I’m not aware of any particular connection between “cromulent” and physicists. But I am pretty sure we have a large number of Simpsons fans around here.
And speaking of high falutin’, there’s also new-fangled, though I’m not sure that fangled ever appears unhyphenated there. Just a couple of days ago, I had occasion to refer to a new-fangled washing machine, as opposed to an old-mangled one.
Beep beep oombeep beep yeah
Coo-coo ka-choo kuhkoo coo kachoo
Oom chaka chacka-lacka oom chacka chacka-lacka
I’ve heard “limbs akimbo”, from Frank Zappa. Since “akimbo” means “hand on hips, elbows out” it clearly refers to arms, but we’re talking about specific words, not concepts. The idea of legs akimbo buggers the imagination. (So does the phrase “bugger the imagination,” but we’re not talking about self reference here.)
Flotsam and jetsam were covered above. Wreak seems like a winner, though.
FTW!
Not sure about disgruntled. It could also include band members. If you’re unfamiliar with this concept, you’ve never been in a band. Slake and thirst seem good, though.
What’s the subclass? All jetsam is deliberately thrown overboard. Otherwise it’s flotsam.
Yes, but Lagan is attached to a bouy, for later recovery.
Just to be sure, because I want to use the word and perhaps scrape up against other people, “cromulent” means (as I’ve seen it used here):
“Not only pertinent to the subject at hand, but appropriate and correct.”
I always thought “pertinent” and “appropriate” covered that, but if the word is a compact way of expressing a finer shading, then it should be admitted with all rights and honor due to any other good neologism or borrowing from another language.
Am I getting the sense right?
It was originally used in a simpsons episode as a response to someone’s surprise at the use of the word embiggen with Mrs. Krabappel saying, “It’s a perfectly cromulent word.” My understanding is that when it is used in real liife, it is used to mean unobjectionable.
Well, SD users of the word cromulent?
I would consider “cromulent” to mean “valid”, or “legitimate”.
Oh, and on “disgruntled”, you can have disgruntled customers, too.
Well, my definition is better. And richer. And like Humpty Dumpty, I say that words mean what I want them to mean.
Let’s check back in 30 years and see whose meaning triumphed.
Lagan (apparently one ‘n’) is basically jetsam marked for subsequent recovery, whereas plain ole’ jetsam is just thrown overboard to lighten the load, with no expectation of future retrieval.
Except it’s not relevant to this thread because it’s only one word: highfalutin.
The link suggests that the word somehow arose from the root flute.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Spic_and_Span
Can also be used with window, drawer, trunk, really anything that opens and closes like that.
Don’t forget Disgruntled Goat.
One that just came up today: “Neap”. I don’t think I’ve ever seen that word without it being followed by “tide”.
And while we’re at it, “gibbous moon” (though technically, Mercury and Venus can be gibbous, too). Waxing and waning come close, but you can also be waxing poetical, and have waning influence.
That’s pretty much by definition. “Neap” doesn’t mean anything but the kind of tide.
“Fro” is rare without “to” as in “to & fro”.
One can also slake lime.
Lime is CaO. Hydrated or slaked lime is Ca(OH)[sub]2[/sub] which is formed by the action of water on the oxide.
-DF
I assumed that Leo was conflating cromulent and embiggen insofar as embiggen first appeared in print in an article published in High Energy Physics in 2007.
According to your own link, “embiggen” first appeared in print in 1884. The 2007 occurrence in High Energy Physics is its first use, in print, in the context of physics. Physicists did not invent it. No doubt they got it off The Simpsons. The Simpsons’ writers probably did invent it, but they were by no means the first to do so.
I just spotted an embiggen in a conservative political blog.
There’s a word for these words–I read it here in a thread, but lost it. I guess I’ll do a search.
But, in the meantime, a lot of people have taken whacks at poems and short pieces using words like gruntled. The best and longest I ever saw was this in The New Yorker.