Make that word of the “whenever it occurs to me”.
In my previous post (“The three–no, six–loves”), I used the word “egregious”. In English, it means “extraordinary in some bad way; glaring; flagrant”. (Dictionary.com, which I highly recommend. If you have any doubts about the word you are using, says the Speaker to First-years, please do look it up. Even when you’re just blogging.)
Egregious comes from the Latin egregius -a -um, which is a compound of ex, out of, and grex, gregis, flock or herd. When you are egregius, you are distinguishing yourself from those around you by your actions, bearing, etc. Context tells you whether this is good or bad, but generally it means you are admirable. In English, apparently, we don’t like that, and it has come to mean “standing out in a bad way”.
