Monthly Archives: August 2022

Antirrhesis

Posted on August 4, 2022 | Leave a comment

Antirrhesis (an-tir-rhee’-sis): Rejecting reprehensively the opinion or authority of someone.

Hey Ma, listen to this: our little schooly girl is trying t’ tell me the earth is round like a big tomato floatin’ in the sky with all us a livin’ on it, like ants on a gum ball. She says her teacher, Miss Toomy, said it’s true. Well, I’ll tell you right now that Miss Toomy should be fired. It’s like when she told our little girl our well water comes from rivers under the earth! God, is she ignorant! We all know the water is left over from the big rain storm when Noah sailed his boat around filled with animals—mainly chickens. When it stopped raining Noah went swimming and had a great time. Too bad he only had two ducks. And where did I get these true facts from? It was Grandma’s home schooling. She taught me more in two weeks than that ignoramus looser Miss Toomy could teach you in 200 years. Me an’ Grandma would sit on the couch and she would teach me a lesson. I did not know how to write, so I’d put the lesson in my vast storehouse memory. When Grandma tested me, I did not remember any of the answers. She would say, “It’s all right, Bob Dole never remembered nothin’ either, yet he opened a corn dog factory in Kansas and made a lot of money.” Grandma knew everything. Some days we’d take the tractor out and Grandma would teach me the road signs: red for stop, curved arrow for curve, cross for intersection, triangle for merge. My favorite was speed limits where I had to match the numbers on the sign with the numbers the arrow pointed to on the speed meter in front of me. Top speed for the tractor was 25, so there was lot’s of times I couldn’t make a match. Grandma would say “Put the pedal to the metal!” I didn’t get it. Grandma said that it was my poetry lesson.

Anyways, we need to get rid of Miss Toomy and her communist pervert propaganda that will surely ruin our daughter’s chance for success in our little corner on the world. As soon as she lets it leak that she thinks the earth is round, they’ll put her on a bus and send her north, where they believe that kind of blasphemic crap. I think we should go to the school board meetin’ on Tuesday. I’ll give a speech callin’ for Miss Toomy to quit or be fired.

At the meeting I was told to shut up and sit down. Miss Toomy is Mayor Toomy’s niece. I shoulda figured that out— you know—two Toomys. Now I’m lookin’ for a steady job. I think I have a crack at “rag man” at the car wash. I’m real good at wringin’ and operatin’ a squeegee.

Definition courtesy of Silva Rhetoricae (rhetoric.byu.edu)

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Antisagoge

Posted on August 3, 2022 | Leave a comment

Antisagoge (an-tis-a-go’-gee): 1. Making a concession before making one’s point (=paromologia); 2. Using a hypothetical situation or a precept to illustrate antithetical alternative consequences, typically promises of reward and punishment.

Ok, ok. So I shouldn’t have tried to incinerate our neighbor’s dog. But, it dumps big steamers in our yard twice a day and has repeatedly dug up our garden boxes. Our neighbor, the dog’s owner, is a very large and very strong weight-lifting violent troll whose hobby is kick boxing with his nine-year-old son (who has a little trouble speaking and walks with a limp). In short, my neighbor scares the holy crap out of me. At least he didn’t catch me squirting lighter fluid on his dog “Dog,” a name suited for the pet of a giant nitwit bully. Right then, I heard him crunching up my gravel driveway. I had to hide behind the hedge until he left—but before he left, like the giant in Jack and the Beanstalk, he said “Fee fie foe dude, I smell the smell of lighter fluid.” I nearly peed my shorts, but I stayed quiet and didn’t do a panicked runner. He knew I was hiding somewhere nearby, but he left, dragging Dog behind hm.

Something still needs to be done about the dog.

I was willing to go to any length to whack the dog—to stop the yard bombs and the marathon barking sessions. What if I trapped him in a dog crate with a big piece of meat, kidnapped him, took him on a cruise on the Queen Mary 2 to England, and threw him overboard somewhere in the middle of the Atlantic Ocean? Elaborate, but brilliant.

The plan failed. My neighbor accompanied Dog on his daily bombing mission and saw me, the dog crate, and the meat inside it. He reached behind him and pulled out a pistol. He aimed it at me and slowly panned toward the dog crate and started firing. He emptied the gun and the dog crate was transformed into a lump of smoking plastic. He started reloading, and I heard police sirens. My neighbor was arrested for attempted murder—for attempting to murder me! Ha ha! He had successfully murdered the dog crate, but I didn’t have a scratch. At his trial, I testified that I was inside the dog crate when he arrived and was able to just barely get out of it when he started shooting. I told them I was lucky to be alive. My neighbor was convicted of attempted murder and is currently living out his 25 year sentence at Rahway State Prison. I adopted Dog and trained him to shut up and poop in the gutter when we take walks. I don’t mind bagging Dog’s poop.

Everything has worked out for the best for me, but not for my neighbor, and Dog has become a model multiple breed dog, enjoying peeing on the fake fire hydrant at the doggy play park, humping other dogs, and begging for doggy treats.

Definition courtesy of “Silva Rhetoricae” (rhetoric.byu.edu).

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Antistasis

Posted on August 2, 2022 | Leave a comment

Antistasis (an-ti’-sta-sis): The repetition of a word in a contrary sense. Often, simply synonymous with antanaclasis.

I have a collection of single socks that rivals the collection at the Victoria and Albert museum in London, England. The prize item in their collection is the single grey sock Oliver Cromwell was wearing when he was disinterred and “executed” by supporters of Charles II. His head was removed and stuck on a pike, with, some say, his death-sock stuffed in what was left of his mouth after months in the ground in a churchyard somewhere in London. Ravens plucked out his eyes while buskers plucked out happy tunes on their mandolins.

My single sock collection is worth at least a half-million dollars. Since I’m a licensed collector, I have a permit to rifle through peoples’ trash bins, as long as I don’t make a mess. I specialize in celebrity trash bins rummaging for (you guessed it) their discarded single socks. Last week, I scored a “Jeff Goldbloom” from a bin in front his flat in New York. It is one of those stretchy black socks made out of very thin polyester. It has a tiny hole in the toe and is monogrammed with his initials. It has a slightly perfumed odor, suggestive of moss and pine needles. This sock is probably worth at least $500. My prize sock was worn by Johnny Depp under his swashbucklers as Captain Jack Sparrow in “Pirates of the Caribbean.” “Pirates” was the first time I hung out on a movie set, and it was worth it. Depp’s sock was made from baby-blue spun cotton, with a padded white toe. It smells faintly of salt water and steamed clams, and also has a slight fishy smell, most likely Pollock or Cod. Depp’s sock has been appraised by Sotheby’s at $110,000.

I will be opening a single-sock museum in Los Angles in two months. It will be called simply “Single Celebrity Socks.” I will be selling replica celebrity sock singles in the gift shop, along with postcards, and my book “Stalking the Celebrity Sock.” This week, I’m parked outside of the Christian Evangelist Joel Olsteen’s unbelievably lavish home in Houston, Texas. It is rumored that he has the Ten Commandments embroidered on his socks. Something’s bound to turn up if I wait long enough—I’m giving it a month—then I’m headed to Elon Musk’s.

Definition courtesy of “Silva Rhetoricae” (rhetoric.byu.edu)

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Antisthecon

Posted on August 1, 2022 | Leave a comment

Antisthecon (an-tis’-the-con): Substitution of one sound, syllable, or letter for another within a word. A kind of metaplasm: the general term for changes to word spelling.

I was going snackelling under the Caribbean Sea. You ask: What the hell is that? It is probably the most stupid immature thing I’ve ever done. I was 35 years old. Starting to get a few gray hairs, and softening up, as time took its toll on my muscles. I wore reading glasses and had quit smoking my cherished Cohibas. Yet, here I was wading into the beautiful clear turquoise-blue Caribbean, like I had around 15 years ago, on spring break with my buddies Edward and Phil and Joanne. We invented a game to play when we went snorkeling—we cut up carrots from the hotel’s salad bar into little pieces. We’d put the pieces into baggies and take them under water. Then, once we got into the middle of a school of fish, we’d put a piece of carrot between our lips and the fish would swim up to our faces and grab the carrots—we named this game “snackelling.” Now, I had returned to the Bahamas on a business trip, meeting with hoteliers to discuss their restaurant equipment needs—that’s what I did—I sold ovens, dishwashers, prep tables and everything else needed to properly equip a hotel kitchen. Feeling like I was drifting into middle age, I decided to do a reprise of snackelling. I picked up a carrot at the breakfast buffet, diced it up, and dumped the pieces into a baggie I got from the chef. I headed to the dock, and hired a guide with a little motorboat. When we got about 100 yards offshore, I put on fins and mask, bit down on the snorkel’s mouthpiece, jumped out of the boat, and headed down. I swam directly into a school of Surgeon Fish. I put a piece of carrot between my lips. Suddenly, the whole school of fish disappeared. I looked up and there was a Barracuda headed straight for my face. I froze in terror and the Barracuda bit my nose off. Bleeding profusely from my nose, I swam as fast as I could to the surface where my guide was waiting. I kept kicking the Barracuda away, and finally climbed into the boat. Sticking pieces of carrot into what was left of my nose, I was able to slow the bleeding. We headed for the emergency room where my nose was stitched together with some pieces missing that were temporarily replaced with pieces of foam rubber cut by the surgeon from a shower mat. Since then, I’ve had nose replacement surgery, opting for the “Klinger.” The Klinger is named for a character on M.A.S.H., a TV show that ran in the 70s and 80s. My Klinger is memorable and prompts people to ask about my ethnicity, something my original “Scottish” nose never did. Even with the new nose, I can’t forget what happened to me. Every time I hear somebody say, “The nose knows,” I think to myself, “My nose was eaten by a fish.”

Definition courtesy of “Silva Rhetoricae” (rhetoric.byu.edu)

Paperback and Kindle editions of The Daily Trope are available on Amazon under the title The Book of Tropes.

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