Category Archives: homoioteleuton

Homoioteleuton (ho-mee-o-te-loot’-on): Similarity of endings of adjacent or parallel words.

“Big, wig, pig.” This is what I said to myself every time I crossed paths with my boss. Out loud I said, “Good day sir, how’re the wife and daughter?” Every day he said “Fine Bascomb, fine. The wife’s home baking oatmeal cookies and the daughter’s at school.”

Then one day, he said, “I’ve had a setback Bascomb, a big setback. The wife’s dead and the daughter’s a fugitive. Seems she shot the wife and lit her on fire. I’ll miss those damn oatmeal cookies quite a bit.”

The Boss didn’t bat an eyelash, and didn’t seem torn up or angry. He just kept walking down the line checking out the lathes and eating what was probably the last oatmeal cookie his wife would ever bake. I was worried.

I had read in “Amateur Psychology” that people who are grief-stricken should take a break and travel somewhere new with no memories of the departed. The Boss was not doing that. He was coming to work as usual. I was afraid he was going to snap. He seemed pretty tightly wound anyway. He was the kind of guy who buttoned his top button even when he wasn’t wearing a necktie.

Then I heard sirens—police cars were approaching the plant. I heard a bullhorn say: “Please put down the gun and walk this way. You could be shot. Please put down the gun and calmly walk this way.” I heard two shots and somebody calling an ambulance. The ambulance came and took off with siren blaring. Boss came walking up the line. I asked him how he was doing and was about to ask him what the hell was going on. Before I had a chance, he said, “A little off balance today Bascomb. Just shot the daughter. I think I might’ve killed her—they took her away in an ambulance. She came here to finish the job, first the mother, now the father, lucky I was prepared.” I gave him my condolences and went and hid in the Janitor’s Closet after I noticed he was holding a .45.

The Plant was surrounded and the Boss dropped the gun and surrendered. Subsequently, from his jail cell he recommended that I be promoted to Boss. Instead, I was fired because he recommended me. Now, I work at a dog food factory. I monitor the dog biscuit ovens. The biscuits make me think of Boss’s late wife and her oatmeal cookies. He was a lucky man.

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

The Daily Trope is available on Amazon in paperback under the title of The Book of Tropes for $9.95. It is also available in Kindle format for $5.99.

Homoioteleuton (ho-mee-o-te-loot’-on): Similarity of endings of adjacent or parallel words.

“The itty, bitty, witty kitty made a sound like a diesel truck stuck in muck: Oh bad luck!” After I said this, I felt good, but my friends were looking at me with their mouths hanging open, puzzled and weirded out by what I had just said. These nonsense utterances were starting to fly out of my mouth, randomly, of their own accord. I needed help. I made an appointment with my psychologist.

“You’ve flipped your lid. You’re playing with a half a deck. You’ve lost your marbles. You’re going bananas. You’ve gone off the deep end.” These are the phrases my psychologist used to describe my state of mind. Then he said, “Just kidding. I like to do that every once in awhile to see how my clients react.” I stood up. I was going to punch him out for for messing me. My sanity was at stake and he was fu*king with me. He said “Sit down Herbert!” He was German. He sounded like a Nazi giving orders. I sat down.

He told me that I was suffering from one of the rarest psychological maladies in the world. He told me I was suffering from “Itty’s Compulsive Recollective Syndrome” (ICRS). It is a tendency to pile words together ending in “itty.” Its origin is completely bizarre—more than bizarre. It comes from not being breastfed as an infant, and becoming obsessed with the word “titty,” uttering its truncated cognates as symbolic of “titty’s” absence from your life. The “itty” words trigger thoughts of “titty” often plunging you into depression while at the same time giving you hope you may meet the “whole” titty and partake of your mother’s milk.

I thought he was joking, but he showed me the medical journal documenting ICRS. He told me the Japanese had developed a milk-giving mother sex doll for perverts. He recommended I get one and use it therapeutically to overcome my ICRS. It cost $4,000, a small price to pay to be cured.

My “mother” doll came in two weeks. I plugged in her charger and filled her milk tank with whole milk. The next morning I suckled her for breakfast. Her milk was warm and I drank my fill, had a cup of coffee and went to work. I had no “itty” episodes. I thought I was cured. I put “mother” away in the spare bedroom. Then, three days later I had another itty episode. I was dismayed. I plugged “Mother” back in and filled her milk tank, and had a good breakfast with her the next morning. I had no itty episodes at work.

This has been going on for five years. I don’t think I’ll ever stop needing the rubber mother titty. In a way it is like methadone.

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

The Daily Trope is available on Amazon in paperback under the title of The Book of Tropes for $9.95. It is also available in Kindle format for $5.99.