pomophobe

[Wilson Gray]

On Tue, May 3, 2011 at 4:44 PM, Joel S. Berson <Berson at att.net> wrote:
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> Sender: Â  Â  Â  American Dialect Society <ADS-L at LISTSERV.UGA.EDU>
> Poster: Â  Â  Â  "Joel S. Berson" <Berson at ATT.NET>
> Subject: Â  Â  Â Re: pomophobe
> -------------------------------------------------------------------------------
>
> At 5/3/2011 04:25 PM, Wilson Gray wrote:
>
>>At first, thanks to increasing presbyopia, I read the word as
>>_pornophobe_, an obvious oxymoron.
>>
>>But, "hates apples?" I don't get it.
>
> As in "pome, n.1." =
> "1.a. †A fruit of the apple kind, or one shaped
> like an apple (obs. except in a technical sense:
> see 1b); an apple (now poet. and rare)."
> b. Bot. The type of fruit that is characteristic
> of the apple ( Malus domestica), the pear ( Pyrus
> communis), and related members of the family
> Rosaceae, which consists of a fleshy, enlarged
> receptacle enclosing a tough central core (the
> true fruit), formed from several united carpels and containing the seeds."
>
> (Or perhaps a fear of kings and cabbages. Â Or
> meatballs. Â (See other definitions s.v.)
>
> Joel
>
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>

Thanks. Joel! I got it now.

I should have been able to make the connection. When I was in high
school, white bucks were known as "fruit boots," as opposed to the
cooler - but, nevertheless, lagging in popularity - blue suedes.

--
-Wilson
-----
All say, "How hard it is that we have to die!"---a strange complaint
to come from the mouths of people who have had to live.
-Mark Twain

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