Wordplay

I got an absurd amount of pleasure out of writing that poem yesterday. More specifically- out of rhyming. J'adore le rhyme. Et le trying to speak in Romance languages. So- while eating lunch today, I came up with these couplets. They don't mean anything- I just picked words I like and strung them together. (Hey- it's Friday, for crying out loud!) I've included my comments.

Lemur curtsey Soddy-Daisy
Husbandman hot toddy hazy

[Soddy-Daisy is a place- a town in Tennessee. I saw it in an atlas as a kid and the name cracked me up. Someday, I'm going to go there. Additional note: the term "husbandman" for a farmer has always intrigued me. How did a farmer and a woman's spouse get the same name?"]

Jackdaw science bossanova
Gimcrack hoarfrost come on ova

[Ova, ovum, ovary- all of those egg-words seem slimy on my tongue. But bossanova- now THAT word makes me feel very 60's- like I should have a cocktail in one hand and a long cigarette holder in the other.]

Truffle umlaut fleur-de-lis
Borage kumquat ginkgo tree

[Umlaut. Gotta love articulation markings. If Middle Sis is reading: "Ja, und I am Gretel."]

Harried brusque gesticulation
Global circumnavigation

[I read an article with 'global circumnavigation' in it and was determined to use it.]

Friar onomatopaea

xenophobic logorrhea

[Oh Lawdy- I can't stop.]

Slippy drippy droopy whee

rogue brogue vogue please someone stop me

Bottom line- I really like words and sounds. Maybe I'm meant to be a linguist next?

Ode to the Month

I do not like you, February.

You’re dark and cold and quite contrary.

You thaw and freeze and ice and blow.

You live on sleet and dirty snow.

Why tear the groundhog from his den,

Just to watch him go back in?

Why soil the name of Good Valentine

With chalky hearts that say “Be mine?”

Your chocolate’s cheap, you February!

All shiny foil and teddy bear-y.

My calendar’s squares all are blanks,

“Relax a bit,” I sigh with thanks.

But that’s a lie that March has sent,

Just turn the page and bam! It’s Lent.

March- hold on, I’ll get to you!

I’ve got a few choice words to spew.

You bluster and whine and rain in drams,

Then dress it up in lions & lambs.

Oh, bitter months, I shall decry

Another name to call ye by.

I’ll put you both ‘neath one brusque arch

And declare that you are… Farch!

This onomatopaeic name

Is suited to your dual ill-fame.

Ha-ha! I farch in your direction.

It gives me low-brow satisfaction.

I giggle, chortle, and guffaw-

It feels good to clear my craw.

Eating my words

So, I've heard from time to time about the existence of "Christian comics," comedians who make a living (of sorts) by traveling from church to church to youth conference telling clean jokes for God. Every time I heard about this, my eyes would roll and I'd say something along the lines of "Oh, puh-leez!" (Obviously, my superior wit and eloquence makes such things beneath me."

But- occasionally I must eat my words. Flipping channels, I landed on one of the Christian ones and ended up watching this guy for over half an hour. Enjoy.

Vocation, in pet form.

This is my new pet rabbit. His name is Vocation.

Vocation is young and charming, despite having a name from the Latin for calling. His favorite activities are: using his talents for God, feeling motivated, and writing fairytales on the American Orthodox Dream.

Okay, I don't really have a bunny, but if I did, Vocation would be his name. Because there's nothing that PK's like better than making fun of overused church retreat themes.

Also in my menagerie are:

Stewardship. He enjoys organizing church dinners, tithing 1 out of every 10 food pellets, and long walks on his wheel.

Sacred Arts. Her hobbies include painting, hitting high notes and preening.

Church & Culture. A thoroughbred with well-documented ancestry, she enjoys dining at the Mother Country Club, supporting new liturgical artists, and trotting.

Prayer. A true ascetic, he prefers to sleep on hard floors, eats simple dry food, and needs little grooming.

Obambulate is a real word

One of my former English teachers noted that today's word-of-the-day calendar offering was "obambulate." Naturally, I had to google something so homonymic to the democratic presidential nominee, which led me to a list of obscure words. So many of them reminded me of election politics, so I had to share. My absolute favorites are highlighted.

• acyrology: poor choice of words, poor diction
• bloviate: to orate verbosely and windily
• cynosure: a person or thing that is a center of attention
• epuration: Purification, especially removal of officials or politicians believed to be disloyal; purge.
• eristic: enjoying argument for its own sake
• erotesis: a rhetorical question
• extradictionary: consisting in deeds, not words
• hypophora: the posing of questions to oneself and the answering of them, or a reasoning aloud
• logodaedalus: one who is cunning in the use of words
• logodaedaly: the ability to coin new words, verbal legerdemain
• logomachy: a dispute about words and their meanings; a quibbling over semantics that gets away from the subject
• logomonomania: loquacity in manic proportions
• logorrhea: incoherent or excessible babble
• longiloquence: long-windedness
• mumpsimus: 1. Adherence to or persistence in an erroneous use of language, memorization, practice, belief, etc., out of habit or obstinacy. 2. A person who persists in a mistaken expression or practice.
• obambulate: to walk around or wander
• obganiate: to irritate with reiteration
• oofle: the attempt to find the name of a person whose name you should know but cannot remember
• paralogize: to draw illogical conclusions from a set of facts
• paramnesia: A distortion of memory in which fact and fantasy are confused.
• reductive fallacy: the fallacy of reducing a complex issue or problem to one oversimple thing or aspect
• sciolism: superficial show of knowledge
• slurvian: American language marked by carelessly slurred pronunciations such as "gimme", "c'mon", and "d'ju"
• tacenda: things better left unsaid
• tintiddle: a witty retort you wish you had made but thought of too late
• tranont: to shift one's position, especially rapidly and stealthily
• unasinous: equally stupid
• verbigeration: the habit of frequently repeating favorite words or phrases

Milestone Birthday

As some of you know, I’m turning 30 this week. Dum Dum DUM! And of course, milestone birthdays are occasions which call for/ insist on deep thought, soul searching, and evaluation of your quality of life. I haven’t completed these tasks, but I can reveal these preliminary findings:

1. I am not, in fact, an assured, stable, adult woman. Which is okay, as I have an inkling that these are, in fact, mythical creatures on par with fairies, dryads, and phoenixes.
2. "Phoenixes” is not really the correct plural form of “phoenix.” There is no plural, because according to myth, only one phoenix lives at a time. But, if there were a plural, “phoenixes” would be it. Although “phoenices” would be more fun.
3. I am a big nerd, as evidenced by the above. This entry may be struck from the list as it is hardly a recent realization. I’ve known this since 6th grade Advanced English when I first encountered an etymological dictionary and was bummed that it was too heavy to steal…err… take back to my desk. However, this nerdiness has been recently reinforced by my new-found love of Battlestar Galactica.
4. I am sad that I am 30 and not married. (This is what led to #1 above). That’s just the way it is. I was quite frustrated with this before- I wanted to be the assured, stable, adult woman who sees this birthday as a chance to celebrate life, be thankful for God’s blessings, set some new goals, etc.
5. This feeling is NORMAL when you turn 30, so I’m not going beat up on myself for being sad (would kind of defeat the purpose). I hereby give myself permission to feel bad for a few days if I want to. It won’t keep from having a good time and I’m not keeping to my bed weeping copious tears, so I think it’s safe.
6. Watching Pride & Prejudice on a rainy day when you’re blue because you’re single is not wise. Besides the obvious emotional danger, it will cause phrases like “keeping to my bed weeping copious tears” to creep into your blog.
7. Always have hot cocoa in the house. I did not, and I think it would have had a transformative effect on the above.
8. I am waaaay too sensitive about my hair. I realized the other day that the reason I don’t like a certain person is because she called my hair “blonde” when we first met. (I can almost hear my sisters’ indignant gasps.) Technically, it is probably strawberry blonde, but those of you that know my family know that we’re not into technicalities- our hair is RED. However, I chalk it up to the fact that this person is foreign and therefore doesn’t know the subtleties of American English, our cultural implications of being a blonde, or how to be polite in the Midwest. At least she didn’t try to boing my curls- she probably would have lost an arm.
9. I have, to some degree, learned from the lessons of my 25th birthday. For example- one thing I realized at 25 was that I have trouble asking for help when I need it. I am better at this now- for proof: when I moved in December, I asked a lot of people to help, assuming it would be like pulling teeth to get volunteers. It wasn’t, and I had the fastest, easiest move of my life. So when I realized turning 30 might be tough, I put a few feelers out there with the result that I’ve got 1-4 out of state visitors coming and a friend throwing a party. (Yay!)
10. I like to make lists. I make a lot of them. Grocery lists, lists of CD’s to buy, books too read, recipes to try, tasks to accomplish today, life goals, etc. I also am really good at losing lists.

New Fun Stuff

Sorry- no post. Not feeling deep or introspectful I guess. Perhaps next week when I celebrate a milestone birthday?

Until then- I've put some new links under Fun Stuff to the right- if you need a giggle.