Grammar Corner

Many people still have problems with "capital," "capitol," and "Capitol" (yeah, there's three. Eat it.), so let us tackle this indiscretion, albeit briefly.

Now, "capital" can be many, many things: part of a column, an adjective meaning punishable by death, a letter, excellent, something that's very important, money, stock, etc. In the context of this post, we'll take the meaning of "a city serving as a seat of government" or "a city preeminent in some special activity." So, in usage, you would say "Austin is the capital of Texas" or "NYC is the media capital of the world."

Lowercase "capitol" means the building where the state legislature meets, as in "the Texas state capitol is located in downtown Austin."

Confusion sinks in with the capitalized "Capitol," which means the building where the U.S. Congress meets. So, you could say something like "the Capitol is located in the U.S. capital, Washington, D.C." while the Washington state capitol is located in Olympia.

Got it? Good. Still don't got it? Eat it.

(Source: Merriam-Webster's Collegiate Dictionary, 11th ed.)

Grammar extra:
I've been using the word "ridunculous" (spelling varies, but this seems the most proper, at least to me) at work a lot lately (although I do prefer "ri-fucking-diculous," but that's not very work-friendly. But I've been trying to figure out the etymology of it, but I'm stumped. It's not as easy as "ginormous" ("gigantic" + "enormous") or "craptastic" ("crap" + "fantastic") or "absotively" ("absolutely" + "positively"). I mean, obvious it's "ridiculous" + something else, but I can't figure out what, and definitions (here as "ridonkulous," [but "ridiculous" + "donkey"? I don't buy it) here, and here) of it over on Urban Dictionary don't really help out the matter. I don't know. What do you all think? I don't like the donkey aspect because that's really stupid. If that's the case, I think I'll just find something else to say at work; it's been a while since I've given "ludicrous" the limelight. Sigh ...