C’mon. Admit it. You love them.  Look at the way they march across the page, wrapping around the images just so. They are truly magnificent, aren’t they? It’s true, none of us can live without them, and almost all civilized people use them, but you are, well, you’re just one of those special aficionados, aren’t you?

Crossword puzzles, Jumble, SCRABBLE. I know, I know, the world doesn’t understand. It’s cool. But you shouldn’t have to hide your passion any longer; you and all others like you should be allowed to come out into the light of day and profess their unfettered (if not completely natural) love!

WORDS.

Ooh.

I just got a chill.

Seriously, though, don’t you love them? And aren’t there just some that when you see them on the page you get all squishy inside? It’s okay. We all have ’em…our FAVORITES. Those words that make us get jiggy with it, regardless of their definitions. The way they take up that space on a page, the effortlessness as they slide off the tongue.

Ohhh, SHARE. Well, we can't have a suggestive blog without HER, right?

You want to know mine? Hmm. Not sure I want to share. I mean you have yours, I have mine, and I really don’t see any reason to swap words, you know? I’m not that kind of guy. I’m a one-guy-one-word man. Well, it’s more like on-guy-fifteen-to-twenty-words, but that’s just the way we were raised.

Okay, tell you what…you share some of yours, I’ll share some of mine. I have to admit, though, it’s not unlike naming a favorite musical group, song, movie, or book. I love so many. I’m very open that way—once you’re in my heart, that’s it, you’re IN. But I will try to narrow the list a bit. For educational purposes I’ll include the primary definition for each word. Not that it matters—I would love these words no matter what they defined:

Chimera [ki-meer-uh] – a mythological, fire-breathing monster, commonly represented with a lion’s head, a goat’s body, and a serpent’s tail.

Epicurean [ep-i-kyoo-ree-uhn] – fond of or adapted to luxury or indulgence in sensual pleasures; having luxurious tastes or habits, especially in eating and drinking.

Flummox [fluhm-uhks] – Informal – to bewilder; confound; confuse.

Machiavellian [mak-ee-uh-vel-ee-uhn] – being or acting in accordance with the principles of government analyzed in Machiavelli’s “The Prince”,  in which political expediency is placed above morality and the use of craft and deceit to maintain the authority and carry out the policies of a ruler is described.

Phalanx [fey-langks, fal-angks] – (in ancient Greece) a group of heavily armed infantry formed in ranks and files close and deep, with shields joined and long spears overlapping.

Oblique [uh-bleek, oh-bleek] – neither perpendicular nor parallel to a given line or surface; slanting; sloping.

Solipsism [sol-ip-siz-uhm] – Philosophy – the theory that only the self exists, or can be proved to exist.

There are a lot more—these were just what I came up with off the top of my head. I left off one in particular, but only because I spoke recently with another author/friend about this word and if that author decides to comment, I figured it was only fair to leave said word available!

So belly up the the bar, but watch those obliques; enjoy the epicurean feast of syllables. For all you solipsists, form a phalanx if you must. Just don’t be Machiavellian or I swear to you you’ll leave this blog floundering and flummoxed. Look out for the Chimera; he’s got no place here other than word inclusion but that doesn’t make him any less dangerous.

Seriously. Have no trepidation.

Share your favorites.

You know you want to.

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The blank page is dead…long live the blank page.

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Author known to use spontaneous satire, sarcasm, and unannounced injections of pith or witticisms which may not be suitable for humorless or otherwise jest-challenged individuals. (Witticisms not guaranteed to be witty, funny, comical, hilarious, clever, scintillating, whimsical, wise, endearing, keen, savvy, sagacious, penetrating, fanciful, or otherwise enjoyable. The Surgeon General has determined through laboratory testing that sarcasm can be dangerous, even in small amounts, and should not be ingested by those who are serious, somber, pensive, weighty, funereal, unsmiling, poker-faced, sober, or pregnant.)