Phrases/words that you love

[Serial_Apologist]

How I envy your extensive vocabularies! English is such a beautifully nuanced language, and I never seem able to find precisely the right word at the right moment to describe what I mean. So, with that in mind, every time potentialy useful words come to mind as replacements for the commonplace/over-used, I write them down in the back of my address book.

So far - in no particular order, I have the following:

Dissect/dissection
Incontrovertible
Spellbinding
Substantiate
Authenticate
Provenance
Expediency
Empiricism
Convivial
Caveat
Cumulative
Emanate/emanation
Gratuitous
Embryonic
Gestate
Compendium/Conflate
Abrasive
Polyvalent/multivalent
Genial
Blistering
Synergy
Allude
Redeem/redemption
Routine
Undercurrent
Subtext
Attribute
Oxymoron
Miasma

[ferneyhoughgeliebte]

celery celery celery celery celery celery celery celery celery celery celery celery
celery celery celery celery celery celery celery celery celery celery celery celery

Like a basement?

I prefer

Salary.

[arancie33]

Poltroon

[ferneyhoughgeliebte]

Scintillate.

... as in (with apologies to Roger McGough):

When I was young, I used to scintillate. Nowadays I can only scintillhalfpastfour.

[ferneyhoughgeliebte]

Poltroon

Yes, but I try my best.

[Anna]

Some more words which I find very satisfying (but not used everyday!):

Salamander
Catafalque
Thistle
Contiguous
Balaclava
and two culinary ones: Bavarois; Macedoine

[Nick Armstrong]

Some more words which I find very satisfying (but not used everyday!):
Salamander
Catafalque
Thistle
Contiguous
Balaclava

Whereas

Frangipane
Glooming
Strew
Miasma
Strumpet

you do use everyday???



I use 'miasma' quite a lot, in fact.

I need to find more opportunities for 'strumpet'...

[Serial_Apologist]

I need to find more opportunities for 'strumpet'... [/COLOR]

Plenty

Eg: what's that instrument playing the lead part?

It strumpet!

[EdgeleyRob]

Thistle

A face like a bulldog licking pis* off a thistle.

Snooker.
C sharp minor.(don't know why,just love the sound of the words,always have)
City lost.
9 o'clock gnus (Spike Milligan).
Donkey Kong.
Dubrey Firkin.

[mangerton]

I need to find more opportunities for 'strumpet'...

You can't be keeping the right sort of company.

(PS I do like Anna's "catafalque" and "balaclava")

[vinteuil]

I use 'miasma' quite a lot, in fact.

:

"In Greek mythology, a miasma is a contagious power that has an independent life of its own. Until purged by the sacrificial death of the wrongdoer, society would be chronically infected by catastrophe. An example is Atreus who invited his brother Thyestes to a delicious stew containing the bodies of his own sons. A miasma contaminated the entire family of Atreus, where one violent crime led to another, providing fodder for many of the Greek heroic tales. However, attempts to cleanse a city or a society from miasma may have the opposite effect, that of reinforcing the miasma."

"Miasma was considered to be a poisonous vapour or mist filled with particles from decomposed matter (miasmata) that caused illnesses. The Miasmatic position was that diseases were the product of environmental factors such as contaminated water, foul air, and poor hygienic conditions. Such infection was not passed between individuals but would affect individuals who resided within the particular locale that gave rise to such vapors. It was identifiable by its foul smell."

... ah, life at Caliban Towers!

[Nick Armstrong]

"In Greek mythology, a miasma is a contagious power that has an independent life of its own. Until purged by the sacrificial death of the wrongdoer, society would be chronically infected by catastrophe. An example is Atreus who invited his brother Thyestes to a delicious stew containing the bodies of his own sons. A miasma contaminated the entire family of Atreus, where one violent crime led to another, providing fodder for many of the Greek heroic tales. However, attempts to cleanse a city or a society from miasma may have the opposite effect, that of reinforcing the miasma."

"Miasma was considered to be a poisonous vapour or mist filled with particles from decomposed matter (miasmata) that caused illnesses. The Miasmatic position was that diseases were the product of environmental factors such as contaminated water, foul air, and poor hygienic conditions. Such infection was not passed between individuals but would affect individuals who resided within the particular locale that gave rise to such vapors. It was identifiable by its foul smell."

... ah, life at Caliban Towers!

Happily I'm not sure I've had cause to use it at home...

[Nick Armstrong]

A face like a bulldog licking pis* off a thistle.

Oh ho... if we're playing the "Face like a..." game, there's a few others I love too...

A face like a...

...bulldog chewing a wasp
...bag of spanners
...smashed crab
...smacked a*se

[Anna]

I use 'miasma' quite a lot, in fact.
I need to find more opportunities for 'strumpet'...

I've always used 'miasma' a lot as well, (it perfectly describes the mist which I see arising in the glooming from the river here) and I notice it's on S_A's list of words also!
I don't think I can help in your search for opportunities to use 'strumpet' in a more efficacious manner without frenchie's tuk-tuks taking offence. (But you could start with a Strumpet Voluntary)
I like to 'strew' certain culinary dishes with herbs (doesn't everyone?)

[Nick Armstrong]

You can't be keeping the right sort of company.

Correct! I must mend my ways!

(PS I do like Anna's "catafalque")

You're only human!

I learnt the word, improbably, from Pete & Dud's obscene alter egos Derek & Clive... specifically Peter Cook's character. In the sketch "The Horn" - which is not about musical instruments, sensitive souls should not google it! - the word appears in the only section one can quote in a family Forum, at the start of the sketch - the first time I'd heard it:

DEREK: Ommmmmm om om ommm .....

CLIVE: I'll tell you something, er, that religious singing reminded me of something.

DEREK: Ommmm .....

CLIVE: Did you, did you see that, er, TV coverage of the, er, the Pope when he was lying in state? The-, the last Pope, you know, John Paul?

DEREK: Yeah.

CLIVE: Lying in state? On that..., on that catafalque?

DEREK: Yeah.

....etc etc