It’s my birthday today and as usual, I have been wondering. Why do we call it a birthday? Then may be those who were born in the night would call it a birthnight, and by the red underline that springs up under this word birthnight, thanks to the spellchecker, I guess it’s not even a recognized word in the Random House Dictionary. And then what do those guys like me would say who were born at 7-15 in the evening, which time is not exactly either a day or night but falls in between? Happy Birthevening? And since we call it a birthday and celebrate it every year when that date arrives, shouldn’t we call it a birthdate, that is something like Happy Birthdate to you, since in my specious reckoning the birthday is only once in your lifetime, that is the day when your Excellency was born, and all the similar divine dates on which it annually visits you, would be birthdates. This is not nit-picking, please. Far from it.
Not surprisingly, nobody likes his or her name to be spelled or pronounced wrongly by others. This is a universal observation and largely to do with preserving your identity in an otherwise generally averaging world. Similarly, when the annual celebration of the event of your birth takes place, you would certainly want to, at least I do, describe the time as precisely as possible. If you are holding out the day on which you were born, as auspicious as it might seem to you and would like others to believe so, then you might as well horofically (not horrifically, or heroically, or horoscopically, the word horofically is correct, don’t doubt it! You may though not find it in any existing dictionary.) announce the time as precisely as possible. In which case, I discover, it would be called Happy Birthhour!
This is neither here nor there. And it’s getting me nowhere, year after year. Prisoner of words that I am, and a worshipper of semantics that I have made myself a die-hard into! What did I say? Die-hard? Hmm, something on that, some other time. You might as well heave a sigh of relief because I am pausing.
Not surprisingly, nobody likes his or her name to be spelled or pronounced wrongly by others. This is a universal observation and largely to do with preserving your identity in an otherwise generally averaging world. Similarly, when the annual celebration of the event of your birth takes place, you would certainly want to, at least I do, describe the time as precisely as possible. If you are holding out the day on which you were born, as auspicious as it might seem to you and would like others to believe so, then you might as well horofically (not horrifically, or heroically, or horoscopically, the word horofically is correct, don’t doubt it! You may though not find it in any existing dictionary.) announce the time as precisely as possible. In which case, I discover, it would be called Happy Birthhour!
This is neither here nor there. And it’s getting me nowhere, year after year. Prisoner of words that I am, and a worshipper of semantics that I have made myself a die-hard into! What did I say? Die-hard? Hmm, something on that, some other time. You might as well heave a sigh of relief because I am pausing.
