Saturday, November 03, 2007

More joys of Scrabble: zeugma

Zeugma

Now, that is a fine word, except it sounds like a made-up word.

I would have thought, in fact, that it was, but one of the joys of playing Scrabble (our way of playing, anyhow) is that you are given the opportunity to go exploring through the dictionary.

Sure, when I open the dictionary, I am supposed to simply be verifying the existence of a word. Along the way, however, my eye stops on the first and last words of the page and occasionally I get a nice surprise.

Like "zeugma."

Here is an example of a zeugma:

"He caught a fish and a bad cold."

So, you have waited long enough. Here is the definition of zeugma:

"The use of a word to modify or govern two or more words when it is appropriate to only one or them or is appropriate to each but in a different way."


Like I said: a very fine word!

3 comments:

Marco Gralike said...

Today I learned a new word from Alex Gorbachev called "apogee", but I guess that won't count for a lot of points...

;-)

Michael O'Neill said...

I completely understand your Scrabble goings-on. For the kids, my wife and me it's Boggle that gets us going. I'm Glad your back home safe and sound.

Unknown said...

I am going to have to chime in with Michael and say its Boogle with my family plus I never get thos hard words in Scrabble. :-) Glad to read that the India trip went well but I am curious why your guests said you should walk around; that would have been a dissapointment for me.
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