Tag: Language

No Bad Words

Published

Our imperfect brains like to categorize things with broad brush strokes. This is how we create stereotypes. While not always true our broad brush strokes and stereotypes are a good starting point for learning.

Yes, it’s ok to have stereotypes as long as we recognize that they are very basic categorizations that need refinement.

We can see these stereotypes not just about people, but about the things around us.

My 9 year-old was talking about bad words the other day. I didn’t have the the opportunity for me to help her refine her impression at the time, but it’s on the list of things to do. How she categorizes her language will impact her future. For now, I’ll address it with this audience.

Yes, dear reader. I’m practicing on you.

There are no such thing as bad words!

Now, if you’re of the sensitive ear set the way to discover this might not be completely palatable. Helen Zaltzman’s work with language through her podcast The Allusionist revealed that it’s not the words themselves that are offensive. It’s that language has an aggressive aspect in both its content and delivery.

You see it’s not the list of words that we see as bad or good that’s really at play. That would simply be a checklist. It’s the words that our society only sees as aggressive.

This would be an aggressive — reverent scale. Not an aggressive — passive scale. Passive refers to tense, not tone.

The words used to create aggressive or irreverent language changes over time. The folks who screen movies might have a checklist of what can/can’t be said for certain movie ratings, but in our everyday life where we don’t have that checklist it’s not that we should check our words. We need to check our tone.

Are we communicating with an aggressive tone that will reduce our ability to collaborate?

If so, maybe that’s what we need to change. It’s not the list of words we’re using, but the choice of language we’re using in comparison to our desired outcome.

With the Door Closed

Published

Privacy in the bathroom is something our Western society often takes for granted. What’s also pretty interesting is we extend that physical privacy into our language by referring to the activities our bodies naturally go through while in the bathroom. Thankfully sites like Wiktionary have consolidated a list of terms used for urination and defecation.

I’ve adjusted the list to be numbered so in addition to reading you can see how many items are on the list.

Urination

  1. Aim Archie at the Armitage
  2. Answer the call of nature (or nature’s call)
  3. Beating the piss out of the little guy
  4. Blasting the beast
  5. Bleeding the lizard
  6. Breaking the seal (specifically the first visit during a drinking session)
  7. Change water on the goldfish
  8. Coffee dump
  9. Cooling a tire (American truck driver slang)
  10. Do a wee
  11. Draining the Anaconda
  12. Draining the dragon
  13. Draining the lizard
  14. Draining the main vein
  15. Draining the radiator
  16. Draining the sleepy weasel
  17. Draining the one-eyed monster
  18. Draining my rpg
  19. Draining down the system
  20. Empty my tank
  21. Flush my buffers
  22. Freshen my Snapple
  23. Go pee pee
  24. Going to the office
  25. Going to water my horse
  26. Hosing the porcelain
  27. Humping the cat loin
  28. Jimmy Riddle
  29. Leak the lizard
  30. Let er’ fly
  31. Lift leg (used commonly among members of the furry fandom, derived from how male canines urinate)
  32. Lower the water level
  33. Make one’s bladder gladder
  34. Number one
  35. Parking my breakfast
  36. Pass water
  37. Paying the water bill
  38. Pee
  39. Pwenk (very rare)
  40. Pee Pee
  41. Piddle (considered a coarse expression in some quarters)
  42. Piss
  43. Pit stop
  44. Point Percy at the Porcelain
  45. Point the Pink Pistol at the Porcelain Firing Range
  46. Powder one’s nose
  47. Punish the porcelain
  48. Putting out the fire
  49. Raining on the bowl
  50. Release the pressure
  51. Refresh the body
  52. Relieve yourself
  53. Running the Sidney Lanier Bridge
  54. See a man about a horse
  55. Shaking hands with the president
  56. Shaking hands with the vicar
  57. Shaking hands with the wife’s best friend
  58. Shaking the dew off the lily
  59. Soaking yourself
  60. Splashing the pirate
  61. Spend a penny
  62. Sprinkle
  63. Sprinkle my tinkle
  64. Squeeze the lemon
  65. Squirt
  66. Squirt(ing) the dirt (American truck driver slang)
  67. Steering Stanley to the stainless steel
  68. Syphon the python
  69. Taking a Chinese singing lesson
  70. Taking a leak
  71. Taking a pee
  72. Taking a piss (considered a coarse expression in some quarters)
  73. Taking a slash
  74. Taking a squirt
  75. Taking a whiz
  76. Taking a wicked “Yes” (Family Guy; Peter Griffin in French class after hearing the words, Oui Oui)
  77. Talking to grandma slowly
  78. Tapping a kidney
  79. Tinkle
  80. Training Thomas on the terracotta
  81. Troggle
  82. Turning the bike round
  83. Twinkle
  84. Visit Uncle Charley
  85. Visit the urination station
  86. Void my bladder
  87. Walk my snake
  88. Wash my mongoose
  89. Water my weasel
  90. Watering the flowers (outdoor)
  91. Write my name in the water
  92. Write my name in the snow

Defecation

  1. A sewer snake to release
  2. Anaconda action
  3. Arsefire
  4. Back one out
  5. Backing the big brown motorhome out of the garage
  6. Baiting the trap
  7. Becoming the porcelain assassin
  8. Blasting a dookie
  9. Blinking
  10. Blow one out – Also flatulence
  11. Blow the load
  12. BM
  13. Boo-Boo
  14. Boom Boom
  15. Bomb the porcelain sea
  16. Build a beaver dam
  17. Building a log cabin
  18. Burn a mule
  19. Caca
  20. Call of Doodey
  21. Carpet Bombing Afghanistan
  22. Chocolate time!
  23. Choke a Darkie
  24. Create a custom extrusion
  25. Crimp one off
  26. Cripping a crapple
  27. Crowning
  28. Curling one off
  29. Cutting a Monkey Tail
  30. Cutting rope
  31. Deceiver of Farts
  32. De-corking the borking
  33. Deucing
  34. Dirty squirties
  35. Dispatching a train
  36. Doing brown
  37. Doing some spring cleaning
  38. Dominating
  39. Doo-Doo (making/doing/having/taking a…)
  40. Doodey (making/doing/having/taking a…)
  41. Dooey (making/doing/having/taking a…)
  42. Download a brownload
  43. Dr. Benjamin Fartlin
  44. Drop a double deuce
  45. Dropping a dook
  46. Dropping a bomb
  47. Dropping a deuce
  48. Dropping a hoopsnake
  49. Dropping a jolst
  50. Dropping a load
  51. Dropping a loaf
  52. Dropping an otter (dropping a Leith Otter)
  53. Dropping a Purtle
  54. Dropping a Washburn
  55. Dropping a sewer pickle
  56. Dropping The Dangle
  57. Dropping anchor
  58. Dropping bass (“base” as in the opposite of treble. Not the fish.)
  59. Dropping logs
  60. Dropping some friends off at the pool
  61. Dropping the Browns off at the Super Bowl
  62. Dropping the kids off at the pool
  63. Dropping the Mexican Boll Weevil
  64. Dropping the weights
  65. Dropping wax
  66. Dump my truck
  67. Empty one’s spaghetti house (from Tim & Eric’s ‘Dr. Steve Brule’ segments)
  68. Faxing a shit to the toilet machine
  69. Feeding the seagulls (politer version of “Feeding the shitehawks”)
  70. Feeding the toilet
  71. Fertilising the plants (refers to defecating outdoors and on the ground, such as while camping)
  72. Filing some papers
  73. Filling the bowl
  74. Fire away
  75. Firing a Rocket
  76. Freeing me chocolate hostages
  77. Giving birth
  78. Giving birth to a family of otters
  79. Giving birth to the black eel
  80. Giving birth to the Spineless Brownfish
  81. Going Boom Boom
  82. Going poop
  83. Going to meet Jim Davidson
  84. Going to number two
  85. Going to have a talk with Mr.Hanky (South Park [1] Reference)
  86. Going to have a meeting with the Governor
  87. Going to the Library (refers to reading while there)
  88. Going to the restitorial
  89. Growing a tail
  90. Hanging a rat
  91. Harry Plopper
  92. Hatching the brown trout
  93. Hungry Hungry Hippos
  94. Inserting a SEAL Team
  95. Kurt Bevacqua
  96. Launching torpedoes
  97. Lay down some brown
  98. Laying dumplings
  99. Laying a brick
  100. Laying a brownie
  101. Laying a cable
  102. Laying a Hank
  103. Laying a turd
  104. Laying some wolf bait
  105. Lengthening the spine
  106. Letting loose
  107. Letting the toilet know who’s boss
  108. Letting the dogs out
  109. “Liam Neeson!” (exclamation)
  110. Lift tail (used commonly among members of the furry fandom)
  111. Logging
  112. Logging into the toilet and making a huge download
  113. Logging out
  114. Load your pants
  115. Loafin’
  116. Lose some weight (Also used in urination)
  117. Making a banoogie (referring to an unusually large defecation, often clogging the toilet)
  118. Making a tail
  119. Making an appointment with Dr. John
  120. Making gravy
  121. Making logs (or a log)
  122. Making waves
  123. Makin’ bears
  124. Monopoly
  125. Montezuma’s Revenge (traveller’s diarrhoea)
  126. Number two
  127. Pebble-dashing the porcelain
  128. Pinching (off) a loaf
  129. Pinching (off) some soft serve
  130. Pinching a yam
  131. Pinch-hitting for Kurt Bevacqua (a reference to the old brown uniforms worn in the 1970’s and 1980’s by the San Diego Padres.)
  132. Poo-Poo
  133. Poopy Doo
  134. Poppin a gooky
  135. Producing some output
  136. Pump a clump of dump out of my rump
  137. Pull a few cones (Think Mr Whippy soft serve ice cream, and the cones)
  138. Punching a growler
  139. Punishing the porcelain
  140. Punishing the toilet
  141. Put food in the dog’s water
  142. Releasing a depth charge
  143. Releasing a Dungbomb
  144. Releasing Meatloaf’s Daughter
  145. Releasing the chocolate hostages
  146. Releasing the hostages
  147. Releasing the Kraken
  148. Releasing the hounds
  149. Reset unload two
  150. Restocking the pond with brown trout
  151. Ride a pony and trap
  152. Riding the Centaur
  153. Ring of fire
  154. Sacrificing to the Toilet/Porcelain god
  155. Saturday morning special
  156. Scatter bombing
  157. SE (Sit and Emit)
  158. Sending a Fax
  159. Shed some ballast
  160. Shitting bricks (Houses or apartments as substitutes for higher quantity.)
  161. Showering the room with roses
  162. Shtounga
  163. Slopping gruel in Oliver’s bowl
  164. Spray-painting the porcelain
  165. Squirt juice
  166. Stalling a brown sedan
  167. Streaming Nixie (naval expression referring to an anti-submarine device towed behind a ship by a long, thick, possibly brown cable)
  168. Studying one’s Process Design notes (refers to Environmental Engineering Process Design, a course taught to civil and environmental engineering undergraduates and that deals with, among other topics, the design of wastewater treatment facilities)
  169. Taking a brew
  170. Taking a crap
  171. Taking a Critical Ambient to the Lab
  172. Taking a dump
  173. Taking a Nixon (used by Kinky Friedman in his detective novels)
  174. Taking a poo
  175. Taking a Shatner (as in Captain Kirk; would also accept “dropping” or “doing” a Shatner)
  176. Taking a shit (a coarse expression, not a euphemism)
  177. Taking a slam
  178. Taking a Tarzan (crapping in the woods/forest)
  179. Taking the Browns to the Superbowl
  180. Taking the mains offline and ejecting the warp coil
  181. Taking the morning curl
  182. Throwing up backwards
  183. Tuesday Afternoons
  184. Turtle time (see Turtle Action)
  185. Uh-Oh! (Peter Griffin again; is incontinent at awkward moments)
  186. Uni
  187. Unlikely Traveler (Defecation, usually on vacation, when you defecate in your pants away from a toilet)
  188. Unload
  189. Unloading a batch of cigars
  190. Upgrading my Thetan Level
  191. Visiting Boston
  192. vote for president
  193. Workin’ the Turd Saw
  194. wrestling a leprecaun

The Bee’s Knees

Published
There’s a great post over at the Telegram about this phrase and other slang terms from the flapper era.  Wiktionary gives us this background:
Attested since 1922, of unclear origin.[1] There are several suggested origins, but it may simply have been in imitation of the numerous animal related nonsense phrases popular in the 1920s such as the cat’s pyjamas, cat’s whiskers, cat’s meow, gnat’s elbow, monkey’s eyebrows etc.[2] A popular folk etymology has the phrase referring to World Champion Charleston dancer Bee Jackson.[3] Another suggestion is that the phrase is a corruption of business[2][4] but this may be a back-formation. The singular bee’s knee is attested from the late 18th century meaning something small or insignificant in the phrase big as a bee’s knee. Also as weak as a bee’s knee is attested in Ireland (1870). It is possible that the bee’s knees is a deliberate inversion of this meaning, but is not attested.[4]
Today the phrase seem’s pretty common.  I’ve heard t used on the 2003 film School of Rock with Jack Black.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=C6s0VeSEVmE
How common is it in 2018 is somewhat difficult to track.  Five Thirty Eight‘s online tracker doesn’t have it as an option.  Google’s Ngram Viewer only tracks until 2000, but is still a wonderful graph.
Maybe the more important thing to be aware of isn’t how popular a phrase is (cat’s pajama’s was slightly more popular in 2000), but how cool you look when you use the phrase is probably more important.  Unfortunately there’s no graph I can show some one for how cool they look when they use the phrase.  If I could find a graph for that I’d be sure to share. When it comes down to it, though I really don’t know anyone who doesn’t like the phrase.  This is probably because it’s predominantly used as a compliment.  We could use a few more compliments in our daily discourse.  So, have a go at it!  Why not toss out “the bee’s knees” today in a conversation? adult beard boy casual

Corrupting the Language

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As the language evolves it evolves in different direction. The Urban Dictionary does a great job showing the evolution of the language, but you can see how crude it is.

In contrast there are these verses in the Book of Moses 6

5 And a book of remembrance was kept, in the which was recorded, in the language of Adam, for it was given unto as many as called upon God to write by the spirit of inspiration;

6 And by them their children were taught to read and write, having a language which was pure and undefiled.

Defile means to make unclean or impure. A language that was pure must be a language that contained only the ability to express things that were pure. After all, this was the language that God used with Adam in the Garden of Eden.

The origin of the root defile includes the from Anglo-French defoiller, defuler meaning to trample. This refers to the process of filling which required stomping on the wool (sometimes soaked in urine) over and over again until the wool was softened enough to make it comfortable. It is not an accident. It is intentional.

We see the word trample elsewhere in the scriptures. In Matthew 7 we hear the Savior prompt

6 Give not that which is holy unto the dogs, neither cast ye your pearls before swine, lest they trample them under their feet, and turn again and rend you.

The imagery of something as precious as a pearl being trampled is powerful. This use of trample in conjunction with defile shows us that the corrupting of the language is an intentional process taking something that is most beautiful (the language we use to communicate with God) and reducing it only to it’s baser elements crushing what is precious and staining that which is pure.

Guarding our tongues and thoughts will determine how comfortable we are when we meet our Savior again. But as that day is some time off we have lots of time to practice and learn to appreciate the robust versatility and beauty that is our language.

Smuggling English

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Since Solo: A Star Wars Story is due in theaters soon, and the main character is considered an established expert in the smuggling trade, I’m wondering how many smuggling oriented words will be included in the movie.

tony-robinsonIt should be no surprise to the routine readers of this blog (thank you mom and dad) that I love words (I have a favorite lexicographer), fonts, and other things nerdy.  I was recently watching Sir Tony Robinson‘s series on Walking Through History where he walks across England and shares the history of the paths he travels on.  The show is rather well done and while I could spend the time talking about the interesting nuggets of history he discusses (like how the Bolin family were vying for political influence with Henry VIII) instead, I’d like to discuss a subject that was only tangentially introduced during the show.  Words related to smuggling!

Yes!  Tony spent an entire episode walking the terrain of England where smuggling was common place and when an activity is common place words often emerge to help people communicate about it.  After all, I don’t think we’d have ended up with such a lovely word as gongoozle if it hadn’t been for the Leeds and Liverpool Canal.  After all, you need canals in order to gongoozle and so it’s highly unlikely that a word like gongoozle would have emerged in an area where canals were few and far between.  The word is British in origin not Turkish–although feel free to ask me about the word zarf sometime.

The Coast Is Clear— this term came out of the smuggling trade as goods were transported between various parts of the world and would land on the English coast.  Whoever was the lookout, would see if any officers were in the area and if there were none, the call would go out that the coast is clear.

above-board— this is another term Tony mentioned in the show.  When smuggling something it was common practice to put the cargo below the boards of the ship’s deck.  Keeping things above-board meant that there was not hint of dishonesty in the practice.

Bootleg— in America small items were stored in the gap of a persons boot and America not only gave birth to a consolidated constitution, but also this term for transporting illicit items.

Rum-Running— while one might think of this word originating through the failed American experiment with prohibition, the term actually precedes that terrible experiment by several hundred years.  Rum-running first became a term in the 1600’s in response to policy of selective taxation passed through parliament.

Some of our words for illicit materials were themselves smuggled from other nations.

Contraband— was smuggled from Italian and Spanish Origins

Illicit— was stolen from Latin. And of course, you can’t smuggle things without having a means of transportation and for that one may want to use a

Corsair— (a fast ship used for piracy) which of course is a word with Latin and French roots.  As French words seem to give me the most trouble with pronunciation I’ll close the post here with a scowl as I remember how many times I forgot the ending -et in French words sounds like an -a.

So, this is a quick way for me to capitalize on the popularity of an upcoming movie and nerd out over a few words.  Thanks mom and dad for reading.  If anyone else happens to be here at this point and thinks any of these are in error feel free to comment, but beware I might label you a snoutband.

han-solo-movie-trailer-college-football-national-championship