Whoa - that's... scary.

Not just you. I work in construction and have learned to talk to my coworkers as though I am talking to 5th graders. On a good day they are even challenged by 5 letter words like 'drill' and 'lever'. (heavy sigh)

I haven't, but only because I work for a very small company and I interact with a very limited number of people. I have run across this in other places though - it's always disconcerting, especially if I use what I think is a word that everyone would know.

Persnickety? That's pretty bad when they don't even know that, even kind of sad isn't it?

Yes. It happens to me all the time.

Whenever I use the word antidisestablishmentarianism, I get the funniest looks.

Gee, I thought everyone learned antidisestablishmentarianism in grade school - wasn't it the longest word in the dictionary at some point?

That and floccinaucinihilipilification.

I remember the same thing happening in high school— I used the phrase "[something] being the operative word," and another girl complained that I always used such big words. Mind you, this was a competetive private school, so I was the one dumbfounded.

(And I hate it when people think you're using big words to sound important. Hey, twits, I use these words because they're accurate, and all of my friends talk that way. If they don't know what a word means, they ASK instead of assuming that I'm trying to show them up!)

Oooo. What scares me is that I know what floccin-whatever-ication means... though I might get it conflasticated with flocculation, which of course is an earthquake danger in saturated soils underpinning buildings - you don't want your foundation to suffer flocculation! On the flip side, it just makes clouds pretty.

The act of deciding something is trivial... much like my floccinaucinihilipilification of the candidacy of the Prince of Darkness...

Of course, I just copy and pasted it in that time. I'd hate to try to keep track of where I was at with that word in a spelling bee.

All those "i"s make Mississippi look like a paragon of brevity.

I'll go take my medication now.

No, it's not just you. I work in an IT department, and I'm constantly amazed by the ribbing I get for using words like "vacillate" and "tangential." I once had somebody swear that "verbiage" was not a word. Sheesh.

Don't waste your time,Ma'am, trying to educate suchlike folks. That would be like engaging in contraventile micturition.

John and Beth are nothing if not very propaedeutic.

I had it bad in some High Tech companies, but now it is even worse for me.

I am now working at physician's office. The only one who understands what I am saying some of the time is the doctor himself. My co-irkers have NO clue.

ARRGHHHH!!!!

Sapper Mike

Being as I am an autodidact I would have this problem also, except that like Teresa I work in a very small office.

As for antidisestablishmentarianism, I did a post a while back in which I discussed exactly how that particular issue relates to a current debate in our own polity.

Remember, never use a large word when a diminutive one will suffice.