Transcript of “To Tetris: To Organize Things In Real Life As You Would the Blocks in the Video Game Tetris”
Hello, you have A Way with Words.
Hello, my name is Abhishek. How are you guys?
Hi, Abhishek. Doing great. Where are you calling from?
I’m calling from Gaffney, South Carolina.
Gaffney, South Carolina. Well, what can we do for you?
I was talking to one of my friends, Tony. He was moving from his house in Augusta.
And when we were talking about, you know, the logistics of the whole move, and, you know, like I remarked that it usually takes longer to load stuff into like a U-Haul or a box truck, right?
And we were kind of like, yeah, you know, it does take a little longer.
And while saying that, I remarked, like, so, yeah, I guess it’s like we are tetrising all these small items in this constrained area, right?
Like packing it all in.
And that kind of got both of us thinking like, hey, I don’t know if that’s a real word, Tetris-ing, but is there another word that can be used in this context where we are packing things in a small area and if there is any other history to it?
Because I kind of made that up.
I think tetrising is a wonderful word for trying to arrange a whole bunch of things in a small area.
And how long ago was this that you two were doing that?
Yeah, this was about maybe three months ago now.
And, you know, we were kind of talking about it.
And one of the days he remarked, you know, I’ve been thinking about that word and I think it really fits well.
Like, you know, I agree it fits well, but I don’t know if it is right.
Yeah, it literally fits well.
There’s a self-Tetris-ing word.
Yeah, it literally fits well.
Wait, so let’s be clear for everyone who’s maybe not quite getting what we’re talking about.
We’re talking about the video game Tetris, T-E-T-R-I-S, and it’s all about putting cubes together.
And packing them in so that your stack doesn’t build too close to the top of the screen and you lose.
Right. There are blocks falling down from the top of your screen in different combinations.
And you have to combine them as they’re piling up.
And it’s really satisfying, isn’t it, Abhishek, when you get them to click?
Yeah.
It is.
Yeah.
And especially in a moving context.
Absolutely.
You know, you have all these randomly shaped things.
There are some in moving boxes, some weird shaped lamps, and, you know, maybe two curtain rods that don’t really fit anywhere.
And you sort of figure it all out and then you pack it all in.
It’s a little longer to pack.
But when you’re unpacking, it’s a lot easier.
Exactly. Yes. And I think Tetris-ing is a wonderful word.
I asked how long ago you used it because it’s been in use for at least a couple of decades.
I know the game itself, Tetris, was invented back in the mid-80s.
But what’s happening here is something that linguists call denominalization.
Actually, about one out of every five verbs in English is formed from a noun.
And anybody who disagrees with us can phone us or email us or text us.
But why disagree? Because it’s going to happen without you.
Yeah.
With or without.
Yeah. So Tetris-ing, although it hasn’t made it into lots of dictionaries yet, it’s this wonderfully efficient and effective and vivid verb.
So you were using a denominal verb.
And I think it works really well.
I was using Jenga the other day.
Oh, yeah.
Piling up.
That’s another good game.
Yeah.
Nobody here at the house wanted to take out the recycling.
And it just kept, you know, the pile kept getting bigger and bigger.
And I just referred to it as our Jenga.
Yeah.
I might use that one next.
There you go.
You know, there was one other meeting of two Tetris that started out very early in the history of people becoming just obsessed with the video game.
And this is how after you play the game for a while and you move off into the real world, you want to do the same thing with everything in the real world.
You want to consolidate and combine anything and everything just like the Tetris game.
And so you just keep looking at things, even if they’re none of your business, and saying, I could rearrange the shelves of this grocery store a lot better.
These canned goods aren’t how they need to be.
Yep.
You start looking at shapes and patterns.
Yeah, so you’re tetracized is a word that you can find even earlier than the meaning of tetracing that we’re talking about.
To be tetracized means to have this basic principle, this conceit of the game to overtake your real world view.
It was great talking to you guys, and I love you.
Yeah, take care. We appreciate it. Call us again sometime, all right?
Yeah, thank you.
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You can find that on our website at waywordradio.org.
