This mistletoe bouquet has a realistic toe

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Originally published at: This mistletoe bouquet has a realistic toe | Boing Boing

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Cute, but where’s the missile?

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Gratuitous Etymology Alert (tl;dr: -toe: twig, missel-: basil (or urinate, maybe))

mistletoe (n.)
European plant growing parasitically on certain trees, Old English mistiltan, from mistel “mistletoe” (see missel) + tan “twig,” from Proto-Germanic *tainan “twig” (source also of Old Saxon and Old Frisian ten, Old Norse teinn, Dutch teen, Old High German zein, Gothic tains “twig”). Similar formation in Old Norse mistilteinn, Norwegian misteltein, Danish mistelten.

missel (n.)
Old English mistel “basil, mistletoe,” from Proto-Germanic *mikhstilaz “mistletoe” (source also of Old Saxon mistil, Dutch mistel, Old High German mistil, German Mistel, Swedish mistel), a word of uncertain origin. According to Watkins, it is a diminutive form, so called because it “is propagated through the droppings of the missel thrush,” from Germanic suffixed form *mih-stu-, “urine,” hence “mist, fine rain,” from PIE root *meigh- “to urinate.” Missel-bird “missel thrush” is attested from 1620s.

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nail polish and all.
there are ways, Dude. believe me, you don’t want to know.

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