I thought "rectitudinous" had something to do with "rectum", the final section of the large intestine, terminating at the anus. It turns out that the word is defined as "characterized by the quality of being honest and morally correct." This definitely does NOT describe the person I was thinking of.
There are many other words that don't mean what we think. A few...
1. Bemused does not mean amused, it means puzzled, confused, or bewildered.
2. Disinterested does not mean having no interest in something. It means unbiased, fair-minded and objective.
3. Enormity has nothing to do with enormous which means very large in size, quantity, or extent. It means the great or extreme scale, seriousness, or extent of something perceived as bad or morally wrong. A second meaning is a grave crime or sin.
4. Noisome has nothing to do with noise and ears. It means something has an extremely offensive smell.
5. Factoid. It does not mean an interesting little piece of trivia. No, factoids are something we are inundated with everyday. Norman Mailer (an American novelist, journalist, essayist, playwright, activist, filmmaker and actor) coined the word in 1973 and he explained the meaning. Factoids are “facts which have no existence before appearing in (print and they are)...not so much lies as a product to manipulate emotion in the Silent Majority.” In other words, factoids are bits of fake news that people believe to be true because they appeared in print.
6. A travesty is not a deplorable occurrence or situation. A travesty is a false, absurd, or distorted representation of something. You might say it's a close relative of a factoid!
7. Peruse does not mean idly scanning magazines or websites in a casual manner without paying too much attention to details. It means to read or examine something carefully and thoroughly.
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