Mogshade. Bliffert. Sloomy. Plog.

February 26, 2018 3:53 PM

Haggard Hawks is a web site, web log, twitter feed, YouTube channel, etc., by Paul Anthony Jones, devoted to obscure words, language facts, and etymology.

Mogshade: an old English dialect word for the shadows cast by trees.
Bliffert: a short but sudden fall of snow.
Sloomy: sluggish or dull-witted.
Plog: to hamper or disadvantage something.

posted by carter (4 comments total)

Lovely. My kind of blog. Thanks.
posted by MovableBookLady at 7:20 PM on February 26, 2018

Directly into my RSS feed...
posted by jim in austin at 8:23 PM on February 26, 2018

Here's a good time to mention that the excellent Online Etymology Dictionary now has a companion blog on facebook.
posted by gold-in-green at 10:30 PM on February 26, 2018

Well, the "language facts" are not always facts. I notice he repeats this long-exploded myth: "The Russian word RAZBLIUTO means ‘the feeling you have for someone you once loved but no longer do’." (A respondent in that Twitter thread provided a link to my 2005 post on the topic, where we learn that the “word” originated in the ’60s TV show The Man from U.N.C.L.E.!) And Stan Carey, in the midst of an otherwise favorable review of one of his books (Stan is much more tender-hearted than I am), wrote:

The fact-checking occasionally falls short. Volcano is not an example of anapaest, since the order of short/unstressed and long/stressed syllables is crucial. Platypodes and octopodes are not ‘the only truly correct forms’ unless you think English should behave like Greek. Fuck is a couple of centuries older than 1475 (and bowdlerising another swearword seems unduly prim). I also noticed a handful of typos.

So: enjoy, but grain of salt.
posted by languagehat at 7:55 AM on February 27, 2018 [3 favorites]