words wholly unrelated

hairy & hirsute

the oh ee dee definition for hairy is “hirsute.” the oh ee dee definition for hirsute is “hairy”—there could be no better synonyms in all the world. the words even look like fraternal twins, what with their initial aitches, their peek-a-boo eyes, and their awkwardly bending arrs. but, as i am sure you have already pieced together, neither word is etymologically related to the other.

hairy is from the old english hǽr (hair). hirsute is from the latin hirusutus meaning bristly. both words describe my barreling man-chest as well as the clump that i extracted from my shower drain earlier this morning when i was searching around my shower drain for interesting clumps to add to my interesting clump collection. now you know one of my secret hobbies.