by Kirsten Dirkes
urceolate
shaped like an urn. A pitcher plant is urceolate. Tulips, on the other hand, are not; they’re bell-shaped, or campanulate.
epiphyte
a nonparasitic plant that grows on another plant or object. Examples include bromeliads and mosses but not tulips. Tulips would never impose like that.
espalier
the training of a woody plant so that it grows in a decorative flat plane. If you could splice a tulip into a woody tree, I’ll bet that would make for some really pretty espalier.
explosive dehiscence
the rapid opening of a plant structure to disperse the seeds a distance from the plant. It’s really cool but a little show-offy and gauche, which is why tulips don’t participate in it.
tulipomania
a word actually in the Merriam-Webster dictionary, but I won’t hold it against you if you don’t believe me and need to look it up yourself. In Holland in the 1600s, a tulip bulb fad caused prices to rise until single bulbs were selling for tens of thousands of dollars. Eventually, people came to realize that trading one’s house, livestock, and iPad for a flower that would probably be eaten by rabbits anyway wasn’t perhaps the best decision they’d ever made, and the market crashed. That’s some hardcore petal appreciation, Dutch people. Nobody can accuse you of being pansies.
by Kirsten Dirkes
…To the Bats of the Planet.
Bat: a human-cow goddess of the sky from early ancient Egypt.
Fungo Bat: a baseball bat designed specifically for hitting fungos (practice fly balls), used by a batter who throws the ball instead of a pitcher.
Patagium: the membrane that forms the surface of a bat’s wing.
Batman: a unit of mass during the Ottoman Empire. Interestingly, Wikipedia states that the Tartar batman “is an equivalent to 1000 pood” and further clarifies by stating that a pood “is a unit of mass equal to 40 funt.” I’m glad we got that straightened out.
Batman, Turkey: a city in eastern Turkey known for its oil reserves. It’s the capital of Batman Province and is located on the Batman River. It’s home to the Batman Air Base, the Batman Express newspaper, and the Batman BS soccer club.
by Kirsten Dirkes
Isn’t it great when you can learn a new word that will actually come in handy because you often find yourself looking at something that could be described with precisely that new word? And then you use the word, and your companions look at you blankly and then continue their conversation about where to eat lunch? Well, that won’t happen with these words, because I’m pretty sure that everybody you know reads the CaptionMax blog.
cyclorama (or cyc): a large, often curving backdrop used on stage, in photography, or as a green screen.
l’esprit de l’escalier/staircase wit: the unfortunate phenomenon of thinking of a witty response when it’s too late.
MacGuffin: a term popularized by Alfred Hitchcock for a plot element that drives the story, often something which all the characters want to obtain.
**Examples of MacGuffins: a secret document, a bomb threat, the Maltese Falcon, the Holy Grail.
stot: a Scots verb meaning “to bounce,” this word is used to describe that funny movement that gazelles and similar animals do when they bounce high in the air with all four legs straightened.
zastruga (plural: zastrugi) (also: sastruga): a hard ridge of snow shaped by the wind. Employees of CaptionMax World Headquarters in Minnesota can still use this word for a few more months, and the rest of the world can use it when watching news and weather footage from Minnesota. Oh, that’s cold!
by Kirsten Dirkes
Time to dust off your nicknack terminology! We’re exploiting the end of the alphabet for our words this week.
Quaich – (Scottish) A wide, shallow bowl with handles used primarily for drinking alcohol.
I’m just speculating here, but maybe they were invented because a heavy-drinking guy finally got fed up with the difficulty of trying to keep his whisky steady with one hand, in which case inventing a cup to allow him to drink even more perhaps wasn’t the direction his wife was hoping he’d go.
Treen - Handmade wooden household objects (excepting furniture).
When you’re trying to impress a cute Christie’s representative, can you imagine how embarrassed you’d be if you included a chair in your collection of treen? Major faux pas!
Unguentarium – Here’s a great word that we will all immediately forget. It’s a small Greek or Roman glass bottle.
If you’re looking for some dense reading with lots of complicated new words to learn, I recommend the Wikipedia article on unguentaria.
Uranium glassware –These curiosities go back centuries but were most popular between 1880 and 1930.
Production dwindled during the 1940s because—wait for it!—most uranium went to the war effort. That’s right, production did NOT fall off because people decided that uranium glassware was a bad idea. Apparently, the radioactivity of “most” uranium glass is “negligible.” Hmm. Call me demanding, but I like my table settings to be completely nonradioactive.
Vertu – Objects of art, particularly classical art; often used in the phrase “objects of vertu.”
I wouldn’t use this one with the Christie’s representative. It’ll just sound like you’re trying too hard.
by Kirsten Dirkes
Be a Fiction Writer…
Retcon/Retroactive Continuity - Another way to say, “I, uh, meant to do that.” Retcon occurs when a writer/creator changes the previously established facts of the story. A famous example is when Arthur Conan Doyle killed off Sherlock Holmes and then, after the public wasn’t down with that, decided that Holmes just faked his death.
Soap Opera Rapid Aging Syndrome (SORAS) – the rapid aging of a character, usually a baby or child, to allow the writers to introduce plots that wouldn’t work with a younger person. The difference is usually a matter of a year or two, but apparently the writers of All My Children once tried to introduce a 16-year-old daughter as the product of a 24-year-old rape. After the public wasn’t down with that either, they then applied retcon and adjusted her age to a more believable 23.
Fridge Logic – When you accept something at the time but then later, as you’re standing at your fridge, you realize that it didn’t make sense. Warning: DO NOT ATTEMPT TO APPLY FRIDGE LOGIC TO ANYTHING SEEN ON ALL MY CHILDREN. JUST GET YOUR ICE CREAM AND GO.
Hang a Lampshade/Hang a Lantern – a writers’ maneuver of purposely drawing attention to an implausible occurrence to diffuse the audience’s disbelief. (i.e., a soap opera character saying, “Wow, my 96-month-pregnancy sure is unusual. It’s something that usually only happens in soap operas! By the way, honey, my water broke this morning, so I called my doctor, and she told me to get to the hospital in 4 years, at the very latest.”)
by Kirsten Dirkes
Spoonerism: an accidental or deliberate rearranging of sounds or letters of a word or phrase that results in a new meaning. Named after Reverend William Spooner, who was notorious for speaking the accidental kind.
- Examples:
- “A lack of pies” in place of “a pack of lies.”
- “I’d rather have a bottle in front of me than a frontal lobotomy.”
Malapropism: an unintentional use of an inappropriate word or phrase; from the 1775 play ‘The Rivals’, in which the character of Mrs. Malaprop (from the word “malapropos,” meaning “inappropriate”) spoke many of these mistakes.
- Examples:
- “He is the very pineapple of politeness.” – Mrs. Malaprop
- “They misunderestimated me.” – George W. Bush
- “If you can’t imitate him, don’t copy him.” – Yogi Berra
Mondegreen: a misheard phrase. The term was coined in a 1954 essay whose author had, as a child, misheard a ballad’s line of “They have slain the Earl O’ Moray and laid him on the green” as “They have slain the Earl O’ Moray and Lady Mondegreen.” A famous example from music is “Scuse me while I kiss this guy” instead of “Scuse me while I kiss the sky” from Jimi Hendrix’s Purple Haze.
Eggcorn: a recently coined term for a misheard word or phrase that is deemed by the speaker to make sense in context.
- Examples:
- “old-timer’s disease” for “Alzheimer’s disease”
- “pus jewel” for “pustule”
Soramimi: a Japanese term for a change of song lyrics from one language to similar-sounding words in another language. Example: A line from Sean Paul’s song Fire Links Intro goes, “Mayday! Sean Paul! This one is hot!” It is humorously sung in Japanese as “Me itai! Shanpū! Rinsu wa nai sa!” (My eyes hurt! The shampoo! There isn’t any more hair conditioner!)
by Kirsten Dirkes
It sounds like a good day to discuss sounds! (Sorry, no pictures this week.)
ULULATION – a high-pitched, prolonged, wavering vocal sound; among others places, ululation is found in singing contexts and Tarzan contexts, though I’d recommend learning from my mistake and turning down your speakers if you’re going to YouTube the latter
WALLA - an American entertainment industry word for a sound effect that imitates a crowd murmuring; walla can consist of people saying “walla,” “rhubarb,” “peas and carrots,” or actual sentences, among other things
FOLEY – the recording of sound effects for use in film, radio, or television
WILHELM SCREAM – any of a series of high-pitched screams recorded for the 1951 film Distant Drums and used as stock footage in over 200 films
by Kirsten Dirkes
Last week, we featured the colorful topic of international clothing. But I don’t want to spoil you into thinking you’ll get something vibrant and exciting every week, so this week’s topic is rocks. (However, we have added some photos, so this post may be more exciting than we intended.)
BAS-RELIEF (bah-reeleef) - a sculpture of raised main elements carved in low relief
CHOCOLATE HILLS - a dense collection of conical mounds in the Philippines
BRIDGE SCOUR - the erosion of rocks, dirt, and sediment from around bridge pilings and abutments
RIPRAP - a pile of rock used to fortify shores against erosion
STACK - a stone column in the sea near a shore, caused by erosion; see, if you hadn’t put all that all that riprap there, you would have gotten a pretty stack…eventually.
by Kirsten Dirkes
The topic of international clothing is filled with colorful items that are memorable for being really fun to say. Seriously, just try to forget some of these words; I bet you can’t. Especially the grand boubou. Sadly, nobody in my office ever wears any of these things. On the other hand, I work from home, so I have nobody to blame but myself.
OBI - a sash or belt worn with a Japanese kimono or other clothing
DASTAR - a Sikh turban
GI - an English word for a martial arts uniform; from the Japanese word keikogi, a training uniform
AO DAI (ow-zye) - a traditional Vietnamese outfit of a fitted silk tunic over pantaloons, worn mostly by women in its current resurgence
GRAND BOUBOU (gran boo-boo) - a long, loose robe commonly worn by West African men
Here are some of our favorite words from this week:
vacillate: to waver in mind, will, or feeling; hesitate in choice of opinions or courses
spiel: to play music; to talk volubly or extravagantly
platitude: the quality or state of being dull or insipid; a banal, trite, or stale remark
jejune: devoid of significance or interest
insouciance: lighthearted unconcern