asymptote

Dave Brackeen: asymptotically!
Other person: Huh?
Dave Brackeen: In Geometry an asymptote of a curve is a way of describing its behavior far away from its point of origin by comparing it to another curve.
Other person: Oh!
Dave Brackeen: Specifically, the second curve is an asymptote of the first if distance between the two approaches 0 as the points being considered tend towards paralleling infinity
Other person Please specify
Dave Brackeen Ok! well informally, this means that the first curve gets closer to the second as it gets farther from its origin. Now one important case would be when the asymptote is a straight line; this is called a linear asymptote (or simply asymptote if there is no chance of confusion). (My favorite part is the parenthesis)
Other person: Oh!
Dave Brackeen You see if curve A has the curve B as an asymptote, one says that A is asymptotic to B. Similarly B is asymptotic to A, so A and B are called asymptotic
Other person: Oh gotcha