Friday, March 03, 2006

Words, words, words

I now have a title to call my own.

After a runner-up finish and an honorable mention, I'm the sole winner of this week's Word Verifictionary Contest over at The Columnist Manifesto. The goal is to create meanings for those silly strings of letters used for word verification on comment pages.

I've always wanted to coin a word for public use, but this will have to do for now. The words I've created can't be worked into normal conversation; heck, I wish I'd thought up verifiction. But I'm patient. In time I'm sure I'll come up with my own truthiness. Stephen Colbert, you're on notice.

55 Fiction Friday struggles enough with words it already knows.


"Spare no expense"? This kind of espionage was new.

Amazing who she found in the mercenary market:
chemists, chefs, spies. She outfitted a laboratory and put
them to work.

"Solved it?"

"The formula's complex... we need time."

"You have the weekend. My competitor introduces its
sandwich Monday. I must know what's in the secret sauce."

5 comments:

Oscar Madison said...

It's true. Each of us has to find his own truthiness.

Unknown said...

55 Fiction-- That's the best invention I've heard of in a long while. Well, next to Oscar Madison's word verification contest.

I'm glad Oscar introduced you to his readers. Who can resist anybody in a R2D2 get-up who writes this well? Not me, certainly.

Neel Mehta said...

Thanks for the compliments, Janelle.

I must admit, though, that I only invented 55 Fiction Friday. The New Times of San Luis Obispo, CA originated 55 Fiction.

Anonymous said...

Neel,

I must compel you to visit www.looneylabs.com and purchase a "Nanofictionary" deck (although Nanofictionary has a 50-word limit, I think). But I do believe you will enjoy the game, and it may help you with the occasional writer's block.

aqui said...

It won't succeed as a matter of fact, that's exactly what I think.