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WORD OF THE DAY..........courtesy of Dictionary.com
ifyoucantfixit:
pilikia \pee-lee-KEE-ah\, noun:
Trouble.
After a while this older man spoke: “Remember, we never asked you to cause pilikia. We only asked that you help set things right.”
-- Rodney Morales, When the Shark Bites
Otherwise, pilikia, particularly in the form of illness, will result for the mover.
-- Karen Lee Ito, Lady Friends
Pilikia stems from a Hawaiian word meaning "trouble".
ifyoucantfixit:
mumpsimus \MUHMP-suh-muhs\, noun:
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.
"I profess, my good lady," replied I, "that had any one but you made such a declaration, I should have thought it as capricious as that of the clergyman, who, without vindicating his false reading, preferred, from habit's sake, his old Mumpsimus...
-- Sir Walter Scott, The Talisman
Mr. Burgess, who sticks (I fancy) to his old mumpsimus, thought that the other gentleman might have given the canoe a shove to get it clear of the lock…
-- Ronald A. Knox, The Footsteps at the Lock
Mumpsimus comes from a story (perhaps first told by Erasmus) about an illiterate priest who mispronounced a word while reciting the liturgy. The priest refused to change the word, even when he was corrected.
Now we have a word for George W Bush's malaprops. Perfect explanation of his "Nook u lar." Instead of Nuclear. I think his pronounciation was incorporated into the language, so people would be able to say it could be pronounced either way.
I have to say, it still bugs the crap out of me to hear it pronounced that way...jus sayin
ifyoucantfixit:
sumpsimus \SUHMP-suh-muhs\, noun:
1. Adherence to or persistence in using a strictly correct term, holding to a precise practice, etc., as a rejection of an erroneous but more common form (opposed to mumpsimus).
2. A person who is obstinate or zealous about such strict correctness (opposed to mumpsimus).
And now let all defenders of present institutions, however bad they may be — let all violent supporters of their old mumpsimus against any new sumpsimus whatever, listen to a conversation among some undergraduates.
-- Frederic William Farrar , Julian Home
She is a master of sumpsimus, more anal in language usage than Doc in his rigid professionalism. She insists on saying It is I, or He gave the book to John and me.
-- Ann Burrus, Astride the Pineapple Couch
Like its counterpart mumpsimus, sumpsimus comes from to a story about an illiterate priest. In this case, sumpsimus refers to the opposite practice as mumpsimus.
ifyoucantfixit:
surfeit \SUR-fit\, noun:
1. Excess; an excessive amount: a surfeit of speechmaking.
2. Excess or overindulgence in eating or drinking.
3. An uncomfortably full or crapulous feeling due to excessive eating or drinking.
4. General disgust caused by excess or satiety.
verb:
1. To bring to a state of surfeit by excess of food or drink.
2. To supply with anything to excess or satiety; satiate.
In both adults a surfeit of prudence and a surfeit of energy, and with the couple two boys still pretty much all soft surfaces, young children of youthful parents, keenly attractive and in good health and incorrigible only in their optimism.
-- Philip Roth, The Plot Against America
ifyoucantfixit:
tractate \TRAK-teyt\, noun:
A treatise; essay.
Divide up all the tractates and commit yourselves to learn them during the coming year.
-- Yair Weinstock, Holiday Tales for the Soul
Jean-Pierre Mahé has rightly insisted that we should explore possible explanations other than mere haphazard collection, not only for the presence of the Hermetic tractates within Codex VI…
-- Michael Allen Williams, Rethinking "Gnosticism"
Tractate comes from the Medieval Latin word tractātus meaning "a handling, treatment."
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