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Carpal Tunnel
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Carpal Tunnel
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>Rubrick just metioned somewhere "there's that rag, again"< Rag: n. cloth; n. newspaper; n. music, a composition in ragtime; v. to harangue, rail at, scold, torment, tease (also ragging) no feminist-slur intended And this marked origin unknown (sounds like a job for TsuwmMan!...faster than a reading bullet! ) n. 1. any of various hard rocks 2.a large roofing slate that is rough on one side (rocks?...stales?) And this: n. chiefly Brit: an outburst of boisterous fun; also PRANK (sounds like mav's department on both counts!  ) Also n. the stringy axis and white fibrous membrane of a citrus fruit, but Anu had a Daily Word for this last spring I liked much better...gotta look it up though, unless someone beats me to it. All citations from Websters
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Carpal Tunnel
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Carpal Tunnel
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mine (belonging to me) mine (gold, silver, coal etc.)
fine (penalty) fine (good)
pine (tree) pine (for the fjords)
Bingley
Bingley
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Carpal Tunnel
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Carpal Tunnel
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PRANK (sounds like mav's department on both counts!Being a maverick, I shall take this as an invitation to comment... on another thing entirely! Kent Rag or ragstone describes a characteristic dense limestone found in the area of the lower Downlands, of a soft grey mellowed with glints of many sandstone colours. 
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Carpal Tunnel
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Carpal Tunnel
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>we are looking for a set of words with completely distinct meanings
actually, I think we are looking for a set of words with completely distinct *origins. as today is a day off for me, I will take the opportunity to wax pedantic on this subject. I took helen's challenge to apply to lexical units that are spelled the same but have different meanings and, by implication, different etymologies. I believe helen's followup posts contain words which exhibit these characteristics, as do Bingley's. words which have multiple senses (such as set) don't meet this test and are interesting for different reasons. helen (please correct me if I misstate your case, of troy) has asked for words that, probably through happenstance, have been canonized by Johnson and Webster et al with equivalent symbol strings.
sanction, for instance, doesn't make the grade; its multiple (and opposing!) meanings come from a single source. the same goes for rule.
the three meanings of cricket, on the other hand, seem to stem from three unique origins, although the ultimate origin of the name for the game is uncertain (according to OED).
root has only two variants, each with a noun and verb form.
in the case of plant roots, the verb came later. in the case of to root with the snout, a not too useful noun followed -- the old wroot spelling was influenced by the other root, and the coincidental dirt factor.
nothing is simple.
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Carpal Tunnel
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root has only two variants...plant roots...to root with the snout
And the rooting that wombats (the two legged variety*) indulge in is related to rooting with the snout?
*That which they do after they eat and before they leave
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Carpal Tunnel
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re: wombats, foma & granfaloons
>related to rooting with the snout?
just so.
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Carpal Tunnel
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OP
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yes, thank you twuwm-- Wow got it right (which is why i followed up and showed two root words for foil and thanks wow, that was a new one for me!)
Bear is an other..
gnome too..
one is a garden gnome.. a troll like creature..gnomus
but a gnome as in a maxim, comes from a similar looking root, but goes to the greek gnome-- for knowlegde...
sometimes very different meanings arise from the same root.. (cosmetics (make up)and cosmos (universe)-- and the connection is only clear when you look at the root.. (kosmos- to neaten, to be orderly..)we have looked at roots, and their families of words..Gen comes to mind.(genisis, aboriginal..etc.,)
homonyms.. are interesting too.. some times they are extended meanings of the root..
(rule is a good example.. all those different meanings are from one root word!)
but sometimes.. they are different root words that have come to be spelled and pronounced the same--and still kept their old meanings.
Cleave is the only example i know of totally opposite meanings.. but CASE might surprise you.. a legal case and brief case are two different cases!
one word goes back to chance or circumstanses.. (casus-to fall) and that is a case as in grammer or a legal case..or a police case..
the other case that goes back to caspa-- chest, is a suitcase, or or briefcase, or even, by extention, a casement of a window.
the legal brief that is carried in a brief case(2), about the legal case(1)..Case is two total different words, with totally different roots!
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Carpal Tunnel
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old hand
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old hand
Joined: Jan 2001
Posts: 771 |
Dingy:
din·gy [1] (dĭn'jį)
Darkened with smoke and grime; dirty or discolored.
Shabby, drab, or squalid.
[Possibly from Middle English dinge, dung, variant of dung. See dung.]
ding·y [2] (dĭng'į)
adj. Slang.
Crazy; insane.
Atomica doesn't give me any etymology for this, but I'm not seeing a clear connection from dung.
Howzat?
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veteran
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veteran
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Wild guesses
toll ( bridge tax vs bell ringing )
limb (branch vs edge of a nebula, not sure...these might be related)
lox (liquid oxy vs salmon)
fall (autumn vs from grace?)
bat (club vs winged mammal)
page (paper or html vs temptation for a congressman)
score (music sheet vs number of points)
ground (beneath the tyrant's boot vs what underlies even a commoner's sole) i dunno. maybe these are related.
race (contest vs kind)
grave (necrophile's hangout vs serious)
list maybe? (like tilt vs an enumeration of items?)
seal (water mammal vs special mark)
troll (bait vs hermione's attacker)
k
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