Thursday, April 28, 2011

Day # 166 The Envelope

Come to my arms, my beamish boy!
Oh Frabjous day, Callooh!  Calley!

And I shall chortle in my joy.  The genetic envelope arrives this evening and will, once greeted, utter his favorite phrase:  "Food!"  And we shall feed him, for to do otherwise would be to deny his raison de etre.  He being an almost six foot three inch tall teenage boy this side of sixteen years of age, his two sole occupations in this world that I care to know about are eating and growing.

Of course, a time we will have.  Perhaps not at Pacific Raceways.  No matter that this is where I am supposed to be this weekend.  The microbes have robbed me of half of my brain and as such I may not be a benefit to the sport of motorcycle road-racing.  Consequently The Kid may be relieved of his Pit Bob duties.  We shall see, but a time we will have nonetheless.

Charles Lutwidge Dodgson saw publication of his book "Through the Looking Glass and What Alice Found There" in 1872.  At the time it probably did not occur to him that one of the words he coined, the word "chortle", would live on and become a part of the English language.  Other words used in the poem "Jabberwocky" were not so lucky and today one seldom hears "vorpal" or "brilllig" or even "frumious".  I suppose having even a single made-up word survive and become a part of the mother tongue is no small achievement.

While today the only thing that The Kid goes galumphing after are victuals, he certainly understands the adjective "beamish" although generally not without an eye-roll when he hears the word directed at himself.

In the meantime it is my strongly held opinion that the sooner we promote the wide-spread use of the word frabjous the better and happier a world it will be.

Callooh!  Calley!

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