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Jun. 22nd, 2005 12:01 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
order_of_chaosMeretricious vs. Meritorious
aka. Word Squee.
Meretricious: Of, befitting, a harlot; (of ornament, literary style, etc.) showily attractive. Hence: meretriciously, meretriciousness. From the latin word meretrix, meaning harlot.
I love the very existence of this word - it sounds so much like it should mean the same as meritorious, but no… and my dad used it. In a sentence. Love. Sooner or later my Commodore will use it to describe Captain Jack Sparrow, but that can wait.
Meritorious: (Of person or act) deserving reward, praise, or gratitude (often as term of limited praise, well-meant, well-meaning).
And while I'm at it:
The section of abbreviations in the back of the Concise Oxford Dictionary (and probably others) is well worth reading for amusement value alone. For example, MD stands for Medicinae Doctor (Doctor of Medicine) or mentally deficient - which is rather the opposite. This amuses me.
***
Things I love without rhyme, and for reasons irrational
aka. Object Squee.
Nail Polish: I practically never wear this, and have no interest in doing so, save perhaps to try the strangest colour-combinations I can think of. But! It looks so shiny in those little glass bottles, and I just know they would make lovely chess pieces if I could decide which should be which. But that's not the reason. It's quite simply perfect for adding highlights to paintings - transparent, translucent, shiny, glittery, metallic - you name it, and in an array of colours that they don't give you as paints without long hard searching (which I don't do). So, I adore it, and probably have at least twenty bottles of the stuff.
And yes, I'm going through an art phase.
Paper: It's so... so WHITE. And blank. (I suspect it's the infinite potential of a blank piece of paper that draws me in, but who knows. It might be the taste.)
Candles: No reason, I just find them aesthetically attractive. Preferrable never lit. I have a green gel-candle in a clear goblet with charms around the base that my brother got me. It practically screams Slytherin.
Cacti: Not so much now, but... the little fluffy round ones with brilliantly coloured flowers. (At least, fluffy until you touch them and spend the next ten minutes picking prickles so fine as to be almost invisible out of your fingers.)
Dictionaries: Enough said.
Unused paintbrushes: The soft, perfect ones. *cuddles paintbrush.*
The plug for the kitchen sink: Someone threw the old one out with the scraps by accident, and it wasn't replaced for weeks, so... PLUG!
Charcoal pencils (infact, all art pencils): See pencil, buy pencil. And I've actually managed a few pieces of art that actually-look-like-what-I-was-drawing. This doesn't happen often. Lack of practice, and stuff. And black smudges all over everything. Happy.
***
And Finally
Tell me that this quote from Chess doesn't sound like Sparrow, and I'll tell you to get your head examined.
M: The man is utterly mad -- you're playing a lunatic.
R: That's the problem. He's a brilliant lunatic and you can't tell which way he'll jump -- like his game he's impossible to analyse -- you can't dissect him, predict him -- which of course means he's not a lunatic at all.
Change a few words and it's Gillette and James speaking.
aka. Word Squee.
Meretricious: Of, befitting, a harlot; (of ornament, literary style, etc.) showily attractive. Hence: meretriciously, meretriciousness. From the latin word meretrix, meaning harlot.
I love the very existence of this word - it sounds so much like it should mean the same as meritorious, but no… and my dad used it. In a sentence. Love. Sooner or later my Commodore will use it to describe Captain Jack Sparrow, but that can wait.
Meritorious: (Of person or act) deserving reward, praise, or gratitude (often as term of limited praise, well-meant, well-meaning).
And while I'm at it:
The section of abbreviations in the back of the Concise Oxford Dictionary (and probably others) is well worth reading for amusement value alone. For example, MD stands for Medicinae Doctor (Doctor of Medicine) or mentally deficient - which is rather the opposite. This amuses me.
***
Things I love without rhyme, and for reasons irrational
aka. Object Squee.
Nail Polish: I practically never wear this, and have no interest in doing so, save perhaps to try the strangest colour-combinations I can think of. But! It looks so shiny in those little glass bottles, and I just know they would make lovely chess pieces if I could decide which should be which. But that's not the reason. It's quite simply perfect for adding highlights to paintings - transparent, translucent, shiny, glittery, metallic - you name it, and in an array of colours that they don't give you as paints without long hard searching (which I don't do). So, I adore it, and probably have at least twenty bottles of the stuff.
And yes, I'm going through an art phase.
Paper: It's so... so WHITE. And blank. (I suspect it's the infinite potential of a blank piece of paper that draws me in, but who knows. It might be the taste.)
Candles: No reason, I just find them aesthetically attractive. Preferrable never lit. I have a green gel-candle in a clear goblet with charms around the base that my brother got me. It practically screams Slytherin.
Cacti: Not so much now, but... the little fluffy round ones with brilliantly coloured flowers. (At least, fluffy until you touch them and spend the next ten minutes picking prickles so fine as to be almost invisible out of your fingers.)
Dictionaries: Enough said.
Unused paintbrushes: The soft, perfect ones. *cuddles paintbrush.*
The plug for the kitchen sink: Someone threw the old one out with the scraps by accident, and it wasn't replaced for weeks, so... PLUG!
Charcoal pencils (infact, all art pencils): See pencil, buy pencil. And I've actually managed a few pieces of art that actually-look-like-what-I-was-drawing. This doesn't happen often. Lack of practice, and stuff. And black smudges all over everything. Happy.
***
And Finally
Tell me that this quote from Chess doesn't sound like Sparrow, and I'll tell you to get your head examined.
M: The man is utterly mad -- you're playing a lunatic.
R: That's the problem. He's a brilliant lunatic and you can't tell which way he'll jump -- like his game he's impossible to analyse -- you can't dissect him, predict him -- which of course means he's not a lunatic at all.
Change a few words and it's Gillette and James speaking.
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no subject
Date: 2005-06-21 06:08 pm (UTC)2: joy over the little things in life, yay.
3: OMG CHESS! Awesomeness. I saw that in concert and have hated it ever since, until I saw the REAL THING. Happeh. And yeah, so Sparrington, there.
no subject
Date: 2005-06-21 06:41 pm (UTC)I saw it first as a musical, but it was REALLY well done, so... love. And then I was thinking about Sparrow, and Princess Bride crossovers, and that quote floated into my mind and wouldn't leave.
no subject
Date: 2005-06-21 10:10 pm (UTC)Yay!
Probably my favorite book that I own is a Dictionary of Quotations. One quote that I am determined will make it into one of my fics:
"Drunkenness is simply voluntary insanity." ~ Seneca
That just sounds so very Jack to me. He's not drunk, he's voluntarily insane.
Charcoal pencils-check. New paintbrushes (ooh, soft)-check. Unburnt candles-check. Dictionaries-double check.
I should have friended you a long time ago. *nods*
no subject
Date: 2005-06-22 09:13 pm (UTC)I should have friended you a long time ago.
Mmm... Ditto.