Semantics, Schemantics...

by Karen Lopez
15 May 2002

OK, so I've been meaning to add more humorous content to this site for quite a while.  Many of you that participate in the Discussion Groups know that I'm a big fan of learning more about words.  I heartily recommend that modellers join Anu Garg's Wordsmith website.  Wordsmith includes the A Word a Day (AWAD) mailing list, a daily treat that explains the meaning, source, and context of words.  These mailings are grouped into weekly themes, often drawing odd and interesting meanings in to the words we use and sometimes don't use on a regular basis.  For instance, this week's theme is "toponyms or words derived from place names."  Today's word was:

lido (LEE-do) noun

A fashionable beach resort or a public open-air swimming pool.

[From Lido, an island reef in northeastern Italy, between the Lagoon of Venice and the Adriatic Sea, site of a famous beach resort.]

"Within seconds, a half-dozen over-eager denizens of Cartagena's lido were on us like flies, offering food and drink, massages, hair-braiding, necklaces." Frank Bajak, Cartagena Struggles to Recover Lost Tourists, The Milwaukee Journal Sentinel, Nov 22, 1998.

I believe that a modeller's greatest soft skill should be language.  Models with poor definitions are not models; they are diagrams with some words attached.

Anu also offers a WordServer, which is a service that allows me to retrieve word information via e-mail.  The word servers offer:

These are great, fast resources for modellers.  As they are e-mail based, they are easy to use, fast, and you don't have to spend time finding a dictionary.  These services are free.

On the fun side, Anu offers an Anagram server that you could waste a lot of time playing with.  For instance, I asked to find anagrams (new words made up of letters of the original word) for Data Modelling and came up with these howlers (with my favourites in red bold):

Long-tailed, mad.

Damn! idle gloat.

Genital, mad old.

Tall, odd enigma.

All-time, odd nag.

Tag idle old man.

Damaged on till.

Admit old angel.

Admit old angle.

A meddling alto.

Laminated gold.

IT and mega doll.

Damaged in toll.

Damn It! old gale.

Giant, old medal.

Glad tail demon.

Long mad detail.

Late, mild gonad.

Align odd metal.

Gloat idled man.

Aligned, mad lot.

Managed IT doll.

Mating old lead.

Dig late old man.

I am dental gold.

I'm a dental gold.

Led in mad gloat.

Led modal giant.

Get dial old man.

Get laid old man.

God! tall maiden.

Leading, mad lot.

Damn It! Ole! glad.

Dealt along dim.

Dominated gall.

Tall and dim ego.

Lame goal didn't.

Damn It! led goal.

With more powerful Anagram Server that lets you control some parameters, I entered "I Love Data Modelling" and got back:

VALIDATED LINE GLOOM

VALIDATED MOLE LINGO

ALLEVIATED MILD GOON

MEDIAEVAL DOLT LINGO

DAMAGE TOLLED VIOLIN

LAMINATED DEVIL LOGO

VALIDATE MODEL LINGO

DIAGONAL DEVIL MOTEL

Take a few minutes and check out Wordsmith services.  They're all free of charge.