Tens of thousands of years ago, when mankind first decided to take this 'walking on two legs' thing out for a spin, we quickly realized that we needed to find a more effective way to communicate than the poop-flinging and hair-pulling tactics we'd been employing up until that point. So we created language. And although the world's oldest language still sounds like the anguished cries of people trapped in the godforsaken desert wasteland they call their home, in most parts of the world, language is constantly changing. And no language likes to change more than English.
English is the poorly-tended fondue of human languages. Sure, at some point it was pure and had its own distinct flavor, but then all sorts of different people came along and dropped chunks of things in it, and goddamn Gerald tripped over the cord and unplugged it and it congealed a little, and now no one really knows what the hell it tastes like. The influx of new words like 'blog' and 'jeggings' and 'guyliner' has been accompanied by the gradual loss of other equally great words, and it's time that we started to bring some of those words back.
Let's start with these ten.
1. Lugubrious
[loo-goo-bree-us]
adj. excessively mournful or dismal
Wow, Google images. That's, uh... that's technically accurate, but a little dark.
Over the past few years, the entire range of human sadness has come to be incorporated by the phrase "this sucks". Whether your friend has just spilled their coffee, or had their entire family tragically killed in a five-car pileup involving a logging truck and a cattle car, "that sucks" is a go-to response. But no more. From now on, when true misery rears its ugly head, English speakers everywhere should fall to their knees and stare up into the light of the unforgiving sky, screaming 'curse this lugubrious turn of events!' as their voice rings through the empty, Godless heavens.
Also, lugubrious is super fun to say, and instantly lightens the mood. Win-win.
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English is the poorly-tended fondue of human languages. Sure, at some point it was pure and had its own distinct flavor, but then all sorts of different people came along and dropped chunks of things in it, and goddamn Gerald tripped over the cord and unplugged it and it congealed a little, and now no one really knows what the hell it tastes like. The influx of new words like 'blog' and 'jeggings' and 'guyliner' has been accompanied by the gradual loss of other equally great words, and it's time that we started to bring some of those words back.
Let's start with these ten.
1. Lugubrious
[loo-goo-bree-us]
adj. excessively mournful or dismal
Over the past few years, the entire range of human sadness has come to be incorporated by the phrase "this sucks". Whether your friend has just spilled their coffee, or had their entire family tragically killed in a five-car pileup involving a logging truck and a cattle car, "that sucks" is a go-to response. But no more. From now on, when true misery rears its ugly head, English speakers everywhere should fall to their knees and stare up into the light of the unforgiving sky, screaming 'curse this lugubrious turn of events!' as their voice rings through the empty, Godless heavens.
Also, lugubrious is super fun to say, and instantly lightens the mood. Win-win.
