Wondrous Words Wednesday – Curmudgeon

Posted September 23, 2020 by elzaread in Wondrous Words Wednesday / 12 Comments

I saw this very catchy blog title on Yvonne, over at  Fiction Books‘ website, and it immediately caught my lover-of-language eye. I so wish I could talk like humans. Who doesn’t love all the different languages? Who doesn’t love a good alliteration? Wondrous Words Wednesday. I can definitely purr that.

My Mommy started investigating and notice that this is actually a meme started by Kathy @  Bermuda Onion Blog. But Kathy is taking a bit of a break and just like Yvonne, I do hope she doesn’t mind that we still use her meme.

English is not my first language, my Mommy mostly speak Afrikaans to me. So yes – we do come across some words that we’ve never heard or seen before in our reading endeavors. For last week’s Top Ten Tuesday, I utterly convinced you that The world does revolve around me. On that post, we came across a word that my Mommy has never seen before:

CURMUDGEON

It sounds like a terrible disease and I guess for some people (and a few cats), it might just be that. As you can see from our cover image, a curmudgeon is a bad tempered person – especially an old one. I know a few of those and one cat.

This got us thinking, who’s your favorite curmudgeon in books? Here’s a few of ours:

 

 

 
I almost forgot about Mrs Rottenmeier from Heidi by Johanna Spyri. My mommy says she still has nightmares from that horrible lady.
Just to add a final flavor to our Wondrous Words Wednesday post, let’s look at the Afrikaans translation for curmudgeon. According to Google Translate, it should be ‘hinderlaag’. That is completely wrong, because a ‘hinderlaag’ is an obstacle. Although, come to think of it… Some curmudgeons are nothing but obstacles…..
In my humble opinion, the Afrikaans translation for curmudgeon should be:
Beneuk or Bedonnerd or Knorrig
What Wondrous Words can you share with us today?
I don’t find a link-up or a linky for this meme, if I’m missing it – please be so kind and let me know.
Have a wonderful Wednesday!
Lots of Love,

Elza 

 

 

Share the Meows
RSS
Follow by Email
Twitter
Visit Us
Follow Me
Instagram

12 responses to “Wondrous Words Wednesday – Curmudgeon

  1. This is a fun word! I think current events are bringing out the curmudgeon in a lot of people. I’m glad Yvonne and people like you are keeping this fun meme alive!

    • Hi there Kathy! What an honor to have you visiting my blog! My day is made. We will gladly keep the flame going until you return to blogging.

      Yes, current circumstances does bring out the curmudgeon in a number of people. I had a discussion with my principal a couple of weeks back about the exact same thing!

      Hope you are enjoying your break away from blogging and we hope to see you soon again.

    • I can't believe I never heard it before! I must have seen it and it just went over my head I guess.

      Please send me your link with the top 5 curmudgeons! Would love to read it.

  2. Hi Mareli,

    Thank you so much for taking part in WWW today and sharing your word. I really like the sound of 'curmudgeon', however it is a little use word here in the UK these days and is more often replaced by the word 'grumpy'. Having worked in the charity sector for many years, I have come across many 'curmudgeons' and I do hate to speak ill of the dead, but my own father probably came in that same description towards the end of his 91 year life!

    Thank you for including Kathy's name in your post, as this is still very much her meme as far as I am concerned and I am only 'keeping her seat warm' for her until she returns. That is why I haven't included a link up in my posts, as I am basically only sharing my own personal words each week.

    If you come across any new to you words though, please do share them, as I always enjoy checking them out.

    I love that you linked your favourite grumpy character books, I had great fun checking them out, but like yourself I can always remember Mrs Rottenmeier from Heidi, as that was one of my favourite books when I was a child and I read it over and over again.

    It is great that you share your Afrikaans words here too, as I am always interested in discovering those as well!

    Have a peaceful week 🙂

    Yvonne xx

    • I there Yvonne! Thanks so much for bringing this under my attention! I'm so going to do this on a regular basis.

      I agree with the meme, let's wait for Kathy to return and then we can do all the link-ups again. For now, we can at least share it with each other.

      Have a wonderful day!