Nerdie Wordie

I have a confession to make.

I like words.

Of course, this is not likely a big revelation to any of you who actually know me. . . or read this blog with any regularity.  I went to the library to pick up some books for school and stumbled across a book entitled "Confessions of a High School Word Nerd" with the promise at the top to "Increase Your SAT Verbal Score While Laughing Your Gluteus Off".  I was hooked.

So far, I have known nearly all the words.  The only three words in the first couple chapters I was not familiar with were:

1 - Euphonious: adj. having a pleasant sound.
2 - Whang - v. to hit something and produce a loud resounding sound.
3 - Seraphim - n. an angel of the highest rank in the traditional medieval hierarchy of nine categories of angels.  (strangely I feel most like I should have known this one!)

Despite the tendency of the book to feel slightly pedantic (Which is really the point) and maybe a little ostentatious,  I love it!

I may not have perfect grammar, or be able to tell you every time you split an infinitive, (though I do get an inordinate amount of pleasure listening to Grammar Girl Podcasts) but, as a child, I had an apparently annoying habit of correcting my siblings--particularly the older ones--whenever they uttered something incorrectly. . . for which I got scolded (though, in my mother's defense, she probably discouraged my grammar policing antics as an effort to preserve my physical health, rather than from a lack of desire to have well spoken children).

Old habits die hard.

I still cringe when people use "I" incorrectly even when it REALLY should be "me".  For instance: "Julie invited Chuck and I."  Me! she invited Chuck and ME.  Or when people mispronounce certain words.

Let me just stop here and confess that I am really a big hypocrite.  For years I mispronounced SOO many words. . . macabre. . . liaison--because while I had read them (and then looked up the unfamiliar ones in my trusty dictionary that I kept on my nightstand) I had not heard them.

That is, until a few years ago when I discovered my new best friend: freedictionary.com .  It has sound bytes.

So now when I correct my children for saying things incorrectly, I can be sure I am not leading them astray.

But lately two words have become quite irksome to me: Yay, and Wala.

They make me cringe.  Yay has become so widespread that I have reluctantly used it a couple times, but I really just wanted to quickly backspace and type "yea".  And "wala" annoys me for two reasons: it's spelled wrong AND pronounced wrong.

So when my six year old daughter flung out her arms and declared "Wala!" tonight, I stopped what I was doing and said, "There is a "V" at the beginning.  Say it 'voila'."  To which she said, "Oh.  I didn't know. "

So of course I asked her where she heard it pronounced that way and she said a movie, but quickly added: " It might have said voila with a "v" and I just didn't hear the "v"."  She has since said it three times, in context, perfectly correctly.  It makes me smile.

 In case you were wondering, I did sometimes find it cute when my very small child said something wrong. After a couple seconds of appreciating the cuteness, I corrected them.  Small children with large vocabularies are also cute, and as I wrote in a skit recently: "It takes less skill to swear than parry with a large vocabulary."  My kids still recite this line and it makes me proud.

So now that you likely think I am a Nazi Wordie (see I am capable of using words only found in "urban" dictionaries),  I want to know:

What puts chills down your spine like fingernails on chalkboards?    


***In case you actually go to freedictionary.com and test out "voila" you will note that THEY pronounce it wrong, with a hard "a" at the end.  This caused me a slight amount of panic which sent me googling all over the place until I had confirmed that it IS a soft "a" at the end.  So much for my new best friend! Many other dictionary sites now have sound bytes also.***