The "I Didn't Comment in Another Thread" Thread

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For new words, I love reading Jack Vance stories. He'll throw a term on a story, and you try to gutta its meaning from context, then check the dictionary to see if it's a real word and if you got the meaning close. If it's a term he made up out of while cloth, He'll include a footnote on the page with his definition.
He's great for that, in part his created words generally sound like they could be real.

Reading a lot of older scifi can also be a good vocabulary booster in general, since so much of it uses (often dated) technical terms to describe how various wonder-gadgets work. I've been working my way through Astounding this year and the 30s and 40s alone introduced me over a dozen words I'd never run into before.

E.E. "Doc" Smith had a cute trick in his Lensmen series where the telepathic translation function of the titular Lenses would permanently assign a new word to any concept, object or phenomenon that couldn't be defined to the "listener" in comprehensible terms and from then on every Lens everywhere would consistently use the neologism when needed. For the POV characters this mostly comes up when dealing with species who have a "biological extension into hyperspace" like the Palainians, resulting in words like "dexitroboping" (which isn't quite farming, or mining, an artistic endeavor or some kind of reproductive activity, but might have something to do with any or all of those) and "emfozing" (which would probably be impolite to mention in mixed company if Palainians understood the concept of politeness).

The books never mention it, but presumably a lot of things merely three-dimensional beings regard as perfectly normal get their own neologisms assigned to them for Palainians and listeners from similar ZZZZZZZZZ-code species, since they doubtless find them equally alien to their experiences. You'd have to be an Arisian or stable at the third level of stress (ie one of the Kinnison kids) to be able to "look at the software" of the Lens translation system to determine how a Palainian "hears" the concept of (say) "the taste of really spicy chili" when a Terran Lensman starts going on about it.
 

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Warpiglet-7

Lord of the depths
Just because a game or style of play is not for you does not mean you should not respect its place in the hobby.
I am with you here but likewise just because I don’t want feature ‘X’ in my favored version of the game is not “edition warring” or ill wishes upon ‘Y’ fans.

Its OK for people to talk about their reactions and preferences even if not everyone gets it or uses just the right language.

Then again, most online debates just make me wish I was playing anyway! Speaking of which, after one kid’s activity today, I need to look at some notes and prep a little. My kids’ group has not played in like a month and I don’t want to let their burgeoning interest in D&D get cold!

Too many video games and anime ready to soak up all of their idle time!

(Total digression: my kids got me to watch cowboy bebop and one piece…and I would never have seen either as possible! I watched speed racer and battle of the planets as my last Japanese cartoons! Ha!)
 


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Ryujin

Legend
When we reach the "per my last email" stage of a thread, it's probably time to wrap it up.
If only that actually worked on clients.

Client - Asks three questions.
Me - Answers three questions.
Client - Asks second and third question again, as if I didn't already replay to them.
Me "As per my previous email..." and proceed to answer last two questions again.
Client - Asks third question AGAIN.
Me - :mad:
 



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