Monday 17 December 2007

Word of the Year

According to the people at Merriam-Webster dictionaries - or, should I say, the people who visit the Merriam-Webster website - woot (or w00t) is the word of the year. I've never used it here, but I've become quite fond of using it in emails since stumbling upon it in various blogs (Pink is the new blog is one of the most memorable for using it.)

For those who don't know, woot is an exclamation of joy. Apparently - which I didn't know - it can also be an acronym for we owned the other team, an expression used by gamers, I'm told. Which would be about right, because my younger and immature brother uses the term 'owned' all the time (not particularly

This year's word of the year isn't found in a print dictionary, but online, and was voted the award from a list of the most frequently searched words on the M-W website, beating out facebook for first place.

My father, the less tech & Internet savvy man that he is, heard this on the radio, and was surprised to learn that it actually was a word, and not something I - or my schoolmates - had made up. He was first introduced to the word by me in an email home, in which I excitedly declared that I had finished all my CAS hours, a joyous moment indeed, and one which no other word could convey. (Yes, it's the nerd in me that I try - often unsuccessfully - to beat down.)

In the meantime, Blogger had better update their spell check, because woot is a word, and it's not just me that says so!

x
Just a girl

3 comments:

Pepito said...

I am disgusted. I have nothing more to say, I feel like I should give up on English and learn Welsh instead, merely to avoid these stupid words. At least in Welsh if they came up with slang like that, no one would be able to spell it so it'd die out fairly quickly....

How did you find HP?

Just a girl said...

Have fun with Welsh! Thomas style, eh? Tis a sad thing that gamers (eg my bro, enough said) are influencing this noble language of Shakespeare and Blake, Woolf and Fitzgerald; what would they say? Though I am glad the word is not anyhoo. I hate that word.

HP was alright, for the sake of the development of the plot, but a bit of a let down considering the wait! And isn't it supposed to be about S & R? Ah well, we can only hope for more soon...

x
Just a girl

Pepito said...

Hmm, I agree with both your comment about your brother and these dastardly children who are defiling our beautiful language; and the let down that was HP. Hopefully she will get round to doing some more soon to satisfy our lust!

He he, I love RS Thomas, so amusing and angry. Eg:"Men of the hills, wantoners, men of Wales,

With your sheep and your pigs and your ponies, your sweaty females,

How I have hated you"

from "A Priest to His People"

Tee Hee!

X

P