Tag Archives: vocabulary

A Word I Don’t Like

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crossstorm

OK, that new weather word “derecho” is officially getting on my nerves.  It’s a new catch phrase being used with alarming frequency by the Weather Channel and Accuweather clans.  Part of my annoyance with this word is that for the first two days I told people about it, I was mispronouncing it.  I said, “DEH-ri-ko.”  Evidently it is a much more sophisticated word, “deh-RAY-cho.”  Live and learn.  The other thing that’s bugging me about this word is that it is a pretty big, scary straight line wind storm, and they keep saying it may head our way.

I think I will stop thinking about this word now, and think instead on my refuge, my safe harbor in any storm, my rock.  “For my soul trusts in You; and in the shadow of Your wings I will make my refuge, until these calamities have passed by.”  -Psalm 57:1  Yes, the storms will come and go, but Jesus remains the same forever.  Wherever you are today, pray, stay safe, and trust in God, your refuge.  Blessings, Lisa

Conundrum conundrum

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I am stuck and need help.  I have been rather fixated for the past day on the word “conundrum.”  It’s one of those words that I really like, and I have on occasion tried to use, but truthfully, I really can’t wrap my mind around the full meaning.  Here’s good old Webster’s words of wisdom:

1
: a riddle whose answer is or involves a pun
2
a: a question or problem having only a conjectural answer
b: an intricate and difficult problem
OK, all you readers…I got meaning 2.  It’s meaning 1, the riddle with the pun answer that kind of boggles me.  I looked “conundrum riddles” up on google, and mostly just found a lot of silly jokes with word pun answers.  Is that all there is?  It feels like it should be something more, something deeper, you know…more of a conundrum.  🙂
The best thing I found was a passage from Alice in Wonderland from Lewis Carroll:
“Why is a raven like a writing desk?”[…]

“Have you guessed the riddle yet?” the Hatter said, turning to Alice again.

“No, I give it up,” Alice replied. “What’s the answer?”

“I haven’t the slightest idea,” said the Hatter.

“Nor I,” said the March Hare.

Alice sighed wearily. “I think you might do something better with the time,” she said, “than wasting it in asking riddles that have no answers.”

So maybe that’s what the conundrum is; we can’t really figure out what it is or what it really means, and that is the perplexing part that makes it the conundrum.
If any of you are conundrum experts, please write and share your wisdom with me.  🙂   Slainte, Lisa

Copacetic

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The older I get, the more I realize how much I don’t know.  Yesterday, my husband casually stated in conversation, “Don’t worry; it’s copacetic.”  Copacetic?  I was convinced that he had made this word up, or that I had misheard him.  “What did you say?” I asked him.  “You know, ‘copacetic;’ everything’s good,” he continued.

In all my years of living and reading, I had never heard this word.  I mean, Ed & I have known each other since we were 14 and have run in basically the same circles, yet he was extremely comfortable in casually using this word in his daily conversation.  Yet copacetic and I were strangers to each other.  I was floored and wierdly excited about this turn of events.  Yes, I am a word geek, truth be told.

Here is the meaning and pronunciation from Merriam-Webster’s Dictionary:

Definition of COPACETIC
: very satisfactory

Examples of COPACETIC

  1. <don’t worry, because I assure you that everything’s copacetic>

Origin of COPACETIC

origin unknown

First Known Use: 1919
I will now attempt to use it in my caption sentence; here goes…drumroll, please.

When Ed & Joshua are chilling out on the rocks, everything’s “copacetic.”

If you already knew this word, I am amazed yet again.  If this is a new wonderful experience for you, let me know that I am not alone!   Slainte, Lisa