12.08.2008

On the bleakonomy

So, it must be said (to all four people that might possibly be reading at this point) that I have misgivings about my maiden blog voyage being on something called "bleakonomy." Why? Two reasons:

1) It implies a rather more dour worldview than I have.
2) It implies that I know something (at all) about economics. I don't. This doesn't stop me from having opinions, but it does make them somewhat less well informed.

Why "bleakonomy," then? It was a neologism that occured to me while listening to NPR, following a mention of the "bleak economy." I have this weird verbal tic whereby I like to smoosh words together that have a connective phoneme. The other example that springs to mind is the name of the erstwhile American Idol also-ran and newly-minted gay baby daddy Claiken. So, thinking that the OED could always use a jolt, I contributed "bleakonomy" to the world's vernacular. Somewhere William Safire is having a seizure.

Anyhow, now that we've got the name, I'll try to tack somewhat toward occasional ponderings on the economy. But I'll probably just blather about politics.

3 comments:

  1. They're called portmanteau words. :>

    -Jen B.

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  2. Ah, yes. I had forgotten the term. (With all due respect to Lewis Carroll.)

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  3. yeah, I was wondering about the title. You always struck me as being an optimistic kind of guy.

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