Words

I haven't always been interested in words.

That's because, if I'm honest, they used to frighten me.

I mean, why put an 'H' in spaghetti? Why does the word 'those' not have a 'Z' in it instead of an 'S'?

Things changed however when I found out ... after years of living in fear ... that 'dichotomy' had absolutely nothing to do with removal of a man's most essential extremity.

No more quivering in fear every time that word was used for me!

Not that it was used much by anyone in the northeast of England when I was young. More often than not people would say 'Wey man, it's split doon the middle, hinney' and be completely unaware that they had just used one definition of the word 'dichotomy'.

We were simple people you see. We thought education and schooling was useful only to give parents time to make more children and go to work. A kind of baby-sitting service if you like.

I however used school ... especially English lessons ... to rid myself of my northeast accent. I began to pronounce my words as the rules of Queens English demanded they should be pronounced.

This resulted in ridicule from family and friends.

Simple saying 'no' correctly in the northeast ... 'nay', 'ner' or 'no-a' (pronounced 'noah') was more usual ... would raise eyebrows and cause some folks to 'out' themselves as abderianists.

I braved the scathing wit and merciless ridicule for many a year and, even if I say so myself, I became highly skilled in the art of adoxography, as you have no doubt already noticed.
  
My attempts to better myself resulted in exsibilations from my peers, to which I responded with aggressive attacks of hippopotomonstrosesquipedalian nature.

This may make me seem to be somewhat of a philosophunculist, but at least I know what 'philosophunculist' means without having to look it up.

Words, eh?

Don't ya just love 'em?