• rheumy •
Pronunciation: ru-mee • Hear it!
Part of Speech: Adjective
Meaning: Having a runny nose and/or runny eyes.
Notes: Well, it is still that season in North America when we meet people with rheumy eyes and noses. If you would like to impress them with your vocabulary, refer to their noses as rheumy rather than runny. It also avoids that silly answer to the question, "Is your nose running?" Rheum is the watery discharge from the nose and eyes and is not as thick as mucus, which you have to blow out. Rheum gets out on its own. I suppose someone could sniff rheumily and even speak of their rheuminess.
In Play: Rheuminess is the cause of the sniffles rather than a full-blown (so to speak) head cold: "The Alaskan cruise was beautiful but we all returned home a bit run-down and rheumy." We might even expand the range of situations we describe with today's Good Word: "Our cruise liner was roomy but rheumy: half the crew and passengers were sniffling the entire trip."
Word History: The family history of this word is so fascinating we can only skim the surface here. It comes from Greek rheuma "flowing, stream" from rhein "to flow". This word comes from an earlier word with an initial S (sreu- "flow"). Early Indo-European languages didn't like the combination SR and most eliminated it. Greek dropped the S while English added a T, leading to today's stream. Evidence of the Greek word pervades English vocabulary. That is it referring to flows in diarrhea and logorrhea. It also seems to have promoted the Greek word for nose, as in the name of the animal with the nose-horn, the rhinoceros. (We thank Dr. Margie Sved for suggesting today's Good Word, with our best wishes that she successfully avoids any rheuminess this season.)
RHEUMY
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Re: RHEUMY
Is this the source of German Rhein / English Rhine, as in the Rhine River? Flowing River? Systranet translate flow, to flow as Fluß, fließen and running water, flowing water as laufendes Wasser, flüssige Wasser....Word History: The family history of this word is so fascinating we can only skim the surface here. It comes from Greek rheuma "flowing, stream" from rhein "to flow". ..
Systranet can't translate "runny" and "rheumy" as in "runny nose," but "nose" translates as "Nase."
There is a prescription drug, Fluticasone, a potent synthetic corticosteroid often prescribed as treatment for asthma and allergic rhinitis. In the US, it is marketed for asthma as Flovent, and allergic rhinitis as Flonase, by GlaxoSmithKline. (Wikipedia)
Regards//Larry
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"To preserve liberty, it is essential that the whole body of the people always possess arms, and be taught alike, especially when young, how to use them."
-- Attributed to Richard Henry Lee
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Ah. Much is revealed-
"In the White Rheum, with black kerchiefs nearby stationed..."
All the world is red and teary, everywhere eye-rheum...
Some of the more subtler manifestations:
When the condition is not bad enough to affect everyday activity, it's called Breathing Rheum. And if the eyesight is unaffected, it's Rheum-with-a-view.
You wanna stay away from the Green Rheum though, unless you really are with the band
"In the White Rheum, with black kerchiefs nearby stationed..."
All the world is red and teary, everywhere eye-rheum...
Some of the more subtler manifestations:
When the condition is not bad enough to affect everyday activity, it's called Breathing Rheum. And if the eyesight is unaffected, it's Rheum-with-a-view.
You wanna stay away from the Green Rheum though, unless you really are with the band
Stop! Murder us not, tonsured rumpots! Knife no one, fink!
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