Word: highfalutin
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...frills" is still his motto. When Skytrain Boss Freddie Laker learned that he was on Queen Elizabeth's Birthday Honors list, he let out the word: "I've been called Freddie all my life, and I'm not changing it to something highfalutin like Frederick simply because I've been knighted." But at the ceremony last week at Buckingham Palace, he wore a proper top hat and morning suit and told photographers: "If you think I'm going to do anything daft today, you're wrong." Sir Freddie is especially pleased with his insignia...
Despite some of the revolting accouterments, there is real musical value in much of punk rock. More and more, the punkers find themselves being referred to as members of yet another New Wave. Sex Pistols Manager Malcolm McLaren regards that as highfalutin, calling the phrase "Establishment language, more descriptive of a new hairstyle than anything else." In truth, New Wave does seem an apt catch-all label for the energetic and varied kind of music that has emerged in recent months from some of the young American bands. The Ramones stick close to basic rock 'n' roll...
...Columnist David Broder complains Carter has pulled off his public opinion triumph despite indifferently delivered speeches that contain no memorable phrases. Indeed, Carter has gone so far as to order his speechwriters to hold their sentences at the ninth-grade level. One speechwriter told TIME that those guilty of highfalutin language "are quickly brought into line-by the leader [meaning Carter]." But, another insisted, "we are not writing down to people. If you follow Strunk and White's Elements of Style, you can meet his standard...
Complex Stuff. His opinions were simplistic, if pungently stated. "I don't mind dictatorships abroad provided they are pro-American," he told a gathering in London. He also called détente a "highfalutin word. They ought to say 'get-together.' While we have so-called détente with the Soviet Union, we should recognize that we cannot necessarily depend on what they say. I think they have out-détented us." A British listener commented that Wallace "seemed to be trying to position himself where Scoop Jackson is, but he hasn't learned...
...dialogue is not without wit, she never sounds much better than the star of a road-company Importance of Being Earnest. As he has demonstrated in novels like The Last Picture Show, Author McMurtry feels most at home with Texas natives, and the odd characters who orbit around his highfalutin heroine regularly upstage her. In the book's best scene, for example, a jealous and not-too-bright husband tries to find his wife at the J-Bar Korral by driving through it in a truck. Aurora's plain, long-suffering daughter is as poignant as her mother...