Jun. 8: I’m not the only one messin’ with Fancy Lori™

I’m just gonna come right out and say it: Fancy Lori™ is a word Nazi.

We totally love her ‘n stuff, but it’s true. She loves to point out when non-words are used in conversation. Actually, she doesn’t love it; upon hearing a non-word you will often then hear her screech “THAT’S NOT A WORD!!” You can imagine, then, how much fun the rest of us have with this sometimes. It’s hard to describe the feeling I get watching Fancy Lori’s expression change from mild interest to abject horror in the split second before and after someone utters a word like “brung.” (Hard, but not impossible: it’s awesome.)

I hate non-words too, but I also love inventing new/convenient words, so it’s a toss-up. Really, it’s mispronunciations that make me crazy. Saying “expresso” or “nuke-you-ler” or “lie-berry” will make me want to jab you in the eye for sure.

But back to mean ol’ lovable Fancy Lori™. Lookie here! I took a screen shot of the Target ad I saw today:

Yup. The headline’s good, but the ad is better. “Funner” happens to be a non-word I use as often as possible around her because hearing “funner” makes Fancy Lori™ all stabby. Don’t be surprised if Target suddenly vanishes from the face of the Earth.

(After all, I hear Nazis have connections…)

Feb. 10: Plinky ~ No “L”

Today’s Plinky prompt is kinda ridiculous:

Write a (very) short story without using the letter 'L.'

Harder than it...uh...appears, huh?

I tried it, though, and it wasn’t as hard as I expected (that’s what she said). This particular stupid story was inspired, in part, by someone I know who’s waiting to hear the grade she got on her kid’s science project—this lovely person shall remain nameless to protect the naughty, naughty parent.

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Once upon a time there was a boy who wanted to visit a nearby dog park. His dog, Tucker, was very eager to get out and romp with other dogs, but the boy was afraid he might get hurt. Tucker was tiny (a Chihuahua) compared to most of the dogs at the park, and they were rough sometimes. The boy was very protective of Tucker and didn’t want him making friends with strange dogs or joining a dog gang. He had seen quite a bit of humping going on among the dogs, too, and didn’t want Tucker to have puppies. (The boy was not very smart because his mom did his science homework for him.)

It was a gorgeous, sunny day, and after Tucker begged and begged, the boy decided he was ready to take Tucker to the dog park. Untethered and within the park fences, Tucker ran free. The bigger dogs scared him, but he tried to stay away from them. He stuck to the kiddie areas, where the timid dogs hung out, shivering and pretending the dog park was awesome. Some dogs are idiots.

After an hour, the boy said it was time to go. Tucker was a very sad dog, for in the time he’d been at the park that morning he’d met Daisy, another tiny dog, and they’d gotten dog-married. They had even gone behind the tree and kissed. Daisy’s owner didn’t see, and Tucker’s owner didn’t see, and both dogs hoped they might keep their adoration for each other a secret for fear they’d not be permitted to meet again.

Nothing was going to wipe the grin off Tucker’s snout that day. He was infatuated with Daisy! She was a charming Pomeranian with the perkiest ears Tucker had ever seen. He knew they’d be together forever.

But on the way out of the park, the boy ran into Daisy’s owner and she accused Tucker of being inappropriate with Daisy. So she had seen them behind the tree! “Duh!” Tucker thought, “Of course I was inappropriate! She’s my wife!” The boy didn’t know what to say. He was pretty sure she was wrong, but promised to keep Tucker away from Daisy in the future.

At first it seemed they were doomed, but Tucker and Daisy did not despair. They knew their devotion to each other was strong enough to survive their owners. They arranged to get together every night after their owners were in bed and carry on their friendship.

So they did. Every night they met on a corner in their neighborhood, where they embraced under the shimmering moonbeams. No one ever knew; not the boy or Daisy’s meanie of an owner. They were the envy of dog pairings everywhere.

One night a coyote attacked and ate them. The end.

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That’s 465 words. Yes, it’s true: I can rock when I try to avoid the “L,” with minimal thesaurus-al help, even though the results are hardly worth publishing. I am soooo adding this special skill to my résumé.

Jun. 24: Words, words and more words

‘Member Sniglets? They were, like, THE thing for a little while back in the 80’s, thanks to Rich Hall and HBO’s Not Necessarily The News. Sniglets are words that belong in the dictionary but aren’t—words like todlitter (food debris residing under a high chair following an attempted feeding) and meganegabar (the line one draws after writing the amount on a check, to prevent the recipient from adding “and a million dollars”) and ignoranus (a person who’s both stupid and an asshole).

Sniglets were/are awesome. There’s probably a better word to describe them than “awesome,” but I don’t have a single one of the ten Sniglet books that were published way back when, so we’re going with “awesome.” Sorry.

Why do I mention these made-up words? Because in my last post I used the word-that’s-not-a-word “funner” and Lovely Lori H called me on it. She’s a total editor-snob, and that makes her way cool until I have to start defending my own word usage. When I told her that “funner” is a perfectly cromulent word, I GOT HER.

(What? You’ve never heard the word “cromulent” either? What is WRONG with you??? I mean, if you don’t watch The Simpsons, how do you know what to think about religion and politics? Gah.)

Some made-up words become such a part of our popular culture that we forget they’re not even real. I don’t mean words like “orientate” or “irregardless” or “supposably” or “whole ‘nother.” Those are letters that don’t belong together and that only friggin’ morons think are actual words. I’m talking about words like “Jazzercise” and “smackdown” and “hottie” and “unibrow.” These are words that have been added to English language dictionaries in recent years.

Cracked.com published a list of their top 12 most memorable words and phrases first heard on The Simpsons, some of which are now recognized by Webster’s. Kinda scary, huh? (Some of my favorites that didn’t quite make the list: debigulator, disembowelingest, embiggen, sacrilicious, Jeebus, shutterbuggery, and yoink. We use several of these on a regular basis in our household, along with fab phrases like “you can’t win friends with salad” and “Marge, honey-fräulein, I'm home.” Now don’t you wish you lived with us? It’s a laugh a minute, I tells ya.)

That list led me to a blog called Wordlustitude and it contains such fabulousness, I just can’t keep it to myself. My fellow word-lovers will enjoy it too, I’m sure.

Mark Peters (better known as wordlust on Twitter) is a language columnist for Good, a euphemism-collector for Visual Thesaurus, a blogger for Oxford University Press, and a Contributing Editor for Verbatim: The Language Quarterly. He has written about language for The Boston Globe, The Chronicle of Higher Education, Esquire, The Funny Times, Good, Mental Floss, and Nerve. This blog is a growing dictionary of ephemeral words, also known as nonce or stunt words. All readers are strongly encouraged to use these terms (here's the index) in their blogs, poems, prophecies, and recipes.

If the first page of Mr. Peters’ posts don’t grab you, check out some of the links in his sidebar. I think he’s my new favorite dude! (So sorry, Vic—we were good for a few years, though.)

Nov. 23: Play and help

My English teacher in junior high was a bit of a nut job (Sally and Kath can vouch for me on this one). I learned a lot of good stuff from him, though. Every Monday he gave us a list of vocabulary words (think "Word Power" from Reader's Digest), and we'd study them all week and have an exam on Friday. It was a big deal. Everyone in the school, even if they weren't in Kendall's English classes, knew about "vocab." We all hated it, but I was one that just pretended to hate it, because I loved learning new words. I still do.

Here's a way you can test your vocabulary skills and feed people at the same time. Check out FreeRice.com, a web site that will donate ten grains of rice for every word you define correctly. In other words, if you're an idiot, then it's your fault people in developing countries are starving. Hope you can live with that.



FreeRice.com uses the advertising revenue the site generates to donate rice via the United Nations World Food Program. Be sure to click on a few ads during your game to help them along.

I know, yesterday I promised I'd be back to my sniveling, sarcastic self today. But GEEZ, I just woke up--give me time. I'm still in a gracious mood from yesterday's stuffing of the belly. Which reminds me, I tried a new stuffing recipe with moderate success. I'll post it later.

Lovies!