Must one be nowned before they are renowned?

In response to last week’s question,  “Must one be nowned before they are renowned?”, my dad’s beach buddy Bob wrote, “Initially only ‘nowed and then’ until the ultimate prize, the recognition by everyone in the trailer park.”  My birthday bud Jon (and not his more refined wife Ruth) added, “that only works if you "verbalize" the word "nowned."

My friend Swany suggested, “I think it's referred to as prenowned,” to which my poster-making friend Chris concluded, “not unless they want to be and/or their press secretary says it’s OK.”

My sailing friend Kurt  replied, “The short answer is yes.  You must be known for good or bad before you can be famous for it.”

My friend Richard,  recalling similar Hmmm questions, explained, “This is one of those odd English words that appears to be a variant of an unknown or unclear base word, along “gruntled” (“to put in a good humor”), which was “back-formulated” from disgruntle. In other words, it was made up after the fact!”

Richard continued, “You can be discombobulated, which means “confused.” However, you cannot be combobulated, which presumably would be the state of having one’s ‘stuff’ together. Of course, such a state is pretty rare anyway, so the fact that the word combobulate doesn’t exist is easily understandable, as it would almost never be used.”

Please share your thoughts about "things that make you go 'Hmmm' “:

Is a clear conscience the sign of a fuzzy memory?

Live well...laugh often and heartily…. have a good week and never regret anything that made you smile!

Hal

Congrats to my TAG colleague Andy for completing his 2^nd marathon and proving that the first one wasn’t a fluke.  It is proof what a person can do in the quest of a clear goal.