I like words. Well, most words, anyway; there are also words I don’t like.Words, and the occasional opposable thumb, are what set us apart from other mammals.

Without words, school kids wouldn’t have to take spelling tests, people who write editorials would have to spend their time doing something productive and the President would have to find something other than the English language to butcher.

Ten of my favorite words are (definitions are left to the reader to research)

1. Perspicacious – A nice sounding word I wish I could work into conversation more often. Unfortunately, not applicable to a lot of people with whom I hang out.
2. Onomatopoeia – Conjures up visions of just what it means.
3. Malapropism – Often comes in handy when people like me try to use too many big words.
4. Exacerbate – Just the sound of this word adds impetus to its use.
5. Daunting – Can actually make the listener or reader imagine you are describing something really difficult.
6. Plethora – I like a lot of these.
7. Acrimonious – Sounds like you just poured acid on something, doesn’t it?
8. Serendipity – I’ve loved this word ever since I accidentally discovered how many truly great scientific discoveries there are that can be ascribed to it.
9. Foist – Just can’t be used enough when describing the Bush administration.
10. Impugn – Seems to happen to my character all the time.

But, like I said, there are also words I don’t like, many of which have found their way into the dictionary simply because they are used so much. For example,

1. Reoccur– This one drives me nuts. The original, and I feel the only correct, form is recur. But the increased usage of the incorrect form has recently made it acceptable.
2. Audibilize – Seems to have come into common, acceptable use after years of being used by football broadcasters when what they should have been saying was “call an audible.”
3. Obstacle – I don’t have anything against this word, per se, but I have been self conscious about using it since a tenth-grade classmate once laughed at the way I pronounced it. Instead, I usually try to say something like, “there’s something in the way.”
4. That – An absolutely necessary word for English to work. But it is also, perhaps, the most overused word in the English language. I’ve found that if I think of that when I’m writing, that it becomes pretty obvious that I’ve overused that too much in that item that I just wrote.

So, give me a plethora of perspicacious people who do not exacerbate a daunting situation, impugn my integrity in an acrimonious manner or try to foist the boom, boom, boom of WEAPONS OF MASS DESTRUCTION on a general populace who have to rely on serendipity to find their way home, and I’ll show you a group of people who avoid obstacles because they do not audibilize reoccurring malapropisms.