Terminolly typing

I alluded to this in an earlier post: I type the dictionary.

One day at a time, one page per day, simple transposition. I started this on 22 August, 2004. I'm currently on page 430. If I miss a day, I do not allow myself to catch up, nor do I allow myself to type more than one page even if I'm feeling particularly ambitious. At my current rate, I should be done sometime in early 2008.

I can't really remember why I started doing this project, but it has served several purposes (1) enriching my vocabulary; (2) improving my typing speed, especially of characters and symbols, and; (3) providing me with an activity that I can do that makes me feel strangely productive, even if it's the only thing I do all day.

I remember Day 2 when I told Kristy Shellenberger, Mark Snyder (the future Mrs. Shellenberger), Matthew Krabill and Mark Miller that I started typing the dictionary. And they didn't think that I'd keep doing it. Well look at me now doubters! I'm too stubborn to stop doing something even if it doesn't really make lots of sense to continue on! I've typed a lot of words! And definition! Many times multiple definitions and for varied pronunciations! (Oh, and in addition to typing them, I highlight words that I would like to learn or use more often. Then, when I've completed all the words for a letter, I compile them in a "best of" archive.)

What did I learn on Day 430? A few of my favorites were propound, pro rata (I'm a sucker for Latin terms that I can mold into business cliches), prosaic, prosody (I think a funny poetry major t-shirt would be: "The only prosody are that there are no prosody*". Even though there surely are.) and protean. Not bad for 5 minutes work.

I was also reminded of the similarity, both in sound and spelling, of the words progeny, prodigy, and protege. Of which I am at least two. I'll let you decide which, and/or of what or whom.

*This shirt only makes sense if you use the simplest definition of prosody provided in my dictionary, which is: "The rules for writing prose".