Random acts of goofiness

Most, if not all, of us have heard of the “Random acts of kindness” movement, in which people do nice things for others simply because.  These acts benefit both the doer and the recipient of the kindness.  I would like to propose a variation of this movement—random acts of goofiness. 

Occasionally, when I have been feeling blue, something quite silly happens to lift me from my doldrums.  For example, a few years ago on my morning commute, I was listening to “Morning Edition,” known for airing silliness on April Fool’s Day but not generally as a part of its programming.  The two anchors in introducing a segment on eels broke into a rendition of “If a fish bites your thigh when it’s just swimming by, it’s a moray!”  This goofiness made my day.

In my last blog, I wrote of acts of “constructive mischievousness.”  I specified “constructive” as I am not a fan of practical jokes that cause pain or embarrassment, but I firmly believe in mischievousness or goofiness that brings a smile.  While the two singing anchors were not anonymous people on the street, the anecdote illustrates my intent.  So I encourage you to do something goofy—wear some silly clothing, hum a silly song, draw a silly picture on some office paperwork—you get the idea.

In the process of performing random acts of goofiness, don’t forget those random acts of kindness.  Perhaps, similar to the hopes of Arlo Guthrie at the end of “Alice’s Restaurant,” we can create our own goofy movement!

De-mentor

Years ago, I saw the saying, “If you can’t be a good example, then be a horrible warning.”  This counsel gave me hope for those many times when I fall short of perfection.  Most of us have role models and aspire to be role models, going back to Greek Mythology when Athena served as a role model for Odysseus and Telemachus in the guise of Mentor.  Recently at work I fell short of perfection again, engaging in what I like to call “constructive mischievousness.” A colleague admired my “wildness” in undertaking this modest act of civil disobedience.  That got me to thinking, if a “mentor” is a positive role model, would a “de-mentor” be a constructively mischievous role model, since “de-“ prefixed to a word means, “do or make the opposite of; reverse”? And if so, have I become “demented”?

Firstly, I must credit my role model, my father, with introducing me to constructive mischievousness, a practice I happily follow.  In my childhood, my father would do silly things like write “dead cow” on the freezer packages of ground beef.  (My mother quickly put an end to that silliness.)

At work, we have an erasable calendar used to reserve rooms.  Evidently, people were erasing established room reservations and replacing them with their own.  Recently, a paper sign was taped to the erasable calendar, reading in Big Black Letters, “Do Not Touch the Calendar.”  The voice of my constructively mischievous father whispered in my ear, “Touch the calendar as you walk by.  Just tap it with your finger.”  And so on many occasions I have engaged in the civil disobedience of lightly tapping the calendar as I pass.

In searching my American Heritage Dictionary, I found that “dement,” meaning “to cause a person to become mentally deranged” or “to lose intellectual power” is the root of “demented,” which informally means “foolish or crazy.” These words come from a Latin root meaning “senseless.”  The suffix “-or” added to a word means “One that performs a specified action.”  In a constructively mischievous parsing of these definitions, then, a person who acts crazily or causes others to act crazily can be a “dementor,” the opposite of Mentor.  In addition, Chambers Slang Dictionary includes and entry for “demento,” citing “the 1970’s radio show Dr. Demento,” and defining the word as “a crazy, eccentric person.”

Tomorrow I will go to work.  I will do the opposite of Mentor, listen to my father’s whispers, and lightly tap that forbidden calendar.  In the spirit of constructive mischievousness, proudly, I will call myself a “dementor.”

LAGNIAPPE:  In the late 1970’s I worked in a costume shop in Baton Rouge.  On Saturdays before the boss arrived, we would put Dr. Demento’s radio show on the shop radio.  The boss immediately would change the channel, not wanting to offend customers.

Feisty--or getting in touch with your inner dog

How many of us who have had canine family members have not at one time or another blamed ill-timed Silent-But-Deadlies on the poor dog?  Currently, I am reading How Dogs Love Us, which led me to the linguistic justification for such blame.  The author, neuroscientist Gregory Berns, a professor at Emory University, enlists the help of his dog Callie, whom his family rescued from a local humane society.  In researching Callie’s mixed pedigree, Berns discovered that she has some “feist” in her.  I was familiar with the word “feisty” meaning “full of spirit or determination; plucky or spunky,” as The American Heritage Dictionary defines it, but not familiar with the meaning which Chambers Slang Dictionary supplies of “a small dog; thus having the characteristics of such a yappy, snappy, energetic creature.”

Never having heard of feist as a breed of dog, I immediately looked it up. The American Heritage Dictionary defines “feist” as “Chiefly Southern US A small mongrel dog” from the Middle English word “fist”meaning “a blowing, breaking wind.”  This definition does not capture the idea of farting associated with the Middle English word.

Chambers Slang Dictionary actually defines the noun “feist” as “a truculent, short-tempered person or animal,” with “feisty” as the adjectival form.  In defining “feisty,” Chambers goes into more of the vulgar (24 March 2013) associations going back to the 15^th century form, “fist”:  “a foul smell, the breaking of wind.”  Chambers qualifies its definition with the possibility that “the dog was so named because one’s own smells could be blamed upon it,” admitting this interpretation is doubtful.  However, until neuroscientists discover a way to interpret dog thoughts into human words, dogs will continue to take the blame for stinky human indiscretions, especially after meals of beans.

 Until now, I thought that “feisty” was a formal, somewhat complimentary adjective.  I had no clue that “feist” and “feisty” are words of Southern regional slang with strong associations with farting.  The next time someone accuses me of being feisty, I will search the immediate area for a dog to blame.

LAGNIAPPE:  Supposedly in human grammar, dogs are referred to with the neutral pronoun, “it” as opposed to by human gender.  In this entry, I have chosen to write in doggie grammar, referring to dogs with human pronouns, as in my world, pets are family members.

LAGNIAPPE:  The AHD entry for “feist” refers the reader to pezd- in the appendix of Indo-European roots.  The entry reads, “To fart . . . from Old English fisting, a breaking of wind.”  The appendix goes on to list root words meaning to fart from Middle English (fisten) and from Germanic (*fistiz), ending with ”petard” from the Latin pedere, to fart. The familiar phrase of being “hoisted by one’s own petard,” blown up by one’s own bomb, takes on new meaning.  Now one “hoisted by one’s own petard” can mean being incapacitated by one’s own farts.

LAGNIAPPE: On regional variations in languages, please see the “Our Living Language” note at “andiron” in the AHD.