>Actually, the more I think about the parallel words and others like legatee, the more I think I hate them all!

Mav:

Words like this are what my wife, a recovering attorney, calls state of the art words. They come mainly from Latin, with a smattering of Anglo Saxon, and are used for very specific legal concepts.

One example is the pair words alienor and alienee. These are, respectively, the person who transfer property and the person to whom the property is transferred. Neither of these are terms you will use in your everyday conversations :)

Illustration:

A fellow I know rented a house from a very nice couple. Unfortunately, two months after he signed the three-year lease, the couple separated. During the ensuing very bitter battle, both of them are trying to collect the rent from him. There have been court battles, he has had credit problems, he's getting ulcers. Truly, another situation where one must confront the evil of two lessors.

My wife has eschewed the practice of law to raise a family, but is now going back to work as a customer service representative for a medium-sized mutual fund company here in Denver. Before leaving the legal profession, though, she left her mark. When she lived in Baltimore, she bought a condo right on the harbor. Weeks after the purchase was completed, Baltimore began a very large project to rehabilitate the waterfront area.

Peggy found the construction din at night so horrendous that she couldn't sleep. To no avail, she tried to get the construction limited to daylight hours. So she filled a class action. Yes, MY wife wrote what is now known widely in legal circles as Port Noise Complaint.




TEd