Topic: Co-Mingle with Me.

[Emagggie]

I watched breakfast TV this am in the absence of a paper and was amused to hear the presenter refer to the mixing of glass for recycling as ' co-mingling'. CO-MINGLING!!!!.....he actually said that some councils were mixing, or co-mingling the glass with other recyclables. A new phrase indeed. I wonder if it will catch on. Of to co-mingle the ingredients for a very nice cake, and then I'm going to sow some co-mingled lettuce.  ;D ;D

[katynewbie]

 ???

Sounds more like a co-mangling of the english language as she is spoke...

 ;)

[Rhubarb Thrasher]

nothing wrong with commingle. First they commingle it, and then they comminute it.
Or comingle, or co-mingle, or any number of mingling mingles

[katynewbie]

 ;D

Still sounds minging to me!

[Carol]

Absolutely!!   Indeed!! 

[Palustris]

At this point in time, even, like, you know!

[Rhubarb Thrasher]

shame on you. It can't be much fun working in a re-cycling centre. Some poor bloke tries to inject a bit of POETRY, and you're down on him like a ton of commingled bricks
PS Think of the Scrabble score

[Emagggie]

But it was the presenter wot said it. Did he think it up all by himself or did he read it ?

[Melbourne12]

I've seen this too in a council leaflet about recycling.  Not only did they misspell it, but they also misused it!

What they mean is that the glass, paper, aluminium and steel are all churned up together prior to being mechanically separated.  Of course, if they were truly commingled than they couldn't be separated, any more than the cake mixture could be separated back into flour, sugar, butter and eggs.

[Rhubarb Thrasher]

what's the point of commingling stuff if you only have to unmingle it after? I spend half my time keeping our rubbish unmingled in me different bins

[Emagggie]

But surely the point is that mix or mingle on their own are good enough. No point in the 'co' whatsoever, innit. ;D Cosuperfluously not coneeded, conohow ;D

[Melbourne12]

It's a legal word, AFAIK.  Certainly I've never used it in conversation.  ;D

From the pamphlet that I saw, the reason that they wanted a special word was that they had a special process.  The contents of the recycling bins were smashed so that all the bottles broke and the paper and card was shredded, then immersed in a stream of water.

The resulting filthy mess was then magically separated - magnets for the steel cans, something else for aluminium, and I think the paper floated on the top and the glass shards sank to the bottom.  Or something like that.

Anyway it was a jolly clever engineering solution to what looked like an unnecessary problem.  ;D  Although I can see that with people becoming grumpy about separating more and more of their rubbish, maybe it solves a political issue.

[Emagggie]

 Thanks for clarifying Melbourne.It's still the stoopidest word I've heard ;D