and 2015. ;-)
October 19, 2007
uselessness commented on the word clayey
When did they start letting six-year-olds write the dictionary?
October 19, 2007
uselessness commented on the word dork out
There really isn't a problem with transporters. Safety mechanisms like the aforementioned pattern buffers and Heisenberg compensators have made the risk negligible. Beaming down to a planet surface is far safer than piloting a shuttlecraft down there, and has been for several hundred years (we're in the 24th century, right?).
Occasionally you'll have some freak thing happen, like a duplicate you running around, or you turn into a ghost, or you discover that old crewmen have been hiding in suspended animation for years in the matter stream. Or any number of other weird anomalies. But for the most part, it's perfectly safe. The major limitations are the 40,000 km range, the fact that you can't transport through raised shields or during warp travel. Certain hacks have overcome some of those, but can't be relied upon in everyday use.
October 19, 2007
uselessness commented on the word semicolon
After how many months, you're beginning to? ;-)
It's the username, isn't it? Hard to take a guy seriously with a name like uselessness. I like it. Catches people off guard. :-P
October 19, 2007
uselessness commented on the word rice
Free Rice! Not for you, silly, for starving people around the world. All you have to do is show your vocabluaric prowess (no shortage of that around here), and you can help end hunger.
October 19, 2007
uselessness commented on the word thesaurus game
Sorry, I can't understand what you're saying. I'm going back to the l33t sp34k page.
October 19, 2007
uselessness commented on the word hexadecaroon
Meaningless, but fun to say. ;-)
October 19, 2007
uselessness commented on the word hexadecaroon
Exactly 1/16? I'm not sure that race can be calculated that specifically. Besides, I'd expect that most people have some small portion of every race in their blood. That is, providing race even exists at all.
October 19, 2007
uselessness commented on the word dork out
There are many reasons dorks watch Star Trek. But let's face it, if you tuned in for the babe factor there's probably not much hope left for you. ;-)
October 19, 2007
uselessness commented on the word dork out
Pattern degradation isn't as bad as it sounds, usually. The recursive pattern buffers and Heisenberg compensators will keep you safe.
October 19, 2007
uselessness commented on the word has a head
Why do you people torment me like this?!?
October 19, 2007
uselessness commented on the word sorryish
Not the most subtle doublespeak in the world, at any rate.
October 19, 2007
uselessness commented on the word dork out
Hmm, I'm not sure about pattern loss on a trip through a planet. You're probably right. But the transporter doesn't only work line-of-sight either. I assume there's a threshold of several meters of matter that you could beam through safely, more or less depending on what the material is. My guess is that if you wanted to transport from one point on the earth's surface to another, you'd only be able to go a little further than the horizon; eventually the planet's curvature becomes an issue.
Of course, that's assuming you're using the wireless protocol they install on starships. That's pretty impractical on land. I expect you could send the signal through the internet on earth, and get just about anywhere there's web access.
October 19, 2007
uselessness commented on the word dork out
You can't transport things long-range because the pattern will degrade. Transporters have a maximum range of 40,000 km, which is nothing in the hugeness of space.
Dating Deanna Troi would be a field trip to hell. Besides the mind-reading, her emotional sensitivity makes her a regular drama queen. And then there's her mother. I don't envy Riker.
October 18, 2007
uselessness commented on the word porcupet
Hedgepiglet?
October 18, 2007
uselessness commented on the word league of extrawordy gentlemen
Tiddlywinks?
October 18, 2007
uselessness commented on the word dork out
I'd take the holodeck, which can at least make all the other things appear real. I mean heck, it fooled Professor Moriarty.
October 18, 2007
uselessness commented on the word semicolon
A clever edit, reesetee, changing the name there, so future generations of Wordies will read this page and think I'm the crazy one...which I am, but that's beside the point.
October 18, 2007
uselessness commented on the word distraction
October 18, 2007
uselessness commented on the word strabismus
There's no business like strabismus...
October 18, 2007
uselessness commented on the word haversack
The what? Don't hint at such marvels, my boy, unless you're prepared to expound upon the reference.
October 18, 2007
uselessness commented on the word myfaceborkutspace
Mmm, Web Pie. I mean pi.
October 18, 2007
uselessness commented on the word in a brown study
*tries to come up with a good pun about the study being elementary*
*fails*
October 18, 2007
uselessness commented on the word league of extrawordy gentlemen
Where's the dartboard?
October 18, 2007
uselessness commented on the word pupil
Eh, only if you believe in evolution. ;-)
October 18, 2007
uselessness commented on the word semicolon
Holy crap, you're lucky I wasn't around last night. Few men have said those kinds of things to my face and... um... avoided rumors being spread about their mothers behind their backs.
Rule #1 of Wordie: Don't ban uselessness.
Rule #2 of Wordie: Conventional books are overrated.
Rule #3 of Wordie: You don't have to be as smart as uselessness, if you make up for it with commentiness.
October 18, 2007
uselessness commented on the list dammit-jim-i-m-a-doctor-not-a-wordie
I miss AZ.
October 18, 2007
uselessness commented on the word sorryish
I think it's more like "I'm sorry I got caught."
October 18, 2007
uselessness commented on the word sticking it to the man
Mine too, except I find it considerably less exciting when the man knows he's been stuck.
October 18, 2007
uselessness commented on the word fried goodness
Avoiding funnel cakes, that's for sure.
October 18, 2007
uselessness commented on the word ubiquity
Here, let me take it off from around my neck, and you can yank it all you want. Go crazy.
October 18, 2007
uselessness commented on the word earworm
I think it's a matter of the remote server coming and going. It's not the most reliable place to load music from. ;-)
October 18, 2007
uselessness commented on the word murther
I need to watch that DVD again. A friend of mine held a "screening" of it a few years ago, and I forgot how funny it was! Of course, if I had the opportunity to see it live... well screw the DVD. ;-)
October 18, 2007
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