I don't feel like talking about today. The weather's depressing (not rainy per se but grey) and my day so far is boring. That's all I want to say about it. So let's get straight to today's candidates for Word of the Day:
- 'milieuplan' (environmental plan). This word is used ironically: the specific political plans it refers to were actually an attempt to bypass European norms on air pollution. That's right - the plans were there to *enable* more pollution. The word itself doesn't exist but its big brother 'milieuplanning' does. But the counterintuitive meaning as used here inspired me to nominate it.
- 'orkaanseizoen' (hurricane season). This word is not listed in the dictionary, and it refers to the upcoming Carribbean hurricane 'period', which is expected to contain thirteen storms of which seven could become hurricanes and three could become heavy hurricanes. (?) This period runs from July 15 to November 15. That's four months, folks, not three. It's not a season. In any right. Seasons are four different segments of the year, each spanning three months, selected for their typical temperature and weather conditions, and for the rotation of the Earth around the sun. Let's *please* stop abusing this term for everything that has a period spanning more than one month. Television seasons, hunting seasons, hurricane seasons, gala seasons.. you're all ruining the definition of the word, because each of you spans a different length of time, and each starts at different dates. What makes a season ? To be a season or not to be a season.. it shouldn't be a question.
- 'wildwestwet' (wild west law). This describes a law passed in Florida that allows anyone who gets threatened in the street, to shoot their assailant, even if unarmed. I suppose the 'wild west'-part is accurate considering the wild west basically didn't have laws (or none that were kept up too well) and there was lots of shooting, if we are to believe the many westerns we all must have seen. But... 'wild west' is English. In Dutch it has no meaning involving shooting, we don't have a gunslinging period in our past involving the west side of our nation. 'Wet' is Dutch and means law. But throw all three words together in one, and you end up with a word where 'wet' gets the English meaning. And I just have no clue what to make of it when I consider that. Bad word. Possibly it could be saved by putting a dash in there (wildwest-wet) but it still looks bad, and besides that, this is a media hype word. Media hype words suck !
- In addition to yesterday's nomination of 'Lonsdale-jongeren', today they're even called 'Lonsdalers'. Nominated ! Oh, and they're part of the 'hardcorescene' - translation unnecessary, but you'll no doubt admit the word looks retarded, and it doesn't exist. Also nominated !
- 'probleemouderen' (problem elders). This seems to stem directly from 'probleemjongeren' (problem youth), but these elders aren't beating up or robbing passers-by, dealing drugs, hanging out until late on the corners of streets etc. These are just elderly people with brain damage (I kid you not, it says so in the article) who will not be seperated from their drivers' licence (despite posing a serious threat to, well, anyone, when behind the wheel). The article claims they often correct their own driving style to 'work' with their handicap, and if not, then they can be trained to accomplish this. I wonder how many people need to get run over before one such elder is judged fit for this training. The article seriously worries me (I live in a mainly elderly neighbourhood and can just see myself gettin run over by some old dumbass who the police just won't disallow to drive) but worse, if the article states that their brain damage isn't a problem, why are they referred to as problem elders ?
- 'stadsrapper' (official city rapper). The city of Almere is searching for their own special rapper now to rap about what's worth seeing and knowing about this city. I'm not sure if there are any official city rappers anywhere else in the world, but this is the first one in the Netherlands (the article eagerly tells me). I have no doubt that this nomination runs the risk that the city rappers will become the next craze and suddenly we will have loads of them, but for now this word describes just one. Who isn't even found or hired yet. It's an empty position that they hope to fill in the next month. I smell 'media hype word' here. Fee Fi Fo Fum.
- 'koopkrachtreparatie' (spending power repairs). Again, a political plan that backfired in an ironic way: the measures taken to compensate the chronically ill partially for the ever increasing hospital and care bills, turns out to actually *cost* the ill money. So I'm nominating this for two reasons: one, reduced spending power isn't just limited to the realm of the chronically ill (there's also the unemployed, singles, you name it - everyone's having to tighten the belt a couple of notches at the least.. except for the insanely rich who seem to only have gotten richer under this government), and two, this is hardly a repair, the way it turns out.
And the Word of the Day is... 'wildwestwet'. I went with 'which word looks the stupidest'.
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