BITS & PIECES OF A MISPLACED LIFE: WORDS,WORDS, WORDS

"Why use words? You know why? To communicate with somebody else,
you see. The real life, the real reality...It's not on earth. 
It's what we cannot explain with words."
                                      George Balanchine
Jennifer Homans. Mr. B: George Balanchine's 20th Century
(New York: Random House, 2022)
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FOLLOWING IN THE FOOTSTEPS OF GREAT DETECTIVES

 Detectives investigate. What does it mean to investigate? One of my favorite books is Word  Origins and Their Romantic Stories by Wilfred Funk  (New York: Bell Publishers, 1950). Here is
Dr. Funk’s paragraph on the word investigate:

When detectives investigate a murder, it is likely today that they first look for fingerprints. And yet
If the crime had been committed on a snowy night
they would search for footprints too. And here we have the sealed-in picture of investigate: Latin in,”in” and vestigo,”follow  a footprint.” From vestigium, “footprint.”This latter , of course, gives us the word vestige, as “there is not a vestige of truth in the statement. “ That is, not a trace or a footprint of truth. 
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GOBBLYGOOK VS. PLAIN LANGUAGE

"A spectre haunts our culture. It is that people will eventually be unable to say, 'We fell in love and married...but  will, as a matter of course say 'Our  libidinal impulses being reciprocal, we integrated our individual erotic drives and brought them within the same frame of reference."
                     Sir Ernest Gowers

William Cole and Louis Phillips. Sex: Even More Fun You Can Have Without Laughing (New York: St. Martin's Press,1994)
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I HOPE THAT THE FOLLOWING ITEM IS TRUE, NOT PHONY

This note on the origin of the word phony originally appeared as part of the excellent internet site DICTIONARY. COM for December
7, 2019):

  “Although the exact origins of phony are unknown, it's likely the word comes from an old con known as the fawney rig. Fawney is from an Irish word for "finger ring," and rig, an old term for a "trick" or "swindle."
   Here's how it worked: the swindler would "accidentally" drop a piece of cheap jewelry in front of their mark, or target. Then, they would pick it up while expressing relief that they hadn't lost such a valuable ring, pretending it was worth a lot (as if made of gold). If they were lucky, they'd sell it to the mark for much more than it was worth.
    By the 20th century, the spelling of the word was eventually modified from fawney to phony and came to refer to anything fake or counterfeit.”
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WORD COINED BY DR. MARDY GROTHE
  OXYMORONICA
ox-y-mor-on-i-ca (OK-se-mor-ON-uh-ca) noun, plural: Any variety of tantalizing, self-contradictory statements or observations that on the surface appear false or illogical, but at a deeper level are true, often profoundly true. See also oxymoron, paradox.examples:
"Melancholy is the pleasure of being sad."Victor Hugo
"To lead the people, walk behind them."Lao-tzu
"You'd be surprised how much it costs to look this cheap."Dolly Parton
Oxymoronica: Paradoxical Wit and Wisdom from History's Greatest Wordsmiths by Mardy Grothe (New York: Harper Collins, 2009)
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Sawbones
 "Dickens came up with this slang term in The Pickwick Papers in 1837, and described it thusly for readers: “I thought everybody know’d as a sawbones was a surgeon.” We don’t see this word often, but it is still listed in the dictionary as an informal term for a doctor or surgeon.

 Word Genius Website (April 25, 2024)
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MARY'S BATH

 " In the 13th century, the Catalan physician Arnold of Villanova made the first-known reference to a double boiler as “Mary’s bath,” using the Latin balneum Mariae. This was translated by other alchemist-authors into French, Italian, and Arabic. By the 17th century, bain-Marie had become the common term for the kerotakis, as well as for the water bath used in laboratories. From there, the term was applied to the similar water baths used for cooking."

https://www.atlasobscura.com/articles/what-is-a-bain-marie?utm_source=feedingcuriosity.com

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SANDWICH PEOPLE

"...I don't really like sandwiches," he said mildly.
"Who doesn't like sandwiches," I said. Why don't you like them?"
I don't trust them."
"You don't trust them?"
"Yes, I feel like they're hiding things."
"They are hiding things --the stuff that's in them."
"Yes, but there's always something else in there that no one mentioned. in my experience, anyway. I don't like surprises."
  "Surprises are a form of aggresion," I intoned wearily.
 "Who said that?"
 "My ex. But he stole it from someone else...speaking of untrustworthy."
 'Yeah, that guy sounds like a total sandwich."

Minnie Driver. Managing Expectations: A memoir in essays  ( New York: HarperOne, 2022)
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              INTERJECTIONS

             Oof! Meh! 
             If it weren't for my parents
             & sexual attraction,
             I never wd have interjected
             My small being
             Into vastness of the universe
             Where so many sentences, alas!
             End with question marks
             Or exclamation points.

             Of course, I am ashiver
             With astonishments. Gadzooks!
             Our planet is an oasis
             Of Holy-smoke-
             Taken-for-granted miracles:
             Today, for example,
             & power of interjections
             To open doors:
             Open Sesame!

Louis Phillips