suetcreosotechilblains
― Li'l Brexit (Tracer Hand), Friday, 16 April 2021 11:07 (three years ago) link
If your home has a chimney, you're gonna talk about creosote all the time.
― peace, man, Friday, 16 April 2021 11:17 (three years ago) link
We were talking about chilblains a lot over the past two months (as in did the husband have chilblains or covid toe, we decided the latter). Was it ever really common though?
― Scamp Granada (gyac), Friday, 16 April 2021 11:18 (three years ago) link
I still frequently buy lamb suet for making DUMPLINGS!
― calzino, Friday, 16 April 2021 11:22 (three years ago) link
'Creosote' appears in a song by The Clientele that I have played a few times this week.
― the pinefox, Friday, 16 April 2021 11:23 (three years ago) link
cor!
― massaman gai (front tea for two), Friday, 16 April 2021 11:24 (three years ago) link
Suet is also common in bird feeders.
― peace, man, Friday, 16 April 2021 11:24 (three years ago) link
I'm sorry, Tracer Hand, that we are working so hard to debunk your OP.
― peace, man, Friday, 16 April 2021 11:25 (three years ago) link
I think I say 'Cor'.
― the pinefox, Friday, 16 April 2021 13:17 (three years ago) link
desuetude
― So who you gonna call? The martini police (Alfred, Lord Sotosyn), Friday, 16 April 2021 13:47 (three years ago) link
hwæt
― Camaraderie at Arms Length, Friday, 16 April 2021 13:51 (three years ago) link
I still use 'hwæt'.
― pomenitul, Friday, 16 April 2021 13:56 (three years ago) link
Cobblers
― Authoritarian Steaks (Tom D.), Friday, 16 April 2021 14:00 (three years ago) link
hwæt, sôðe?
― Camaraderie at Arms Length, Friday, 16 April 2021 14:02 (three years ago) link
There's probably somewhere in Derbyshire or somewhere where people still talk like that.
― Authoritarian Steaks (Tom D.), Friday, 16 April 2021 14:05 (three years ago) link
Sóþsecgendlíce.
― pomenitul, Friday, 16 April 2021 14:05 (three years ago) link
lol, I totally use suet, it's what you put in bird feeders.
― Josh in Chicago, Friday, 16 April 2021 14:06 (three years ago) link
'Iceland' I think it's called.
2xp
― pomenitul, Friday, 16 April 2021 14:06 (three years ago) link
flummadiddle
― pomenitul, Friday, 16 April 2021 14:10 (three years ago) link
think West Frisian is supposed to be the closest extant dialect to Old English
― Camaraderie at Arms Length, Friday, 16 April 2021 14:11 (three years ago) link
It is, but Icelandic is cooler. Besides, Frisian is also closest to modern English.
― pomenitul, Friday, 16 April 2021 14:15 (three years ago) link
I buy suet once a year to make Christmas Pudding
― mahb, Friday, 16 April 2021 15:00 (three years ago) link
if we're talking ilx, i would say RONG never gets used anymore
― P-Zunit (Neanderthal), Friday, 16 April 2021 15:01 (three years ago) link
If you had searched for that, you would have found yourself to be incorrect.
― peace, man, Friday, 16 April 2021 15:04 (three years ago) link
nobody was capitalizing it tho!
― P-Zunit (Neanderthal), Friday, 16 April 2021 15:07 (three years ago) link
The girl group song 'Terry' features the line 'we had a quarrel, I was untrue on the night he died' and every time I hear it I wonder when 'quarrel' and 'untrue' (in that context) fell out of their once-popular use.
― You Can't Have the Woogie Without a Little Boogie (Old Lunch), Friday, 16 April 2021 15:20 (three years ago) link
Eh?
― Authoritarian Steaks (Tom D.), Friday, 16 April 2021 15:27 (three years ago) link
Tom D: I say 'cobblers' almost literally every day.
And I don't even work at an old-fashioned shoe repair shop.
― the pinefox, Friday, 16 April 2021 15:29 (three years ago) link
(xp) Oh I get what you mean about the context for 'untrue', but I think it was old fashioned even then.
― Authoritarian Steaks (Tom D.), Friday, 16 April 2021 15:29 (three years ago) link
Using pop culture as a yardstick, 'untrue' as an analogue of 'unfaithful' seems to have been in fairly regular usage in the '60s. I hear it pop up quite a bit in songs, movies, shows, etc. from that era but not really much thereafter.
― You Can't Have the Woogie Without a Little Boogie (Old Lunch), Friday, 16 April 2021 15:36 (three years ago) link
https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/en/6/64/BurialUntrue.jpg
― pomenitul, Friday, 16 April 2021 15:38 (three years ago) link
Well, it's easy to rhyme, which can never be underestimated in song writing.
― Authoritarian Steaks (Tom D.), Friday, 16 April 2021 15:40 (three years ago) link
Varlet
― | (Latham Green), Friday, 16 April 2021 15:42 (three years ago) link
― It Is Dangerous to Meme Inside (James Redd and the Blecchs), Friday, 16 April 2021 15:46 (three years ago) link
you aren't hearing "shan't" much in the US these days, and "shall" only got a stay of execution from Gandalf
― mark e. smith-moon (f. hazel), Friday, 16 April 2021 15:51 (three years ago) link
xpost it makes you vintage
― P-Zunit (Neanderthal), Friday, 16 April 2021 15:53 (three years ago) link
When I was six it was very common for kids my age to say "keen" to mean cool, great, awesome. And then it seemed as if overnight everyone stopped saying it. (Absolutely nobody said "awesome" when I was six but by the time I was 14 everyone said it). Granted kids often have their own words, but some older people said "keen" also, I'm pretty sure of it.
― Josefa, Friday, 16 April 2021 15:56 (three years ago) link
"Lumbago" was a pretty common term up to and throughout the 70's, to identify any sort of back pain. Archie Bunker and Fred G. Sanford were all over it! Seems like "sciatica" has taken its place.
― henry s, Friday, 16 April 2021 15:59 (three years ago) link
The G. is for “grebt.”
― It Is Dangerous to Meme Inside (James Redd and the Blecchs), Friday, 16 April 2021 16:00 (three years ago) link
does anybody say "kneeslapper" anymore
― P-Zunit (Neanderthal), Friday, 16 April 2021 16:01 (three years ago) link
xpa Canadianism I enjoy is "keener"
― rob, Friday, 16 April 2021 16:02 (three years ago) link
xp to myself
I think it was lumbago that had George Jefferson walking on Bentley's back.
― henry s, Friday, 16 April 2021 16:02 (three years ago) link
cf the Small Faces, "Lazy Sunday"
― Authoritarian Steaks (Tom D.), Friday, 16 April 2021 16:06 (three years ago) link
TIL that that line in "Lazy Sunday" is "How's old Bert's lumbago?"
Always thought it was "How's your bird's lumbago?"
― Josefa, Friday, 16 April 2021 16:12 (three years ago) link
there are words people used to say in the playground a lot that were conflating being silly/stupid with being mentally handicapped. I don't really want to even say what they were, but it always amazes me that these words were common enough to be learned by children. I'm glad I don't hear them any more.
― boxedjoy, Friday, 16 April 2021 16:44 (three years ago) link
xp to myselfI think it was lumbago that had George Jefferson walking on Bentley's back.
― It Is Dangerous to Meme Inside (James Redd and the Blecchs), Friday, 16 April 2021 16:47 (three years ago) link
"How's yer Bert's lumbago?" surely?
― Authoritarian Steaks (Tom D.), Friday, 16 April 2021 16:53 (three years ago) link
Hm it does sound slightly more like "your" than "old." I just went by some random lyric site... now I see there's another site that says it's "your old Bert's"!
― Josefa, Friday, 16 April 2021 17:02 (three years ago) link
lumbago was a final jeopardy answer a few years ago and nobody got it. the clue: "Adding “P” to a word for a chronic back condition gets you this synonym for graphite or pencil lead". one of the contestants was a latin teacher.
milliner / millinery
― wasdnuos (abanana), Friday, 16 April 2021 17:11 (three years ago) link
Never heard lumbago used in conversation but come across it all the time in medical coding.
― A True White Kid that can Jump (Granny Dainger), Friday, 16 April 2021 17:41 (three years ago) link
Sounds like an anagram.
― Tom D: I was in the army (Tom D.), Saturday, 16 July 2022 21:11 (one year ago) link
Fanny, minge, radge, snatch, axe wound...anything but twat.
--Johnny Cash, "A Boy Named Twat"
― Hideous Lump, Saturday, 16 July 2022 21:11 (one year ago) link
lol
― Tom D: I was in the army (Tom D.), Saturday, 16 July 2022 21:14 (one year ago) link
clunge
― Tracer Hand, Saturday, 16 July 2022 21:15 (one year ago) link
good story (which some probably know) abt the variable knownness of the word "twat" down the centuries (via etymonline of course)
The T-word occupies a special niche in literary history, however, thanks to a horrible mistake by Robert Browning, who included it in 'Pippa Passes' (1841) without knowing its true meaning. 'Then owls and bats,/Cowls and twats,/Monks and nuns,/In a cloister's moods.' Poor Robert! He had been misled into thinking the word meant 'hat' by its appearance in 'Vanity of Vanities,' a poem of 1660, containing the treacherous lines: 'They'd talk't of his having a Cardinalls Hat,/They'd send him as soon an Old Nuns Twat.' (There is a lesson here about not using words unless one is very sure of their meaning.) [Hugh Rawson, "Wicked Words," 1989]
I first heard it in the late 60s, when mum and dad -- then young adults -- were giggling with one another bcz one of them (almost certainly mum) had said it in my hearing, so they thought, and they had to explain what it meant (poorly explained iirc) and why it was bad for me to say. somehow unlike my mum and my sister i didn't swear much at all as a youngun so i guess the second element they achieved…
then at school as a teen i began hearing it again, used as a mocking insult one lad at another rather than the old nun sense above. curiously at school it was always said to rhyme with "hat" whereas mum and dad said it to rhyme with "squat"…
etymonline also has a strong story abt git, from 1706 in scotland, where one gregor burgess "protested against the said Allane that called him a witch gyt or bratt"
― mark s, Sunday, 17 July 2022 07:49 (one year ago) link
i'd like to know if browning ever realised his error tho
― mark s, Sunday, 17 July 2022 07:50 (one year ago) link
My dad also says it to rhyme with squat. I, like many other people I think, thought of it as akin to twit and didn’t learn THE TRUE MEANING till I went to university, I think.
― Alba, Sunday, 17 July 2022 08:01 (one year ago) link
It wasn’t actually on the syllabus.
browning is out of fashion academically
― mark s, Sunday, 17 July 2022 08:40 (one year ago) link
my parents mistook this word to mean “butt”, and therefore used it fairly liberally until i guess they found out because i haven’t heard it from them in years
― Tracer Hand, Sunday, 17 July 2022 08:43 (one year ago) link
i'd like to know if browning ever realised his error thoAccording to Bill Bryson d Browning was allowed to live out his life in wholesome ignorance because no one could think of a suitably delicate way of explaining his mistake to him. (citation needed)https://www.goodreads.com/quotes/735078-the-poet-robert-browning-caused-considerable-consternation-by-including-the
― dear confusion the catastrophe waitress (ledge), Sunday, 17 July 2022 09:16 (one year ago) link
I skipped the second “it” on first reading of your post, Tracer, and thought: wow, embarrassment has never hit me quite that hard.
― Alba, Sunday, 17 July 2022 09:19 (one year ago) link
― Tracer Hand, Sunday, 17 July 2022 09:31 (one year ago) link
*giggle*
― Tom D: I was in the army (Tom D.), Sunday, 17 July 2022 09:42 (one year ago) link
now enjoying my very made-up picture of the victorian literary world, with the victorian ashley pomeroys saying "lol lol lol browning but tbf it is a very obscure old word" and the victorian tom ds telling them that actually everyone knows it perfectly well (except apparently browning)
― mark s, Sunday, 17 July 2022 09:46 (one year ago) link
Am now deep into oblivious Victorian uses of twathttps://i.imgur.com/4GS9JzE.jpg
― Alba, Sunday, 17 July 2022 10:00 (one year ago) link
Exploration of Twathttps://i.imgur.com/UhaAXVW.jpg
― Alba, Sunday, 17 July 2022 10:08 (one year ago) link
Gerhard Rolfs: spent over a month in the Twat
― Tracer Hand, Sunday, 17 July 2022 10:24 (one year ago) link
What a story though
― Alba, Sunday, 17 July 2022 10:49 (one year ago) link
One to tell the kids..
― Mark G, Sunday, 17 July 2022 14:20 (one year ago) link
...In the Twat, as a MussulmanDon't stop till you get enough
― Mark G, Sunday, 17 July 2022 14:22 (one year ago) link
Wikipedia also mentions a "traveling-wave amplifier tube". Which leads me to this page, which has a good example of comedy that uses negative space as a punchline:https://www.chemeurope.com/en/encyclopedia/Traveling_wave_tube.html
"A TWT has sometimes been referred to as a traveling wave amplifier tube (TWAT), although this term has fallen out of use."
― Ashley Pomeroy, Sunday, 17 July 2022 16:54 (one year ago) link
My own mother called me a 'twerp' yesterday and I thought of this thread. And then I thought of Kurt Vonnegut:
INTERVIEWER
What is a twerp in the strictest sense, in the original sense?
VONNEGUT
It’s a person who inserts a set of false teeth between the cheeks of his ass.
Thanks, mum.
― Shard-borne Beatles with their drowsy hums (Chinaski), Sunday, 17 July 2022 19:46 (one year ago) link
I was wondering earlier what word could best be substituted for twat. Twerp, while obviously milder to most non-Browning ears, is probably it.
― Alba, Sunday, 17 July 2022 19:53 (one year ago) link
ooh i don't agree with that at all, they're *very* different, twerp has much less vehement hostility and is also (if used affectionately) less affectionate
i ilx-searched twerp to see if anyone uses it except me (ans = yes) or as often as me (ans = daver popshots uses it a lot also)
― mark s, Sunday, 17 July 2022 19:58 (one year ago) link
Divided by a common insult.
― Alba, Sunday, 17 July 2022 20:05 (one year ago) link
when I was a kid in the 80's someone reprimanded me for using "twat" told me it meant I was calling them a pregnant fish
― calzino, Sunday, 17 July 2022 20:06 (one year ago) link
I think once you reach a certain age it’s harder to be a twerp. Elon Musk can still be a twerp and a twat. Kelvin MacKenzie is just a twat.
― Alba, Sunday, 17 July 2022 20:08 (one year ago) link
I was told a prat was a pregnant fish.
Twerp definitely much gentler* than twat, and essentially floats free of any meaning beyond 'a bit of a wally' (see also 'numpty').
*certainly when deployed by my mum.
― Shard-borne Beatles with their drowsy hums (Chinaski), Sunday, 17 July 2022 20:08 (one year ago) link
tubular (Also, do you live in a country other than France that uses a comma as a decimal point? Do you know how this difference came to be?)
― youn, Sunday, 17 July 2022 20:58 (one year ago) link
Does anyone say full stop anymore or was that just from the age of telegrams?
― youn, Sunday, 17 July 2022 21:23 (one year ago) link
I used "full stop" at the end of an article last week!
https://www.stereogum.com/2191562/baroness-yellow-and-green-turns-10/reviews/the-anniversary/
― but also fuck you (unperson), Sunday, 17 July 2022 21:27 (one year ago) link
Always assumed”twunt” was an ilx portmaneau, but now words don’t “mean” anything
― Warning: Choking Hazard (Hunt3r), Sunday, 17 July 2022 22:45 (one year ago) link
i think twunt might come from b3ta or possibly before that. it's not from ilx though, just general UK internet
full stop is just British for period so yes it's used all the time
― even the birds in the trees seemed to whisper "get fucked" (bovarism), Sunday, 17 July 2022 22:52 (one year ago) link
maiden/maid (the latter for anything other than a housecleaner, and even for that becoming less common).
― longtime caller, first time listener (man alive), Monday, 18 July 2022 00:34 (one year ago) link
You still hear maiden all the time if you're a cricket fan!
― Tom D: I was in the army (Tom D.), Monday, 18 July 2022 07:01 (one year ago) link
don't forget about twit
― Piggy Lepton (La Lechera), Monday, 18 July 2022 13:16 (one year ago) link
twit was roughly equivalent to dipshit afaik
There were plenty of slang words for pudenda that I would've used as a teenager. Fanny, minge, radge, snatch, axe wound...anything but twat.
― fetter, Monday, 18 July 2022 15:17 (one year ago) link
^^^ revived by the first Avengers movie in 2012!
― Doctor Casino, Monday, 18 July 2022 15:19 (one year ago) link
https://trends.google.co.uk/trends/explore?date=all&q=facepalm
― Noel Emits, Thursday, 11 August 2022 09:32 (one year ago) link
what happened to smdh. bring it back.
― Daniel_Rf, Thursday, 11 August 2022 10:26 (one year ago) link
not come across a 429 error before. JUst got one there. So think I might need to start using an alternative to google.
― Stevolende, Thursday, 11 August 2022 10:33 (one year ago) link
lmao still hanging on but rofl is in really bad shape these days, sad to see. when was the last time someone even roflmaoed?
I miss pmsl which I thought had real potential but afaict it never spread much beyond UK teens on bebo and myspace
I am very glad the cutesy internet speak of late 00s / early 10s (interwebs etc) seems to be almost extinct though because that shit got unbearable for a while
― Left, Thursday, 11 August 2022 12:16 (one year ago) link
I was struck by this article a couple of days in the newspaper about a feud between George Best and Bobby Charlton:https://www.theguardian.com/football/2022/aug/10/the-feud-between-best-and-charlton-that-shattered-manchester-united
Quoth Bobby, "so many young people on the ‘scene’ have the attitude that nearly everything and ordinary people are ‘sick’. They behave as if the peak of senility is reached at the age of 25 and they must wring every drop out of life by then whether they offend other people or not.” (Bobby) goes on to attack those who insist on being “cool”, “gas” and “with it”."
It's interesting how "sick" has come full circle.
― Ashley Pomeroy, Thursday, 11 August 2022 18:38 (one year ago) link
Did people use "vouchsafe"? Shakespeare loves it.
― Malevolent Arugula (Alfred, Lord Sotosyn), Thursday, 11 August 2022 18:40 (one year ago) link
Reminds me of a Proust translation where the literal "He did not respond" became "He vouchsafed no answer" in English.
― Halfway there but for you, Thursday, 11 August 2022 19:27 (one year ago) link
“beetling” to mean looming, jutting up etc most commonly used with eyebrows but have also read it in conjunction with hills, cliffs
― Tracer Hand, Sunday, 5 March 2023 18:20 (one year ago) link
Jordan Peterson seems to be the only person in the world who still says "up yours"
― the forces of darkness making making us laugh ourselves into DEATH?? (dog latin), Monday, 6 March 2023 00:13 (one year ago) link
Not really the right thread but I couldn’t find a better one:
“Invincible” is pretty common word but in all my 43 years, despite being a big reader, I’ve never heard or seen the word “vincible” until today.
― just1n3, Saturday, 9 September 2023 11:55 (seven months ago) link