Plagiarism for Dummies
It is national plagiarism week! Here for the first act at chamblee54, we give blame credit to Father Tony. As he puts it: A pathologist sent me this list: Washington Post’s “Mensa Invitational” which once again asked readers to take any word from the dictionary, alter it by adding, subtracting, or changing one letter, and supply a new definition. Here are the winners: 1. Cashtration (n.): The act of buying a house, which renders the subject financially impotent for an indefinite period of time. 2. Ignoranus: A person who is both stupid and an asshole. 3. Intaxication: Euphoria at getting a tax refund, which lasts until you realize it was your money to start with. 4. Reintarnation: Coming back to life as a hillbilly. 5. Bozone (n.): The substance surrounding stupid people that stops bright ideas from penetrating. The bozone layer, unfortunately, shows little sign of breaking down in the near future. 6. Foreploy: Any misrepresentation about yourself for the purpose of getting laid. 7.Giraffiti: Vandalism spray-painted very, very high 8.Sarchasm: The gulf between the author of sarcastic wit and the person who doesn’t get it. 9. Inoculatte: To take coffee intravenously when you are running late. 10. Osteopornosis: A degenerate disease. 11. Karmageddon: It’s like, when everybody is sending off all these really bad vibes, right? And then, like, the Earth explodes and it’s like, a serious bummer. 12. Decafalon (n.): The grueling event of getting through the day consuming only things that are good for you. 13. Glibido: All talk and no action. 14. Dopeler Effect: The tendency of stupid ideas to seem smarter when they come at you rapidly. 15. Arachnoleptic Fit (n.): The frantic dance performed just after you’ve accidentally walked through a spider web. 16. Beelzebug (n.): Satan in the form of a mosquito, that gets into your bedroom at three in the morning and cannot be cast out. 17. Caterpallor (n.): The color you turn after finding half a worm in the fruit you’re eating.
Chamblee54 
[…] is a repost. The text is borrowed from this blog. Pictures are from The Library of Congress. They were taken at […]
Yeah, another reason plagiarism isn’t a good idea is that you don’t know that what you plagiarized is right.
Actually, there is no “Mensa Invitational.” The list of neologisms that you lifted from someone else’s blog, where that person copied it from someone else, consists mostly, but not entirely, of winning entries from a 1998 contest in The Style Invitational, The Washington Post’s weekly humor/wordplay contest. (Some words on the list, like “caterpallor,” don’t even fit the requirement of changing a real word by one letter.)
The Style Invitational continues to be very clever and funny to this day, and regularly has neologism contests along with a variety of other humor genres.
So you can see the real thing at washingtonpost.com/styleinvitational. Feel free to link to any of the many contests (including the current one) that appear on that page.
And write me at pat.myers@washpost.com to sign up for an e-mail notification when the new contest and results go online every Thursday afternoon.
Pat Myers
The Empress of The Style Invitational