We all slept in this morning. It was nearly ten before I woke up, and my moving around rousted Fern and Gracie sleeping beside me on the bed. They got their morning treats then we all came downstairs together. As I was going to the door to let Miss Grace out, I found a gift in the hall: a dead mouse. One of the cats had had quite a busy night. I disposed of the deceased, put the coffee on and went to the driveway to get my papers; hence, the lateness of my posting.

It is a cloudy, still day with the sort of humidity which carries a bit of a chill. Rain is forecasted for this evening so I figure the day will stay much like this morning. I don’t expect the sun.

The paper had a great column the other day about the misuse of words and the word literally took front and center. I understood exactly what the author meant as I hear it literally all the time (just kidding). The article also mentioned the misuse or overuse of words. Two examples stood out for me: moot and iconic. It’s a moot point is used to stop any further discussion or argument. It’s been said to me, and it drives me crazy, literally. In that context moot means still open to discussion, but somehow that meaning has been lost. I once had an argument, debate?, with someone about him using the words “a moot point” incorrectly, but I lost. The argument was moot.

Iconic was discussed next and described as one of the latest, trendy overused words. I see it written far more than I hear it, and I figure if so many things are iconic, none really are.

Some words and phrases just disappear. People stop using them. When was the last time anyone was referred to as no spring chicken? We wore blue jeans and sneakers when I was a kid. My mother sometimes told me to stop being a prima donna. I didn’t know what a prima donna really was, but I knew what she meant. Why don’t you just take a picture? I remember using that if someone stared. When I visited my grandparents in the city, I sat on the stoop. I don’t think houses have stoops any more. My grandmother wore galoshes. I wore boots. How about wazoo? My mother often had it with us up to her wazoo. Maynard G. Krebs was a beatnik. A decade later he’d have been a hippie.

I figure all those lost words and phrases are floating around in the cosmos just waiting for the day of their return. That would be, for all of them, a red letter day.