I have lost two words

[MaMight]

This is not actually pendantry, but I thought I would have most luck if I put it to the Pedants' Corner squatters.

Two separate questions:

1. This morning I called my daughter a "daft bessom" and then realised that I have only ever read the word 'bessom' and don't know it's literal meaning. Not wanting to unwittingly use an offensive word, I looked it up... and can't find it anywhere. There is a word bessom isn't there? What does it mean?

1. Years ago I had a 'Word of the Day' calendar. It gave me a word that means a collections of jams, marmalades, honeys etc. It was the breakfast equivalent of 'condiments' I loved this word and used it as often as I could poncily shoe-horn it into conversation. Now I have forgotten it completely. Anyone know?

PS apologies for any spelling or grammar mistakes. I'm not really literate enough to post here, I know .

Just found this on a blog: "The glorious world of opsony"

Until a few years ago, I knew of no English equivalent of the word pålegg. To me, this represented a gaping hole in the English language, as pålegg is a word that I ? and all my fellow Norwegians ? use almost every single day. Pålegg is a collective term which literally means ?On (på) put (legg)?, i.e. ?things you put on top of something?. In this case ?something? is bread. The reason why the English seem to somehow manage to get by without this word, must be that they have a tendency to eat sandwiches consisting of two slices of bread with fillings between. ?Fillings? doesn?t quite cover pålegg, incidentally, as it incorporates such things as mayonnaise, vegetables and chutney. Together with my father ? who like myself is a bit of a vocab-geek ? I commenced the quest for this missing word that would allow us to talk about ham, cheese, pate and chocolate spread without drawing breath. And Eureka! After a year or two we stumbled across the English word opsony, which refers to certain things you may put on top of a slice of bread. Never heard it? Now you have! Opsony ? the word that represents your key to the Norwegian breakfast buffet.

We can't finally have the answer...

To clarify, here's the definition (seems to be an unused Latin word)

opsony (plural opsonies)

1. (obsolete) Any food that is eaten with bread

OP please return and put me out of my misery!

..

I am going to attempt to revive opsony, in any case. I live in Norway and am asked occasionally by Norwegians* what the English call "pålegg".

*usually thinking they already know the answer and consequently smirking in a superior smugness that for once Norwegian is not English's vocabularily challenged cousin.

"Pålegg? Oh, everybody calls it opsony. Didn't you learn that at school in your English classes? Tut, tut."

(I probably can't do so much about the variety of words for mountain, wind and snow...)

"Oh, everybody calls it opsony."
Love the casual tone - poor Norwegians :o

Thanks for the bump, midnightsun. This thread has been driving me bonkers.

So do you say "dd get the opsonies while I'm making the tea", or do you use the singular to encompass everything?

That appears to be the plural - doesn't really roll off the tongue, does it?

It has got to be "opsony" or "opsonium", where's the OP? Can anyone CAT her? Anyone paid for it?

Yes, please. I'm starting to harbour evil thoughts towards the poor unsuspecting OP.

Is it Trenklements?

I look after an old chap who used it to describe 'a collection of things' earlier this morning. Of course my first thought was this post

Can't believe I've just read this entire thread....am going to PM her and put us all out of our misery.

WHy oh why did I click on this thread

PM doesn't work, grrr.

I looked up 'opsony' and it came up with the Manx word 'kytshen' - maybe that was it? At least this will "bump" the thread and MaMight might come back and look at it again.

ooh how exciting, do we have an answer?

I don't think MaMight is coming back so I think we need to reach a consensus among ourselves.

I'll opt for opsony. Anyone else? Any other nominations?

MaMight was last seen in april - anyone know why she hasn't been back?

she must have deregistered too if we can't pm her

Can we just pretend I was right, pretty please? It's driving me bonkers

You were right, Poppy.

That's what the breakfast spreadables are going to be known as in our house from now on anyhow!

That's all I needed (for closure, you understand).

Hairymelons, You are very pretty and deserve to have your hair braided and be fed velvet cake a regular intervals! Thank you!

"at" regular intervals (blah)

Is that consensus then?