
Word of the Day: Porridge

Dec. 19 2008, Published 1:29 p.m. ET
The other day a few friends and I were having a nice dinner at Sushi Roku in LA and
while awaiting our sake and platters of sushi one of my friends blurted, “I want some porridge.” Huh? He quickly fessed up to just wanting to say the word porridge which led to probably the longest discussion about porridge in recent history. Do any of us really know what porridge is other than whatever was in the bowl Goldilocks ate from that was too hot and too cold before being just right? I’m willing to bet not so much. Nonetheless, at the mention of the infrequently heard or spoken word we went around the table in turn repeating it. This became a reoccurring habit over the course of the evening until we decided that we liked the word enough to give it value extending beyond a goopy substance Goldilocks ate. We started giving our own connotations to the word and by the end of the night “I want some porridge’ didn’t sound as odd – or innocent - as we made it mean we were looking for somebody of the opposite sex to flirt with. Put any word in a certain context long enough and it’s possible to recreate its meaning indefinitely, just take ‘phat’ and ‘wicked’ both essentially meaning ‘cool.’
Integrating ‘porridge’ into current day lingo could be as easy as convincing a rap star to incorporate ‘I was out a da club looking to find myself some porridge. Then I saw her dressed in red and I walked over so my hunger could be fed.’
You catch my drift ;) xo