Monthly Archives: December 2011

Heavens to murgatroyd! And jumping jeroboams! Champagne vocabulary!

Posted on December 30, 2011 by thebettereditor

Let’s end the year with some obscure but entertaining words that might just be of value to you as you prepare for your undoubtedly festive New Year’s Eve. Have you ever heard of a murgatroyd? How about a salmanazar? A … Continue reading →

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(post temporarily removed)

Posted on December 26, 2011 by thebettereditor
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Someday, ‘yule’ thank me. (ps: Avoid the hákarl!).

Posted on December 23, 2011 by thebettereditor

Yule: where does that word come from? yeul, yewl, yool, yuill, geol, geochol, gehhel, geola, iula: that’s only a sampling of the spellings (and pronunciations) noted for this word over the past 1300 years. I haven’t read the dictionary cover to … Continue reading →

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My Prescription for Description

Posted on December 19, 2011 by thebettereditor

Or maybe I should title this “My Description of Prescription.” It depends on which side you come at the issue from. Are you a descriptivist or a prescriptivist?

Posted in Grammar, Superstition, Things you should know | Tagged , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , | 1 Comment

Is it a fact or is it facticity?

Posted on December 16, 2011 by thebettereditor

Facticity, you say? Surely that’s not really a word. (Let’s not have that discussion again.) I encountered facticity recently in an academic journal article: “There was no way around this facticity…” wrote the author. All he meant to say was … Continue reading →

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