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Tsuwm's wwftd is putz, which has to be used with discretion, since it can be an actively resented insult. But I remembered that the German word is quite acceptable, meaning "finery", such as jewelry or stylish clothing. To check this, I searched and found an excellent German-English dictionary I had not seen before. I would have sent it to MaxQ, but if I understand him, he has filled the space he had vacant. German English dictionary: http://dict.leo.org/?search=Putz&searchLoc=0&relink=on&deStem=standard&lang=en
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Uh, dr. bill, let us just say that if there were a yiddish equivalent to George Carlin's "Seven Words that May Not Be Said on Television", then "p*tz" would be on that list, indeed would be very high on that list.
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Dear Keiva: We all know what a euphemism is. What is the word for the Yiddish practice of taking a benign word, and turning it into an obscenity?
My younger brother got a ruptured eardrum for calling someone a "schmeckelbeiser" completely ignorant that it was such a potent insult.
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Dear Keiva: Re: schmeckelbeiser, I tried to look up "schmuck" which I have heard used in a decidedly pejorative way. If I remember correctly, in German it meant "adornment" of '"jewel". But I did find an interesting site about how often Yiddish words have been accepted in law, even in reported law cases. http://www.law.ucla.edu/faculty/volokh/yiddish.htm
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Reminds me of the two Jewish kids from NY who stole a camel from the circus and were riding it around the Garment District. After a while one of the kids kept getting off the camel and looking underneath, then getting back on. The second kid asked him why he was doing that. "What? You haven't heard all the people talking about how deformed this beast is?"
"No," replied the other.
"You mustn't have been paying attention. At least ten people have said, 'lookat the two schmucks on that camel.'"
TEd
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I also smile at the Smuckers brand of preserves, with the motto " With a name like Smuckers it has to be good."
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TEd, the usual set-up for that punchline is any of several tales, each ending with the question, "Was the camel male of female?"
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Dear Keiva: but the sidewalk commentators correctly discerned the gender of the riders.
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I wanted to ask here: is anyone actually familiar with the purported Penn. Dutch usage; i.e., "a Nativity scene"?
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