When someone asked my Dad to perform some difficult or problematic task, he would sometimes reply, “I’m like a steer.  I can only try.”

I’m going to try to show you the many, muddled meanings of the word

QUIXOTIC

taken to mean (among many other things) dreamy, foolish, impractical, impulsive, romantic. unrealistic, utopian, chivalrous, ineffective, impetuous, imaginary, fantastic, and starry-eyed.

It comes, of course, from the early 1600’s Spanish novel about Don Quixote – a man who tried to do the right things, for the right reasons, but failed, because of poor eyesight and worse judgement – only succeeding to draw his many personality peculiarities into the English language.

Finding the meaning of the original name – Quixote – using internet dictionary, translation, and Google research was like riding a carousel, round and round it went – like having Christian apologists claim that the Bible is inerrant…. because the Bible says that it is inerrant.  The character was quixotic – because he was Don Quixote – and he was Quixote – because he acted quixotic.

The Spanish suffix ‘ote’ means ‘large.’  Old Spanish says that ‘quix’ meant ‘leg’ or ‘thigh.’  It apparently began as an occupational name for someone whose job required much lower limb exercise, producing muscular, large legs.  Sounds like an American Thanksgiving turkey advertisement.