Must It Always Be About Sex?
Adam Liptak
New York Times
Sundan, November 2
WASHINGTON — The Supreme Court specializes in law, not lexicography. But it will soon have to consider the meaning of that most versatile of four-letter words.
The Oxford English Dictionary’s three core entries on the word — noun, verb and interjection — are about six times as long as this article. That doesn’t count about 30 derivations and compounds, all colorful and many recent. The nimble word, the dictionary tells us, can help express that a person is incompetent; that another is not be meddled with; that a situation has been botched; that one does not have the slightest clue; and, in a recent addition, that someone has enough money to be able to quit an unpleasant job.
You know the word I mean.
2 comments:
I just heard a voice in my head saying "Wu-Tang Clan ain't nothing to be meddled with!"
...doesn't work.
ha!
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