Bill Kirby: I would like to have a word with you - The Augusta Chronicle - Dictionary

“Dictionaries are like watches; the worst is better than none, and the best cannot be expected to go quite true.”

― Samuel Johnson

Welcome back to Professor Bill's School of Wayward Words.

I continue to be surprised by the words in the English language that I did not know existed. As someone who has read and edited for decades, I'm often amazed, not by the technical words or phrases, but by a simple combination of letters that reveals something I'd never seen.

I save these on my computer laptop and am now up to 112.

Here are some of the latest.

Cossetted – It means "pampered." 

Chiasm – An intersection or crossing of two tracts in the form of the letter "X". I like to think of it this way: It's the opposite of a "chasm" – that separation between two bodies, such as a canyon. A chiasm ("chi" is the Greek word for "X") is where two bodies connect.

Heuristic – In mathematics or decision making, a heuristic is basically a shortcut. You sacrifice accuracy for speed and say, "Close enough." (Which is the way my wife says I figure out income taxes.)

Porphyry – "A textural term for an igneous rock consisting of large-grained crystals such as feldspar or quartz dispersed in a fine-grained silicate." (I thought it was that stuff you put in small bowls to make a room smell good.) 

Koan – It comes from Zen Buddhism and is a paradox or riddle that illustrates shortfalls in logical reasoning. One of the examples offered is whether a tree falling in the woods creates a sound if there is no one to hear it.

ANOTHER COLLECTION: Yes, I am also still "collecting" license tags, keeping track of different states in my travels since last summer. I was down to two until last week when I spotted Hawaii on a dark gray Honda in front of me at the stoplight. Now I'm down to one – Rhode Island. Providence, I hope, will help me out.

BASEBALL BEGINS: Major League Baseball returns Thursday with the Braves opening in Philadelphia.

I like to think this means my life will return to a little bit of normal, but normal is hard to define anymore. Take our local professional team, the Augusta GreenJackets. They don't begin their season until May.

No April games, which used to be my favorites. The players were all new and the nights were not as humid.

TODAY'S JOKE: A man goes into a drug store and asks the pharmacist if he has anything to cure hiccups.

The druggist leans forward and abruptly slaps the man's face.

"What was that for?" the startled gentleman asks, rubbing his jaw.

"Well," said the pharmacist, "you don't have the hiccups anymore, do you?"

"No," said the man, "but my wife out in the car still does."