Grumpy Editor observed copy editors now have to contend with more than 1,000 fresh words added to the Merriam-Webster dictionary including what its producers said are "terms from recent advances in science, borrowings from foreign languages, and words from tech, medicine, pop culture, sports and everything in between.”
What’s puzzling, however, is some words have been around for a while.
Take, for example, “ping.” It is listed as one of the additions, although its use (via the Navy) goes back to World War II. As the dictionary explains it, ping is “the pulse of sound waves reflected from or emitted by a submerged object in submarine signaling or detection and heard by special apparatus.”
Seems we have heard that word in scores of movies since WWII.
Ping also is described as “a sharp sound like that of a striking bullet ” and “a signal sent from one computer to another across a network for usually diagnostic purposes.”
Among other new words:
Photobomb --- to move into the frame of a photograph as it is being taken as a joke or prank.
Safe space --- a location, as on a college campus, intended to be free of bias, conflict, criticism or potentially threatening actions, ideas or conversations.
Humblebrag --- when a person makes a modest or self-critical comment about himself or herself that is really meant to draw attention to their accomplishments or impressive qualities.
Fast fashion --- clothes that are manufactured and sold cheaply to keep up with new trends.
Woo-woo --- another vintage word now defined as dubiously or outlandishly mystical, supernatural or unscientific. (Actually, “Woo-woo goes back to Feb. 1, 1939 when Harry James and the Boogie Woogie Trio recorded a 78 r.p.m. jazz instrumental disc.)
IN CASE YOUR FAVORITE NEWS OUTLETS MISSED THESE..
Misleading media: Chatter on NBC’s “Meet the Press” on Sunday, along with other media outlets, wrongly pin upcoming Social Security cuts on Donald Trump. Long before Trump took office last month, Social Security reforms passed by Congress mandated a reduction of 24 percent in benefits by 2050 --- accomplished mainly by gradually raising the program’s full retirement age from 65 to 67…CNN came up with this headline on Friday when Trump greeted Japanese Prime Minister Shinzo Abe at the White House: Donald Trump shook the Japanese Prime Minister's hand for 19 seconds. (That was probably considered a “scoop.”) The play-by-play story said, “Trump pulled Abe's hand closer, patted it several times and held on for 19 seconds. When they completed the handshake, Trump pulled away and Abe made a regrettable facial expression”…NewsBusters noted that at the White House press conference with Trump and Abe “all liberal three networks were not chosen to ask questions. ABC didn’t even bother to cover the event live. Only CBS and NBC broke in. Instead, Trump called on Daniel Halper of the New York Post and Blake Burman of Fox Business. Prime Minister Abe took questions from Japanese reporters”…As noted by CNSNews.com, Piers Morgan, editor-at-large for The Daily Mail, London, on Fox News’s Tucker Carlson program said, President Donald Trump has good reason to distrust liberal media outlets such as CNN and the New York Times, which are "utterly determined to bring the Trump presidency crashing down”…The Trump administration will continue using the term "fake news" until the media understand that their "monumental desire" to attack the President is wrong, said Sebastian Gorka, deputy assistant to President Donald Trump...Gallup poll found confidence in the economy rose to new highs at the time Trump entered the White House, adding optimism was higher in January than any month since 2008.
Coffee drinkers perk up. A bill introduced in Oregon would impose an excise tax of five cents a pound on wholesale transactions of coffee beans and ground coffee in order to fund education programs…Two more dailies, tracing roots to the late 19th century, fold. Massachusetts Mondays through Fridays papers The Malden Evening News and the Medford Daily Mercury stopped publishing print and online editions…North Korea fired a ballistic missile that soared east towards the Sea of Japan, latest in a number of nuclear tests in the past year…Former Obama Attorney General Eric Holder’s ’s law firm, Covington and Burling will be paid $25,000 a month from the California Legislature for 40 hours of work providing “legal strategies regarding potential actions of the federal government that may be of concern to the State of California.”
Brown likes brown.
Noting California Gov. Jerry Brown refuses to scratch the word “drought” from his current vocabulary triggered a long-time resident to comment:
“Yet no matter how much rain or snow we get, Gov. Brown will always say we are in a drought. He wants the state to be brown!”
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