[QUOTE=only_human;422396]
[URL="https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/wonk/wp/2016/01/13/the-totes-amazesh-way-millennials-are-changing-the-english-language/"]The totes amazesh way millennials are changing the English language[/URL][/QUOTE]From that article:

[I]There aren’t any English words, for instance, that end on “nf” or “aish” — which is totally arbitrary[/I]

That depends on your dialect. For instance, Cockney speakers are world-renowned for pronouncing voiced-th as v and unvoiced-th as f. Hence, for example, the saying of the hopeful sculptor: [I]Some day my plinf will come.[/I] A recent example of the voiced variety which came to a global audience is [I]You aint no Muslim, bruv.[/I]

[QUOTE]There aren’t any English words, for instance, that end on “nf”[/QUOTE]

It does occur, however, in Gaelic:
[URL]https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Banff,_Aberdeenshire#Etymology[/URL]

It sounds a lot like [URL="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Shorthand"]stenography[/URL], dropping the vowels and having special signs for terminations, and I think that is human nature to do it so (well... the steno was driven by the need to write fast with the pencil on the paper, the other is driven by the need to use the small on-screen kbd and to look "cute" - don't tell me, we have a feral teenagers[SUP]TM[/SUP] here in house..)

[QUOTE=Nick;422536]It does occur, however, in Gaelic:
[URL]https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Banff,_Aberdeenshire#Etymology[/URL][/QUOTE]

And in maff, where I learned the standard abbreviation of 'infimum' (both written and spoken) to be "inf".

Today's word is [I]Outredgeous[/I]. It is a variety of lettuce as described here by a seed vendor:
[url]http://www.highmowingseeds.com/organic-non-gmo-seeds-outredgeous-lettuce.html[/url]
[QUOTE]Out-does all the reds, forming a loose teenage head with spectacular solid magenta color. Outredgeous is so red that botany students didn't recognize it as lettuce when they saw it in the Wild Garden Seeds breeding nursery. Makes an eye-catching statement in your premium salad mix. Bred by Frank Morton and released under the Open Source Seed Initiative; now growing at the International Space Station! Open Source Seed · Great baby leaf variety · Upright habit (Lactuca sativa)[/QUOTE]
So this is an amusing turn on the word [I]outrageous[/I]. I came across it when a different sentence piqued my interest enough to read an article about a little space garden:
[URL="http://phys.org/news/2016-01-mold-space-station-mars.html"]How mold on space station flowers is helping get us to Mars[/URL]
[QUOTE]The zinnia plants began to exhibit [B]guttation[/B] and [B]epinasty[/B], both signs of plant stress. [/QUOTE]
I looked up both words; I had no clue whatsoever. The sound is much more luridly evocative than any actual meaning would be. While I am on that article, they misspelled [I]Outredgeous[/I] as [I]Outredgrous[/I] but that is understandable since it is a variety name and not a regular workhorse of the English language - unlike, (ahem), guttation and epinasty.

A last thought: I like the quotidian nature of gardening discussions with ground support (from the above article):
[QUOTE]By Christmas Eve, though, Kelly called down to the ground support team to report new problems with the plants. It seemed the high fan speed was drying out the crop too much, and Kelly said he thought they needed more water. He was told, though, that the next scheduled watering was not until Dec. 27.

"I think that would be too late," Kelly told the ground team. "You know, I think if we're going to Mars, and we were growing stuff, we would be responsible for deciding when the stuff needed water. Kind of like in my backyard, I look at it and say 'Oh, maybe I should water the grass today.' I think this is how this should be handled."[/QUOTE]

[URL="http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/blogs-magazine-monitor-35279102"]The Vocabularist: When plastics stopped being plastic[/URL]
[QUOTE]Nevertheless, it was only in the 1950s that "quality" UK newspapers started saying things were "made of plastic" rather than "made of plastic material".

Meanwhile, the word's meaning developed so that sometimes it is rather the opposite of the original sense.

A plastic fork, for instance, could be said to be anything but plastic.

The material it was made from was plastic - that is, easily moulded - but the fork itself is brittle and quite incapable of being moulded into anything else.

Unless it is melted again - and then it stops being a fork.[/QUOTE]
[YOUTUBE]PSxihhBzCjk[/YOUTUBE]

[url]https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Verlan[/url]
[QUOTE][B]Verlan[/B] (French pronunciation: ​[vɛʁlɑ̃]) is an argot in the French language, featuring inversion of syllables in a word, and is common in slang and youth language. It rests on a long French tradition of transposing syllables of individual words to create slang words.[1] The name [I]verlan[/I] is an example: it is derived from inverting the sounds of the syllables in [I]l'envers[/I] ([lɑ̃vɛʁ], "the inverse", frequently used in the sense of "back-to-front").[/QUOTE]
YouTube: [URL="http://youtu.be/m75CK3O9FCU"]French Verlan for Dummies[/URL] (3:02)
[YOUTUBE]m75CK3O9FCU[/YOUTUBE]

nofly list:
list of people whose recreational drug use violates their terms of probation.

Recently I read that hairdresser shop names in another language were also formed from puns. So I have finally found a legitimate everyday use for puns.

In the department of corrections department, on the several occasions that I've tried to use the word [I]irregardless[/I] as an obviously deliberate but colorful mistake, each and every time I've been gravely corrected to make sure that I was aware that it was a mistake.

The only time that I have been corrected more vehemently was the single time that I used the word [I]Frisco[/I].

I'm trying to recall legitimate uses of double negatives in English as a negative intensifier. I noticed them a long time ago as occurring when one of the negatives was hidden in the definition of a word. As far as single negatives, prescriptivists seem to have no problem with a negative in a question merely riding along to indicate expectation instead of being used for negation.

Oh yeah, one more. Does anyone in casual speech pronounce [I]bona fide[/I] with the correct number of syllables?
[QUOTE]bo·na fide
ˌbōnə ˈfīdē/
adjective
1.
genuine; real.
"only bona fide members of the company are allowed to use the logo"
synonyms: authentic, genuine, real, true, actual; More
adverbLAW
1.
sincerely; without intention to deceive.
"the court will assume that they have acted bona fide"[/QUOTE]

[QUOTE=only_human;425351]Oh yeah, one more. Does anyone in casual speech pronounce [I]bona fide[/I] with the correct number of syllables?[/QUOTE]What is the correct number of syllables in your opinion?

I pronounce each word with two syllables, as in the Latin which it so obviously is.

[QUOTE=xilman;425426]What is the correct number of syllables in your opinion?

I pronounce each word with two syllables, as in the Latin which it so obviously is.[/QUOTE]
Well of course you know and pronounce it correctly. I have never pronounced the second word with two syllables. I don't think most of my peers would recognize it.

[QUOTE=only_human;425432]Well of course you know and pronounce it correctly. I have never pronounced the second word with two syllables. I don't think most of my peers would recognize it.[/QUOTE]
Good point.