The NY Times has published Quiz: Do You Speak 2025? (“An assortment of absurd, useful and funny words and phrases entered the vernacular this year”; archived), which goes from 1. “Imagine you’re wearing a new outfit. What culinary term would you not want someone to use about your appearance?” to 11. “In 2025, what phrase might one use to describe entering a state of focus in order to achieve one’s goals?” I got 7 out of 11 (“You more or less speak 2025”), but that was with a lot of luck (including the fact that I just the other day saw a story about “the Italian brain rot crew” and happened to remember the names, which are memorable). I know it’s fluff, but hey, it’s about language; actually, I might not have posted it if it weren’t for the inclusion of Le poisson Steve, which both my wife and I found irresistible.
I won’t make a separate post out of it because it will mean something only to Russian-speakers, but Anatoly at Avva has a very interesting post about how the word обыденный changed its meaning from ‘done/made in a single day’ (which apparently was an important concept in folk culture) to its current sense of ‘ordinary, commonplace, everyday.’ There’s material on etymology and on Ukrainian and Belarusian equivalents, as well as splendid examples of peevery (Yakov Grot: «обыденный, как ясно показывает его происхождение, может значить только однодневный»).
Also, let us all join Joel at Far Outliers in his “profound gratitude and appreciation to the doctors, nurses, technicians, and orderlies of Wojewódzki Szpital Zespolony w Kielzach for saving my life during my sudden blogging hiatus this month.” Click through for his harrowing experience.
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