French fried, tie dyed, and spaghettified

I’ve had a fascination with words since my childhood. One of my earliest memories is of my dad and the grocery story. The chillens weren’t allowed to go into the store with my mom, who ostensibly went in for a loaf of bread and a few other things (it was always amazing how many loaves of bread mom could buy in a single shot!). So my professorial father needed to find a way to keep us amused.


He actually devised an interesting technique. He would think of a word, scramble the letters, give them to us in no apparent order, and we’d have to figure out what the word was…all in our cranial cavities. Pretty clever, que no?


I was seven at the time, and it was just great fun to figure this stuff out. You have to understand my dad didn’t make it easy. One of the longest words he ever served up was “encyclopedia.” There was enough of an age gap between me and my sibs that, of course, I got the hardest word. But I successfully rearranged the furniture. The memory of those days is still enough to infuriate my youngest brother, who wasn’t able to utter “encyclopedia” during the day, let alone solve the puzzle.


But dad stimulated an interest for me that most people don’t really have. There is something to beautiful and mellifluous about vowels and consonants drunkenly strung together. OK, so you’ve never held of mellifluous? Well, think about what it sounds like. And if you guessed that it sounds like something that flows well, say like honey out of a pot, you guessed right. I’ll grant you it’s a tough word to spell, even when you know how…


Sci Fi aficionado that I am, I just love words that astrophysicists are introducing to our everyday vocabularies. This is, of course, because they have a universe of abstract thought to convey. Take, for example, the word “spaghettified.” You may have never heard of pasta being used in this context, but you know inherently what the word means. As in: to be stretched to the utter limit. Here’s where the word comes from. Astrophysicists have mathematically proven the existence of black holes at the center of galaxies. Even our own Milky Way – a name that sounds so mundane and ordinary, if not downright saccharine and confectionary – has an invisible monster lurking at its core.


So, you ask, what in the blue blazes does this have to do with anything? Well, here comes the Reader’s Digest explanation. If one were so inclined as to venture to the event horizon – the point of no return – of a black hole, gravity in the extreme would stretch every molecule of your corporeal being to such a point that you would become spaghettified. It’s the ultimate galactic disappearing act. Somehow, the image of being turned into cosmic taffy is quite, well, intriguing….


Another noted physicist refers to the process as being “marmalized.” You get the point.


I heard one last night on TV that absolutely caught my imagination, resulting in more than one belly laugh. Here it comes. “Felony stupid.” Wow, that’s about as descriptive an intuitive obviosity as can be uttered or read! People can be variously described as dumb, dumb as a rock; thick, thick as a brick. But being tagged felony stupid is the ultimate insult. What made it even funnier is the fact that I can think of some people here in my sleepy mountain hamlet who deserve the moniker.


Another action verb from a bygone day comes from Justin Wilson, AKA The Cajun Chef. Now this guy knew how to mix up some spicy verbal gumbo! He was one of the first culinary celebrities to bring his kitchen into ours, and he did so with gusto and zest (lemon or orange, take your pick). Here is the word he invented that stuck with me: “spatulate.” As in to mix. There was just something so endearing about his N’Orlins accent as the word issued forth. He said it the same way lovers whisper into each others’ ears. He dwelled on each syllable until the word slithered out of the verbal frying pan into the linguistic fire. Even today, it’s a word I share with others.


So folks, if it’s snowing outside, as it has been here at altitude, don’t just say it’s snowing. Figure out whether it’s corn snow or bropples. Then grab a cup of coffee and a brownie…