“So, who appointed me as the official Thesaurus cop?”
“The what?”
“The Word Police, man. The know-it-all of fancy words. Or stupid words.”
One afternoon last week, while I was pretending to be busy painting planks in the garage (probably to avoid some or other un-favourite chore), Brynn dug out her dog-house project and started putting some finishing touches to the ply structure for her toy dogs, all of which she had built herself, with the exception of the actual sawing of the ply boards (dad refused to let her operate the electric circular saw.)
She was allowed to do the paintwork, on condition that she worked on the grass somewhere outside or in the garage, where the risk of spillage or other catastrophes would be minimised. Needless to say, the over-enthusiasm to get the structure looking “just-so” resulted in some of the brightly-coloured liquid landing on the floor and some other surfaces.
“Gran-pa, I’ve had a slight accident, and I need to wipe it up before Mom comes. Can I borrow your handkerchief?” she asked, pointing to the paint-rag hanging from my back pocket.
I guess kids mostly use tissue paper for their snotty noses nowadays instead of the old germ-rags we always carried in my day. What revolting and frequently slimy articles they were, although we seemed to think of them as quite normal!
But, here I had discovered a new word for my Thesaurus:
Paintkerchief - noun. A white scrap rag used by a painter decorator for wiping paint spots and spillages. Frequently stored half-hanging out (for easy retrieval) of the back pocket of the overalls. If the painter has a severe cold, it is not uncommon for the painter to become inventive and to use it as a nose-wipe as well…
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