[Vhfcn-l] Monday musings

[Gary Thewlis]

I have always noticed that people will never laugh at anything that is not
based on truth.

Will Rogers

 

A little learning is a dangerous thing, but a lot of ignorance is just as
bad.

Bob Edwards

 

Whenever you find that you are on the side of the majority, it is time to
pause and reflect.

Mark Twain

 

Laughter is the closest distance between two people.

Victor Borge

 

Common sense is the collection of prejudices acquired by age eighteen.

Albert Einstein

 

Good advice is something a man gives when he is too old to set a bad
example.

Francois de La Rochefoucauld

 

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15 Word Origins Hiding In Plain Sight

 

It's fair to say that some word origins are pretty
straightforward-straightforward being a fine example of that. Then there are
those word origins that are so obscure, the word in question offers few
clues to its history. Tragedy, for instance, might come from the Greek for
"goat song" (perhaps a reference to actors in ancient Greek tragedies
dressing in animal furs, or maybe because a goat was once offered as a
prize). A glass of punch takes its name from the Hindi word for five
(because the original recipe for punch had just five ingredients: water,
liquor, lemon juice, sugar, and spices-although the Oxford English
Dictionary says that the original recipe was milk, curd, ghee, honey, and
molasses). And the less said about avocados and orchids the better, frankly.

 

But then there are those words whose origins, after a just little
consideration, seem obvious once you know them.

 

1. Secretary

The original secretaries were officers or aides working in the courts of
European monarchs, a sense of the word that still survives in the titles of
positions like "secretary of state." As close associates of the king or
queen, these secretaries were often privy to a lot of private
information-which made a secretary literally a keeper of secrets.

 

2. Pandemonium

You might well know that this word was coined by the poet John Milton, who
used it as the name of the capital of Hell in Paradise Lost in 1667. And you
might also have figured out that the pan- here is the same as in words like
pandemic and panorama, and literally means "all" or "every." Put together,
that makes pandemonium literally "a place of all demons."

 

3. Preposterous

Preposterous is one of a handful of so-called oxymoronic words in the
English language, whose roots combine elements that contradict one another.
A pianoforte, for instance, literally produces a "soft-loud" sound. And the
contradiction is even more obvious in words like bittersweet, bridegroom,
and speechwriting. The preposterous meaning of preposterous derives from the
fact that it brings together the prefixes pre-, meaning "before," and post-,
meaning "after"-and so literally describes something that is back to front
or in the incorrect order.

 

4. Breakfast

That meal you have first thing in the morning? It would have originally
"broken" the previous night's "fast."

 

5. Month

The months of the year were originally calculated from the phases of the
moon, and ultimately a month is essentially a "moon-th."

 

6. Lunatic

Another moon-related word that's staring you in the face is lunatic. The
word was originally an adjective, describing someone whose behavior was
affected by the phases of the moon.

 

7. Nausea

The first few letters of words like nausea and nauseated are closely related
to maritime words like nautical and nautilus. That's because nausea was once
specifically used to mean "seasickness," and in fact derives from the Greek
word for a ship.

 

8. Astronaut

The astro- of astronaut is related to the root of words like asterisk and
asteroid, while the -naut comes from the same seafaring root as nausea. Put
them together, and an astronaut is literally a "star-sailor."

 

9. Disaster

A disaster is literally an ill-starred event: a catastrophe blamed on an
ill-fated astrological misalignment of the stars and planets.

 

10. Disappoint

It stands to reason that if you can appoint someone, then you can disappoint
them; in fact, the word originally meant (and literally means) "to remove
someone from office." The current sense of "to let down" or "to fail"
developed in the late 15th century from the earlier use of disappoint that
meant "to frustrate someone's plans" or "to renege on an engagement."

 

11. Freelance

Yes, the "lance" in freelance is the same one carried by a medieval knight,
at least in early 19th century fiction. That's because the original
freelancers were mercenary knights in stories like Sir Walter Scott's
Ivanhoe-characters who carried no allegiance to any specific cause, and
could instead be paid or hired to fight.

 

12. Equinox

The equinox is the date at which the sun passes Earth's celestial equator,
on which night and day are equal; appropriately enough, the word itself
literally means "equal night."

 

13. Blockbuster

The original blockbusters were enormous bombs developed by Britain's Royal
Air Force for use in raids on German targets during the Second World War. To
the RAF, they were officially known as HC, or "high-capacity" bombs. To the
pilots involved in the raids, they were known by the unassuming nickname
"cookies." But to the press, these huge explosives (the largest of which
weighed 12,000 pounds and contained 8400 pounds of explosive Amatex) were
nicknamed blockbusters-bombs powerful enough to destroy an entire block of
buildings. After the war, the military use of the word fell out of favor so
that only a figurative meaning, describing anything-from films to political
speeches- that had a similarly impressive impact, remained in use.

 

14. Malaria

Mal- essentially means "bad," as it does in words like malfunction and
malpractice, while aria is the Italian word for "air." Ultimately malaria
was so called because it was once said to be caused by the stagnant air and
choking fumes that emanated from areas of marshland or swamp, rather than
the infected mosquitos that inhabited them.

 

15. Journey

Once you remember that jour is the French word for "day," it's easy to
figure out that a journey once meant a day of travel. A sojourn is literally
a one-day stay; you write up a day's events in your journal; and you can
read accounts of the day's events in journalism.

 

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The not-so-popular 5.0-liter or 6.5-liter AMC Gremlin V8, produced between
1970 and 1978 are considered to be muscle cars.

 

The 1960 Buick Riviera Grand Sport with its European styling is considered
to be a muscle car.

 

Many muscle car fans call the Chrysler 300, introduced in 1955 and produced
until 1965, the first muscle car.

 

The Dodge Daytona, first released in 1969 and intended as a NASCAR racer,
was not only a NASCAR winner but a modified Charger, which included a
426-cubic inch Hemi engine which produced 425 brake horsepower.

 

Although marketed at the mature buyer, the Plymouth GTX, produced between
1967 and 1971, was considered a muscle car.

 

The Ford Galaxie, named during the space race between the US and the USSR
and built between 1958 and 1971, had a Cammer V8 engine and was in direct
competition with the Chevrolet Impala.

 

The "Grand Sport" first appeared on the Buick Skylark in 1965, but by 1967,
it was a brand all of its own. In 1970, the company released the Grand Sport
455, considered by many experts to be one of the greatest muscle cars ever
built.