Your vocabulary origins

I don't remember the origin, but I remember mispronouncing 'superfluous' in a speech in grade school and misusing the word 'sovereign' in the same speech.

The mispronunciation I found out about immediately after the speech. The misuse I did not discover until several years later.

 

John Prine led me to look up the word "onomatopoeia."

Even though I now know what it means, onomatopoeia is a word I seldom use.


I think Jiminy Crickett taught me the word encyclopedia.

 

Anathema. It means they don't like it. George Costanza.

 

I think I had seen Dead Poets Society before Metallica's Reload came out, but the first time I heard carpe diem on the CD (having not had the phrase register when I was in fourth grade), I thought it was some dirty word and felt rebellious for listening to a song like that around my parents. Before I get judged, I had just gotten into middle school when Reload came out and I was a little naive. So when I finally got around to looking up carpe diem, just to see what they were actually singing about, I was a little disappointed. Now, I just laugh at myself, but it has stuck with me.

 

I like historical novels, particularly the fiction of Patrick O'Brien (of "Master and Commander" fame) and have pulled dozens of great - if antiquated - phrases from him. For one, I was always under the impression the phrase was "jerry-rigged" before I ran across the correct "jury-rigged" in his text (as in, "rigged to the jury mast").

I'm a bit of a word geek and probably not alone, here. Forever finding a great word or turn of phrase, I'll jot it on a Post-it and stick it to my monitor. The screen is virtually surrounded by these little yellow pearls.

I credit Carlin for my tendency to try to be exact as possible (his "pre-boarding" and "pre-registration" rants have always stuck with me). And, of course, I got "jocularity" from Father Francis Mulcahey.

 

Pillars of the Earth taught me a lot of new words.

And honestly, I learned that the proper way to spell dammit is dammit and not damnit thanks to this awesome site.

 

Sounds like grew up on Tatooine you did.

 

I learned a LOT of new words from Stephen King. Pernicious was not one of them. 8)

I learned what "debt" meant when it knocked me out of the school-wide spelling bee in elementary school. Always think of that experience whenever I go further into debt these days.

 

I spelled aminal, I mean animal wrong in the 6th grade bee (I froze, bad).

The word I will always remember learning was "virgin". I was asked in middle school if I was one and I didn't know and the kids laughed at me. I had no clue what it meant (as you can guess...I am not Catholic).

I also remember not knowing what "69 dude!" meant when Bill & Ted's Excellent Adventure came out and a girl I REALLY liked in my 7th science class (who "borrowed" my brown plastic band wrist watch and never gave it back) and she asked me if I knew what "69" meant and I answered. "Yeah, it was when the Vietnam War started." (always the smart one was I).

 

I learned "fuck" as a noun, adjective and verb in the course of a neighborhood tackle football game when I was in fifth grade.

 

Beauteous did for me in my best showing at the county spelling bee. Don't think I used it before or since (this post aside).

I learned "pusillanimous" (cowardly, weak-kneed) from the O'Reilly Factor -- and thankfully little else.

 

I learned "batshit!" from the old neighbor man down the street when I was a kid. He shouted it every time he smashed a finger with a hammer.