DIALECT AND WORD MEANINGS

[Stanley]

Margaret, I will bow to your superior knowledge!

[Tizer]

Mrs Tiz pointed out this BBC News headline and suggested it could have been more precisely worded!
`Boy shot as toddler raises £8k for hospital ' BBC

[Tripps]

I've been collecting words and phrases that inhabit the comments sections on various websites for a while now. (Chronicles of wasted time.) It's an interesting space, but must be treated with great caution. Most are rubbish, but there are often perceptive gems worth noting. Here's the list to date - I don't even know what some of them mean.

A big boy did it and ran away.
and I'll tell you why
asking for a friend
a stopped clock is right twice a day.
based
Black swan event
Boiling the frog
But what came next will astound you
Circular firing squad
clutches pearls
Cognitive dissonance
down the rabbit hole
drinking the tears of. . . .
drink the Kool aid
give your head a wobble
hold my beer
if you think that I have a bridge to sell you.
I'll do it so you don't have to
ICYMI In case you missed it.
I see what you did there.
Karma
living rent free in your brain
meh
melt
meme
merch
mind bleach
mind blown
my bad
not all heros wear capes
Overton window
Owl
prank
shilling for
Soylent Green
Squirrels
take the blue pill
take the red pill
These are my principles; if you don't like them I have others" Groucho Marks
Trope
Unicorns
Walt
word salad
World's smallest violin.
Zil lanes

[Stanley]

Almost all that list means nothing to me. However some do and they convey complicated concepts.
One I particularly dislike is 'merch'.

[Tripps]

I was about to use the slang word "schimpf" which I haven't used in decades, but knew from the army - meaning to complain or grumble about something. I'd say my use of it dated to the 1960''s and 70's roughly. It was fairly common, and would be well understood in the circles in which I mixed.

I first Googled it - and find that meaning to be unknown to Google.
Well Mr G take note next time your're passing, and add that usage to the big list.

[Stanley]

I have never come across it either David. Is the root Yiddish?

[Tizer]

I first Googled it - and find that meaning to be unknown to Google.

Try a search using the Bing search engine. It gives a lot of entries for the German word schimpf, for example: Cambdridge German English dictionary

I'm finding Google to be erratic these days. I do searches connected to my hobbies and interests and it often brings up totally irrelevant results as if I'd searched for a different word. Also, sometimes the font size goes large until I do the next search then goes back to normal. As I've mentioned before, I suspect they're dabbling in the dark arts of AI!

On a separate issue but related to words, I wrote an email to my sister-in-law yesterday with an attached joke from OG. I often do that and tell her it's `from the Barlickers' (she knows who you lot are!). When I pressed Send it did a spellcheck and wanted to change Barlickers to Arse-lickers!

[Big Kev]

When I pressed Send it did a spellcheck and wanted to change Barlickers to Arse-lickers!

gotta love a spellchecker

[Tripps]

Tiz - Thanks for that. I'm pleased to have my memory confirmed.

I'm finding Google to be erratic these days

Except for this example - I can't say that I have - but how would you know? I've looked again with different browsers including Opera which has a built in VPN, and Duck Duck Go, but your definition does not appear. They all just quote the noun and not the verb. I think you're right about AI. Its addition is sold as a benefit in updated software packages such as browsers, but I'm not so sure it is.

[Stanley]

Just out of curiosity I put this search term in Google.... 'Schimpf etymology' and got this response:-
Schimpf is a German surname, which originally meant a humorous or playful person, from the Middle High German schimpf, meaning "play" or "amusement". The name may refer to: Axel Schimpf (born 1952), German admiral.
Heard later at 04:30..... Collins dictionary list of 'words of the year' includes 'brat' but in their discussions about meanings nobody mentioned its use in the mills to describe a fent tie at the waist for an apron.....

[Tripps]

Missed that - I've just seem 'Brat' named as word of the year. Search shows several mentions on this site.

Though Collins already defined “brat” as “someone, especially a child”, who “behaves badly or annoys you”, it has been selected as word of the year because of its new definition: “characterised by a confident, independent, and hedonistic attitude”.
“‘Brat’ has become one of the most talked about words of 2024,” Collins said. It “resonated with people globally and ‘brat summer’ established itself as an aesthetic and a way of life”.

The modern expanation is quite beyond my understanding, (again) but I note we mentioned it on this thread back in July, and I ran up the white flag. I always enjoy seeing 'fents' as in my family tree was a shopkeeper, who sold 'sweets and ferrets' , It later emerged that ferrets was a typo for fents. Time to give up again. . .

I surrender.jpg

[Stanley]

As long as there are textiles there will be fents David but I suppose nowadays they are called remnants.
Loved the typo.....

[Stanley]

I used the word 'peter' this morning in the sense of fading away or tapering off. I looked up the etymology..... I found two explanations....
The phrase "petered out" is an informal phrasal verb that means to gradually diminish, weaken, or become smaller before ending or stopping. The earliest known use of the adjective "petered-out" was in 1878 in Harper's Magazine. The earliest known use of the noun "petering-out" was in 1890 in Overland Monthly. Both the adjective and noun were formed within English.
The origin of the phrase is unknown, but one theory is that it may refer to the apostle Peter. According to this theory, Peter's enthusiastic support of Jesus quickly diminished, and he denied knowing Jesus three times during the night after Jesus's arrest.

And this....
“Peter” also means “rock”. “Peter out” originally was used by miners starting in the 19th century (it first showed up this way in 1846 in the Oxford English Dictionary) to describe a mine that no longer had enough ore to be worth mining. So, originally it meant a mine that had run out of gold, silver, coal, whatever.
Take your pick.... I think I favour the second one connected with mining.

[Tizer]

Take your pick.... I think I favour the second one connected with mining.

So do I. In science the study of rocks is called petrology.

[Stanley]

Nice Peter. I didn't know that. (Or if I did I had forgotten.... )

[Stanley]

While looking up ferret muzzles this morning I came across this word as an alternative name for a ferret muzzle. I have searched but can't find a reference anywhere.
'COPE'

[Tripps]

Good word. .

"Not sure I can cope with much more of this" - said the Archbishop of Canterbury as he removed his cope and mitre, for the last time. "I'll take up woodwork" he said reaching for his coping saw. "That saw does better for mitred joints - or perhaps I'll get a couple of ferrets".

[Stanley]

Lovely David.... You did far better than I did! And yes, I knew all of those.... I think my mistake was I was focussing on the ferreting connection......

[Stanley]

Funny how a word can jump out at you. This morning it was 'replenish', it triggered off a question and here's the answer I found
'Plenish'. late Middle English: from Old French plenir ‘fill’, from plein ‘full’, from Latin plenus ; compare with replenish.
I feel better for that!

[Tripps]

You've triggered another of those "I'd forgotten that I'd forgotten that" moments.'

In the 1960's in Germany, the process of supplying scattered distant radio outposts, during the major exercises (with fuel mainly ) was known as "replen".

Now separately - I've just heard the Hindi phrase 'ek dum' used on a Youtube video. I'd heard it before - either Kipling or It ain't half hot, and had thought it meant 'immediately'. Now thanks to Google I learn it actually means 'completely'.

I thought you'd all like to know that. . . .

[Stanley]

Now there's a funny thing, ek dum rang a bell with me as well. I suspect that like 'jildi' (Make haste or quickly) it came to me embedded in army English
Another was 'bondook' .... (shufti.... ba din.... )

[Stanley]

The word that grabbed me was 'shriek' in the context of a high wind.
From obsolete shrick (1567), shreke, variants of earlier screak, skricke (before 1500), from Middle English scrycke, from a North Germanic/Scandinavian language (compare Swedish skrika, Danish skrige, Icelandic skríkja), from Proto-Germanic *skrīkijaną, *skrik- (compare English screech).

[Stanley]

The word that jumped out at me was 'Dent'. The dictionary meaning is 'a slight hollow in a hard even surface made by a blow or pressure' Or in some cases a reduction in a figure, i.e. 'The figure for increases was barely dented'.
But there is another more specialised meaning in textiles. The space between the wires in a reed is called a 'dent' and reeds are specified by the number of dents per inch.
Looking a bit further I find that the Latin 'dent' means tooth (Root of dentist)and this could fit with reed space or even gears.....

[Tizer]

Plant leaves with toothed edges are, not surprisingly, described as dentate. If finely toothed they are denticulate. There's an abundance of interesting words in this glossary of botanical terms: Wikipedia

[Tripps]

Don't forget "Dandelion". (Dents de lion).