Sorry, I can’t resist posting about another Wordcraft word of the day. This is another untranslatable German word:
fisselig: flustered into incompetence because a critical person is watching
Yup, we need that one, too!
Sorry, I can’t resist posting about another Wordcraft word of the day. This is another untranslatable German word:
fisselig: flustered into incompetence because a critical person is watching
Yup, we need that one, too!
Since one can never have too much extraneous information clogging one’s inbox, I’ve subscribed to the Wordcraft “Word of the Day” email. Many days the word is one I already know, or, since I don’t aspire to David Foster Wallacian writing, is too arcane to be of interest.
But yesterday’s email was kind of fun. The theme is untranslatable words: words that don’t exist in English but should. The email first introduced a book on this subject, “They Have a Word for It,” by Howard Rheingold, then gave the word of the day, the German Korinthenkacker (core-IN-ten-COCK-er): “a person overly concerned with trivial details, [Literally, ‘raisen-sh*tter’]”:
The Korinthenkacker is the guy whose desk has every item perfectly in place, neatly aligned. The Korinthenkacker is the guy who insists on figuring the precise to-the-penny amount (plus tax) owed by each of six people who have dined together at a restaurant. The Korinthenkacker, says Rheingold, is “anyone who couldn’t find a forest because he or she is too busy applying a magnifying glass to an inspection of the bark of one tree.”
I agree, a very useful word; I plan to bandy it about, liberally, the second it catches on :-)