akshay wrote:nyx: (Greek mythology) Greek goddess of the night; daughter of Chaos; counterpart of Roman Nox [syn: Nyx]HH wrote:In a Letter to a friend at School, during Vacation: " ... flabbergasted***** ..." (wanting to sound high er 'bombastic')
***** Horrors ... it did not mean anything to flatter ... it meant >>>>>flabbergast - : flab·ber·gast
Pronunciation: 'fla-b&r-"gast
Function: transitive verb
Etymology: origin unknown
: to overwhelm with shock, surprise, or wonder
- http://www.m-w.com/cgi-bin/dictionary?va=flabbergasted
End of School ... Lost a good smiling friend, too!
So Beware of Unknown / Strange Words ... Know Meaning and USE!
Just to stress HH sir's message:
exonerate: To free from blame. To free from a responsibility, obligation, or task.
I have an interesting association with this word. When I was in college I thought it would be cool to express my attitude through words on my action sneakers- remember that brand??
I thought exonerate indicated an unfettered attitude, an attitude of breaking from bondage, freeing oneself in a comprehensive sense. So thought it was cool and expressed my attitude. So I used to parade around the college with EXONERATE calligraphed on my sneakers. No one really commented; it is likely they decided I was demented.
It was not untill an year later upon revisiting this word did I realise that the word has a legal association and not a rebellious association. Ofcourse, I felt like an ass for a long time after that. Very soon after that I stopped the whole nonsense of calligraphed shoes.
so someone has ultimately googled my display name...

