A few days ago, Claire was texting with someone and the person had asked about our Christmas trees, wanting to know if they were real. (She had sent a picture and the person remarked that they really looked \u201creal.\u201d)<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Claire wanted to respond that they weren\u2019t real, they were \u201cfake,\u201d but she didn\u2019t want to use the word fake and she asked me how to spell the word that meant fake but was pronounced \u201cfoh.\u201d I knew immediately what word she was referring to, but neither of us could remember how to spell it. I looked up fake, hoping to find the word in the synonym list but it wasn\u2019t there. I tried a number of similar words like artificial unreal, etc. \u2014 but no luck. <\/p>\n\n\n\n
Claire responded with fake or artificial, or some such term\u2026. it wasn\u2019t until a couple of days later that it came to her how to spell \u201cFaux.\u201d
Just goes to show you that even the sharpest of brains have \u201csenior moments.\u201d\u00a0<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Faux is a French word that means \u201cfake.\u201d Of course we have perfectly good words like imitation and false, etc. when we want to refer to something as fake \u2014 so why use faux at all? Because faux fur, or faux diamonds sounds so much ritzier than fake fur or fake diamonds. Then there\u2019s \u201cfaux pas,\u201d which is French for \u201cfalse step,\u201d or \u201cno-no,\u201d widely used among the witty international set when someone does something \u201cgauche\u201d \u2014 French for \u201cclumsy.\u201d
\u2014 30 \u2014<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
A few days ago, Claire was texting with someone and the person had asked about our Christmas trees, wanting to know if they were real. (She had sent a picture and the person remarked that they really looked \u201creal.\u201d) Claire … Continue reading