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#1694 06/30/00 12:23 PM
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Heard on our national public broadcaster this morning in their 'Word of the Day' segment, and apparently coined by an Australian musician:

Anatadiphobia [spelling uncertain]: the fear that somewhere a duck is watching you.


#1695 06/30/00 02:35 PM
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tsuwm Offline OP
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Anatidae is the Latin name for the family of swimming birds -- ducks, geese, swans, etc. A little Latin +phobia will give you the fear of everything!

pantophobia - the fear of everything
nihilphobia - the fear of nothing
phobophobia - the fear of fear itself
deipnosophobia - a fear of dinner conversation
arachibutyrophobia - the fear of peanut butter sticking to the roof of your mouth


#1696 06/30/00 02:45 PM
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tsuwm Offline OP
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>Anything to get this thread active again!

and thanks for that, paulb!

here's a few more of my fav's:

(a)estivate - to pass the summer in a state of torpor
colporteur - a peddler of religious books (not to be confused with Cole Porter)
coprolite - fossilized excrement
feckless - ineffectual; worthless
muliebrity - femininity
pixilated - slightly unbalanced mentally, bemused
vomitory - the entrance piercing the banks of seats of a stadium

and, of course:
sesquipedalian - given to the use of long words

[try running that through the spelcheque]


#1697 06/30/00 05:56 PM
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Here's a great one from the AWAD archives. It is from Oct.
7th, 1994 :
ddiippllooppiiaapphhoobbiiaa ---fear of double vision!

There is a wonderful discussion notice here, on just this
topic.
And, Tsuwm (good heavens, now I'm trying to make your name
into sue 'em), on Oct. 4th of that year, begins the
search for the correct word for the fear of p-nut butter
sticking to the roof of your mouth, if you haven't seen
it already.


#1698 06/30/00 06:54 PM
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tsuwm Offline OP
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>good heavens, now I'm trying to make your name
into sue 'em

yes, that is approximately how it is pronounced.


#1699 06/30/00 11:31 PM
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>>Psellism is the technical term for stuttering, stammering or lisping<<

What a shame!
Given the posts above I was really hoping psellismophobia was going to be the fear of misspelling!


#1700 07/01/00 08:49 AM
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yeah, why not.

one of my favourite words is: diaphanous.

saw it first in 'heart of darkness' by jc. loved the usage there


#1701 07/01/00 12:00 PM
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>>'heart of darkness' by jc<<
I know I should know this, but who is jc?


#1702 07/01/00 04:06 PM
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James Conrad:

We felt meditative, and fit for nothing but placid staring. The day was ending in a serenity of still and exquisite brilliance. The water shone pacifically; the sky, without a speck, was a benign immensity of unstained light; the very mist on the Essex marsh was like a gauzy and radiant fabric, hung from the wooded rises inland, and draping the low shores in diaphanous folds. Only the gloom to the west, brooding over the upper reaches, became more sombre every minute, as if angered by the approach of the sun.



#1703 07/02/00 01:42 AM
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>>James Conrad:<<
Thanks. I have to ask this, Tsuwm:
do you have an amazing memory, or an amazing (to me at least) facility w/ the Internet, or both??




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