Thursday, July 16, 2009

Does This Pass for a Word?

Yesterday while I took another stab at crafting the Query Letter for Midnight Chaser, I had a word as a “placeholder,” knowing I would find the perfect word later. I didn’t want to disrupt the flow of composing. I placed an "-ish" onto the word. The little suffix brought to mind one of those “Why on earth do I remember this?” thoughts.

The thought of an episode of Super Password, which I watched back in the day, as a kid. (Not that I wouldn’t watch the show now if I found it.) A quick summary for those unfamiliar with the program. Teams of 2 people (1 celebrity and 1 contestant) compete to convey a word using another word as a clue. The target words then are used as clues to guess a subject/another word relating to the clues conveyed. (It’s much simpler than I make it sound!)

Anyway, the celebrity (which I’m pretty sure had been Harvey Korman) had to pass the word “GREEN.” After considering options, he finally said, “LAWNISH.”

Burt Convy laughed himself silly, saying that’s not a word. Korman contested: “What?!? You can add ISH to any word!” But the Judges ruled otherwise.

For whatever reason, this stuck with me through the years.
I’m not really sure if Korman is right, but it sounds good to me.

Fortunately, I’m not in the habit of ISHifying words, so it doesn’t really come up.

Meanwhile, I’m hoping the Query is now done… or at least doneish.

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