Thursday, October 30, 2008

What's up with this?

Today I was introduced to a new word - hippopotomonstrosesquipedaliophobia. It is literally, are you ready for the irony, the fear of long words! My only response to that is, "What's up with that?" If you follow the link for the definition, you'll discover that there is another word with the same meaning, sesquipedaliophobia, and this newer, more improved and even scarier word was created to emphasize the phobia itself.

I'm not sure where to go with this one. Do we talk about self-fulfilling prophecies or people making things difficult for the spite of it? How about something inane like who in the world would ever use this word and are there people out there who really suffer from this? That could lead us into a discussion of how irrational most of our fears really are, especially if we are on a faith journey.

If you know me personally or read this blog with any type of irregularity, you already know my mind can be twisted and warped. I could take any of the above thoughts and work them out, applying each one to our faith journeys. As much fun (and helpful) as that would be, I'm going to resist. For now I'm going to learn how to pronounce this word and use it in casual conversation at least three times tomorrow.

In a closing note, a shout out to my buddy Ben who has joined the blogosphere. He has written an excellent treatise on wind pants. I think you'll enjoy it.

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