Other Meme

[firstfrost]

For those who find thinking of Five Significant Words the hard part, post "Badly Chosen Words!" here and I will give you five words which are not necessarily significant at all, and then you can use this mutation in memes of your own. Here are the five words justom picked: Okay, so Tom can't count.

• glom
  Many good things are planned. Many other good things are things that just glom together out of nowhere. Like stone soup, or making cookie juice, or suddenly having a counter-meme to write. I am actually surprised to discover that "glom" is a real word - I had thought it was like "frob", which I confused my family by trying to use in conversation. The trick in glomming something interesting together is to escalate. :)
• marmoreal
  Another surprising word. I would have gotten this one totally wrong in Fictionary, as it has nothing to do with biology at all. (Marsupial (marmot) arboreal... not so much). Blink was a remarkable episode of Doctor Who, and not one I should have watched while alone in the house. And the statues in Angels and Demons were pretty nice, too.
• calypso
  Okay, this one doesn't actually count as not-significant. Maybe that's why mickle snuck in. "``Pirates, Voodoo, and Virtual Reality'' is the stupidest genre I've ever heard of." And, hey, I can tie it to Angels and Demons! Nobody can invert those words like the Illuminati!
• testify
  I am somewhat disappointed that I've never got to serve on a jury. It seems like the sort of thing that one should do. Would I be fooled by mystery novels and TV into believing that there's one explanation for everything (which the prosecution handily suggests)? Or would I be more skeptical?
• stub
  "Stub" is the Wikipedian cry of optimism. "This article is short! Surely, more must be known! O world, please help it!" I actually find Wikipedia an amazing endeavor, both in how it works, and how it has evolved to deal with the parts that do not work (especially the "The internet is full of idiots" part). There must be sociologists studying how the culture and rules evolve, right? It seems like a nice accelerated model, compared to an actual government.
• mickle
  I note that "mickle", "muckle", and "mockle" mean the same thing, (a whole bunch), but "mackle" is only two. I can imagine early grammarians grumbling to each other, the way people do now about "flammable" and "inflammable". "meckle", on the other hand, is not a word at all. Someone has been falling down on the job of vowel shift.

Comments

[mathhobbit.livejournal.com]

Badly Chosen Words!

[firstfrost.livejournal.com]

Spork
Aqueduct
Tonsure
Gumption
Clepsydra

[desireearmfeldt]

Except if you grew up on Gilbert & Sullivan, in which case "mickle" means "not very much at all." But I'm pretty sure Gilbert just had it wrong. Like dcltdw and "teetotal," for which I must now mock him in case he's tuned in. :)

[desireearmfeldt]

Wait, but "muckle" can't mean the same as "mickle," or "many a mickle makes a muckle" would be nonsense. In this context, "mickle" *is* the little thing, and "muckle" the big thing. Bah!

[firstfrost.livejournal.com]

It doesn't seem so implausible that "many a mickle makes a muckle" is nonsense; it sounds sort of like woodchucks chucking wood. :)

Wiktionary claims:
Many a little makes a mickle.
(The form Many a mickle makes a muckle. is a common misunderstanding.)

[dpolicar]

I started playing this version of the game with spam, a little while ago, but I think your

Badly Chosen Words!

will be more fun.

[firstfrost.livejournal.com]

Dilatory
Pteranodon
Darjeeling
Indivisibility
Pluot

[dcltdw]

BADLY CHOSEN WORDS!!!!

I mean, sure, this sounds fun, too. :)

[firstfrost.livejournal.com]

Bridesmaid
Onomatopoeia
Sphagnum moss
Squint
Chalcedony

[kelkyag]

Badly chosen words, please!

[firstfrost.livejournal.com]

Wasabi
Defenestration
Trapezoid
Mollycoddle
Antediluvian