Humor and Humors

Humour (British English) or humor (American English) is the tendency of experiences to provoke laughter and provide amusement. But this funny version of the word comes from what was once a very serious term in ancient medicine.

The ancient Greeks taught that the balance of four fluids/humours in the human body controlled human health and emotion.

In Latin, humor meant a "body fluid."

The blood was believed to be produced exclusively by the liver.

BILE = a bitter, alkaline, brownish-yellow or greenish-yellow fluid that is secreted by the liver, stored in the gallbladder, and discharged into the duodenum and aids in the emulsification, digestion, and absorption of fats - from Latin bilis "fluid secreted by the liver" (also known as choler),

Excess of yellow bile was thought to produce aggression, and reciprocally excess anger to cause liver derangement and imbalances in the humors.

The Middle English melancholie comes from the Late Latin melancholia and earlier from Greek melancholía meaning the condition of having black bile. An excess of black bile was understood to cause depression, and inversely a decline of feeling or opinion cause the liver to produce blood contaminated with black bile.

Phlegm was thought to be associated with apathetic behavior, as preserved in the word "phlegmatic." In Middle English it was fleem  and in Middle French flemme both from Late Latin phlegma via Greek phlégma meaning "flame" equivalent to phlég(ein) to burn + -ma.

Ghosting

When someone disappears from a relationship like a ghost...

"Ghosting" is a term that has been around since at least 2011. It means breaking off a relationship (often an intimate relationship) by ceasing all communication and contact with the former partner without any apparent warning or justification. You disappear, like a ghost. It also includes ignoring any attempts by the person ghosted to reach out or communicate.

It was especially popular in the context of online relationships and dating which are easier relationships to shut down. It was included in the Collins English Dictionary in 2015.

A few ghostly offshoots of the term are ghostbusting, Marleying and Caspering.



The term "ghostbusting" is when you force someone to reply - as a Ghostbuster forces a ghost into a trap.



"Marleying" comes from the ghostly character Marley from Dickens' A Christmas Carol and is used for the specific situation of when an ex gets in touch with you at Christmas or New Year's Eve out of nowhere.



 “Caspering” has its origin with the comic book friendly ghost, Casper). This is friendlier kind of ghosting when instead of just totally ignoring someone, you’re honest about how you feel, and let them down gently before disappearing from their lives.

These are just four words that have emerged around the newest world of dating.

Odds-and-ends

Today, we use the phrase "odds-and-ends" to refer to all kinds of miscellaneous or remnant items.

They can be physical objects. "Everyone has an odds-and-ends drawer full of things." 

It can also refer to something non-physical, such as in "I have some odds-and-ends [chores] to take care of this weekend."

an odds-and-ends drawer

The origin of the phrase goes back to the mid-sixteenth century when the idiom "odd ends" referred to the leftover scrap materials from making something, such as the fragments of cloth or lumber from a project.