The blue moon is back tonight. Don’t miss out on it. Thought I’d share my earlier post again today and suggest you share it too!
I don’t have stunning pictures of the phenomenal lunar eclipse that occurred in January (the one above is from the Google Gods). But I did see every square byte of internet space crammed with breathtakingly beautiful pictures of the celestial phenomenon. Now a full moon in March is coming up again on the 1st of March, and once more in March itself we will have a blue moon. So I thought it was a good idea to examine how much of our language gets coloured by the moon, it’s phases and yes, it’s colours!
Once in a blue moon
If I got a coin for every time I said that phrase (especially to dear friends), I’d probably be in my own private island next to Richard Branson’s! A blue moon is not necessarily blue. It’s not blue in colour nor is it sad, and no, it does not even represent a genre of music. What it means is exactly what happened in January and what will happen again in March: two full moons in one calendar month. January 2018 just made it by the skin of its 31 days! We had a full moon on the 1st and now on the 31st. And March has happily followed suit. Strangely that makes the once in a blue moon, kind of twice in a blue moon?! Or once-in-a-blue-moon two times. Uh oh!
Moonshine
No no! Don’t confuse it with moonlight or the light of the moon. This is hooch! Plain illicit. During my recent trip to Kentucky I went bourbon tasting and I discovered the true meaning of this word. (Oh and just some side information, whiskey is not whiskey in the US, it’s bourbon, my dear friend!)
Here’s a wiki definition for Moonshine.
Moonshine was originally a slang term for high-proof distilled spirits usually produced illicitly, without government authorization.[1] In recent years, however, moonshine has been legalized in various countries and has become a commercial product. Legal in the United States since 2010, moonshine is defined as “clear, unaged whiskey”,[2] typically made with cornmash as its main ingredient.[3] *
So beware, Moonshine is not as romantic as it seems! It’s what the local bootlegger is making in his dark shack! Hooch!
Moonlighting
Thought I’d clear this one quickly too – specially for my advertising friends. Do your agency job by day and then meet that small client with a shoestring budget or the fledgling agency later in the evening. Meet in a bar or a coffee shop, get the brief, go home, turn it around with some brilliant creative, then go bleary-eyed to work the next day and tell your Creative Director how your dog took ill! The word comes from working by the light of the moon! Don’t we know about moonlighting!
moonlight
ˈmuːnlʌɪt/
verb
informal
gerund or present participle: moonlighting
- have a second job, typically secretly and at night, in addition to one’s regular employment.
Mooning!
Ahhhh! Naughty! Naughty! Mooning is a interesting and evolving word and has not one, not two but three diverse usages – the third one absolutely the latest!
So here’s the first one:
Those Bollywood film starlets moving around singing sad songs? The tearjerkers? That pretty much sums up the first meaning
muːn/
verb
gerund or present participle: mooning
Behave or move in a listless and aimless manner.
“I don’t want her mooning about in the morning”
And then there’s the famous mooning
Bart Simpson has taken this to an art! Need I say more? (Since this is a family blog I’ve found the most politically correct image possible. But you can google for this and find GIFs and Emoticons galore for this!)
- If you don’t know the third one you’re not likely to survive in the new digital economy because it’s all about cryptocurrency! Following the wild fluctuations around bitcoin mooning has a financial connotation now! Here it is…
Moon – optimistic price projection often used in the crypto coin communities. So if your share price is ‘mooning’ it means it’s going through the roof! Wow! Who’d imagine the moon to be part of the new digital universe!
And that’s really it for the ‘moon’ today.What were you expecting?
Seriously?!
As usual, well written informative piece. Thank you for updating me on the various concepts associated with the moon. Love you to the moon and back!
Thanks Disha! It’s wonderful how language evolves from nature isn’t it? And thanks for the love! I’d give you the moon and the stars for that! 😀
In all creative work and in the practice of it, perhaps a stage is inevitably reached where the self and one’s medium come to know each other well. Expression acquires an ease of being, linked as it is to both the hand which writes, and the ideas contained therein.
So…Does it resemble the comforts of an old marriage?!
Oh this is so full of problems! ?
Anyway, I love the way you write. The profusion of words, and the flow of thoughts are seamless….So at ease with one another. Dare I say it again? An old mariage? Argh! ?
Hi Amit! I truly enjoy getting these comments from you! As you can see I am writing as much as you are commenting so obviously it has been encouraging! 😀
But seriously thanks. I write the way I feel and in this one case, I am fascinated at the way language evolves with the times!
Also, my request is that you keep commenting! After all, we know don’t we, what’s a writer without a reader!!!