7
votes
Proposal: Weekly neologism thread
I'm a terrible writer, in part because I've got that epistemophiliac adoration for obscure, archaic or onomatopoeic words, word-play, and more pedantry than most audiences can bear.
That being said, I think it would be a fun exercise to create and justify new words. A broad range of examples can be found here.
I'm suggesting this both to give serious writers new tools, and as a light-hearted lower-but-not-low effort community-building exercise to include those who don't consider themselves writers yet.
Rules:
- Any subject matter, though I'd prefer we kept this SFW.
- The "logos", or rationale, of the neologism should need little explanation, or be presented in the context of usage, e.g. "asshat", "we're not leaving town, we're staycationing this year."
- English language is not required - if you can make a logical creole word and provide English justification, that's fine.
- Please Google to ensure originality.
- Puns are going to happen. If that's a problem for you, please refrain from complaint unless you feel there's unnecessary cruelty outside the bounds of Tildes' terms of use.
Here's a starter:
mortlifting - abusing the occasion of a celebrity's death to make an unrelated political point.
Ooh, this is a good idea. (Anecdote: The Meaning of Liff by Douglas Adams and John Lloyd did this by reusing placenames for concepts lacking a name; at least the Finnish translation rewrote the whole book to use Finnish placenames and (some? mostly? only?) Finnish concepts instead.)
(A long time ago, pre-wifi, I had that book as a text file dumped inside a jar program on a phone, for long toilet visits; never got past Pelutho because laughing too much disturbed the other... toilet-eers? A word is needed, here.)
(n., colloq., a person visiting a toilet for the intended or some other purpose.)
(Can't come up with anything except, "a Knight of the Yellow and the Brown, bent down low in dutiful service and grim Obeisance of the Clenched Knot to the all-accepting glory of the White Porcelain Goddess", which isn't too colloquial and would be a little difficult to slip into conversation. ("Where are you going?" "I am going on a quest!" "But that's the toilets!" "And today the Fiery Worm of Chipotle shall be torn apart and drown'd!"))
Now, for a word: queugh. Which is, finding yourself the only customer, and realizing with disgust that as there is no queue, you have no idea of where or in what order to go, what to do; finding yourself slowed down by not having to wait for those in front of you to be done; flummoxed by the lack of emulatory predecessors. "Nobody else at the buffet because of the sea. Spent ten minutes finding out which tray didn't have the risotto. What queugh!"
Also, I somehow feel "wendy" should be a word: "as I went down the long wendy road" --- from wend, as bendy from bend, and instead of wending.
Snackreligious - when you enjoy the communion wafer (or other religious food) so much that it becomes a vice.
Snackreligious (a fiction)
So I had a genius idea: there are a hundred churches in the city, so I could just go from one to another, take the communion, and live off that. Monotonous, as well as monophysite --- but free food!
A lot of running around, sure, but I think I'll take a trial day and see if I can compress the schedule.
I'll keep notes.
1
Went well. Felt like a secret agent.
2
Not so good. Priest went on about "using the mantle of the divine for one's own earthly profit", and kept staring at me.
Ran out halfway through the sermon.
Me, not the priest.
On later consideration, maybe he just had those eyes that stare at everybody. Could be useful, in that job.
3
There are definite differences in the offerings. This place had sticky plasticky wafers; ended up on the minuses in calories, trying to get that loose.
Plus with all the head-shaking and strange noises felt like a cheap remake of the Exorcist, which despite all didn't feel appropriate for the back pews.
4
The priest said, "I haven't seen you here before."
I said "He he he" and hoped they didn't have... membership cards?
Is that a thing?
I've never seen a bouncer at a church. A... Heaven's Angel?
INTERLUDE
These services overlap too much, I'm missing on so many.
Those that don't --- er, there's the place whose communion is at midnight, in the bad part of the town. Went there once because I was bored and thought it was a nude ladies place. I swear the priest said, "and the Lamb said to me, don't take this, it's my flesh, please" and laughed --- that's not kosher.
5
I swear something had gone wrong with the bottle here. The "wine" was transparent, and tasted like it was 10 000 proof. The priest spend five minutes asking if anyone else wanted some. Because if nobody does, he has to down all that's left in the big cup.
I went five times.
6
This place had been converted from a bar.
They should really have invested in new, smaller cups.
Oh my aching head.
7
It's difficult to keep from singing. Or dancing, as we were called to the front to receive.
Note to self: stick to hymns.
Not Born in the USA.
9 (?)
You know, it's bad when a cop asks you if you're drunk. Worse when it's your mom. But a priest? Doesn't feel so good either.
Also, he said, "Do you want the non-alcoholic option?"
And I asked, "What, there's a non-alcoholic option?"
"It's just the bloody wafer."
10
Would it be too much to ask for a... menu? Like, a roll, a breadstick, or a wafer?
Is it the spirit in me that's talking?
11
I was really angry the priest wanted me to pay, and was dressed in an apron and standing next to a popsicle stand.
Wasn't one.
I think.
12
Tried to go twice in the same place.
No charity.
None at all.
13
There's a place. A wholesaler. For the wafers.
Their... they're really rude.
Won't send samples to decent individuals calling on the phone.
Must be atheists or something.
14
Same as #6. Cups still too big. The jukebox, they'd kept the jukebox from the bar.
Not good for singing along. I tried anyway.
Nobody appreciates me.
15
How many wafers before I'm all Jesus?
The priest didn't know.
What do they teach in the seminary these days?
Wouldn't tell me that either.
16
I am beginning to think this was a bad idea.
17
Here's a fact. In, in some places they don't have the eating. The eating thing.
They don't like if you ask when the eating starts, either.
Weirdos!
18
I wasn't drunk driving; this doesn't count.
This is religious persecution!
Just now I found myself coining "para-Tildes", i.e. things surrounding Tildes, about Tildes, but not Tildes itself, referring to Kat's Tildes wiki.
I don't think I've ever made up a word from scratch, but I do occasionally form compound words that lie outside of standard english. "Dayray" as a synonym for sunray, sunbeam, etc is the only one that comes to mind right away. I'll add more if / as I remember them.