282. Almost

So I woke up at 3 AM today and my brain was spinning about the word “almost”. Who came up with that word? Probably a small child was involved: “Did you finish all your dinner, Sweetie?” “Yes, Mommy, all. Uh, except those peas. Most.”

The English language is a funny thing. “Almost” is not all, and it’s not most. It’s more like, yeah, good enough.

What word combinations are we sorely lacking? Well, I’ve touched on this one before, but how about a hybrid of friend and neighbor to describe just that: freighbor. Or a friend that is a co-worker: co-friend?

I will jump on the train with whoever coined the term “stay-cation” to fill in for a vacation at home. But let’s do it one better and come up for a term when you call in sick but you really aren’t: Day-cation.

I love words that look like what they are, like awkward. “Awkward” just looks plain awkward, what with that double “W” thing going on, and that “K” stuck right in the middle.….. almost like a middle-schooler with braces and a really bad haircut (oh, wait, that was me).

“Freeze” seems to have icicles coming off of it. “Sweltering” looks like steam rising off the asphalt.

Let’s modify “delay”: I think “de-late” is more fitting.

The other day I was at Starbucks and ordered a “capp-a-latte”. The girl knew what I was talking about. She turned to my husband and asked if he wanted a “mocha-ccino”. (Of course, we did have to wait in a long line first, a line where the Clever Marketers have placed things to buy, things like coffee mugs and stuffed animal Mooses and cd’s. Which begs the question: am I in line, or in “buy-n”?)

The only thing more frustrating than the word frustrating is trying to remember how to spell “frustrating”. The word “knowledge” drives me crazy. Is there a “D”? a “G”? Quite possible both? Let’s get rid of that and substitute my new word: brain-full. That sums up nicely what knowledge pretends to be.

I’m actually pretty good at spelling. I can spell most words. Well, almost.

MOV
("Meaningful Or Vapid?")