A Field Guide to Street Children

How often have you batted a tiny hand away from the moneysacks that hang from your belt, shouting “Be away from me, ye wastrels”?

Have you ever stopped, mid-shout, and wondered if you were using the correct word for the type of impish chield-fiend you’ve encountered? Fear not! In time for your next back-alley stroll, I’ve found the word for you!

tatterdemalion (TA-ter-dee-MAYL-yen or TA-ter-dee-MAH-lee-un) — noun: a person dressed in ragged clothing. adjective: 1. ragged or disreputable in appearance. 2. being in a decayed state or condition.

All in all, it’s a wonderful word that makes light of the target’s station in life whilst simultaneously boasting enough syllables to give the speaker an air of learned superiority. Really, how better to put one in their place that to slander them with a word they won’t (and can’t) know? The etymology is unclear, with the first part most like coming from the word tatter but perhaps being related to the word Tartar — referring to one of several historically disadvantaged or dangerous peoples causing or receiving trouble in Eurasia — with that last part being simply a “fantastic second element,” according to Etymonline, whatever that means.

According to a system that I just now made up, tatterdemalion is actually the kindest word one could use to describe a poor child whose family made the unfortunate decision to be poor. On its end of the “Young Unfortunates” spectrum are the wee ones who are more likely to elicit pity or paternal affection than other the other ones, who are more likely to stab you with a penknife after being paid a mere nickel by one of your longtime social rivals. Let’s have a look at the various gradations, so as to prepare yourself for your next visit to an orphanage, an urchin farm or the underground bowels of that factory you secretly own.z

(a ragamuffin who has somehow obtained the amount of daily calories that a wealthy child would get and is therefore unpredictable)

Please update your discussions of the your neighborhood watercress salesgirl accordingly.

Previous words of the week after the jump.

• acné excoriée des jeunes filles, adulterine, ageusia, ambeer, anosmia
• barrack, beeturia, bissextile, bloofer, breastsummer, brinicle
• catholicon, cecaelia, cephalophore, cherpumple, chilver, chyron, cockernonnie, collywobbles, coprolalia, couvade, cranberry morpheme, crwth, culaccino, cummingtonite
• darkle, deasil, decussate, deuteragonist, dingbat, dingle
• eidolon, epeolatry, epopt, espalier, etui, exoterica
• fabiform, Feghoot, fissilingual, Föhnkrankheit, folderol, freekeh, froward
• gallinipper, gnaborretni, grandgore, grue, guilloche, gyaru
• hippopotomonstrosesquipedaliophobia, hobson-jobson, hogo, honorificabilitudinitatibus, hoyden
• ignivomous, iracund, isabelline, itaiitai, izod, izzard
• jabroni, jamais vu, jehu, jumentous
• kaffir, kakopygian, kayfabe, knipperdollin
• lagniappe, leman, lemniscate, limnovore, linsey-woolsey, longicorn
• malacia, malison, maroon, milt, mongo, mooncalf, morepork, muzjiks
• narrenfreiheit, nef, nihilartikel, nobiliary particle, nosism
• ochanee, ogonek, ombré, ooglification, orchidectomy, ordured, orf
• pace, padiddle, pareidolia, pavonated, perendiate, perigee, petrichor, pettifogger, pettitoes, phlegmagogue, pismire, pixilated, pogonip, pong, pruniferous, puggle, pulveratricious, purse
• quacksalver, quagga, qualtagh, quidnunc, quiff
• ronion, roynish, rubirosa, rumpsprung, runcible
• salmagundi, scrutator, seneschal, sharrow, shebang, sinople, slampadato, slubberdegullion, stan, stevedore, suovetaurilia
• tappen, teratogenesis, tergiversate, tetromino, thagomizer, thon, tiffin, tittery-whoppet, tmesis, toby, tutoyer, tyro
• ucalegon, ultramontane, umiaq, umquhile
• veneficial, verdigris, vespertilionine, vinegeroon
• weeaboo, widdiful, williwaw, witzelsucht, wooper looper
• xenodocheionology, xyster
• yazoo, ypsiliform, yoink
• zanjero, zenzizenzizenzic, zinnober, zugzwang

Stage Directions for a Play About the Lives of Housecats

[breaks eye contact to stare at wall]

[blinks coldly]

[looks down at paws; maintains gaze for three hours]

[much yawning]

[raises right leg above left ear]

[licks own paw with great interest]

[rolls over to display supple belly]

[tongues hindquarters firmly]

[skulking, sulking]

[sleeps]

[sleeps entire play]

[peers our nervously from beneath chair; retreats instantly]

[inches forward to track shifting sunspot]

[bats furiously at sunspot]

We Still Need to Talk About Kevin

I really wish I could explain why I find this movie so funny.

And I do really wish people would talk with me more about Kevin. Really.

The Kind (of Wheat) You Don’t Take Home to Mother

Can wheat be sexy? No, wait — don’t stop reading my blog. Allow me to rephrase: Wheat can be sexy — and exotic! … You know, if you’re American.

freekeh (FREE-kah) — noun: wheat harvested when still green and then roasted.

I feel like it makes me sound obnoxious if I say that I enjoy a menu more when it teaches me new words. Regardless, I have to admit that I feel no shame in bringing my iPhone to the table and using it to make sense of what’s been laid out before me. And I especially like seeing how the dictionary definition differs from how the server explains it. For example, soubise. Says the internet: “A béchamel variant whose velvety texture benefits from the pungency of onions.” Says the server: “It’s white sauce.” And I really like catching the restaurant dressing up simple fare in fancy terms. — haricots verts used for plain old green beans, for example.

Freekeh, as a word, manages to make wheat more interesting — a little lusty, a bit weird, sort of scary, a skosh threatening. I can’t comment on the taste, because my life has so far been freekeh-free, but my superfreak friend Kristen’s recent article in the Wall Street Journal tells me that freekeh offers either a smokier or grassier flavor than that gutterwheat you’ve been eating all this time. I trust Kristen — a sort of culinary guinea pig over at Food52 who consequently has a lot of guilt about eating guinea pigs now — and now I feel bad for not knowing about freekeh sooner. You know who has known about freekeh even longer than Kristen? Arabs. Culinary up-and-comer though freekeh may be in the Western world, it’s not a new dish the cuisines of Egypt, the Levant or the Arab Peninsula, according to Wikipedia. It can also be known by the name farik — literally “rubbed” in Arabic, as a result of the thrashing process it undergoes — which seems like an alternate transliteration of the original Arabic. That one’s only sexy if you interpret it as an extremely affected pronunciation of freak. And I do. Mostly because I know it actually means “rubbed.”

Heh.

Previous words of the week after the jump.

• acné excoriée des jeunes filles, adulterine, ageusia, ambeer, anosmia
• barrack, beeturia, bissextile, bloofer, breastsummer, brinicle
• catholicon, cecaelia, cephalophore, cherpumple, chilver, chyron, cockernonnie, collywobbles, coprolalia, couvade, cranberry morpheme, crwth, culaccino, cummingtonite
• darkle, deasil, decussate, deuteragonist, dingbat, dingle
• eidolon, epeolatry, epopt, espalier, etui, exoterica
• fabiform, Feghoot, fissilingual, Föhnkrankheit, folderol, froward
• gallinipper, gnaborretni, grandgore, grue, guilloche, gyaru
• hippopotomonstrosesquipedaliophobia, hobson-jobson, hogo, honorificabilitudinitatibus, hoyden
• ignivomous, iracund, isabelline, itaiitai, izod, izzard
• jabroni, jamais vu, jehu, jumentous
• kaffir, kakopygian, kayfabe, knipperdollin
• lagniappe, leman, lemniscate, limnovore, linsey-woolsey, longicorn
• malacia, malison, maroon, milt, mongo, mooncalf, morepork, muzjiks
• narrenfreiheit, nef, nihilartikel, nobiliary particle, nosism
• ochanee, ogonek, ombré, ooglification, orchidectomy, ordured, orf
• pace, padiddle, pareidolia, pavonated, perendiate, perigee, petrichor, pettifogger, pettitoes, phlegmagogue, pismire, pixilated, pogonip, pong, pruniferous, puggle, pulveratricious, purse
• quacksalver, quagga, qualtagh, quidnunc, quiff
• ronion, roynish, rubirosa, rumpsprung, runcible
• salmagundi, scrutator, seneschal, sharrow, shebang, sinople, slampadato, slubberdegullion, stan, stevedore, suovetaurilia
• tappen, teratogenesis, tergiversate, tetromino, thagomizer, thon, tiffin, tittery-whoppet, tmesis, toby, tutoyer, tyro
• ucalegon, ultramontane, umiaq, umquhile
• veneficial, verdigris, vespertilionine, vinegeroon
• weeaboo, widdiful, williwaw, witzelsucht, wooper looper
• xenodocheionology, xyster
• yazoo, ypsiliform, yoink
• zanjero, zenzizenzizenzic, zinnober, zugzwang

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Additional Proof

Remember when I said that Zooey Deshcanel is totally evil?

Her cheerful demeanor is straining her face muscles! We must be vigilant!

Sugar Teeth

Just hold on. I’ll get to this in a second.

We had an English major problem at work — and believe me, an English major problem is a hell of a lot better than, say, an anatomy problem or structural integrity problem. Writing about the very subject of my previous post, someone mentioned that the Senate candy desk satisfies the cravings of the entire Senate floor, only she chose to do so by referring to the senators’ sweet teeth. Logically, if one candy lover has a sweet tooth, then two must have sweet teeth. Right?

Technically, no.

Sweet tooth belongs to a rarely discussed set of nouns known as exocentric or “headless” compounds. Basically, they’re compound nouns — like blackboard or ice cream or internal combustion engine, in which smaller words function together as if they were one single word — but in this special case, neither involved word actually refers to the thing described. For example, while a blackboard is a board, a flatfoot is not a foot at all. And flatfoot is especially handy because that end word, foot, has an irregular plural that you ignore when it appears in an exocentric compound. Thus, one flatfoot, two flatfoots. It seems unnatural when you think about it, but I actually feel like most people causally speaking would say flatfoots without thinking about it. The example you’re probably most used to hearing, whether you’re a hockey fan or not, is Toronto Maple Leafs. Logically, that should be Maple Leaves, only the team is officially Maple Leafs. Other examples? Still lifes, sabertooths and houndstooths, and no I’m not sure anyone has had to refer to houndstooth in the plural and no, I don’t know why most of my exocentric compound examples involve teeth. But I feel like sweet tooth, which isn’t a tooth at all, totally falls into the same category and that the plural should be sweet tooths.

But here’s the thing: Even though the one dictionary that offers a plural for sweet tooth agrees with me, it would still look wrong to the majority of readers. Rather than be technically right but apparently wrong, we simply re-wrote the sentence. Readability once again conquered correct but awkward grammar.

One more thought on the subject of exocentric compounds, and it relates to the image at the top of the post: Should cloverleaf (referring to the looped highway interchange and not, like, the actual plant parts) be pluralized as cloverleaves or cloverleafs? Is the structure leaf-like enough that it’s not exocentric? Webster says leaf can actually mean “something suggestive of a leaf.” Now I don’t know how to discuss the countless cloverleaf structures that I, as an Angeleno, must wind around every day.

Something Sweet, Something Pungent

First the sweet.

Are you aware of the U.S. Senate candy desk? Begun in 1965 by Republican Senator George Murphy -- a former actor and dancer who starred in For Me and My Gal before leaving Hollywood for Washington -- the candy desk has occupied the same spot on the Republican side of the Senate floor since 1981, and all senators are free to grab sweets as they pass by. No matter who bitter I get about politics, humanizing little footnotes such as this one make me resent politicians just a little bit less.

Now the pungent.

From 1997 to 2007, the candy desk was occupied and stocked by none other than Rick Santorum. And if you think that taints the appeal of this unofficial Washington D.C. institution, then choke on this: Because Santorum hails from Pennsylvania and because he lacks the slightest shred of self-awareness or social savvy, the candy he favored was… Hershey's chocolate. Yes, Rick Santorum was pumping the Senate full of his trademark cocoa goodness. Given the infamy of "small 's'" santorum, I'm almost tempted to think the guy has a sense of humor. But no. Not at all. He couldn't.

#froth