Are desires bad?

Desire. It has an interesting, appealing sound. Why do I hesitate to use the word? Must be those 12 years of Catholic School!

The word "Desire" comes from French. That figures.

Synonyms: covet, crave, wish and want

Okay, "covet" is worse, from the Catholic School perspective...

Crave is like a need.

Wish is like a dream. One of those things you never truly expect to happen.

Want is an overused word. Everybody wants something. And yet no one knows what they want.

Piquant Perspective

I’m piqued by the word piquant. Pique as a verb can mean to offend, stimulate or provoke. Pique as a noun means resentment. It looks and sounds French. I should reread my last post for the etymology. The Unabridged says it comes from piquer, to prick or sting.

Piquant means agreeably pungent, sharp or biting; intriguing or provocative. Charming is listed as a synonym!

Piquancy means having a tart or pungent flavor.

Zestful Zeal (or Zealous Zest)

You don't hear words that start with Z much. It must be a very small section of the dictionary.

Towards the end of the definition section of the dictionary, you will find words that start with ZO, like zoo and zoology. I know they come from a Greek word, zoi, which means life.

Zeal and zest are not much different.

Zeal means enthusiasm, passion, fervor. From Latin, originally from Greek.

Zest means enjoyment, relish. (And also lemon or orange flavoring from the peels.) From French. The closest synonyms are savory, and Piquant. (That could be the subject of a future article for the philologue. Pi-quant! Well, it sure doesn't come from Greek!)

Zesty means hot (temperature-wise) in Greek.

Zealous and Zestful are adjectives, while Zeal and Zest are nouns. A person with Zeal is a zealot. A person with Zest is a ... carefree living treasure?

If you live to be 97 in Okinawa (and lots do!), you have a special birthday celebration, called a ka-jee-maya, and they call you a Living National Treasure. I will discuss this in my next class, The Hypnotic Fountain of Youth, starting Sept 17, at 7 pm, at the Unity Church of Palm Harbor. See http://verbalimpact.blogspot.com/ for details.

Lackadaisical Afternoons

Are you Lazy or Lackadaisical?

Lackadaisical means lacking life, spirit, or zest. The dictionary lists a "folk etymology," that the word comes from an archaic word, "lackaday," which is from the expression, "Alack, the day!"

People don’t speak like that any more. Alas!

Lazy means disinclined to activity or exertion, encouraging indolence or inactivity; sluggish; or droopy. It comes from MLG, which is Middle Lower German.

Alack is used to express regret or sorrow. From Middle English, curiously enough, since the following is from Latin:
Alas is used to express concern or unhappiness.

Alack! I have been lazy about updating my blogs, but I promise that is soon to change!

Pedantic Sophistry

A Pedant is someone who likes to show off their knowledge. The dictionary says it is from Middle French, and lists 3 definitions: a male school teacher, one who parades his learning, or one who emphasizes trivial points in the presentation or use of knowledge. I think the description we might use for the last one is anal retentive, a psychological term that is found in popular usage today.

A Sophist is an ancient Greek teacher of pholosophy, or a thinker, or a fallacious reasoner. Although, S-O-P-H indicates wise or expert, it also carries the meaning of deceptively clever.

Sophisticated means cultured, knowledgeable or disillusioned, or something which has become more complex or developed.

Sophomore which comes from the words for Wise and Moron in Greek, means a second year student, and sophomoric means foolish, or overconfident, but immature.

I suspect these words all come from Sophicles, not Sophia as I originally thought. Must be a gender bias. Great Dictionary!

Tall, dark and aloof

There's something about someone tall, dark, and aloof. That is my type!

Aloof. What an interesting sound! It must be germanic or scandinavian. It sounds like alley-oop. It lifts you up and then lets you float down. But aloof means standoffish.

Maybe it is French. I wanted to put some words from French origins here. I had a discussion at the convention and we spoke about workd taken from other languages and inserted into the English dictionary. I asserted that many Greek words have done just that, but was informed that 100,000 words have come to us directly from French, with the same spelling and usually the same pronunciation. With Greek words the spelling is usually altered and the pronunciation murdered. Of course, the Greek do use a different alphabet, so that might have something to do with the spelling, anyway.

I had to go to the Huge Unabridged Dictionary (HUD), since my constant companion did not list an etymology for aloof. It just left it out, without any explanation or apology. But my HUD says it is from a Dutch origin. And it doesn't say standoffish, it says distant in sympathy, reserved.
Standoffish is, however, in my HUD and the definition for it includes the word, aloof.

With regard to tall, dark and handsome men, aloofness can be very alluring. A-llooour-ing. There's another interesting sounding word...

Deep

I was conversing with some colleagues of mine the other day. The topic of conversation included books we were currently reading, and turned to one of my favorite authors, Deepak Chopra. Someone said Doesn't he use all those big words? I replied, he does have a predilection for multisyllabic terminology!