@Hairy Scot ... Can you "slightly" exaggerate? Can you "greatly" exaggerate? If you can "greatly" exaggerate, then you can "excessively" exaggerate. If you can "excessively" exaggerate, then you have met the definition of "overexaggerate" (or, if you like it better, over-exaggerate". There are degrees of exaggeration ... indeed, there always has been.

From the OED: The word originally meant ‘pile up, accumulate,’ later ‘intensify praise or blame,’‘dwell on a virtue or fault,’ giving rise to current senses.

There is not and never has been only one degree of exaggeration. That's only a myth in the shut-off minds of pendants. For the rest of us in the real world, there are degrees of exaggeration which means that one can eathly overexaggerate.

Yes, the facts remain that there are degrees of exaggeration whether you like them or not.

(OED) Prefix over- 1 excessively; to an unwanted degree

Are you saying that it is not possible to exaggerate excessively?

If it is possible to exaggerate excessively, then one can overexaggerate.

One can be friendly and one can be over-friendly.
One can magnify and one can over-magnifiy.
One can exaggerate and one can over-exaggerate.

@K ... I agree with you, more or less, but only so far. One can be too pedantic. We all have our pet peeves but I'd like to think that we can see that we make mistakes. I'm the king of typos ... and poor proofreading! I don't wrapped umbe (around) the axle about commas and some other little stuff.

Some of us, like me, are rebels and like to use old or odd meanings of words or just seldom used words. It doesn't mean that we're benighted ... just odd! lol

I'm all for choices and "bendability" in usage, but there are limits. Having said all of that, if someone were to write "on accident" several times, I would ask him about it. If I were a teacher, I'd correct it to "by accident".

@Brus ... not in the US Army. The adjective comes before noun ... brigadier general, major general, lieutenant general ... thus brigadier generals, major generals, lieutenant generals. General is the noun, not the adjective, in the military rank. Whereas in attorney general, it is the adjective.

From the OED:

usage: In US English, the adverb form is sometimes spelled backwards ( the ladder fell backwards), but the adjective is almost always backward ( a backward glance). Directional words using the suffix -ward tend to have no s ending in US English, although backwards is more common than afterwards, towards, or forwards. The s ending often (but not always) appears in the phrases backwards and forwards and bending over backwards. In British English, the spelling backwards is more common than backward .

@dogreed ... It is eath to see, that you have not read the thread since, if you had, you wouldn't write such benighted words. I know it is a long thread ... but read it thru and if you wish to discuss a truer English rather than the mongrel tung of Latinates, then feel free to delve into English words with Anglo-Germanic roots.

BTW, think that "eath" is "imaginary" ... still in the wordbook: http://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/eath ... eath, eather, eathest, and eathly.

A couple of interesting lists:
a sampler of obsolete English words
http://ozarque.livejournal.com/39453.html
http://ozarque.livejournal.com/90704.html

I like widderwin (also widerwin, witherwin --- opponent, adversary). Compare to widdershins - counterclockwise.

Benothinged (pp or benothing (v))- annihilated, destroyed is good ... and still brooked!

An interesting read (I like beslobber!):

More "Be" Verbs and Adjectives

A veritable flood of terms meets us here. Someone whose clothes are dirty might be bedaubed, bedabbled, besmeared, bespattered or beslubbered. I suppose that splashing through mud was such a preoccupation in medieval and early-modern England that they needed loads of words to describe one who hadn't negotiated the roads cleanly. However, ***beslobber*** means to praise fulsomely or, more usually, "to kiss like a drivelling child." An 1828 quotation from Macaulay is to the point, "The salaried Viceroy of France...beslobbering his brother and courtiers in a fit of maudlin affection." To beseem means to befit or suit--"it ill beseems you to complain."

Clothes that have been patched many times are bepatched; a log cabin is betimbered; an addled or confused person is betwattled and a person who bespouts is one who recites things in a pompous manner. Something reduced to nothing is ***benothinged***. "His aim was to benothing the competition." Finally, my favorite is benighted, whose older and rarer meaning is simply to be overtaken by darkness of night [John Bunyan in Pilgrim's Progress says, "I am like to be benighted, for the day is almost spent"] while the more usual meaning is to "involve in intellectual or moral darkness, in the 'night' of error or superstition." As England flexed its muscles in the 18th and 19th centuries, it found this word eminently useful to describe those who fell under its imperial sway.
http://www.drbilllong.com/SpellersDiary/114125.html

@Roxanne ... It's been many years since I graduated from an MCS (Memphis City Schools) school but I assure you that "on tomorrow" wasn't taught in the schools back then. If it is being taught now, then maybe the Shelby County-MCS consolidation will fix that.

@Ængelfolc ... Interesting. There is vowel shift for the OE that is sunder from the other Germanic tungs.

Maybe hûsc n. mockery, derision, scorn, insult ['hux']?

In ME, hean made it as hēn(e) ... (a) Poor, needy, wretched; riche and ~; (b) contemptible; also, hateful, injurious; holden for ~, to hold (sb.) in contempt.

I haven't seen it beyond ME tho hean, heen, or hene would be a good word for contempt which is Latin for scorn (scorn itself has aGermanic root).

Overween \O`ver*ween"\, v. t. [AS. oferwenian]
To think too highly or arrogantly; to regard one's own thinking or conclusions too highly; hence, to egotistic, arrogant, or rash, in opinion; to think conceitedly; to presume.

OE ofer-wennan, -wenian to be proud, become insolent, or presumptuous.

This word might come in handy for unexpectedly, suddenly, unusual ... In ME, it was a noun, verb, adj, and adv! ... Like ween, it has sundry meanings some seem to be gainsaying!

Word of the DaySunday, October 23, 2011
ferly, noun;
1. Something unusual, strange, or causing wonder or terror.
2. Astonishment; wonder.

adjective:
1. Unexpected; strange; unusual.
Quotes:
I had had half a thought, at the outset, of telling him about the ferly, my glimpse of the palace. But I couldn't bring myself to it. -- Clive Staples Lewis and Fritz Eichenberg, Till We Have Faces: A Myth Retold
Lord, ye'll have all the folk staring as if we were some ferly. -- Margaret Oliphant, Kirsteen
Origin:
Ferly is derived from Old English fǣrlīc meaning fǣr (fear) and -līc (-ly). It was related to the German gefährlich meaning dangerous.