Wednesday, May 16, 2012

Childhood Memories


supercalifragilisticexpialidocious
Source: http://yvonnebyattsfamilyfun.blogspot.com/2010/12/marry-poppins-party.html

      Today I woke up and thought I would do a little brain expanding. Afterwards, I was left laughing so hard and amazed I had to share my results. I was reviewing "some of the longest words in the dictionary," when I came across a childhood favorite:  
Supercalifragilisticexpialidocious 

I definitely got the later part of that word wrong when I attempted to spell it as a child. But ladies and gentlemen, that is how the dictionary(.com) says you spell it! Okay, for the best part. I was looking at this word and couldn't believe that it actually was a real word! It only got better when I looked up the "official" definition:

"used as a nonsense word by children to express approval or to represent the longest word in English" (source: dictionary.com) 

(My favorite part of that definition is italic!) Another dictionary reported this word's definition as meaning "god," or at least that was what Mary Poppin's intended it to mean. (Source:http://www.placementor.com/resources/longwords.htm)

  Oh the joys of childhood! I wonder if I ever quoted that word correctly?

But for all of you wondering what is the official longest REAL word, well most sources claim:

Pneumonoultramicroscopicsilicovolcanoconiosis
(Sources: dictionary.com, wikipedia.com, and oxfordictionaries.com)

Does anyone else get a bit of a head ache trying to even pronounce that 45 letter word?! It represents a type of lung disease caused by silica dust. It is so long that my Iphone Dictionary.com application can't even fit the whole word on the screen. It simply cuts the word off with "..." HA!

I would definitely like to see these two words in the next spelling bee! 

 

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