Post #415700 by joefla70 on Mon, Oct 27, 2008 1:34 PM

I don't know if it necessarily made me "happy", but something did happen today that gave me a bit of amusement. The fact that it gave me some excitement might be a sad commentary on my boring life!

Sometimes when I am writing legal briefs (I'm an attorney) I come up with a word that I am not sure is an actual word, or if its something I just completely made up. A little while ago I was writing a sentence and needed a word that basically means “to point out the basis for something” or “to provide an explanation.” The word that immediately popped into my head was “elucidate.” I don’t remember ever reading or hearing that word before but, nevertheless, it just popped into my head as being a word that would be appropriate.

However, because I had no idea whether I had just made up that word or if it was a real word, (or even if it was a real word, whether it meant what I thought it meant), I looked the word up on the Merriam-Webster online dictionary (as I often do when I pull words out of my ass).

The definition is as follows:

elucidate
One entry found.

Main Entry:
elu•ci•date
Pronunciation:
\i-ˈlü-sə-ˌdât\
Function:
verb
Inflected Form(s):
elu•ci•dat•ed; elu•ci•dat•ing
Etymology:
Late Latin elucidatus, past participle of elucidare, from Latin e- + lucidus lucid
Date:
circa 1568
transitive verb : to make lucid especially by explanation or analysis intransitive verb : to give a clarifying explanation

The sentence I wrote in my brief reads as follows:

“In his motion Defendant does not elucidate the basis for his contenion that...”

I surprise myself sometimes! I guess I'm not as much of a dumbass as my wife thinks I am! :)