New words & experiences keep us learning & busy

~Google images~

 

 

              Because my two novels are set in the Missouri Ozarks, I “follow” Ozark Highlands of Missouri’s blog. Last week, it discussed how controlled burning practices were not what they should be. In the information was the word “forb.” The blogger apparently presumed his/her readers knew all the terms. I didn’t, so I Bing-ed the word.
 

          “Forb”—herbaceous flowering plants that are not graminoids (grasses, sedges and rushes). Examples of forbs are sunflower, clover, daylily and milkweed. A peek into vegetation ecology.

            Then, there’s the experience I had over the Thanksgiving weekend. Since my daughter’s family would be in the Mississippi deer woods from Wednesday through Saturday, I was fingered to tend their five Black Australorp hens. Again, I had to Bing (alternative to Google) the breed to find the correct spelling. Daughter wasn’t sure, she said.

          Tending her chickens was a piece of cake! All I did was gather the eggs, check on the water bucket, check to see no feet were hung in the wire, go inside, wash the eggs, stick ‘em in the fridge. Feeding/watering the indoor/ outdoor cats—and I was done. Fun.
 

          I love Bill White’s column in this paper, especially when he tells of doing things around the house himself. He and Cupcake get into it at times, don’t they?

          I, too, try to do things around here myself—not because I can’t afford to have it done, but because I like the challenge. Of course, I couldn’t EVER and wouldn’t EVER do re-laying of carpet, re-finishing hardwood floors, or laying tile in the kitchen like I hired done this past summer.

         But the living room ceiling was a different matter, I thought. At two different times, after several days of rain, some of the 70s-era Celotex tiles fell. The original textured plaster (from 1932) painted a light green came into view. Immediately, I knew I would not replace those fallen tiles. Thus began months of intermittent removal of the myriad squares. Then the grasping and twisting of the 40-year-old staples out of the wood strips (1 by 4s) Dad had fastened end to end and nailed through the plaster to the studs in the l-o-n-g room. Every eight inches of ceiling is another parallel set of boards, supposedly added to keep any more of the plaster from falling.

 

            Pulling staples pales in comparison with the prospect of repairing the ceiling where the original plaster fell. The shape of Africa, that hole shows the laths and the old cement between them and spreads under six of the boards. I would need nearly one-half inch of filler––for unlike today’s plaster coating, this stuff is thick. I looked on the internet, gathered some information on materials I would need. I bought a can of mix-it-yourself plaster of paris along with a sponge and spreader. But all that sits as yet untouched.

            I’ve had other ideas about how to repair it without all the aforementioned stuff. Maybe next week I can show what I did. The photo is someone else's ceiling.
 

           Meanwhile, onward in the rush to Christmas.

Things my eldest child continues to teach me

by Pat Laster

First, my second-born teaches me that what I thought were dandelions are a type of coreopsis.
Next, the youngest teaches me about reusing fan blades rather than buying a new fan. The third-born teaches me how to text. Except for Kid Billy, my “fifth-wheel,” there is one child whom I haven’t yet mentioned in this context.
I have inherited (!) from my first-born, Gordon--the one who turned fifty last month--the tendency to make lists. When he was a teen, he would sometimes sit in his room, listen to the radio and make a log of what songs played and when and how often. If my in-progress compendium of journal jottings (lists) ever hits the printing press, he might be the one to do it.
Gordon sends me bundles of the weekly New York Times Book Reviews. I read/skim them, have ordered books, and learned new words. So my first-born has taught me to broaden my reading horizons. Thank you, son.
Speaking of new words, picture this. Six women, two in their eighties, two in our seventies and two in their sixties, standing or sitting before a table holding six music stands, six copies of music, and with a tone bar in each hand-- what we refer to as bells.
Before we begin, one woman comments how she enjoyed reading Roy Blount, Jr.’s Alphabetter Juice: the Joy of Text, which I lent her at her request. Before long, the word “copacetic” escaped someone’s lips. Another said, “Oh, I haven’t heard that word since my husband died. ‘Copacetic’ was one of his favorite words.”
Readers, this was astounding! I had seen the word in print; in fact, that very night, I read an essay that ended with “copacetic.” Next morning, I emailed the group to see who actually used that word in the air we were breathing. No one admitted it. One said, “Unless it came out of my subconscious.” It means excellent; first rate; fine.
I will have to say, the bell rehearsal that day was copacetic.
Trying my best to learn (and use, perhaps) new words has been a project since I began serious journaling. I keep a document called “Unknown Words and Phrases.” And their meanings—why else? But some words just don’t make it deeply enough into my gray matter at first, and I have to re-look-up the meanings.
“Misanthrope,” for example. “A person who hates or distrusts all people.”
And “scrum.” I’ve seen that twice lately. And without context, I’m at a loss. It is too new for both of my dictionaries, so I go online. In rugby, Wikipedia says, a “scrum” refers to the manner of restarting the game after a minor infraction.
In another context, “Scrum is an iterative, incremental framework for project management…” Math teachers probably called it “show-the-steps-in-your-solution.”
Aha! Scrum is already in my list of unknown words, but with this definition: “a disordered or confused situation involving a number of people, as in a “scrum of photographers.”
I pretty well know the words, “ennui,” “angst,” and “genre.” If I learn one or two every now and then . . . well, that will be copacetic. #

c 2011, Pat Laster dba lovepat press