I’ve been slightly-off-world lately, in great part thanks to the interesting side-effects of the counter-intuitively trade-named Lyrica which continue to steal my words and give me other ones instead.
Par example:
The other day I was sitting in the sunny patch on my doorstep* directing S as to how exactly I wanted the gardening chores done when, while sipping my tea, a clever, space-saving thought struck.
"S," I said, "is there anywhere on the wall to hang my rain-barrows?"
"Your... what?" came the reply, quizzically.
"My rain-barrows. If they were hung on the wall it'd save space and clutter."
"I don't get it. What are they, again?"
"Rain Barrows!" I enunciated clearly, although at this point I was beginning to doubt that I was using the correct term and wonder what on earth might be another word for them.
"Rain-barrows?" I repeated, somewhat hesitantly, pointing at one of the rain-barrows which was perched six feet away from me on top of some empty plant-pots. "Barrows," I said, while thinking it isn't a barrow it's something, um, "for carrying rain," not rain, that doesn't come out of taps, "to spread on the..." Damn - that’s not right... My voice faltered away.
"Watering-can?" S suggested, gently, while stifling mirth...
I could only nod. And blush. And start to giggle.
I prefer ‘rain-barrow’ now. It's a much better name for the object, since I often find mine filled up with a few days'-worth of free liquid from the sky and imagine that others do. Mine would be filled by the down-pipe in the guttering sometimes if it weren't for the slight obstacle of all the drain-pipes from the flat roof of this block of flats (and the balconies) being built inside the walls and linked directly to the main drain.
Waste of rain! Plus, ultimately, it is rain that comes out of the taps. And barrows surely don't have to have wheels...
* Don’t be daft - I was sat upon a chair. I’m not quite limber enough, these days, to sit on the step. Well, just not and get up again...
4 comments:
I have those moments of "thingie you know...um....". Even my autistic son can fill in what words I'm trying to hunt for now. As a writer this is eminently embarrassing but that's what online dictionaries/thesaurus are for. Too bad one isn't wired into my head.
Thanks, Oya's Daughter :-) I'm so glad that I'm not the only one and bless your son for finding your missing words!
I really hope that this is temporary - it's funny at the moment but I have been the walking(?!) dictionary and thesaurus for most of my life. Getting a bit frustrated, as well, at the collapse of my once-perfect, 70wpm typing into gobbledegook as, at times, I'm down to 10wpm including editing. Oh well, some of the things that are coming out amuse me and perhaps if we collect all the odd, substitute words that come out we could just write a new dictionary and found a new language...
xJ
Dearest Rockhorse!!!! Yey! Great to 'read' you! Off world! Such an appropriate term. We special people have our special lexicon and after years of attempting to be a pedant, I have stopped correcting others, but more importantly, stopped correcting mesen!! A Rain-barrow it shall be. To steal the term is to love it!!! Much love,
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