Mamihlapinatapai

It's 'a look between two people that suggests an unspoken, shared desire,' and if I could pronounce it, it might just be my new favourite word. (I've decided that I'm going to pronounce it ma-meelya-piñata-pie until someone corrects me. As it's a Yaghan word (the Yaghan are a race that I have never heard of before and initially thought someone made up a rather obscure race who live near Tierra del Fuego, which is by Sweden under South America) I do not expect it to be corrected any time soon. Nevertheless, if you think you know better than ma-meelya-piñata-pie then don't let that stop you trying.)

I found 'mamihlapinatapai' on yo mama's face a list of foreign words the English language needs (full list here), along with some I already knew (because of my enormous vocabulary) and some I didn't. My other favourites are 'backpfeifengesicht,' a German word which means 'a face badly in need of a fist' and which I am not even going to try pronouncing, and 'nunchi' (noon-chee) which is a Korean word that's kind of hard to explain - it means, more or less, the ability to properly judge a social situation and behave appropriately. When Mrs. Obama hugged the Queen, she was showing a decided lack of nunchi; so was that boorish acquaintance of yours when she decided that a clothes swap party was the perfect occasion to peddle her hideous home-made Christmas cards.

Andrea also introduced me to two other excellent and bonafide English words recently: 'aeolist,' or someone who thinks they are highly intelligent but actually spends all their time talking out of their arse; and 'arsle,' which means 'to leave a room backwards' and is where the word 'arse' comes from. Dictionary.com doesn't believe in either of these words; I bet when they read this blog their no-good backpfeifengesicht-featured aeolist of an editor will arsle sheepishly out of the room.

Here is a treat! Something not created by me.* It is from an excellent comic and I think it pretty much says what every art critic since the dawn of time has had enough nunchi to not quite say:

Anything else from me today? Nah. That's kind of about it. I applied for some jobs.

I'll leave you with the Pun of the Day**: my mother walks inside carrying a handful of runner beans. "Sadly, I think these are past their prime...they're has-beens." I guess it puns in the family is passed down from generation to generation.

EDIT: Pun of the Day has been revised, thanks to Antiques Roadshow! (I wasn't watching it.) One of their experts is examining a (presumably antique) antique dead dog carcass which had been hollowed out, covered in tar, had the leg ends (stumps?) sealed with (I think) cork and used to indicate where a fishing net had been dropped. Kate: "Who thinks, when their dog dies, 'I'm going to make this into a buoy?'" Me, appraising our dog: "Charlie would make a good buoy." Kate: "Hahaha! Good buoy, Charlie." (Is only funny if you pronounce 'buoy' 'boy' and not 'booey' as, apparently, some do; may not be even funny then but I am still cracking up about it.)


I have no idea why I didn't stop this post after the comic; how about you pretend that I did.


*although really I've been pretty educational today

**I promise this won't become a regular feature