The other day I was thinking about words that sound like the opposite of their definitions. It’s a pretty subjective exercise, but these are the three that occurred to me:
natty – It means ‘dapper’, but I always think of gnats. Plus, words that end in ‘ty’ tend to seem negative to me–‘dirty’, ‘gritty’, ‘faulty’ and so forth.
quotidian – A very peculiar word to describe something that’s commonplace. The ‘q’ suggests that it ought to refer to something exotic.
solvent – As in, ‘having enough money’. I learned the other, more quotidian (heh) definition first, and I always imagined that it should mean that you didn’t have enough money–that it had dissolved.
In university, I was offered some (relatively-speaking) high-paying work by a prof in my department. He brought me into his office and asked me ‘how solvent are you these days?’ I didn’t know that usage at the time, so I replied ‘ah, you know, as solvent as the next guy’. I don’t know if I fooled him or not.
What words do you think sound the opposite of what they mean?
DarrenBarefoot.com 
What words do you think sound the opposite of what they mean?
Inflammable, which actually mean flammable. This irritates me no end.
Spendthrift. It’s the “thrift” part of it that always throws me.
This one doesn’t *sound* like the opposite of what it means, but it is rather odd that the “abbreviation” is such a long word.
What about tasty? Or zesty? Or toasty? Or frosty? Or lusty?
Quotidian used to get me until I thought about “status quo.”
And the “inflame” at the beginning of inflammable!
But now I’m just being a pain in the ass.
Similar to quotidian is ubiquitous which means something you see everywhere (right now it is the ubiquitous smart car on the streets of Victoria
Nonplussed is one that always gets me.
“Tact”. It’s such a short, sharp word (and rhymes with “fact”) that makes me think of someone being direct or blunt, rather than coy or diplomatic.
I don’t like the word diction. No real reason, but I don’t think it gets used correctly enough.
Also, Quotidian is derived from the French ‘quotidienne” for “daily”
Fulsome would be my selection here. It sounds postive but actually means offensive, excessive, or gross.
“Hagiography” is another one. Makes me think that it’s going to portray the subject as an evil old crone, when in fact it’s quite the opposite.
very nice