Shot.
“Shot” is definitely in my top 10 favorite words.
“Shot” can either be one of the best things, or one of the worst things.
“Hey guys, Dave just found out he’s getting a shot to audition for SNL!”
“Hey guys, Dave just did 5 shots and then backflipped into the pool!”
“Hey guys, Dave just heard out that, had he not gotten his Shingles shot, he’d be dead right now!”
“Hey guys, Dave just got shot!”
See? That’s quite a spectrum of possibilities.
How can one word carry so much weight?
4 single letters in the English language, when put in the right order, determine whether somebody takes a bullet to the arm or a vaccination to the arm.
There are 456,976 possible 4-letter combinations in the English language. Why are we doubling down on meanings? We shouldn’t have any homonyms.
If we really wanted to, we could make “shot” just refer to the first meaning I mentioned: “a chance or opportunity.”
All the other possible meanings of “shot” could be changed with such ease, considering there are 456,976 possible 4-letter combinations.
Let’s start the English language from scratch. This time, we use every possible combination. I want ORDER this time.
“Hey guys, Dave just did 5 AAAAs and then backflipped into the pool!”
“Hey guys, Dave just found out that, had he not gotten his Shingles AAAB, he’d be dead right now!”
“Hey guys, Dave just got AAACed!”
See? You knew what I was talking about every time. This is a far more precise method of forming linguistic order.
Think about it.
Until next time,
Michael J. Erickson, CEO & Co-Founder
