This post harks back to the amount/ammount account/acount conundrum of days past. The idea for this started awhile ago on my trip to Charleston when I was talking to my mom and sister about how I couldn't download this book onto my Kindle. I said, "It says it's archived but it's not" to which they both burst into laughter and said "What did you say?" "Archived," I responded. But I didn't pronounce it arc-ived, instead I said ar-chived. Like chives. Like the widely cultivated small Eurasian plant related to the onion, with purple-pink flowers and dense tufts of long tubular leaves that are used as a culinary herb (obviously my definition*). This mispronunciation brought on a discussion of words that have given me some trouble in the past and right then I realized this was fantastic material for a post. So here it is, three months later:
- Wade. Like I wade through the slime. I pronounced it wod or waad for some time. I do not have any earthly idea why.
- Beau. Apparently that is pronounced bo. This one still makes me angry because I don't see how the word gods got the o sound from eau. I'm not quite sure how to describe how I pronounced it but I'll give it a go: Byou.
- Queue. Like something is queueing. I pronounced and often catch myself pronouncing it quo. Like status quo. Like my papers are quoing at the printer. I do not know why.
- Embed. This one just came to mind. I thought there was a difference between embed, like embed a link, and embed, pronounced with a silent b like dumb. No comment on the logic of that one.
On my computer, I have a stickie that is titled "words i like" (no joke). Some words include perhaps, stellar, seems, rather, underwhelmed and sacapuntas. The last one is the spanish word for stapler. Which reminds me: for quite some time now I have been wondering why "whelmed" or "whelming" isn't a word to describe something that was just as one expected it to be. Like "yeah the show was whelming-no surprises." Instead, whelm means, "to submerge; engulf," basically the same thing as the more used overwhelm.
I took an online quiz at testyourvocab.com and found that I know around 22,000 words. I don't know if I should be happy, embarrassed, or just whelmed. Feel free to share your scores if you take the quiz. Well, that's all I've got for words.
Update from the last post: one Judaism paper down, one to go. California bound in a week but it already feels like summer here in beautiful Northfield. This ad came up on a webpage I was on and it made me realize how Minnesotan I already am. 30 degrees is toasty. Also, I don't think Merrells are really the warm shoe of choice...*To avoid smiting from the plagiarism** gods, I'd like to clear up that that was in fact not my definition but rather the product of a Google search.
**Apparently plagiarism is not spelled plagarism--my world is being turned upside down.
Happy Purim!
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