New words and phrases learned while reading “Fahrenheit 451” in French.
un pissenlit: dandelion (If anyone can explain the etymology of “pissenlit,” I’d be really interested to know why “pissenlit” seems to translate to “piss in the bed,” although this is grammatically unsound, so I don’t know if it’s right, but “pisser”=to piss or to leak, “en”=in, “lit”=bed, so…anyone?)
engourdir: to become literally or figuratively numb, asleep, deadened, slow, drowsy, sleepy, or dull.
I think my favorite “use it in a sentence” dictionary example is, for “pisser:”
“Il pleut comme vache qui pisse” which has an English idiomatic equivalent of “It’s pissing down,” but translates literally to “It’s raining like cow piss.”
(Again, if there are any true linguists out there who would like to correct my amateurish nerdiness, please do! I just really hope I’m right about the cow piss thing. Am I right about the cow piss thing?)
