BREAKING UPDATE:
Continuing with an attempt to “lighten up,” I am happy to announce that we have a winner in our unofficial, unsanctioned, unrequited challenge to use the 20 “forgotten words that should be brought back” in a small essay.
Since there was only one submission, it was relatively easy to pick a winner and I did not even have to involve our editors.
Having said that, the one submission was so good that — had there been more — it would have given other submissions a pretty tough target to compete against.
So, without further ado, the clear winner is — drum roll — She (“Sheila”), aka Sheknows.
And, as promised, Sheknows receives a free lifetime subscription to The Moderate Voice — while in good standing.
To read Sheknows’ wonderful entry, please scroll down to the comments section.
And a wonderful Christmas/joyous holidays to all.
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Original Post:
In these times of political turmoil and animosity, it is good to once-in-a-while lighten up — even be a little silly — so please bear with me…
Some of the readers already know, and I am sure many surmised because of my sometimes sentence structures bad — there, I think I did it again! — that English is not my native tongue.
And perhaps that is the reason that I love to discover interesting words and, if appropriate, to add them to my new vernacular — the latter being one of them.
After reading a delightful piece on “20 ‘Forgotten’ Words That Should Be Brought Back,” by Lana Winter-Hébert, I pondered for a while which of those 20 words that have fallen out of common usage would “serve to add more colour” to my daily life, as the author suggests.
Well, about the only “colour” they added to my life was the “fun” I had and the amount of time I spent — it seems like donkey’s years — putting this nutty piece together, trying to use every one of those words and with enough silliness to cobble dogs with.
For good measure, I even added a couple of “funny English idioms you may not know.”
I’ll let the reader decide whether I succeeded admirably or failed miserably. Regardless, I would like to challenge our readers who like to play with words and idioms to cobble together — not with dogs this time — a fun piece using the same words. If this catches on, perhaps our editors can select the best piece and award the winner a free lifetime subscription to The Moderate Voice.
I have italicized the 20+ odd words and idioms I have used just in case they do not jump out at the reader.
If the meaning does not become clear from the context, click here to see what they really mean.
BTW: Should you decide to use these words, disable your spellchecker.
And Bob’s your uncle:
As I am a hopeless pluviophile and a devoted librocubularist, I would have just loved to curl up in bed the other night reading my favorite book and listening to the wind-driven rain hitting my windows, especially since I had a mild febricula
But I am glad that I listened to my inner voice — “Bunbury” I call it, or “him” — so at eventide I hopped over to Rosie’s Kitchen where I enjoyed a delightful gallimaufry of my favorite lentils, sausage, wild rice, onions and garlic.
I am also glad that I paid no attention to the blithering namelings, Bob and Bob — both suffering from a heavy case of ultracrepidarianism when it comes to culinary delights. They made nothing but scurrilous mullock about Rosie and her cuisine.
As a matter of fact the gallimaufry was so good that I ordered it thrice and guttled it all down like there was no tomorrow.
The evening would have turned into a true pannychis had it not been for the somewhat barbigerous waitress handing me a note written in such uglyography that I could hardly read it.
When I realized that the note was written by that (fill in a Party affiliation) snollyguster running for our City Council who is always sophronizing and promising you the whole starrified welkin while doing exactly the opposite behind your back (you know the kind, all talk and no trousers), I lost my appetite and did a runner.
Back at my pad, I did a Devon Loch, but paid for in the early morning when I just laid there uhtceareing and worrying about not having paid my bill at Rosie’s…
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Now it’s your turn, if you are not afraid of dropping a clanger.
Image: www.shutterstock.com
The author is a retired U.S. Air Force officer and a writer.