Those Word Coincidences

[escargot]

but: that shape in your other pocket probably is your phone, anyway??

You never know.
Quoting myself here -

I felt that my phone was a little heavy in my pocket, and I pulled it out to look at, and it was actually a tin of spicy mackerel fillets which I'd been showing Techy earlier and meant to drop off in the kitchen.

Next day Techy put the tin in his pocket, intending to take it to work for lunch, and thought it was his phone.

So there you have it - tins of spicy mackerel fillets are dangerously similar to mobile phones. FAR too risky.

 

[escargot]

The key word coincidence here is bolded.

Steve Pemberton compiled the crossword that featured in the Inside No. 9 episode The Riddle of the Sphinx.
He managed to have it published in the Guardian, where some of the solvers grumbled about the obscurity of certain answers. Those words were chosen to fit around terms that had to be included to tie in with the episode's story.

Anyway... solvers noticed a couple of what looked like clever touches. One was the letters R I P N H S along the bottom line. Pemberton says this was accidental but fitted well as a reference to the suicide of Squires.

More strikingly, the letters arranged down the middle of the grid, in between the black squares, read as

O
N
E
L
E
P
U
S

Lepus is the Latin word for 'hare'. Pemberton says its inclusion was pure coincidence.
Astounding.

Here's the Guardian crossword in question -
Cryptic crossword No 27,132

There's also a Guardian article about it:
The Riddle of the Sphinx: how the Guardian's cryptic crossword found its way on to Inside No 9

The first thing that had to be done was the creation of the crossword itself. I printed off a blank grid and the hardest job was fitting in all the words. I believe you can get computers to fill grids for you these days, but I wanted to start with the nina. So on a diagonal line we needed the hidden message I SWAPPED CUPS. Then I knew I wanted ASPHYXIATION and PUFFERFISH, so there were three big chunky things to get me started.

I printed the grid out six times on a piece of paper and played around until one of the combinations threw up MYSTERY GUEST, which was useful, and then KNOW-IT-ALL and UNDERSLIP.

Pemberton mentions teaching other people to do cryptic crosswords. I like doing this too. It's about explaining that the clues can be about the structure of the words and not only their meaning.

As he says, once you get the mindset you're on the way.

 

[Ermintruder]

(With many thanks to @escargot for having indirectly reminded me of this thread)

Once I take it out of its box, and unleash it upon the word world

The Word:

• It is a neologism, in that it's a word which does not exist (I'm very confident that is the case, since I deliberately-created it, over 30 years ago;
• I think of it, in my head many times, but have never publicly-shared it, or used it verbally;
• It has the capability of gaining currency amongst, well, people who speak English and who suffer from confident verbosity;
• It describes a human habit that is of such stunning-annoyabilty to those that recognise it being done, they can be driven to the edge of infuriated madness and beyond (nb there is a high degree of probability, dear reader, that you notice this particular Verbal Fraility That Has No Name Right Now, because you are cursed with being a perceptive thinker that engages their brain before operating their vocal cords....but, you've actually done this sin sometimes yourself. You hate it if you do commit this paticular verbal idiopathy yourself, and it can make you want to nearly kill other perpetrators.....
• But (and there had to be a 'but')....it is unsnappy, in it's wordliness. Distended. Clumsey. Yet possessed of a certain fey faux neo-Græcian charm.

And with infinite apologies for my delayed delivery (sorry Enola, but you'll read this anyway)

But I'm still wondering what Ermintruder's proposal was ...

My word was/is anadigitabulaecession:

....the oft-witnessed human act of someone appearing to commence the verbal recitation of a expectedly articulate series/list of points, responses, reasons, cases etc....

I mean, they confidently-commence with a loudly-declared numerical "ONE!" or the letter "A!" and then start the co-ordinated tapping of the thumb of one hand with the index finger of the other...(sometimes twisting their wrists, forearms or even spines for additional empty emphasis)

And *guess what!* (yes, we all see/hear this far far too often)... the speaker then totally-fails to incrementally-state any further 'prepared' points, but instead colllapses into unstructured prose!!

Am I right, or am I totally right? I do so wish that anadigitabulaecession could be stamped-out: we all do it sometimes, but certain people do it nearly constantly. It's a really jarring mental quirk, especially once noticed (that's OK, you can thank me later).

 

[escargot]

(With many thanks to @escargot for having indirectly reminded me of this thread)


The Word:

And with infinite apologies for my delayed delivery (sorry Enola, but you'll read this anyway)


My word was/is anadigitabulaecession:

....the oft-witnessed human act of someone appearing to commence the verbal recitation of a expectedly articulate series/list of points, responses, reasons, cases etc....

I mean, they confidently-commence with a loudly-declared numerical "ONE!" or the letter "Ay!" and then start the co-ordinated tapping of the thumb of one hand with the index finger of the other...(sometimes twisting their wrists, forearms or even spines for additional empty emphasis)

And *guess what!* (yes, we all see/hear this far far too often)... the speaker then totally-fails to incrementally-state any further 'prepared' points, but instead colllapses into unstructured prose!!

Am I right, or am I totally right? I do so wish that anadigitabulaecession could be stamped-out: we all do it sometimes, but certain people do it nearly constantly. It's a really jarring mental quirk, especially once noticed (that's OK, you can thank me later).

Also, you often hear people in a discussion reply to a point with (say) 'Well, a, this roundabout was not part of the the original plan for the road and drivers from other towns are unaware that it even exists. The signposting is inadequate and the sharp bend just before the roundabout makes it hard to see...' and so on, having promised to present a list of objections but rambling instead.

Can't say I object to this less formal, more conversational style of debate. I can keep track easily enough and it sounds sincere.

 

[escargot]

Oooer, just now I was listening to the BBC podcast on The Premonitions Bureau while browsing the Discontinued Foods thread.

A photo of a 'Frosty' slush maker came up at the same time as a mention of the frosty weather conditions noted by Campbell at the time of his fatal water speed record attempt.

Campbell was superstitious and took careful note of possible omens. On a previous outing he'd only completed a record attempt after seeing a vision of his late father, who assured him he'd survive.

The night before his final water speed record attempt Campbell played cards. He drew ominous cards.
This was at the 16th century Sun Inn at in Coniston, still going strong. I bet it's STUFFED with ghosts.

 

[auretz]

An example of a word coincidence is the fact that the Mbabaram Aboriginal language in Australia's word for dog is dúg, pronounced identically to 'dog'. There had been no contact between English speakers - it had just evolved coincidentally to be the same word. This has ended up a cautionary tale in linguistics about taking a coincidence as any evidence of a relationship between languages!

 

[escargot]

An example of a word coincidence is the fact that the Mbabaram Aboriginal language in Australia's word for dog is dúg, pronounced identically to 'dog'. There had been no contact between English speakers - it had just evolved coincidentally to be the same word. This has ended up a cautionary tale in linguistics about taking a coincidence as any evidence of a relationship between languages!

How interesting, and welcome!

 

[brownmane]

An example of a word coincidence is the fact that the Mbabaram Aboriginal language in Australia's word for dog is dúg, pronounced identically to 'dog'. There had been no contact between English speakers - it had just evolved coincidentally to be the same word. This has ended up a cautionary tale in linguistics about taking a coincidence as any evidence of a relationship between languages!

Welcome. Great first post.

If you are interested in language, there are several threads that you might like:

https://forums.forteana.org/index.php?threads/origins-of-phrases-notes-queries-oddities.18430/

https://forums.forteana.org/index.php?threads/the-continuing-insult-to-the-english-language.31931/

https://forums.forteana.org/index.php?threads/the-mystery-of-jawn.70308/

Hope you enjoy your time here.

 

[Bad Bungle]

An example of a word coincidence is the fact that the Mbabaram Aboriginal language in Australia's word for dog is dúg, pronounced identically to 'dog'. There had been no contact between English speakers - it had just evolved coincidentally to be the same word. This has ended up a cautionary tale in linguistics about taking a coincidence as any evidence of a relationship between languages!

This just compounds the mystery of how 'dog' entered the English language (and Continental ones subsequently) after centuries of useage of OE 'hound' (hund).

 

[Frideswide]

Great post @auretz !