#959 Leftovers

I guess one of things we’re most familiar and most comfortable with is leftovers. They are a part of nearly everyone’s life. And the proof is there’s only one word for them.
It’s long been my contention that the more uncomfortable or embarrassed we are about a thing, the more words we have for it. Witness how many words we have for sex organs. The reason is the progressive euphemism. A euphemism will be developed for a thing. Then that euphemism is viewed as disgusting and another one will come from it and so on.
The word urinate was reduced to the word that starts with P and rhymes with sis, then it was reduced to pee, then that was child-i-fied to pee pee.
At least it’s easy to text now.
Especially since the word urinate is back in acceptable use.
The sex organs enjoy a disproportionate amount of words compared to other body parts. Yet there’s only one word for elbow. There is apparently nothing sexy about an elbow.
Penne pasta is Freudian and sexy.
Elbow macaroni not so much.
Maybe because we so often stir it in to leftovers.
Judging by the recent economic news, there are also endless words for the crashing economy. Depression, recession, collapse, uncertainty. Sounds like we don’t need a bailout, we need a drug. How about a liquid injection from a big pharmaceutical company?
Actually, that’s not so farfetched. Big Pharma is one of the few vibrant growth sectors in the market.
So follow your baby boomer urges, and put all your money in drugs.
Speaking of the economy, my friend Rick had a great solution for the national debt we’re about to stimulate. He pointed out since we were saddling our grandchildren with this massive debt burden we could only help them by “spreading it around a little,” to paraphrase the prez during his election campaign.
The solution? All our kids need to have octuplets. The more grandchildren, the less any one of them has to pay to bail us out today.
I’m comfortable with the idea. Because even though our generation will consume most of the good stuff, at least they’ll get the leftovers.
America, ya gotta love it.