Tag Archives: ilk

Beanbag

Beanbag: (n) a large cushion, typically filled with polystyrene beads, used as a seat.Dictionary B

The beanbag chair is the “government cheese” of furniture.

It’s too bad.

Beanbags come in a variety of colors. Matter of fact, they even have quite a choice of stylings.

Yet the best way to communicate to people around you that you’re only moving into the apartment temporarily, to soon be evicted, is to sling a bunch of beanbag chairs around your living room.

Some of them are very comfortable–that is, if you decide to situate yourself in them and not attempt extraction. At almost any age, getting out of a beanbag becomes a purposeful action. Yes, it is a campaign which you approach with great sobriety.

That’s why beanbags are considered the seating choice of the unemployed. It’s not that these people are unmotivated–just uncertain as to whether they can actually get up from where they’ve placed themselves.

I’ve had some great conversations sitting on beanbags. Many years ago, during the coffee-house era, it was the preferred perch. But honestly, no one who has money, ilk, conceit, preference or even a conscious awareness of decor will ever purposely select a beanbag to include in the layout of a favored room.

So if you are deciding on your stock portfolio, I could not recommend investing in beanbags.

That is, unless the next President of the United States helps to make us all very, very poor again. 

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Thank you for enjoying Words from Dic(tionary) —  J.R. Practix

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Antique

dictionary with letter A

Antique: (n) an object such as a piece of furniture or work of art which has a high value due to its considerable age.

For a brief season in my life I had more money than I needed and therefore convinced myself that I needed more money.

It’s amazing how greed does not go away when you find yourself in the black after bills are paid, but rather, settles as a black cloud over your soul, convincing you that if you don’t lay up more treasure, you will be swallowed by some catastrophe in the future, yet unseen.

So even though most of my journey has been spent clapping my hands in glee when the electric bill has been paid and cleared the bank, during this particular odyssey of finance, I became obsessed with a new word.

Investment.

Yes. Everything needed to be an investment.

So I was told my counselors (who were many since they discovered they could siphon off my wealth via giving advice) that houses were a good purchase.

I was told that if I bought a beautiful white grand piano, it would only appreciate over the years.

And of course, it was necessary, since I was now a person of worldly ilk, to go antiquing.

I was supposed to go to little storefronts which were jammed to the gills with fishy deals, and listen to someone explain how “this table was once in the den of Johnny Appleseed,” and had “already trebled in value and would certainly continue to do so.”

Having an untrained eye, to me it looked like a beat-up piece of wood which should have been broken up to fuel a fire years ago.

When I pointed this out to one of the enthusiastic “antiquers,” he stood back in horror and said, “It’s old. So it’s worth more money.”

I explained to him that I was getting older, and no one found me more valuable. He laughed a little (after all, I was still a potential sale).

Here was my discovery:

  • I bought houses and barely broke even on the turnaround.
  • That white grand piano had to be sold for less than half of its original value.
  • And all the antiques I purchased were viewed by garage sale people as worthless clumps of nothing instead of the posterity of Mr. Appleseed.

There is a bliss to poverty.

You don’t have to wonder what you’re going to do with all your money.

Macaroni and cheese still tastes good on Day Three.

And most importantly… you don’t have to deal with antiques.

 

 

 

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Thank you for enjoying Words from Dic(tionary) —  J.R. Practix

Amice

dictionary with letter A

Amice: (n) a cap, hood or white linen cloth worn on the neck and shoulders by a priest or member of other religious orders.

Always willing to admit my ignorance, I had absolutely no idea what this word was, nor do I still have much of a vision for the garment described

But I am certainly aware of the inclination of those who wish to express their position, authority, superiority or uniqueness by the type of cloth they use to adorn their bodies.

I guess it’s just a part of being human.

But I must be honest–at times it seems inhuman or unkind, to separate oneself off from others by blaring a fashion statement.

Case in point: I don’t have anything personally against the Amish nor their ilk, but I find it a bit aggravating that secretly, somewhere deep in their souls, they sense a moral and spiritual upliftedness by dressing “plain,” and proving that in so doing, God is smiling more on them than on my sweatpants.

It does not take very long to travel through the Good Book to see that Jesus was quite aggravated himself by the religions leaders, who adorned themselves in elaborate robing to demonstrate their position and heavenly placement.

On the other hand, I suppose it’s essential that military service personnel wear uniforms, to create–well, uniformity. (Yet, when we really are being intelligent in wartime situations, we have our soldiers infiltrate the local populace by dressing normally. It increases the possibility for victory via subterfuge.)

I’ve had ministers tell me that wearing a collar when walking down the halls of a hospital makes it easier for the patients to identify someone who could bring spiritual solace.

As always, for every objection you can make in life, there is someone who can hatch a story to egg you on, to defend why things are the way they are.

But for the record, you will probably never see me wear an amice.

First of all, I don’t look good in hoods. I was raised to believe this is a slang term for “criminal”

Also, if the best shot I have at impressing the world around me of my prowess is to wear a particular doo-dad or a dud, in order to be the cool dude …then I think I would rather blend into the simply-clad masses.

 

Adjective

Words from Dic(tionary)

dictionary with letter A

Adjective: (n.) a word or phrase naming an attribute, added to or grammatically related to a noun to modify or describe it.

Sometimes I grow exhausted living in a “verb-and -noun world.”

Adjectives are those words inserted into our lives which prove that we actually give a damn. For instance:

“This is my wife.”  Dull, right?

“This is my beautiful wife.” Just adding the adjective “beautiful” means that I care enough to explain that the woman with me is not merely a flesh-and-blood appendage, but someone who possesses attractiveness.

“This is my intelligent friend.” The word “intelligent” triggers the notion that I am about to meet someone of ilk and knowledge.

Adjectives are the words that God created to keep us from becoming boring.

              “How are you doing today?” my neighbor asks.

              “Good,” I reply, completely terminating further communication.

I know that many people think being laid back, limited in words and tight-lipped is a way of sharing that you are simple and free of complication. It is also a style which telegraphs that you don’t have much going on in your cranial cavity and your emotions have been drained of all juiciness.

I like adjectives.

Of course, they can be overdone. A simple rule is to never use an adjective to be an adjective to an adjective. In other words, two adjectives in a row are not only unnecessary, they are verbally incestuous.

But without them, we don’t really have any way to tell people how valuable they are to us, or of sharing with God how glad we are that He has come … to modify our lives.