Sunday, April 17, 2011

O is for Osculate

Dear Osculate,

You are a very fun word.  I discovered you recently while reading Jennifer Murdley's Toad by Bruce Coville to my kids.  I'd read it several times when I was little, but apparently never bothered to look up the definition of the word osculatory. One of the chapter titles was: Osculatory Experiments. For those of you who took Latin, you will undoubtedly know right away what this means.

Osculate - (verb) "to kiss"
osculated, osculating, osculation (noun), osculatory (adjective)

"Kiss" is one of those words that doesn't have a whole lot of synonyms, and I'm huge on synonyms.  I love finding a variety of words to use so that I'm not using the same word over and over again.

However, I don't think there will ever be a way that I'll be able to use you seriously, dear Osculate.  You may be fun, but you are awkward and clumsy.  Besides that, you remind me of two particular words mashed together and it doesn't paint a very pretty picture in my head.

From,
Someone Who Likes Words


*For fun: What's the best/weirdest sentence you can think of to use "osculate" or a form of it?  I jotted several down in my personal journal after discovering the word, because it was fun and sounded so weird to me.  (I've mentioned I'm a giant nerd, right?) ;)

8 comments:

  1. I don't think you're a nerd at all. :) I love synonyms, too. Kiss is a hard word to find for synonyms. Osculate, however, is a new word for me, thanks for sharing it.

    Hmmm, let's see what kind of sentance I can come up with that uses this word.

    "Mary had bad breath from her tuna sandwitch, so her boyfriend, Brad, did not want to do any osculating."

    Osculate. I have got to use this word more often, thanks again.

    Also, I enjoyed your blog so much I would like to give you the Versatile Blogger Award. You can accept the award here:

    http://thetalesofsiriusthedragon.blogspot.com/

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  2. I love that sentence, Melody. :D And thank you SO MUCH for the award!

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  3. No way! I would NEVER have guessed that that word means to kiss!

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  4. Rachel, I know! It's such an interesting word. :D

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  5. Very cool Rachel! Thanks for giving me a "juicy" word to work with.

    Now let me think of a good sentence...hmmm...here goes:

    When George saw his wife's ire escalate, he quickly chose to osculate away her temper. How was that? Corny, I know. LOL.

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  6. I love discovering new words! If only I could remember them after finding them...

    If words were tangible, I'd probably osculate them.

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  7. septembermom-I don't think it's corny; I think it's sweet. :D

    Ruth-LOL, yeah, I have that trouble sometimes, too. "I know there was a word for this! What was it?" And your sentence made me laugh. :D

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Thanks for sharing your thoughts!