If you’ve ever left a comment on a blog, you may very well have come across
“word” verification.
On blogs hosted by Blogger, as elsewhere, the author can select an option asking
people commenting to type a seemingly random bunch of letters to prove that they’re actual humans rather than automated envoys of mischief or malevolence. This used to take the form of a single nonsense string that almost always could be a real word, but wasn’t; then, last year, the hosting service joined the ranks of websites using heinously jumbled-up, visually skewed mixes of characters. Previously the nonsense “words” tended to have vowels and consonants placed in such an order that they were pronounceable, leading me to invent definitions for them based on actual words, morphemes, and phrases they suggested.
Yesterday the can of Campbell’s soup went up in the sidebar to signify that posts
are backed up and slow with the going. I’ve been under the weather and less productive than usual lately, perhaps as a cosmic reminder not to make grand plans. On top of that, my Internet connection turned equally lethargic today.
So while things will hopefully get up to speed again soon I wanted to at least publish this note as preamble to a batch of word-verification definitions. Faithful readers are familiar with the exercise; anyone who isn’t can find an explanation in a page on the blog collecting all such entries to date.
As suggested by my title, I’m running out of content for these posts, largely because of Blogger’s switch earlier this year to a different verification mechanism that prompts fewer imagined definitions from me. The next installment in this series will probably
be the last.
• assfu — [ass foo] n. Martial art based on literally kicking your opponent’s butt.
• bininsic — [bin in sik] phr. Quick explanation for lack of activity outside the home.
• compery — [kom puh ree] n. Rackin’ up freebies.
• dectus — [dek tuss] n. A catcus as big as ten normal cacti.
• Essencei™ — [eh sen say] The cologne for hard-working dojo masters. “You chop the sandalwood in half. We combine its fragrant oil with hints of strawberry and musk. Essencei.”
I’ll have legally been 42 for 24 hours at the stroke of midnight. Regular visitors here
will recognize this post’s title as referring not just to my age, per an earlier post today, but fitting the pattern of my occasional volleys of word-verification definitions (collected and explained for the uninitiated at that link). I’ve taken to publishing these when I expect the blog to lie fallow for a spell, as well as simply when the mood strikes, but while I can see some things getting in the way of new posts over the next couple of weeks I confess that I’m not yet sure to which scenario this entry applies.
• androjor — [an dro jor] n. Robot duplicate of Superman’s Kryptonian father.
• bucritas — [buh kree tahss] pl. n. A Mexican dish made from pirate meat.
• cobside — [kob syd] adj. Near an ear of corn.
• dingdoc — [ding dok] n. Popular subgenre in Australian cinema of nature films featuring wild dogs.
• entheist (1) — [en thee ist] n. One who worships the 14th letter of the English alphabet.
With new posts being sparse here lately and several months having passed since my
last volley of word-verification definitions, I think it’s time for another.
The backlog is growing short, as I wrote earlier this year, thanks to Blogger’s switch
in formats yielding less choice material. I’ll probably close the door on this series after
a few more installments, based on current reserves and the sluggish pace at which new entires are added to my stockpile, whereas for quite some time after I began the well was replenished at a strong, steady pace. You are hereby referred to my stand-alone page collecting past entries, where this phenomenon is explained, if it’s unfamiliar to you.
• agamsee — [uh gam see] phr. Edward G. Robinson pointing out some dame’s leg.
• clonyma — [kloh nee mah] n. Your mother’s genetically engineered duplicate.
• counduct — [kown dukt] n. How Dracula behaves.
• daymews — [day myooz] pl.n. My cat’s morning wake-up sounds.
The state of the blog is once again a clog, and I have only myself to blame.
While Blogger is highly complicit in making even slightly tricky posts much trickier than they should be, I’m supposed to remember that. Yet here I sit with things backed up in part because I wanted to present some image-heavy offerings before taking the kind of extended break that I so often try to schedule and never really get to follow through on — because an unintentional hiatus manifests first, leaving me with a drive to just get those “last” few efforts published for peace of mind and personal satisfaction.
So I’m riding out the waves of a perfect storm comprising the usual technical snafus
and health issues combined with the prolonged wake of a sad occasion that I’ve been trying and failing to write about, ever more exhausted, producing sentences that run on like Bart Allen after too much Halloween candy and too little patience to suss out a good simile. I therefore, hereby, and forthwith offer up another slice of the vocabularium imaginarium that is my log of word-verification definitions, whose backstory can be found on their dedicated page, with hopes but no promises that posts will resume flowing after some requisite spring cleaning.
• adangst — [ad angst] n. What keeps us tuning in to watch Don Draper.
• barifti — [bar eef tee] pl. n. Ftarbuckf employeef.
• calvic — [kal vik] adj. Having a stuffed tiger that comes to life when nobody else is around.
• chirk — [churk] n. An obnoxiously noisy little bird.
• explo — [eks ploh] n. A dynamite convention.
While posting here is never easy, at times yet another new Blogger problem crops
up or I forget about an older glitch because I’d been avoiding it for a spell or I just don’t have the patience to deal with the workarounds and troubleshooting, so it seems even harder and plans get kicked down the road again. That’s when I’ll put up the Campbell’s soup can or its associate the bottle of Devil Tylenol from Hell — and when I share another batch of word-verification definitions. I’ve explained the phenomenon before in my first such post and more recently on the dedicated page of this blog that collects them all to date.
• ashible — [ash ih bull] adj. Made of such substance as will be reduced to powder by burning.
• Boxidect™ — [boks ih dekt] It’s ten — ten — ten boxes in one!
• caticeph — [kat ih sef] n. A being with a feline head.
Since I’m under the weather and behind on everything, here’s another batch of the word-verification definitions that I leave when commenting on other blogs. An explanation of what’s going on and a collection of all the definitions to date can be found at the dedicated page I’ve set up for that purpose.
• adynog — [ad ee nahg] n. (Spanglish) Having promotional material in one hand, a traditional Yuletide drink in the other.
• britend — [brit end] n. 1. A bum (not a panhandler; rather, the buttocks region) in Merry Olde England. 2. The farthest point of the United Kingdom’s territorial waters in the English Channel or Atlantic Ocean.
• colifou — [koh ly foo] n. French bacteria strain that takes your sanity.
• copone — 1. [kop wun] v. Get handsy. 2. [koh pohn] v. Make cornbread in tandem.
• Exhiali — [eks hee ah lee] Alien race of heavy breathers.
• Flumenta™ — [floo men tuh] The first FDA-approved treatment for psychic influenza.
• grizato — [grih zah toh] n. Italian ice cream made from brown bears. [No animals were actually harmed in the creation of this definition.]
I’m not feeling particularly grumpy, nor am I going to wax philosophical about the passage of time here like I did in my last birthday post. Really the title is just to keep up the usual conceit of my word-verification definition offerings. For those not familiar with the phenomenon, I’ve explained it on the dedicated page that collects accumulated entries to date.
• antick — [an tik] n. 1. Ye olde foolish behaviour. 2. Half ant, half tick.
• bledlump — [bled lump] n. A smidge of clotted exsanguination.
• botica — [bah tih kuh] n. The study of ’droids and other ’tomatons.
• Clola™ — [cloh luh] Clam-flavored cola. (Don’t knock it ’til you’ve tried it.)
(Uh... But don’t try it.)
• derbsaly — [durb suh lee] adv. About or referring to a horse race, or a sporting contest in general. “Derbsaly speaking, Kentucky is my favorite.”
As you can plainly see, I’ve put the Campbell’s soup can into effect.
I was hoping to have thoughts on the last Harry Potter film up soon, never mind all
the other posts in the pipeline. But of course if wishes were horses I’d be buried under a pile of stallions, mares, foals, ’n’ fillies — and I know too well that just wanting a thing to be does not, in the words of Jean-Luc Picard, to mix my multimedia franchises, make it so. Which brings us to another round of word-verification definitions, those lists of lexicographical alchemy that result from my attempts to conjure a bit of amusing sense from nonsense; for more on the phenomenon, you’re welcome to click through the boldface type above to the page on this blog that explains it and collects the definitions to date, while I try to regroup.
• afenemat — [uh fen uh mat] n. What you lay outside to welcome visitors who insist on entering through the window.
• BenCur — [ben kur] The (sadly unsuccessful) all-dog production of Ben-Hur.
• cacturne — [kak turn] n. Short, romantic piano composition about desert plants.
I have the blog’s first stand-alone page up, a collection of my word-verification definitions (with an explanation for the uninitiated), so here’s another installment of that series in celebration.
• applayer — [ap play ur] n. Someone hooked on their smartphone games.
• bedness — [bed niss] n. Whedon-esque term for sleeping: “After a night like that, I’m just looking for some quick snackage and the bedness.”
• boation — [bo shun] n. Movement on a seafaring craft.
• cardosm — [kard oz um] n. The result of enjoying shuffling a little too much.
• distendee — [diss ten dee] n. A swelled guy.
• endene — [en deen] n. The last element molecule of unsaturated hydrocarbons containing a double bond we will ever create or discover. (Nagging doubts to the rescue!)
• exest — [eks est] adj. 1. The most former. 2. (exEST) n. A transplant from the Atlantic coast of North America.
• firefib — [fiyr fib; fiy ur fib] n. Lies about arson.
• Fitican — [fih tih kun] The workout room at the Vatican.
... Meaning, which I tend to use in some form or another to title a list of word-verification definitions, but also mourning and a myriad of other things that have kept me from posting, as well as mulling over how to publish the content currently in the pipeline for this blog.
• actato — n. [ak tay toh] Spud that doth trod the boards.
• CountOG — [kownt oh jee] The rarely seen “original gangsta” version of Sesame Street’s Count von Count.
• eouns — pl. n. [ee ahnz] Variant British spelling of eons: “That is my favourite colour in eouns.”
• eurth — n. [yurth] Ground bordered by the Atlantic Ocean, Africa, Asia, and the Arctic Circle.
• Flutrina™ — [floo tree nuh] Nutritional supplement formulated for wind-instrument players.
The setup of the blog’s new home has been awfully slow going, while posts-to-be are piling up and getting stale, so I’m going to give publishing here another try for a limited run. Perhaps the spirit of the season will pervade even the grinchitude of Blogger’s grinding gears... Of course there’s no better way to kick things off than with a batch of word-verification definitions, collected and explained for the curious at that link.
• apersed — n. [ah pur sed] “&” with a cold.
• brqua — n. [burr kwah] Ice water.
• cesinema — n. [see zin eh muh] The niche film genre concerning movies made about the alkali element Cesium. (It’s rare but it tends to get really big reactions.)
You’re reading this because no other posts have gone up in several days despite my
best efforts and profound desires to the contrary. I haven’t done much commenting on other folks’ blogs lately, either, so the following pretty well exhausts my supply of word-verification witticism for the nonce. Those of you unfamiliar with this exercise are directed to the master list of definitions, which explains the idea and collects the contents of all such material to date.
arrater — [ahr ay tur] n. Someone who decides that movies have too much sex, violence, or profanity for G, PG, or PG-13.
bousnext — [booz nekst] phr. The way the maitre d’ at a tacky Halloween-themed restaurant greets folks in line.
boyawk — [boy awk] n. A young male bird of prey.
cathopi — [kath oh pye] n. A flexible tube 3.14159 mm. in diameter inserted for bladder relief.
conesses — pl. n. 1. [kah neh siz] Lady tricksters. 2. [koh ness iz] Men sharing the lead role in The Untouchables.
dreeabl — [dree ah bul] n. Southern dribble.
Filetro — [fih leh troh] Arch-criminal known for boning his victims. (You know what I mean.)
gewse — [gyoos] n. A very British goose.
Grank — [grank] The 2035 installment of Jason Statham’s Chev Chelios franchise.
I’m sharing a batch of verification-word definitions again so soon because with July at an end I find myself faced with a meager two posts for the month. One would actually be fine, since there were valid reasons for the lack of blogging — among them my connection problems, which have already pushed the publication of this dispatch past the date stamped on it — but two is just inelegant, so I’m going for three.
August should find renewed activity, with plenty of posts waiting to be fleshed out
or in some cases merely entered online, proofread, and graphicked up. There will be more about comics, finally, as well as some film and TV reviews that I decided to hold back until their video releases or the start of the new season since the posts were no longer timely. Subjects include Avatar, Inception, the Archie multiverse, Batman RIP and beyond, Secret Six, Asterios Polyp, and True Blood, in addition to the afore-mentioned essays on returning TV series that’ll come further down the pike. I’d love
to hear thoughts from the followers that Blogger says I have on which of those posts interest you most.
Here are the latest in my dwindling reserve of definitions, meanwhile. They’re also being added to my omnibus post “The Mean Streak”, where you can find an explanation of just what this is about if you’re new to the concept.
equit — [ee kwit] v. Take a sabbatical from online activity.
I’m sorry to have gone so long without a post. No-one misses regular activity on this blog more than I do, but it looks as though I’ll be in hibernation mode here for a while yet. Up goes the infamous Campbell’s soup can once more.
If you’ve ever left a comment on a blog, you may very well have come across word verification — and if you’ve been following this blog at all the past several months, you may very well have seen my lists of verification-word definitions.
As I explained in my first such post (“Mean”), then illustrated in one last month
(“Even Meaner”), word verification is a check that authors on Blogger/Blogspot can select to help ensure that it’s humans leaving comments and not spamming robots. When one has comments enabled on one’s blog, among the info at the end of a post (labels, time stamp, etc.) is how many comments there are. Clicking on that line takes you to the comments page and/or a pop-up window where you can read the comments to date and submit your own. When verification is turned on, below the comment box will be a jumble of letters that usually could almost be a word — as opposed to the total mess of consonants and numbers often seen when filling out forms online — but isn’t, except on the rare occasions when the randomizing algorithm ends up with an actual word accidentally; you must type those letters correctly for your comment to be accepted. Some blogs also have moderation turned on for all or at least older posts, so your comment won’t show up until the proprietor of the blog has reviewed it.
I’ve taken to sharing definitions for my verification words in my comments, should a definition come readily to mind for the word on the screen at that moment. The idea is similar to Sniglets, which Rich Hall popularized on HBO’s Not Necessarily the News and in a series of books back in the ’80s, but in reverse. While I lay absolutely no claim to being either the first or the best at this, I amass these definitions regularly when commenting on other blogs and now offer them up periodically here on mine, often when there’s a dry spell. In this case, although I have posts in the pipeline, the Internet connection has been troublesome and my metaphorical batteries are low, so it’s a fine time. You’re not only welcome but encouraged to leave definitions for your own verification words when leaving a comment on this or any post here.
The can of Campbell’s soup is in the sidebar, due to connection problems as well as projects that aren’t being dealt with as efficiently as I’d like. For those who’ve not seen it before, I should point out that the can is a mysterious “ancient Internet tradition” begun by Mark Evanier, as explained and in fact recently invoked by Evanier on his blog, News from ME, which if your interests are anything like mine offers a variety of fine, funny, and fascinating material by the bushel.
I hope to have a volley of posts up soon (yeah, When don’t I?), but meantime here’s another batch of Blogger word-verification definitions.
abendsl — n. #2 graphite stick, when you’re congested.
betoofsr — Father of Betoof Jr.
boophala — n. A shout-out from Ms. Betty.
I need to take my laptop in to get the DVD drive replaced one day soon. While I’m hoping to get some of the many nearly finished posts on hand published before then, here are more word-verification definitions in the meantime so Miss Peasy is no longer the first thing you see on the blog.
For the benefit of those friends and family members whose only exposure to the blogging world is this page right here, by the way, I’ve finally gotten the bright idea to take a screenshot of the world-verification form.
My keyboard is freaking out again, so posts and comments may be sparse to nonexistent for a while. I hope this issue gets resolved soon, but while the laptop is working I’m updating this post with some more word-verification fun so that it’s more than just bad news.
brawlyst — n. A practitioner of the pugilistic arts.
coape — n. Your gorilla sweetheart.
Colognet — The first cable channel devoted exclusively to smellin’ good.
dehortic — adj. Of the removal of one’s encouragement.
distra — wd. frgmt. Expression often used by easily confused or inattentive people. ex. “Sorry I couldn’t talk before; I was distra... What’s that?”
Emusal — Do you resemble a large, flightless Australian bird more and more with each passing day? Emusal is guaranteed to not only halt but reverse this and other embarrassing avian transformations!
equit — v. To take a sabbatical from online activity.
We’re halfway into January and the lack of posts on this blog o’ mine has turned my usual calm demeanor, well, meaner. I’m trying to find time and energy to get the ever-less-relevant year-end posts back online while not being too discouraged or distracted to write up anything new.
So it’s as good an opportunity as any to post a sequel to “Mean”, the inaugural offering of my first-impression definitions for the (usually) nonsense collections of letters that appear during word verification when submitting comments on many Blogger sites.
Here are a batch of some of the better ones I’ve come up with in the past month or so.
aphyla — Items belonging to no particular taxonomic category.
Bewowsor — “New from RonCo! A device guaranteed to fascinate your friends and loved ones! What does it do? It fascinates your friends and loved ones, we just told you. Order today and get not one but two Bewowsors for the price of one... You pay only shipping and handling. Does it work? Didn’t you just order two?”
Bonicen — A multi-vitamin for folks age 100 and up.
