Gongoozling from Upsidedown ʎoɾ

ʎds pɹoʍ ɹɐǝp

I have read your blog spot and I can just learn new things from reading it...

I've recently found a new word on the web. It's

,ɹǝlzooƃuoƃ,

Whoops

'gongoozler'

It means an idle spectator. I was wondering where it came from or who made up the word.

That reminds me, why do we say brang when we're little, and realize it's actually brought later on?

˙ɐ ʎoɾ puǝıɹɟ-ʇǝɯ-ʇsnɾ uʍop ǝpısdn ɹnoʎ

P.S. Do you remember St George Chrsitian School? (hint hint ;] )


Dear Joy,

I'm really jealous of your upsidedown writing - how do you DO that??

I remember your school very well - that was a lovely day for the Word Spy!

Now, gongoozler. That is a fabulous word! It seems to be a word that comes from England, and is used for people that stand around staring at the boats going up and down the canals. A bit like "trainspotters" for people who stand around staring at trains going by. (Something the Word Spy likes doing from time to time.)

It looks like nobody really knows where the word came from (although there are theories). Thank you SO much for telling me about it - I had never heard of it, but now I will definitely start using it!

Now, as for "brang" - that's an example of something called "extension". When you are learning to speak, you find out that  to say "I sing" in the past tense, you are supposed to say "I sang". So you think to your little self, well then, "I bring" must be "I brang".

 Bit by bit you learn that English has lots of funny words that don't follow the rules!

I remember in one of my very first stories I wrote down "Grandfather thunk it was time for a swim." I have to say I'm still fond of the word thunk, although my teacher thought it was not QUITE right...

Thinking hard, your pal,

The Word Spy