From an AP story on the wire today:

"Computer models drawn by scientists at the Coast Guard and the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration predict the spill will wash out to sea and not glom onto the shores . . .."

I thought glom had a differednt meaning: "I would glom onto the meaning of the statement" being something akin to "I would figure (puzzle) out or perhaps stumble upon the meaning of the statement."

It's not a word I would use. Would any of you use it? And if so, how?

I might use it, rarely, and to me it means to grab onto something.

I agree with jheem, but with the addition of "and not let go"

I've used it, and it has a sticky quality to it. figure it out, grab onto it, grok it...

Ah! You mean like a little kid with a booger on his finger?

Just looked it up. Supposed to be from a Scots word.

like a little kid with a...

well. I used to use it...

I pronounced this as 'boo'-'ger' read this as "one who boogs". So, 'booged' must be the end at which the means "gloming" arrived?!?!

I believe that you have achieved the glomization of the boog...

glom onto the shores

Which came first I wonder? "Glom" or "conglomerate".

Oil spills glom onto shores. Oil spillers glom onto shares.

It's easier to punish the shores than the shares ... which probably explains why the spills keep occurring.

I've heard the word used only in the context of a person attaching himself/herself to someone else (or a group of people) but that person is not really wanted. The person who is glomming is considered undesirable in some way.

The conversation usually goes like this..."yeah, we just said hi to her while passing in the hall, and she glommed onto us and wouldn't leave us alone"

Is glom ever used without "onto"?

Is glom ever used without onto?

Good question, Father Steve.

The American Heritage Dictionary defines "glom" as a verb as follows:

"To seize upon or latch onto something".

Does this take us back to "hoi polloi" or "the hoi polloi"?

If "onto" is included in the definition, then "glom onto" is as wrong as "the hoi polloi".

But everyone says "glom onto", so we may as well glom onto the bandwagon.

On 2nd thought, I think it depends on the usage.

A person can climb a fire escape ... if they are already on it. But you have to "climb onto" a fire escape before you can actually begin to climb it. (Ditto climbing stairs if the first step is obstructed.)

The same holds true with "glom".

An oil spill is carried by the tide until it "gloms onto" a shoreline.

On the other hand, a military invader "gloms" a beachhead. The shoreline is just the place where "the glom", like "the climb", begins.

A person who intends to take [and keep] an advantage, will "glom" an advantage.

If the taking is more symbolic than real, like occupying a public place as a protest, then the protesters are simply "glomming onto" an advantage.

I use the word perhaps every three or four months. I don't know what it's supposed to mean or where I picked it up at - though I think it must have been hanging out with other computerists. I get the same sense of "stickiness" that others report, but also the notion of attractiveness - like electrical or gravitational. Oddly, at the moment I can't think of exactly HOW I use it, but I'm pretty sure I've never used it to mean "understand."

It's one of those words on which I latch when I'm groping for a more discriptive term and think, "Well, this pretty much conveys what I intend."

k

>never used [glom] to mean "understand."

I'd use 'grok' in that instance. :)

Being the old harrumphy(®) prescriptivist that I am, I prefer to keep grok in its sense of comprehending completely, including all the ramifications and unintended consequences. This means that, for lack of a real world referrent, it is a word that is never used.

Grok, from the Martian, 'to comprehehnd, understand completely'.

This discussion makes me feel like a stranger in a strange land.

This discussion makes me feel like a stranger in a strange land.

If it gloms onto you, you will grok it.

But it's sticky like a booger, and you might have to wash your hands afterwards.

I think that pretty much sums it up, Father Steve.

Isn't it interesting just how a word like "grok", sourced from a book and never used anywhere else previously, can become well-enough known that a conversation about it here doesn't actually have everyone asking (a) what it means, and (b) where it comes from?

I wonder if Robert the Misogynist .. er, Heinlein would really want to be remembered for just ONE word, given his prodigous, if repetitive, literary output?

I wonder if Robert the Misogynist .. er, Heinlein would really want to be remembered for just ONE word

An ingenious playwright can create an entire scene "out" of ONE word.

ONE word can germinate an entirely new way of looking at or investigating reality, for instance, the word "biosystems" which is said to be sweeping through academia today.

ONE Word can even launch a universe, or all the universes, so the bible instructs.

Any person who creates ONE word which ignites untold thousands of minds and sets them racing off into untold thousands of new directions, has a place in history for all time, wouldn't you say?

Consider our own Faldo ... who inspired "adroitless".

How much faldage has Faldage toiled so fruitlessly to publish all of these many years without a single word of it springing to mind when it might serve some useful purpose?

Consider then the triumphant singularity of a single word, just ONE word, in the life of our very own Faldage.

If Faldo never inspires or creates another single new word, can anyone say Faldo is livid in vain?

Even if no-one else were to remember "adroitless", "adroitless" will always be on the tip of Faldo's tongue.

Some will say, that's exactly where "adroitless" belongs.

[Just kiddin, Faldage. Male bonding stuff, ya know.]

Funny ... I thought that Faldage's most noteworthy coinage (not that he got paid, or anything) was "yeahbut©"

My comment about "grok" was expressing some surprise about a word which is not in the general literature but which is fairly generally known and understood. A straw poll in my work team shows that everyone in the team knows it and what it means and that most of them know who came up with it and name of the book it was in. Only a few have actually read the book. I was reminded, however, that it was shamelessly ripped off and used by the creator the "Judge Dredd" comic.

My team is made up in roughly equal numbers of IT geeks and bankers.

Yeahbut© was, I believe, attually® tsuwm's.

Geez, you really don't know when to keep stum, do you? And if you did coin "adroitlessly", when did you do it and where is the evidence that we need to present to the OED?

I din't never say I coined 'adroitless' An if you thinks I'm gone try and steal tsuwm's thunder an risk having faldage come up in his dictionary meaning 'thunderthief' you best recalibrate yo thinking cap.

... and *I thought it was maverick.
apparently, stum's *not the word