Grammar Girl: What’s your favorite word and why?
Sandie Jones: Discombobulated always makes me smile whenever I hear it, especially when it’s used wrongly! I recently overheard a customer asking someone in a pharmacy if their medicine had been discombobulated. The concerned pharmacist checked the system for known side-effects and said:
“It shouldn’t make you feel like that.”
“So, it hasn’t then?” asked the customer.
“Hasn’t what?”
“Been discontinued?” she said.
I wouldn’t mind, but discontinued is surely much easier to recall than discombobulated? I use it as much as I can—I love that it sounds how it feels—I can’t even say it without shaking myself down!
GG: What’s a word you dislike (either because it’s overused or misused) and why?
SJ: Sick. Back in the old days, when I was young, this was a word used to describe feeling unwell. I hated it even then, because it was always bad news; either for myself or for the friend I was anxiously waiting for, only for my mum to look at me with a pained expression and say, "Lisa can’t come over to play today as she’s sick." But, it was better than the retch-inducing alternatives of vomit or "throw-up," both of which would render me to do so at the mere mention of the word.
Now, much to my chagrin, "sick" is used by my own children to describe something good. How is that even possible? Or remotely apt? When they’re watching YouTube and say, "That’s sick!" I fear the worst and demand to see what they’re looking at. But then they show me a video of a puppy doing tricks. Apparently, that’s "sick" in a good way!
GG: What word will you always misspell?
SJ: Mediterrean—see I told you! I pride myself on my spelling ability and there are very few words I get wrong. But no matter how many times I write meditteraen, I misspell it again and again, and never in the same way.
GG: What word (or semblance of a word) would you like to see added to the dictionary? Why?
SJ: Whoops-a-Daisy is a very English term, that was probably brought stateside by the film "Notting Hill." After the brilliant dinner party scene, Hugh Grant attempts to climb over railings into a private garden in an effort to impress Julia Roberts. He loses his footing and says “whoops-a-daisy.” It was only Julia Roberts's hysterical reaction that made me realize it's not a term common in America. But I think it’s a fabulous expression that says so much, and should be recognized everywhere, not least in the dictionary!
GG: Any grammar...
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