Words that sound like they should have a different meaning

[ShesTheAlbatross]

Does anyone else have words that they just think do not sound like their meaning?

I was just reading something that had the word “chartreuse” in it. Does anyone else think that this sounds like it should be red? “Puce” is also the wrong colour for the word.

Similarly, I cannot accept that “bucolic” is a word for anything good. A combination of colic and bubonic, and it means the pleasant English countryside? No.

@PractisingMyTelekenipsis so do I actually, which is perhaps why I was confused for so long!

Extraordinary. Extra-ordinary. Seems to me the word should mean so ordinary it's dull.

'Bucolic' sounds like a horrible sort of illness not a lovely pastoral scene. Bucolic plague.

Yes, clicked on this thinking of puce (should be mustard colour). Agree also with bucolic and Dunkirk.

I always think of puce as a murky green colour rather than its actual meaning

Extra = outside rather than exceedingly. So extraordinary = out of the ordinary; extraterrestrial = from outside Earth. Otherwise ET would be "so Earthy there's nothing to see here"

Oh man, I've just looked up the etymology of puce and it comes from the French for "flea", which is also puce. I'd never linked the words before. 🤓

Omg that’s horrible. I knew it felt somehow a bit grim and that confirms it!

Isn't it?

Yes, I do - it should be red or pink IMO.

Funnily enough that was exactly what sprang to mind when I saw the title of your thread!

Remuneration always seems like it should be renumeration because it's about money/numbers.

There's a medical term for - I think - diarrhoea - which sounds like a pretty name. Melia? There was a thread about it some years ago.

Hirsute.

Should be dapper and well-dressed.

There IS a Dunkirk just north of Bath (as well as Petty France).
A polymath sounds as it relates to someone who is good at maths.

I completely understand the definitions but valuable and invaluable sound like they are the opposite of one another I.e. one is stunning and expensive and the other is crap 😅

@Squirrelsnut I thought Rubella sounded like a pretty name.

That’s a good one. I think those two would make more sense if they were switched.

Pontefract sounds like it should be in Wales

Melaena? Meaning dark black, tarry stools from bleeding in the upper GI tract. But also a very pretty girl’s name!

Ah yes, the OP wanted opinions on Melina and many HPs advised against..!