and she used to teach English

[labellementeuse]

SCENE: the dinner table. PRESENT: my mother, my father, various irrelevant hangers-on. TOPIC OF CONVERSATION: words people mispronounce, specially featuring me b/c I read a lot when I was a kid.

MUM: Mature to rhyme with nature!
EVERYONE: *laughs*
MUM: Misled pronounced mizzled! (this wasn't me, ftr.)
EVERYONE: *laughs*
DAD, looking at Waldorf salad that has been sitting in the fridge since Christmas day: Is this salad safe to eat after "superating" for the last four days?
MUM: It's fine.
ME: Why did you say it like that, superating? It's suppurating.
MUM: No, it's superating. Ha-ha, another one of those words!
ME: Yeah, but it totally looks like it should be said like supper because it has two ps.
MUM: No it doesn't!
DAD: No it doesn't!
ME: Yes it does! S U P P U R A T I N G.
MUM: No! S U P E R A T I N G
[extended debate ensues, in which we google to inconclusive results - there are way more results for superate but they're all in Italian, whereas the first result for suppurate is "to form or discharge pus."]
MUM: But the internet's always wrong!
ME: Fine then. *gets the dictionary*
CHAMBERS ENGLISH DICTIONARY: Superate: To overcome, outdo, or top.
Suppurate: to gather pus or matter.
MUM: You're quite right.
ME: HAHAHA, I win. (Actually I was way more gracious.)

Recorded here because the number of times my mother has ever admitted I was right and she was wrong... few and far between! Also because superate is kind of a cool word.

Comments

[amarynth.livejournal.com]

It's easy to be gracious when you're secretly composing your snarky LJ post eviscerating the subject of your graciousness in your head, I find.

[labellementeuse.livejournal.com]

It is, isn't it? :D

[squaringkarma.livejournal.com]

There are strawberries in my fridge that are suppurating, but they are not mine, so IDK if I should take them out. Not sure which flatmate they belong to.

Anyway, I just wanted to thank ya for the new word! Ta!

[labellementeuse.livejournal.com]

My pleasure - it's a good one!

[squaringkarma.livejournal.com]

I now know they belong to the flatmate that isn't here (she gets back some time before the 10th), so we've tossed them.

I used the word when explaining the situation to my flatmate and he was like whaaa? Hee.

[sixth-light.livejournal.com]

Superate is a cool word. I'm not sure how useful it would be in day=to-day conversation, however...

[labellementeuse.livejournal.com]

Well, it basically means to beat. "I superated Mike to the last of the chocolate trifle," which you should post the recipe for, by the way.