http://blogs.e-rockford.com/woodonwords Can't get enough words about words with Sunday's newspaper column? Then this blog's for you, my word-craving friend. I work the late shift, so don't look for responses until the next day. Sat, 07 Nov 2009 13:07:47 +0000 http://backend.userland.com/rss092 en The dictionary's second member of the "gig" gang is a fishing term. It can be "a fish spear" or "a fish line with hooks designed to catch fish by jabbing into their bodies." It also can be a verb for such activities. It's a contraction of the earlier terms "fishgig" and "fizgig," ... http://blogs.e-rockford.com/woodonwords/2009/11/07/the-angler-angle/ The first "gig" to make its way into modern English took a long road. Its most recent ancestor is the Middle English "gigge," meaning "whirligig," which is mainly a spinning toy or a merry-go-round. That one probably descended from Scandinavian words, such as the Danish "gig" -- "whirling object" or "top" -- ... http://blogs.e-rockford.com/woodonwords/2009/11/05/versatile-but-obscure/ The first "gig" I can remember was Gig Young, the actor. His birth name was Byron Elsworth Barr; he took Gig Young from a character he played in the 1942 film "The Gay Sisters." He died in 1978, and his life story is not a happy one. And he's not ... http://blogs.e-rockford.com/woodonwords/2009/11/04/its-just-a-job/ "The jig is up" is a slang phrase "said of risky or improper activity," according to Webster's. This association reflects its origin, which "American Slang" puts at sometime after 1800 as another way of saying, "The criminal enterprise is discovered." Its current definition is "that ends it; all chances for success ... http://blogs.e-rockford.com/woodonwords/2009/11/03/lets-dance/ "Hobnob" is a word you don't hear much anymore, maybe because it has more pasts than presents. It used to be a noun for "a friendly chat," an adverb for "at random," and a verb for "to drink together." Webster's gives all three the label "now rare." What has survived is "hobnob" ... http://blogs.e-rockford.com/woodonwords/2009/10/07/hobnobbing-with-hemingway/ I'm a big fan of simplicity, but sometimes we try to make English too simple. Case in point: Here's an entry in The Associated Press Stylebook -- recur, recurred, recurring. Not "reoccur." The problem is, there's a subtle difference between "reoccur" and "recur." I concur with trying to avoid "reoccur." It simply means ... http://blogs.e-rockford.com/woodonwords/2009/10/06/recurrent-thinking/ The dictionary's third definition of "dilemma" is "any serious problem," and it gives "predicament" as a synonym. This is about as loose as usage can get. The word comes from the Greek "di-" for "two" and "lemma" for "proposition." Its original sense, and still its first definition, is "an argument necessitating ... http://blogs.e-rockford.com/woodonwords/2009/10/05/two-choices-both-bad/ Word detectives have been on the trail of "cop" for a long time. More than one prime suspect has been encountered along the way. One of the first was the metal "copper," which reportedly was what the uniform buttons of British law officers of the time were made of. Or perhaps ... http://blogs.e-rockford.com/woodonwords/2009/09/24/the-first-cop/ We received a reader complaint about the use of "cops" in a headline on Sunday's Local cover -- "Rally for Rockford cops brings 1,000 downtown." Here's what the AP Stylebook has to say about "cop": "Be careful in the use of this colloquial term for 'police officer.' It may be used ... http://blogs.e-rockford.com/woodonwords/2009/09/23/policing-our-language/ Here's a group of words just begging to be mixed up. The verb "censure" means "to express strong disapproval of," while "censor" takes disapproval to another level by restricting or actually prohibiting the use of something. As nouns, a "censure" is a condemnation, formal or otherwise, and a "censor" is a person ... http://blogs.e-rockford.com/woodonwords/2009/09/11/sensory-overload/