Language of Confusion: Feeling Sleepy

I literally came up with this idea because I’m tired (I had trouble falling asleep and then woke up early, it was a whole thing).

Sleep

Sleep comes from the Old English slaepan (for the verb) and slaep (for the noun), both meaning sleep, and before that the Proto Germanic slepanan. So I guess each iteration just gets rid of an “an”. It can be traced all the way back to the Proto Indo European sleg-, which means to be slack or languid and has a lot of weird descendants that are either related to slacking (like lax, release, and languid) or just make no sense (lease, relish, and catalectic). I could probably do a whole post on these weird words (and I’m sure I will in the future).

Doze

Doze showed up in the mid seventeenth century (possibly earlier in some dialects) and is thought to be Scandinavian in origin, although it doesn’t get more specific than that. It also might be related to the Old English word dysig, which just happens to be the origin word for dizzy. Fun fact, dysig actually meant stupid.

Slumber

Slumber showed up in the mid fourteenth century, although it also existed a century earlier as slumeren, related to slumen, to doze. I guess they needed to use something before doze was invented. It’s thought to be from the Old English sluma, light sleep. No idea where the b comes from. It just seems to have showed up one day.

Snooze

Not much to say about snooze. It showed up in 1789 and is what’s known as a “cant word”, which basically means it’s lingo or jargon. It’s origin is unknown, and people think it might be echoic of the sound people make when snoring. Sure. Why not? Makes more sense than most of the other words today.

Nap

Nap comes from the Old English hnappian, to doze or sleep lightly. And that’s it. It’s origin is unknown. As is why it had an H. No relation to nap as in “downy coating” or the fuzzy ends of fibers or knap. Or knapsack, which is somehow not related to knap.

Sources

Online Etymology Dictionary

Dictionary.com

University of Texas at Austin Linguistic Research Center

University of Texas at San Antonio’s page on Proto Indo European language

Tony Jebson’s page on the Origins of Old English

Old English-English Dictionary

From The Spamfiles

Yes, this again. Well, next week is my goals post so at least you get then off.

The Keto diet is just the Atkins diet. This PSA brought to you by: stop changing the names of things and expecting them to be different you won’t lose weight.

I knew it. Greg is sneaking into my accounts and getting messages sent to him. But I caught him this time.

…This is the first time I’ve ever been given a neutral option. It might be the first time I’ve been given an option that suits me.

Sorry to be repeating spam types, but I wanted to point out that I’m vehemently against spelling it “woah”. The word is “whoa”.

How could you possibly think this was a scam! The National Central Bureau of Interpol has been enhanced by the United Nations! And the FBI!

No Sense

I hate it when I’m with my mom and she asks me to do a favor for her. Especially going to the store up the street.

There’s a reason why she does most of her grocery shopping at a store in a different town. The one up the street is like a game that no one can win.

Language Of Confusion: Later

Late comes from the Old English laet, which meant sluggish or slow before it meant, you know, late. It comes from the Proto Germanic lata- and Proto Indo European led-, slow or weary, from the root word le-, which actually means let go or slacken, and like most Proto Indo European words has a lot of descendants.

For example, belated (which showed up in the early seventeenth century) is just be- + late. Later, appearing in the sixteenth century, is a comparative (i.e. near and nearer) form of the word. Then there’s latter. It comes from the Old English laetra, slower, and it was actually a comparative of laet! It actually meant “belonging to a subsequent period” in the thirteenth century and didn’t mean the last item mentioned until the sixteenth century.

Last showed up in the thirteenth century, actually a contraction of the Old English latost (last) and the superlative (the highest comparative of laet. The verb form of last (as in outlasting something) is not related, because of course it’s not related that would make sense.

Seriously, that last comes from the Old English laestan, perform, carry out, or pursue. It’s Proto Germanic origin word is laistjan, and it’s Proto Indo European word is lois-, which means furrow or track. No, I have no idea how it got from furrow to outlast. This is a madman’s game.

Sources

Online Etymology Dictionary

Google Translate

Dictionary.com

University of Texas at Austin Linguistic Research Center

University of Texas at San Antonio’s page on Proto Indo European language

Tony Jebson’s page on the Origins of Old English

Old English-English Dictionary

From The Spamfiles

Yes, still doing this. It means one lest post for me to write, which means more time for actual writing. Besides, these are funny.

Well, as we learned last week, Greg’s significant other might be cheating on him, so maybe this is right up his alley.

Look at all these messages Greg received just in one day. Seriously, what kind of sites is he visiting and why is he using my email address on them?

I’m not Jhon. I’m Greg.

I guess it makes sense that it’s impossible to deliver something I never ordered.

Honestly, I kind of like the little flowers. Why don’t I get those in regular messages?

The 18 with the strike through over it is weird. To me it seems like they’re saying that eighteen year olds aren’t allowed. Anywhere. Ever.

These are the things that bug me.

Puke Isn’t Usually Shiny

Peaches apparently thinks that if something exists, it’s for a cat to eat.

I have no idea where she found it. I can’t even remember the last time I used a piece of ribbon. I didn’t wrap any gifts with it for Christmas, that’s for sure.

Language of Confusion: Love

It’s love day, so I might as well look at words of love. Otherwise I’ll have to wait until the next time that February 14^th ends up on an etymology day.

Love

Love comes from the Old English lufu, which was pronounced something like “luhvuh”, and is clearly way more fun to say. It comes from Proto Germanic lubo, which is from the Proto Indo European leubh-, which means to care, desire, or love and is the origin word for things like libido (makes sense) and believe (What??). The Old English verb form of the word was actually lufian, which is actually pronounced like “loovian”. Why did we change this???

Passion

Passion showed up in the late twelfth century but back then it was only in a Christian context, and it took a few decades for it to mean “strong emotion”, and then things like sexual love and strong liking. It comes from the Old French passion and Late Latin passionem, suffering or enduring, and can be traced to the classical Latin pati, to suffer. I really want to know what happened in those few centuries that made it turn from suffering to strong emotion, because that sounds like a hell of a leap.

Adore

Adore showed up in the late fourteenth century as aouren, no d, coming from the Old French aorer, to adore. It does have a d in its classical Latin form, adorare, which could mean to adore but also speak to formally or ask in prayer. See, the ad- means to here, and orare means to speak or to pray. Adoring something is praying to it. Kind of.

Ardor

Ardor showed up in the mid fifteenth century from the Old French ardure, heat, glow, or passion. Before that it was the classical Latin ardorem, heat. Like, literally heat, but also sometimes figuratively, which is how we got the current definition of ardor. It can also be traced back to the Proto Indo European as-, burn or glow, another word that shows up in quite a few places. Which we will be getting to another time.

Sources

Online Etymology Dictionary

Google Translate

Omniglot

University of Texas at Austin Linguistic Research Center

University of Texas at San Antonio’s page on Proto Indo European language

Tony Jebson’s page on the Origins of Old English

Old English-English Dictionary

Orbis Latinus

From The Spamfiles

Yeah, we’re doing this again. I haven’t found anything good to replace my old Tumblr, so I’m going to start posting things here more frequently. Lucky you.

This makes me uncomfortable for several reasons, not the least of which is that they have a period then an exclamation point. Also, “we find hot girls that want to get wild”. Shouldn’t it be “who”? They’re not objects. They’re hot girls.

Just for ldsmp!

Where the hell did they get the idea that my name is Greg Smith and I’m from Lake Stevens??? But he does have a lot of unclaimed assets, and someone might be cheating on him.

Spaces are so passé. Underscores are in!

It’s Lake Stevens again (or Lake stevens). I’m kind of annoyed at the fact that they put the dollar sign after the numeral, though. Something about that just bugs me.

The What?

Apparently there was some sort of game last weekend.

Sometimes when I’m doing something, I lose track of other things. Who needs sleep or food when you have video games?

Language of Confusion: Get -Rect, Part V

This week, in the last of this series, we’re looking at the -rect words that you probably wouldn’t think are related to the Proto Indo European origin word of reg-, which means move in a straight line, but somehow are. Because that’s how stupid words are.

Rack showed up in the fourteenth century and is thought to be from the Middle Dutch rec, framework. It’s related to the Old English reccan, to stretch out (and that’s actually the first appearance of Old English in all four parts of this series), which comes from the Proto Germanic rak-, which is from reg-. I guess a rack usually has straight lines…

Rake comes from the Old English raca, rake, which is from the Proto Germanic rak-, although I can’t actually be sure that it’s the same rak as in the rak origin. I mean, they’re spelled the same, but you know how words are sometimes. In any case, here rak- means “heap up”, which is a good definition of raking. But although it comes from reg-, I’m not sure I get the relation to direct lines. Some people seem to think it’s because rakes are made with straight pieces of wood. And speaking of straight pieces of wood, rail is also related. It showed up in the fourteenth century from the Old French reille, bolt or bar, from the Vulgar Latin regla and classical Latin regula, rule. No idea why we dropped the G there. I blame French. They had a habit of spelling words based on the Latin in spite of pronouncing them completely different.

Reckless comes from the Old English receleas, reckless or careless, and is just a mix of reck (which was a word, even if it’s not anymore) and less. Reck comes from the Old English reccan, which means something like to take notice of or pay attention to. Um, it’s a different definition than the other reccan I’ve mentioned here. This one is actually from the West Germanic rokjan and Proto Germanic rokja, which can then be traced from reg-. So it means paying attention to something, with the -less meaning lacking/does not. Nope, no idea how you get from “straight line” to that. Because keeping something straight is careful??

And now, source. Yes, really. Source showed up in the mid fourteenth century meaning support or base, coming from the Old French sourse, rising or beginning, from the sense of a fountainhead of a river. That’s from the classical Latin surgere, to rise, which is actually a combination of sub-, up from below, and regere, which I’ve mentioned several times in this series as meaning to rule, or keep straight. And that keep straight is of course from reg-. So it’s to go straight/rule up from below? I guess it’s because of the fountainhead thing. The crazy journey of this one kind of makes sense.

And that’s it for -rect words. These are far from the only words that come from reg-, but it feels like these are the ones that we use the most. I’m sure I’ll get to the others. At some point.

Sources (ha!)

Online Etymology Dictionary

Google Translate

Omniglot

University of Texas at Austin Linguistic Research Center

University of Texas at San Antonio’s page on Proto Indo European language

University of Texas at Arlington

Tony Jebson’s page on the Origins of Old English

Old English-English Dictionary

Encyclopaedia Britannica

Orbis Latinus

History of the Dutch Language

February Goals

Well, it’s February. I guess that means we can all forget about our New Years’ resolutions now. Now let’s see what I should have been working on last month…

January Goals

1. Get to 70K in my WIP.

I did this, and then some. Yay!

2. Figure out if I can start up a new spam blog.

I haven’t looked at this as much as I should have, but I haven’t had much luck. I don’t know. Maybe I should do a post about it.

3. Do all the crappy adult stuff I have to do.

Ugh, well, at least this is over and done with.

So I’d call this month mostly successful. It must be easier to write when you’re trying to avoid a soul-crushing reality. Anyway, what should I do this month?

February Goals

1. Finish the first draft of my WIP! Yes, that is worthy of an exclamation point.

2. Actually do something about a new spam blog.

3. Start planning the rewrites I want to do based on the beta reads I got.

Number three is a bit dependent on when I complete number one, if I do so at all. Not that I won’t put in the work for it. I’m just afraid it’ll end up being longer than I thought.

That’s the hopeful plan of February. What do you want to do this month?

Trying To Write

I just want to write!

I assume it’s because of the cold, dry weather, as that’s usually why my nose bleeds. It’s just uncanny that it happened the second I sit down to write.