Nobody likes you when you're dead

[venta]

A new sheep, as invented by cardinalsin:

In the future, scientists will be able to resurrect human beings - but not using DNA. Instead, they will rebuild you from the collective memories of people who know you.

So: Please post a comment describing one thing you know about me. Preferably something interesting, but factual. One day internet archaeologists will use this information to bring me back to life, so make sure what you say is accurate!

Oh yeah, then post this to your journal. Go on, you know you want to.

Comments

[secretrebel.livejournal.com]

You like avocado, even if you lack skill at ordering it in restaurants. You also like tomatoes and mozzarella but are rather more ept at acquiring these foodstuffs.

[mejoff.livejournal.com]

is 'ept' even a real word?

[wimble.livejournal.com]

It's in the OED (which I have to admit, I wasn't expecting!)

Used as a deliberate antonym of ‘inept’: adroit, appropriate, effective.

1938 E. B. WHITE Let. Oct. (1976) 183, I am much obliged..to you for your warm, courteous, and ept treatment of a rather weak, skinny subject.
1966 Time 30 Sept. 7/1 With the exception of one or two semantic twisters, I think it is a first-rate job -- definitely ept, ane and ert.
1976 N.Y. Times Mag. 6 June 15 The obvious answer is summed up by a White House official's sardonic crack: ‘Politically, we're not very ept.’



Hence eptitude; eptly adv.

1967 New Yorker 11 Mar. 133/1 At the start of a season, the custom milliners are always full of ertia and eptitude -- an attitude that I parage.
1970 Guardian 3 Nov. 11/1 The Foreign Secretary has a deserved reputation for being an accident prone speechmaker, and his eptitude -- if that is a word -- is sometimes questionable.
1974 New Yorker 29 Apr. 129/1 Five masked instrumentalists visit, play a sort of march, exchange instruments and play it again, necessarily rather less eptly.
1978 Observer 29 Jan. 4/8 The affair..has contributed to what has been called his ‘eptitude problem’: his ability, when he is wrong-footed, to extricate himself cleanly from the resulting mess.

Although I suspect they may have shot themselves in the foot somewhat by using eptitude -- if that is a word as a quote. Maybe it's being ironic.

Ok, I'm suffering brain lackage: what's the opposite of irony? Obviously, for this thread, it should be rony, but I suspect there's a more general term. Serious maybe, but it doesn't quite seem right.

[venta.livejournal.com]

definitely ept, ane and ert

Please tell me ane and ert are in there too!

[wimble.livejournal.com]

Ane is, but not in the appropriate sense. It's a dialectic variation of "one".

Ert, spectacularly, does appear to mean exactly what it should! And, although now obsolete, predates inert by 300 years.

I was going to snip this, but for your pleasure, I'll put it in.

Obs.
[prob. a. ON. erta to taunt, tease; but cf. ART v.1]

1. trans. a. To incite, urge on, encourage. Const. on, to, till, and to with inf. Also with on. b. To irritate, provoke.

c1325 Metr. Hom. Prol. 5 That thai mai her and hald in hert, Thinge that thaim til God mai ert. Ibid 19 Quen Crist cumes intil our hertes, To lef sin he us ertes.
c1400 Destr. Troy 4857 We haue ournyt hym with angur, ertid hym mykill. Ibid. 12326 To ert hym on exile euer of the londe.
c1440 Promp. Parv. 142 Ertyn, irrito.
1789 D. DAVIDSON Seasons 24 (Jam.) The herd..now and then Erts on the tir'd tike with ‘Sheep awa, a, a!’

absol. c1400 Destr. Troy 2725 Envy, at Euermore ertis to skathe.

2. intr. To be eager, prone; to hurry.

c1400 Destr. Troy 264 He ertide to an ende egerly fast.

Hence ertand ppl. a., pressing on, ambitious. erter, one who provokes. erting vbl. n., the action of the vb. ERT.

c1440 Gaw. & Gol. xxxi. Schir Gawyne..Egir, and ertand, and ryght anterus.
c1440 Promp. Parv. 142 Ertare, irritator, irritatrix. Ibid. 142 Ertynge, irritacio.