I ought to be in bed

[conuly]

and I'm going just now, but I have to share two words I learned just now: kolk and riprap. I probably will never have a chance to say "kolk" again, but, as I live in a city of islands it is very possible for me to take walks that allow me to casually walk by riprap and refer to it as such! I actually do this already, except I've never had a specialized word for those rocks before!

...occasionally, I have cause to identify very strongly with Tiffany Aching.

There was a lot of mist around, but a few stars were visible overhead and there was a gibbous moon in the sky. Tiffany knew it was gibbous because she’d read in the Almanack that gibbous meant what the moon looked like when it was just a bit fatter than half full, and so she made a point of paying attention to it around those times just so that she could say to herself: “Ah, I see the moon’s very gibbous tonight....”

It’s possible that this tells you more about Tiffany than she would want you to know.

Anyway, riprap is now my second favorite rock related word, immediately after "chossy" but before "scree".

Comments

[acelightning]

There is a poem entitled Riprap, by Gary Snyder, from a collection of his poems.

Meanwhile, the walls and floor are very perpendicular tonight ;-)

[marahmarie]

If the floors are truly perpendicular then you are in trouble.

[bibliofile]

Cool poem that I must now ask a friend if they've heard of it (and read it).

There may be a poem in all of this, perhaps, about rocks and moving them around and where you want them to be (or not).

[conuly]

Nice poem :)

[marahmarie]

Oh, how to use this... *thinks*

The scree made the mountain too chossy to climb, Bree noticed just before the riprap she thought she'd sidestepped upon descent sent her tumbling into a kolk.

I think writing a novel one'd need a dictionary just to read is my new 2019 #GOALS

[conuly]

:D

[cosmolinguist]

I identify with Tiffany in about a million ways but this is definitely one of them.

[conuly]

#solidarity

[hudebnik]

The words "a-a" and "pahoehoe" tickled me when I learned them on a family vacation at age eight, but I have had alas very little opportunity to use them since....

[conuly]

A-a is one of the best words.

[redbird]

Kolk reminds me of a Category 6 blog post I just read, on the Old River Control Structure, specifically the part about how the structure was damaged in flooding in 1973.

(That post says it is part 1 of a 3-part series on "the history and importance of the Old River Control Structure," the massive piece of engineering that is keeping the Mississippi in its current riverbed past Baton Rouge and New Orleans.)

[conuly]

Ah, I found these words because I was just reading how the levee system of controlling the Mississippi was probably, in retrospect, a really bad idea.

[oracne]

Can riprap be chossy?

[conuly]

Can scree?

[elainegrey]

Chossy and kolk are new to me: thank you!

[conuly]

I just love the etymology of the word chossy so, so much.

[cactuswatcher]

Hmm. Growing up in an area with many rivers and artificial lakes, I learned the word riprap when I was fairly young. Can't say it came up in daily conversation... Several years ago I saw an episode of Nova on the Scablands in Washington in which kolks played an interesting role in forming some features in the countryside. Never once in the show did they use the word 'kolk,' though they showed a lab demonstration of how one would form. Can't say I missed much by not learning the word then!

[conuly]

Can't say it came up in daily conversation.

Reread the Discworld quote.

Can't say I missed much by not learning the word then!

Next you'll tell me you don't read the dictionary for fun.

[melannen]

...Kolk, Riprip, Chossy, and Scree should all be music subgenres in some SF future..

[conuly]

They're what trolls listen to in the SF version of Discworld.

[larryhammer]

Am I the only one intrigued by the fact that Wikipedia has a disambiguation page for kolk? And it includes two geology terms?

[conuly]

I think the terms may be related...?

[sonia]

Thanks for the new vocabulary words!

Is it riprap if it's large rocks placed under freeway overpasses and in grassy areas to prevent homeless people from camping comfortably?

I have definitely biked down into a small kolk-scoured area and back up again, near the Columbia River just outside the Gorge (Portland, OR). Steep!

[conuly]

No clue, but it's not very nice then.

[movingfinger]

If you like riprap, you'll love gabion!

[conuly]

Not enough reduplication, but it's still going on my list.

[sovay]

Anyway, riprap is now my second favorite rock related word, immediately after "chossy" but before "scree".

It is very good.

[conuly]

It's the effect of the pararhyme.

[low_delta]

Never heard chossy before.

[conuly]

Well, now you have :)

[lop]

i actually ran into the word "scree" referring to not-screaming for the first time the other day and for some reason it just tickles me any time i read it.

[conuly]

I love that word because the first time I used it in a sentence I was surprised to find I knew it! That happens sometimes when you encounter a word, but it had never before happened when saying a word.