no.stupid.answers

Answers.com’s top 1-click search term this week is pandemic (if you don’t know what 1-click is, check here; it’s incredibly handy for looking things up without leaving the web page you’re looking at). And no wonder: the WHO set the influenza pandemic alert at 5 out of a possible 6.

Pandemic is from pan, meaning all, and demos, meaning people (both from ancient Greek). So a pandemic is something (well, not just something; it’s a disease) that affects all (well, not all, but lots of) people. It differs from an epidemic (a widespread outbreak of a contagious disease) in that it is, well, more widespread. Demos gives us democracy, government by the people; demographics, characteristics of populations; and demagogue, a leader who appeals to popular prejudice. Pan gives us words like panorama, a view of an entire area, and pantheism, the belief that God is in everything.

So, pandemic is clearly word of the week. The Pandora’s box has been opened and it will take plenty of time and effort till we can declare it closed again. We can’t be Panglossian about this crisis, but on the other hand panic won’t help matters. Let’s just be prepared.

I like abbreviations. I think life’s too short, every second counts, etc. Don’t get me wrong, I find lots of pleasure in sesquipedalian words - you know, piecing together the Greek and Latin roots, with prefixes and suffixes and whatnot - but there’s also plenty of fun to be had in acronyms and other shorthand. BRB. OK, I’m back.

So, words like za and rents save precious time. And if you don’t know what a particular word means - well, then the timesaving element is gone but it’s kind of fun to figure out, so either way you win.

I came across this one recently in a Slate blog post about Google bonuses. (Seriously, who doesn’t love eating his heart out over how well those folks get treated?)

Finally, Gizmodo, which helped break the story, notes that this is part of a longtime tech, um, tradition, in which companies hand out their toys to their own employees to beta test them for bugs and get feedback on how to improve the next generation. The toys have been dubbed “dog food” by techies, and Gizmodo has thought up a fun  illo for Google’s latest foray into handing out the Alpo. Click here to see it.

I had no idea what an illo was, though the convenient link helped. To make sure, I Googled it, trying to ignore Google’s insistence that “perhaps I meant Ilo?” (No, like Horton the elephant, I meant what I said.) There wasn’t much out there, but I did find this blog, the Illo Watch, “dissecting the daily New York Times Op-ed illustration,” which made the point pretty clear, and also showed that illo goes back to at least 2005.

And the last thing I did was to make sure that Answers.com had an entry on illo. Because now I know.

I was reading an article this morning about cookies - why not? I didn’t have any nearby to eat - when I came across the following term: Helicopter parents.

But food scientists, chefs and dairy professionals stress butter’s unique and sensitive nature the way helicopter parents dote on a gifted child. (It’s from here.)

Now, “soccer moms” I knew, and “hockey moms,” and “NASCAR dads.” But apparently it was time to update my catalog of stereotypes. So I naturally looked it up right away on Answers.com, and here’s what I learned:

Helicopter parent is a colloquial, early 21st-century term for a parent who pays extremely close attention to his or her child’s or children’s experiences and problems, particularly at educational institutions. These parents rush to prevent any harm or failure from befalling them and will not let them learn from their own mistakes, sometimes even contrary to the children’s wishes. They are so named because, like helicopters, they hover closely overhead, rarely out of reach, whether their children need them or not.

There’s more there, including definitions of “Black Hawk parent” and “lawnmower parent.” Now I know.

Word buffs and green folk alike should be pleased at the selection of hypermiling as top word of 2008. It refers to the activity - actually, for some, like top hypermiler Wayne Gerdes, it’s a competitive sport - of squeezing every last drop out of a gallon of gas. If that requires driving only downhill, so be it.

Other top words that didn’t make it to No. 1 were moofer - as in, one who moofs, a mobile out-of-office worker who gets his job done via Blackberry and the like; staycation - for those who want to enjoy their precious days off close to home or can’t afford to travel; and tweet, as in what you do when you use Twitter (shouldn’t it be called twit? Anyone?).

I detect a theme of mobility: These words all have to do with where you’re going (or not going) and how you get there.

Gotta love the way language grows and reshapes itself to fit our lives. 2008, we salute you.