Saturday, July 19, 2008

Tip of Your Tongue

I had a brainstorm a few years ago. Noticing that the same words tended to repeatedly be on the tip of my tongue, I decided to keep a list. Each time I'd think of a word I'd fished for, I'd note it down. It seemed like a useful writer's exercise, and the results were surprising in two ways. First, there were many more such words than I'd expected, and the list grew larger than I'd expected. Second, it's quite an odd list. 

I'll let you see the list in a moment, but first let me direct you to an interesting NPR report on the psychological issues of tip-of-tongue words.

Without further ado, here are fifteen years worth of my fished-for words:
accolade
anachronism
anethamatic
anointed
apotheosis
apropos
ascertain
astringent
attributes
baroque
barrier
befuddled
behemoth
bête noire
bustle
camaraderie
canard
catalyst
chagrin
chagrined
cognoscenti
comeuppance
compatriot
concoction
conducive
confer
connoisseurs
consumate
consummately
corroborative
cosmopolitan
curmudgeon
cushy
dally
decadent
degenerate
deliberately
denouement
deploy
depraved
desultory
detritus
diligent
disheartening
disinclination
disquieting
drab
dross
effectuate
egregious
enclave
endorse
entitlement
ephemeral
epiphany
errant
estimable
ethereal
euphemism
evocative
execute
explicit
facilitate
factor
fare
fastidious
fatuous
fertile
fey
fiery
fledgling
flinch
foreshadowing
formidable
gantlet
gobble
gratuitous
gregarious
grievous
grim
heedful
heirloom
hindrance
imperious
implacable
imprecise
inclined
incongruous
incrementally
indistinct
inexplicable
introverted
intrusive
irreconcilable
je ne sais quoi
juxtaposition
kludge
kreplach
lascivious
latent
lebensraum
lewd
licentious
lumbering
mainstay
mammothly
mandate
manifest
maverick
medieval
meticulous
milieu
morbidly
negate
nonchalant
obligatory
obliging
oblivious
ossify
otherworldly
parable
paradisal
paradisiac
patronize
pedigree
penchant
perpetrate
pertained
pied-à-terre
placeholder
predilection
preeminent
prehensile
prerogative
prestige
presumptuous
prevalent
profusion
proliferation
promiscuous
prone
propulsive
pungent
quell
quintessential
quirky
raison d'être
reciprocate
refinements
regimen
relevant
reminiscent
rendition
retrenching
revelrous
rivetting
sabotage
scintilla
shoestring
shudder
slake
slouch
solicitous
specimen
sporadic
stigma
subvert
supernal
surmount
susceptible
synesthesia
tactic
telegraphs
torpid
transgress
unearthly
unflappable
unflinching
vapid
vaunted
vendetta
vestigial
vicarious
visceral
vivid
watershed
welds
yardstick

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