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Jackie #192214 08/03/10 02:38 AM
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Maybe we need a numerology thread (yawn)


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that is the other board, ANAD

Zed #192235 08/04/10 03:02 AM
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laugh

Jackie #192243 08/04/10 04:33 PM
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Learned a new word today, for me: cruciverbalist (lover of
crosswords). Has nothing to do with numerology, but I liked
it, thought I would share it for those who have never heard it.


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I wrote a stupid poem once called "The Cruciverbalist's Curse."
I thought I had lost it when geocities dropped their free sites, but I just found it in some cranny of the ether.

http://womencht.reocities.com/Athens/8994/cross1.html

When I used the word "erudition," I had thought it was my own contrivance, but it seems already to have been coined.

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Erudition, hasn't that been there since a very long time? So you prefered being a cryptocruciverbalist. I'd prefer that too, but I'm very bad at cryptos.

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An acrostic! And then there is the double acrostic where both the beginnings and ends of lines create words. Lewis caroll was a whiz at acrostics.

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Originally Posted By: TheFallibleFiend
I wrote a stupid poem once called "The Cruciverbalist's Curse."
I thought I had lost it when geocities dropped their free sites, but I just found it in some cranny of the ether.

http://womencht.reocities.com/Athens/8994/cross1.html

When I used the word "erudition," I had thought it was my own contrivance, but it seems already to have been coined.



I don't think of it as stupid: I sort of liked it. thanks.


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I think your poem is very clever, FF: it is a visual AND verbal play on words!
===========================================================

Okay--I see where cruciform and cruciverbalist are related, but what about crucible? They aren't cross-shaped, are they?
(I expect that explanation's been either here or in A.W.A.D. somewhere, but I do not have an eidetic memory; sorry.)

Jackie #192271 08/06/10 03:28 AM
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http://www.etymonline.com/index.php?term=crucible says:
early 15c., from M.L. crucibulum "melting pot for metals," originally "night lamp." First element might be M.H.G. kruse "earthen pot." Or perhaps from L. crux on some fancied resemblance to a cross. Used of any severe test or trial since 1640s.

But maybe it's not a physical "fancied resemblance" so much as a vague metaphorical resemblance.

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