Saturday, January 10, 2004
Vocabulous Link-o-rama
Words are fun. Sometimes I don't enjoy hearing them, though. It sets my teeth on edge to hear anyone say, "nu-kyoo-lar," instead of "nuclear," or "miss-chee-vee-us," instead of "mischievous." The verb form of the noun "co-habitation" is "co-habit," not "co-habitate".
That's fine. All is still right with the world. I love to throw words like 'kakistocracy' into a conversation with people who know oh-so-much-more than I do about politics (and I have no difficulty finding them) and cause a momentary lull, invariably followed by the question, "Government by people wearing khaki??"
Complaining about the catachreses of others can be fun in a certain frame of mind. There's a surprisingly large segment of the population that enjoys good-natured criticism of different forms of entertainment. There's a scene in an episode of Stargate SG-1, my all-time favorite show to giggle over, where a character is critiquing a movie (she doesn't mention the name but it's obvious to anyone who's seen it) she had recently seen. Another character asks, "Why do you watch these movies if you just cut them up?" That's the main reason I enjoy the program - the producers know perfectly well that much, if not most, of the fun lies in making fun. They actually built an entire episode around that premise. It completely redeemed them from subjecting me to the episodes that appear to do nothing more than waste film. We come up with creative nicknames for the characters during these shows but I do try to be careful. This show is not just dumb but lovably dumb and should be treated as such. After all, there's a fine line between raillery and invective.
So, you too can build your very own fabulously pretentious vocabulary for less than the price of a cup of coffee! Just visit this site whenever you're feeling supercilious and tell them Annie sent you.
'night
That's fine. All is still right with the world. I love to throw words like 'kakistocracy' into a conversation with people who know oh-so-much-more than I do about politics (and I have no difficulty finding them) and cause a momentary lull, invariably followed by the question, "Government by people wearing khaki??"
Complaining about the catachreses of others can be fun in a certain frame of mind. There's a surprisingly large segment of the population that enjoys good-natured criticism of different forms of entertainment. There's a scene in an episode of Stargate SG-1, my all-time favorite show to giggle over, where a character is critiquing a movie (she doesn't mention the name but it's obvious to anyone who's seen it) she had recently seen. Another character asks, "Why do you watch these movies if you just cut them up?" That's the main reason I enjoy the program - the producers know perfectly well that much, if not most, of the fun lies in making fun. They actually built an entire episode around that premise. It completely redeemed them from subjecting me to the episodes that appear to do nothing more than waste film. We come up with creative nicknames for the characters during these shows but I do try to be careful. This show is not just dumb but lovably dumb and should be treated as such. After all, there's a fine line between raillery and invective.
So, you too can build your very own fabulously pretentious vocabulary for less than the price of a cup of coffee! Just visit this site whenever you're feeling supercilious and tell them Annie sent you.
'night
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