pumpkinstrokemarrow

Other people fuss about grammar and take to heart rules about not starting sentences with conjunctions, not mixing metaphors and all the sort of thing which one used to learn in English language classes.

My own fuss point is vocabulary. I am irritated when I think that someone else is abusing a word or is using it in an inappropriate context. Commonly by using a strong word like 'emasculated' when a weak word like 'weakened' would have done. Or 'disaster' for 'disappointment'. But it does have to be someone else; quite OK if I do it myself.

So not best pleased in the TB the other day when I got found out not knowing what an oxymoron was and had to have it explained to me that it meant a phrase which was nonsense, typically an adjective applied to an inappropriate noun. The example given at TB is not fit for onward transmission, so I offer 'tall dwarf' instead. To save face, I explained that the derivation was probably from the state people got into when electrocuted in the course of treatment by a 19th century psychiatric quack by the name of Dr. Moroni.

Coming home some time later, I found myself locked out. The first time that I recall such a thing happening. Maybe had difficulty getting the key in the lock from time to time, but never actually locked out - in this case by the chain on the back door having been put up. Luckily there was no difficulty about getting into the garage but it was far too cold to think of sleeping there. So out with one of my collection of crow bars to see if I could get the chain off the door frame without doing too much damage. Answer, no. Could get the bar in OK, but couldn't get a decent purchase on the fitting which fixed the chain to the door frame and chickened out of really putting any welly into it. Next thought door bell, but decided that this was a bit of a blunt instrument. Might wake everybody or nobody. So settled for getting the ladder up the front of the house and tapping on a bedroom window with a key, a proceeding which instantly had the desired effect and shortly after I was in the warm inspecting an undisturbed chain fitting. So much for crow bars. And so much for neighbourhood watch; not so much as a flicker of a net curtain. Nor remark the following day.

At this point I remembered to check oxymoron and had the satisfaction of finding my TB informant to be in the wrong. According to the OED it is a common misapprehension that oxymoron means nonsense. Rather it means a rather strained conjunction of words, but a conjunction which nevertheless makes a neat point. They offer the example of an Epicurean pessimist.

On the other hand, oxymoron did not come from Dr. Moroni, rather from two Greek words, one meaning sharp - the oxy bit - and one meaning dull - the moron bit. I cannot yet trace Dr. Moroni and it now seems likely that under the influence I confused him with a certain Franz Anton Mesmer from whom the term mesmerised is derived. Not moronised at all. Moron is an old word for a sort of salamander.