What's the oldest, most arcane word you use?

[Pug]

What does your vocabulary say about you? Tell us! The first that comes to mind for me is

Ice Box

That's a refrigerator. I bet you have to be over a certain age to use that one.

[Jennifer G.]

I can remember my great-grandmother always telling me about the ice box.

[lizaanne]

I am having a mind block for myself right now - I know there is SOMETHING I say would fall in this category...hmmm - will probably come up with it at about 2am.

Anyway - my best friend calls the living room the "front room" - but she says it - "frun-troom" - and sluuuurs it altogether. It totally cracks me up (she's 39).

~Liza

[Pug]

Originally Posted by lizaanne

Anyway - my best friend calls the living room the "front room" - but she says it - "frun-troom" - and sluuuurs it altogether.

That reminds me, do any of you have a "parlor" in your home? My grandmother called her front room "the parlor". Is that a North/South distinction?

[corrgc]

Originally Posted by Pug

What does your vocabulary say about you?

Greetings Pug!

I made the mistake of telling my teenage daughter that something was RAD! She gave me that quizzical look that said "I think he just said something from the dark ages..."

I responded to her look with "oh sorry that's an 80's word isn't it?"

Her giggle suggested that my vocabulary was not from the dark ages - but from pre-historic times....

Corrgc

[JimG]

Originally Posted by Pug

That reminds me, do any of you have a "parlor" in your home? My grandmother called her front room "the parlor". Is that a North/South distinction?

I think that "parlor" is from the french word meaning "to speak." It was the "sitting room" to converse with visitors.

[JimG]

There's a lot of those kinds of words & phrases rolling around in my mind, though I don't use them much anymore:

record player
typewriter
running boards (on cars)
ink well (in a desk)
dictaphone
pullman car

secretary (administrative professional's day is coming up soon)
streetcar
party line
touch tone

Cinemascope
VistaVision
Cinerama
Technicolor (Movies produced using the technicolor process still look great even today, because Technicolor film was actually black and white film; and everybody knows that B&W film stays good forever.)

[lizaanne]

I don't use this word, but I have to cringe when I hear it - "How bogue is that!!??" EEEEWWWWWW!!! I have NEVER liked that word!!

Talk about 80's-speak!


~Liza

[Pug]

Originally Posted by JimG

There's a lot of those kinds of words & phrases rolling around in my mind, though I don't use them much anymore:

record player

I was discussing this very word the other day with a buddy of mine. He contended that this word is still hip because it is used to make those scratchy sounds by the DJ at the uh, discotheque, uh, nightclub, or whatever they call it these days.

Here I figured they just pressed a button and the scratching was electronically generated these days.

[Pug]

Originally Posted by JimG

I think that "parlor" is from the french word meaning "to speak." It was the "sitting room" to converse with visitors.

If it is French, like parlez vous francais, then maybe it would be an American South kind of word, from New Orleans or the like. There was a large French contingent there.

[Pug]

Originally Posted by lizaanne

"How bogue is that!!??" EEEEWWWWWW!!! I have NEVER liked that word!!

Yikes! I don't even know that word. If you can bear to think about it for a moment, what did that word mean?

[lizaanne]

I believe it is a shortened version of "bogus" - I've always felt like I was hearing nails on a blackboard when ever I heard it.

~Liza

[chevalier]

Quite a lot, mostly those ancient "whereupon", "thereunder" and similar pronouns. Can't really point out any specific nouns or verbs. My grammar and syntax are quite old as well. I reject all the new speak coming from the political correctness hype. Ah, and everybody is a he.

[Pug]

Originally Posted by corrgc

Greetings Pug!

I made the mistake of telling my teenage daughter that something was RAD! She gave me that quizzical look that said "I think he just said something from the dark ages..."

I responded to her look with "oh sorry that's an 80's word isn't it?"

Greetings and Salutations, Corrgc!

Maybe you need to tell her not to DIS her dad. Or is DIS too nineties? Anyway, she was, like TOTALLY out of line.

[Pug]

Originally Posted by Jennifer G.

I can remember my great-grandmother always telling me about the ice box.

Having a great-grandmother say it counts!