yaybob has looked up 3 words, created 4 lists, listed 329 words, written 93 comments, added 7 tags, and loved 0 words.
Comments by yaybob
Comments for yaybob
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"yaybob has created 4 lists, listed 329 words, written 92 comments, and added 7 tags, 0 favorites, and 0 pronunciations."
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Cheers Yayb!
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Thanks! I've had a ball here already.
sionnich said: I just wanted to say how much I've been enjoying your contributions to the site.
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Hi yaybob!
I just wanted to say how much I've been enjoying your contributions to the site. Keep up the great work!
A belated welcome to Wordie. -
Hey -- I've opened my statin list (http://wordie.org/lists/statin) so that you can add your excellent suggestions.
yaybob commented on the list old-words-that-deserve-revival
moxie
Jun 25, 2012
yaybob commented on the word crossword
GRIDLOCK seems to have disappeared in the last post
Jan 23, 2009
yaybob commented on the word crossword
No,not a ton of links. Just these two, because these are remarkable puzzles.
WIDE OPEN SPACES, both .PDF files
GRIDLOCK features three adjacent horizontal 21-letter entries spanning the entire width of the grid in the three middle rows of the puzzle (rows 10, 11 and 12) which intersect with three similar adjacent 21-letter vertical entries running up and down the three middle columns of the grid. For good measure, there are two more 21-letter horizontal entries in the puzzle. Each of these is a string of automobile model names (the clues are the corresponding makes). The puzzle was conceived as the intersection of two three-lane highways with traffic in gridlock.
WIDE OPEN SPACES is remarkable for its paucity of black squares, its many long entries, and its short word list. The limit would be a 21 x 21 grid with no black squares made of 21 across entries and 21 down entries, or only 42 words. WOS contains only 51 black squares (11%) and 112 words, about 75% of which are 8 or more letters long. Reagle does take some liberties with the language, so allow for that.
Answers are unavailable on the Internet to my knowledge, but I've finished the puzzles - they are not impossibly difficult - and can help if there are any nagging problems.
Jan 23, 2009
yaybob commented on the word crossword
I have URLs for two great crossword puzzles. Would it be inappropriate for me to post those here on Wordie? It's not our mission or purpose, but it is word related, and there may be a few crossword puzzle fans like me among us.
Jan 22, 2009
yaybob commented on the list metaphors-we-live-by
We can't have metonymy without synecdoche. (This was a difficult subject that I once pored over and kept some notes that I thought were helpful and that I'd like to share.)
The following are all nested: a synecdoche is a type of metonymy, which is a type of metaphor, which in turn is a type of trope, which is one of the categories of figures of speech.
(1) Figure of Speech - a word or phrase of figurative language that departs from straightforward, literal language and that is crafted for emphasis, freshness, convenience or clarity. There are two main types: schemes and tropes
(2) Trope - a rhetorical figure of speech that consists of using a word or words to mean something other than what is considered its literal or normal meaning (cf. scheme, the other category of figure of speech, which involves changing the pattern of words in a sentence or letters in a word through omission, repetition, or transposition: "love me do" or "ne'er-do-well").
(3) Metaphor - a type of trope that compares two things (like most elements of the list), as in "the death of music," where music is compared to a living thing, "ignorance is bliss," "the king of beasts, "or "a thirst for knowledge" (cf. irony, another type of trope, where a word means it's opposite, as in "that's just great" or litotes, also a trope, as in "not bad")
(4) Metonymy - a type of metaphor that uses a related object or concept in place of another, as in "the pen is mightier than the sword," where pen represents writing and the sword physical battle, or "the Pentagon" for the Department of Defense.
(5) Synecdoche - a form of metonymy, in which a part stands for the whole, as in "hired hands" or "my new wheels"
Dec 27, 2008
yaybob commented on the list antique-names-female
How about Pansy? It's still in vogue here in southeastern Missouri (I knew three at one time, but alas, two have passed on).
I have a sister-in-law named Eugenia (who had a mother named Dorcas. I wonder why Dorcas fell out of vogue. Lovely name. "Has anyone seen my Dorcas?" "Yes, she's taking tea with Lady Doofus.")
Hattie, as in Hilo Hattie or Panama Hattie.
Bea, as in Aunt Bea and Bea Benederet
Wilhelmina. Why shouldn't Wilhelm memorialize himself in his daughter's name?
I've known two women named Johnna, which is just as lovely a tribute to her father as Wilhelmina.
Dare we consider Bertie more than just a nickname for Bertha?
Constance (Prudence's sister)
Sybil and Agatha
And then there's Maud(e)
I realize that this is a year late, but in response to RAMINI's question, has anyone heard of the name Fritzi? Yes. Fritzi Ritz was a cartoon character from the comics, originally a bombshell like Betty Boop, but eventually, the more dowdy aunt of Ernie Bushmiller's Nancy, a miserable comic strip that was never funny but that I read every Sunday without fail anyway when I was quite young because it was so easy to read and understand.
Dec 27, 2008
yaybob commented on the list wordie-challenge
Well this was unexpected. And flattering. Thank you for including me. As I indicated once before, I'm used to Internet communities being pretty icy and aggressive (as in aggression). This group has been gentle and genteel. Which gives me a sense (please forgive me, proud Americans, but ours is a brutish, "bring 'em on" culture) that the mix is very international.
Now I have a list of the names with which I am most familiar to begin accreteing attributes. Somebody co-authored a book on statistical methods of pharmacokinetic or pharmacodynamics (yikes!), but I didn't record it and now that's lost until the next time I stumble upon it (this is the thinking out loud that I mentioned). It's like a game of Clue. Colonel Mustard is in the study. I thought that I could place sionnach in the bay area in Northern California, but then suddenly Spain seemed more right. Am I conflating attributes of two different people? The list of WORDOs will put an end to the speculating. Prolagus is Italian - or else that guy in the movie Breaking Away.
Anyway, cheers, all!
Listening to: "Sure don't know what I'm going for, but I'm gonna go for it for sure."
(BTW, what's a challenge in the wordie sense?)
Dec 20, 2008
yaybob commented on the list phth
Good answer. Graceful and funny.
Dec 17, 2008
yaybob commented on the list phth
Two things. All opinions solicited, although I believe that skipva should decide which of these ideas, if any, is helpful.
(1) I added aphthous and subsequently noticed aphtha on the list. These are the same thing, and in my opinion, aphthous should be stricken from the list. However, it is not my list and I didn't want to take the liberty. By the same token, because ophthalmologist appears on the list, we probably don't also want ophthalmology, ophthalmologic, ophthalmological, or ophthalmologically. However, xerophthalmia (a condition of dry eyes) and microphthalmos (abnormal smallness of one or both eyes) are on the list and probably should be. They are sufficiently different in meaning and form from ophthalmologist. Microphthalmos differs in meaning only subtly from microphthalmia, the first, as best I can tell, being the abstract idea of the smallness of eyeballs, the other, the fact of it being the case in an individual - genus and species, type and token. Anophthalmia and anophthalmos are analogous, except pertaining to no eye forming. Probably one of these should be included. I have taken the liberty of adding anophthalmia, in the spirit of monophthong, diphthong and triphthong. But how about ophthalmoscope, which in form is like all of the other ophth- words above, but conceptually, is just as unique relative to ophthalmologist as microphthalmos? I will defer to skipva to decide whether to include ophthalmoscope rather than add it myself.
I realize that I'm splitting hairs here somewhat, but isn't that what we do? And just to torture this subject even further, how about another little exercise in lumping and splitting. Who's up for that?
(2) Can we not find a place in this list for two buddies of 'phth,' namely 'chth' and 'ghth,' which are actually even more rare. I would be interested in the words in which they appear in the same syllable, like chthonic and eighth, not words which split them such as autochthonous and knighthood, although frankly, the latter aren't fundamentally different from ophthalmologist, which also splits the 'ph' and 'th' across syllables. Words which contain the the 'phth' sound in the same syllable, like phthalein and phthisis, are, to me, more special. Those other words are really no more interesting than highchair or earthshaking, and were it not for the monosyllabic 'phth' words, this might not be a category for a list.
Dec 17, 2008
yaybob commented on the word microphthalmos
a developmental anomaly characterized by abnormal smallness of one or both eyes.
Dec 17, 2008
yaybob commented on the word podophthalmia
It's remarkable to return to my computer after several hours away and find all of this discussion by so many people on a topic such as this.
BTW, how does one go about making an addition like the one I made appear as a gray definition beside the word rather than as a comment. I referenced FAQ and found this: "The definitions come from an open-source project called WordNet. If they don't provide a definition, then Wordie doesn't show one. So far, there is no way to add a definition - but you can add it as a comment on the word page." That's got to be an intrabuccal linguisticism again, n'est ce pas?
Dec 17, 2008
yaybob commented on the word podophthalmia
An order of Crustacea having the eyes supported on movable stalks. It includes the crabs, lobsters, and prawns. Called also Podophthalmata, and Decapoda.
Dec 16, 2008
yaybob commented on the list cops
detective
Dec 16, 2008
yaybob commented on the list cops
the man
Dec 16, 2008
yaybob commented on the word zed
zed's dead
Dec 16, 2008
yaybob commented on the word chuck-farthing
a game involving throwing small coins
Dec 16, 2008
yaybob commented on the word nosy parker
a person who meddles in the affairs of others
Dec 16, 2008
yaybob commented on the word nancy boy
an effeminate male
Dec 16, 2008
yaybob commented on the word gallinipper
a large mosquito or other insect capable of inflicting a painful bite
Dec 16, 2008
yaybob commented on the word windlestraw
A person who is tall, thin and unhealthy looking
Dec 16, 2008
yaybob commented on the word scopperloit
rude or rough play
Dec 16, 2008
yaybob commented on the word hoddypeak
A blockhead or fool
Dec 16, 2008
yaybob commented on the word clodhopper
A clumsy, awkward fellow
Dec 16, 2008
yaybob commented on the word carriwitchit
A pun or conundrum
Dec 16, 2008
yaybob commented on the word batie-bummil
A useless bungler
Dec 16, 2008
yaybob commented on the list nincompoopery
Nice, sionnach. Thanks.
Dec 16, 2008
yaybob commented on the word -<-@
Thanks. I was hoping somebody that could speak to this with some authority would chime in. I was aware that programmers hid messages to themselves and other programmers in the source code this way, but I didn't realize that this was not the preferred way to do that.
Dec 16, 2008
yaybob commented on the user bilby
That means the same thing as vacation, no? Happy holidays.
Dec 16, 2008
yaybob commented on the word wuziwuk
Waar, natuurlijk, ook ik spreek geen Nederlands.
Ik ben door een wesp gestoken. Kun je me een insekt afwerend? Prettige kerstdagen!
Dec 16, 2008
yaybob commented on the word wuziwuk
Waar, natuurlijk, ook ik spreek geen Nederlands.
Ik ben door een wesp gestoken. Kun je me een insekt afwerend? Prettige kerstdagen!
Dec 16, 2008
yaybob commented on the word frust
According to the Urban Dictionary, frust is, "the small line of debris that refuses to be swept onto the dust pan and keeps backing a person across the room until he finally decides to give up and sweep it under the rug."
Essentially what Yarb said.
Dec 15, 2008
yaybob commented on the word -<-@
I'm no expert on this stuff, but I believe that HTML translators ignore anything contained between the less than and greater than signs that isn't recognized as a standard tag. This allows the programmers to write notes in the source code of a web page that don't affect rendering of the code or the page that we see. You can see that code for the page that you're looking at now by entering CTRL + U. The first sentence there, which begins with "!DOCTYPE html PUBLIC "-//W3C//DTD XHT" is, I believe, an example of this.
Dec 15, 2008
yaybob commented on the user davidsmth606@gmail.com
They've got this stuff automated now at insult-o-matic.com. Some reworked samples of their output:
maggotous vat of vomit
dandruff licking, whimpering pantaloon
toilet-bowl licking rectum
cross-dressing, pus hole
(Just another road kill on the information stupor highway)
Dec 15, 2008
yaybob commented on the list icelandic
I had the great good pleasure of visiting Iceland in 2002. Two words that enchanted me were Þingvellir (Thingvellir), a National Park, and Snorri (who could easily have been the eighth dwarf), a common first name. I found myself repeating both words frequently to amuse myself.
My most enduring trivial memories of the trip were a strapping, 300 lb. tour guide named Bekki, the Pizza Hut in Reykjavik that offered tuna (or, tuna fish, if you prefer) as a pizza topping, and the Icelandic Phallological Museum, which, unfortunately, was closed the day we walked by it.
Dec 15, 2008
yaybob commented on the user yaybob
Thanks! I've had a ball here already.
sionnich said: I just wanted to say how much I've been enjoying your contributions to the site.
Dec 15, 2008
yaybob commented on the list very-funny
sionnich: I find the same thing happens - if I edit a post in which I've previously entered a (correctly) formatted link, and the edit has nothing to do with the link, it first appears that the link has vanished. However, it generally reappears upon refreshing my browser. (I think this is what you meant, yes?)
Yes, exactly. In fact, the link which gave me problems and resulted in the question - Drinky Crow - is now back on line, on its own. In selected cases, I may start adding the URL right beside the link to be be doubly certain. If you see this odd configuration, you'll know why.
Dec 15, 2008
yaybob commented on the list flora-and-fauna-ending-in-x
skipvia said: Not...not...Skinny Dick's Halfway Inn! *gasp* Is he ready?
You betcha!
Dec 15, 2008
yaybob commented on the word wuwh
what's up with him (her)
Dec 14, 2008
yaybob commented on the word wysiwyg
what you see is what you get
Dec 14, 2008
yaybob commented on the word figfd figfu
found in gutter face down
found in gutter face up
(useful for medical and police reports)
Dec 14, 2008
yaybob commented on the word socmob
standing on corner / minding own business - proof that whatever happened wasn't your fault
Dec 14, 2008
yaybob commented on the word walstib
what a long, strange trip it's been
Dec 14, 2008
yaybob commented on the word nttawwt
not that there's anything wrong with that
Dec 14, 2008
yaybob commented on the list very-funny
In case it never appears in the post below this one, this is the URL for the Drinky Crow YouTube: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9FiNGpCHSE8
Dec 13, 2008
yaybob commented on the list very-funny
I've been having a terrible time getting the links in my posts operational or to stay operational, even when the formatting appears perfect. Furthermore, sometimes a link will just disappear after editing a remote part of the post, and upon reloading, reappear. Poltergeists! Is anybody else having a similar problem, or is this something more local, like my computer or server?
Dec 13, 2008
yaybob commented on the list very-funny
Wonderful list and a wonderful subject. I just stumbled onto this material recently, and have dug into the subject a little. Information available on the Internet is sparse and sometimes contradictory. I'm concerned about my definition of crottles not agreeing with yours, and unfortunately, I haven't been able to retrace my steps and find it again to see if I made an error copying it.
Michael Quinion discusses the subject. Crottles appears on his list as crottle-eyed. BTW, if you're interested, his list contains several terms not on your list, although he doesn't define any of them: neoflect, spurl, direct-a-tron (and throwatron, staggeratron, sailatron, swishatron), and jigg.
The definition that I found for crottles - the Xes drawn for the eyes of a dead or stuporous character - conflicts with the Wordie definition. Also, you (reesetee) defined oculama as, "The cartoon science of creating eyes." To that, MiaLuthien added, "Also, Xs over a character's eyes to indicate drunkenness or death," so, there's some ambiguity already.
As I indicated, I don't recall where I got the definition of crottles that I provided, but Quinion's use of the term "crottle-eyed" lends some support to the idea that my resource might have been correct. Although Google provides several mentions of Mort Walker, his book on the subject, and lists of many of his cartooning neologisms, even with an earnest effort, I wasn't able to find definitions of these words anywhere except wherever it was that I read that definition of crottles, and from Wikipedia. And this article contained only a handful of definitions, crottles not being among them. So I can't resolve the issue.
Apparently, this is proprietary material, and they want us to buy the book (pictured on the Wiki page). And since you have provided quite a few more definitions as well as provided a citation from Walker, I'm guessing that you bought the book and can sort this out.
If you are into this stuff enough to have bought a book on it, then you might be interested to know that the Cartoon Channel just introduced a new cartoon to its Adult Swim lineup called Drinky Crow. I've seen it just once, and loved it for both the story line of that single episode as well as the animation. Drinky is often depicted with Xes for eyes, as in the YouTube sample here.
Dec 13, 2008
yaybob commented on the list denizens
For bilby's demonyms list as well:
Neopolitan - Naples
Niçoise - Nice
Malagasay - Madagascar
Bellifontain - Fontainebleau
Downeaster - region of Maine
(Private joke - For the last ten years, I have lived in a town in rural Missouri (US) called Poplar Bluff, and have long called our own Poplar Bluffoons.)
Dec 13, 2008
yaybob commented on the word narthex
sionnach said: "It's the attack of the killer anthropomorphic spice-aliens!!"
Therefore, you will...GARFLE THE NARTHAX!
Dec 13, 2008
yaybob commented on the word bajun
I believe that the (unofficial) demonym for Barbados (officially
Barbadian), is Bajan. Wiki says 'Barbados' derives from the Spanish 'baja mar' (low or shallow sea), hence Bajan.
Dec 13, 2008
yaybob commented on the word angeleno
Of or from El Pueblo de Nuestra Señora la Reina de los Angeles de Porciúncula (The Town of Our Lady the Queen of Angels of the Little Portion), abbreviated L.A.
Dec 13, 2008