30 August 2007
29 August 2007
28 August 2007
24 August 2007
Word of the Day
crambo \KRAM-boh\ noun : a game in which one player gives a word or line of verse to be matched in rhyme by other players
Example sentence: According to his early letters, James Boswell, friend and biographer of English lexicographer Samuel Johnson, was a keen crambo player.
Did you know? We've called the game "crambo" since at least 1660, but it was originally dubbed "crambe." The now-obsolete word "crambe" literally meant "cabbage," but it was rarely used for the leafy plant. Instead, it was used figuratively (in reference to a Latin phrase meaning "cabbage repeated or served up again") for things that were overused or repeated. The game, which was popular in the 17th and 18th centuries, began with one player picking a word. A second player then tried to guess it by asking questions. For example: "I know a word that rhymes with 'bird.'" "Is it ridiculous?" "No, it is not absurd." "Is it a part of speech?" "No, it is not a word." And so on, until the word was guessed.
Example sentence: According to his early letters, James Boswell, friend and biographer of English lexicographer Samuel Johnson, was a keen crambo player.
Did you know? We've called the game "crambo" since at least 1660, but it was originally dubbed "crambe." The now-obsolete word "crambe" literally meant "cabbage," but it was rarely used for the leafy plant. Instead, it was used figuratively (in reference to a Latin phrase meaning "cabbage repeated or served up again") for things that were overused or repeated. The game, which was popular in the 17th and 18th centuries, began with one player picking a word. A second player then tried to guess it by asking questions. For example: "I know a word that rhymes with 'bird.'" "Is it ridiculous?" "No, it is not absurd." "Is it a part of speech?" "No, it is not a word." And so on, until the word was guessed.
23 August 2007
22 August 2007
No More Belly Button
My surgery is over. Except for having to spend four extra days because of nausea, and then diarrhea from the medicine they gave me to show the nausea, it was quite successful. I had my belly button converted to use as a means of self-cathing. This procedure is called a mitrofanoff.
Slick.
Slick.
15 August 2007
09 August 2007
Word of the Day
transpontine \trans-PAHN-tyne\ adjective
*1 : situated on the farther side of a bridge
2 British : situated on the south side of the Thames
Example sentence: Bella recommended a transpontine restaurant for our evening rendezvous, so we took a cab across the East River from our hotel in Manhattan and met her in Queens.
Did you know? Usually the prefix "trans-," meaning "across," allows for a reciprocal perspective. Whether you're in Europe or America, for example, transoceanic countries are countries across the ocean from where you are. But that's not the way it originally worked with "transpontine." The "pont-" in "transpontine" is from the Latin "pons," meaning "bridge," and the bridge in this case was, at first, any bridge that crossed the River Thames in the city of London. "Across the bridge" meant on one side of the river only -- the south side. That's where the theaters that featured popular melodramas were located, and Victorian Londoners first used "transpontine" to distinguish them from their more respectable "cispontine" ("situated on the nearer side of a bridge") counterparts north of the Thames.
*1 : situated on the farther side of a bridge
2 British : situated on the south side of the Thames
Example sentence: Bella recommended a transpontine restaurant for our evening rendezvous, so we took a cab across the East River from our hotel in Manhattan and met her in Queens.
Did you know? Usually the prefix "trans-," meaning "across," allows for a reciprocal perspective. Whether you're in Europe or America, for example, transoceanic countries are countries across the ocean from where you are. But that's not the way it originally worked with "transpontine." The "pont-" in "transpontine" is from the Latin "pons," meaning "bridge," and the bridge in this case was, at first, any bridge that crossed the River Thames in the city of London. "Across the bridge" meant on one side of the river only -- the south side. That's where the theaters that featured popular melodramas were located, and Victorian Londoners first used "transpontine" to distinguish them from their more respectable "cispontine" ("situated on the nearer side of a bridge") counterparts north of the Thames.
07 August 2007
Word(s) of the Day
scaramouch \skair-uh-MOOSH\ noun
1 capitalized : a stock character in the Italian commedia dell'arte that burlesques the Spanish don and is characterized by boastfulness and cowardliness
2 a : a cowardly buffoon *b : rascal, scamp
Example sentence: My great uncle was an untrustworthy old scaramouch.
Did you know? In the commedia dell'arte, Scaramouch was a stock character who was constantly being cudgeled by Harlequin, which may explain why his name is based on an Italian word meaning "skirmish," or "a minor fight." The character was made popular in England during the late 1600s by the clever acting of Tiberio Fiurelli. During that time, the name "Scaramouch" also gained notoriety as a derogatory word for "a cowardly buffoon" or "rascal." Today not many people use the word (which can also be spelled "scaramouche"), but you will encounter it while listening to Queen's ubiquitous rock song "Bohemian Rhapsody," in the lyric "I see a little silhouetto of a man / Scaramouche, Scaramouche, will you do the fandango?"
Walter Mitty \wawl-ter-MITT-ee\ noun : a commonplace unadventurous person who seeks escape from reality through daydreaming
Example sentence: "Many readers seem to be Walter Mittys, content to experience danger vicariously." (James Kelly, _Time Magazine_, August 19, 1985)
Did you know? The original "Walter Mitty" was created by humorist James Thurber, who wrote the famous story "The Secret Life of Walter Mitty." In Walter's real life, he is a reticent, henpecked proofreader befuddled by everyday life. But in his fantasies, Walter imagines himself as various daring and heroic characters. Thurber's popular story, which was first published in _The New Yorker_ in 1939, was later made into a movie. Walter Mitty has since become the eponym for dreamers who imagine themselves in dramatic or heroic situations.
august \aw-GUST\ adjective : marked by majestic dignity or grandeur
Example sentence: Mr. Lee's bearing was always august and stately, and he drew respectful glances wherever he went.
Did you know? "August" comes from the Latin word "augustus," meaning "consecrated" or "venerable," which in turn is related to the Latin "augur," meaning "consecrated by augury" or "auspicious." In 8 B.C. the Roman Senate honored Augustus Caesar, the first Roman emperor, by changing the name of their month "Sextilis" to "Augustus." Middle English speakers inherited the name of the month of August, but it wasn't until the mid-1600s that "august" came to be used generically in English, more or less as "augustus" was in Latin, to refer to someone with imperial qualities.
1 capitalized : a stock character in the Italian commedia dell'arte that burlesques the Spanish don and is characterized by boastfulness and cowardliness
2 a : a cowardly buffoon *b : rascal, scamp
Example sentence: My great uncle was an untrustworthy old scaramouch.
Did you know? In the commedia dell'arte, Scaramouch was a stock character who was constantly being cudgeled by Harlequin, which may explain why his name is based on an Italian word meaning "skirmish," or "a minor fight." The character was made popular in England during the late 1600s by the clever acting of Tiberio Fiurelli. During that time, the name "Scaramouch" also gained notoriety as a derogatory word for "a cowardly buffoon" or "rascal." Today not many people use the word (which can also be spelled "scaramouche"), but you will encounter it while listening to Queen's ubiquitous rock song "Bohemian Rhapsody," in the lyric "I see a little silhouetto of a man / Scaramouche, Scaramouche, will you do the fandango?"
Walter Mitty \wawl-ter-MITT-ee\ noun : a commonplace unadventurous person who seeks escape from reality through daydreaming
Example sentence: "Many readers seem to be Walter Mittys, content to experience danger vicariously." (James Kelly, _Time Magazine_, August 19, 1985)
Did you know? The original "Walter Mitty" was created by humorist James Thurber, who wrote the famous story "The Secret Life of Walter Mitty." In Walter's real life, he is a reticent, henpecked proofreader befuddled by everyday life. But in his fantasies, Walter imagines himself as various daring and heroic characters. Thurber's popular story, which was first published in _The New Yorker_ in 1939, was later made into a movie. Walter Mitty has since become the eponym for dreamers who imagine themselves in dramatic or heroic situations.
august \aw-GUST\ adjective : marked by majestic dignity or grandeur
Example sentence: Mr. Lee's bearing was always august and stately, and he drew respectful glances wherever he went.
Did you know? "August" comes from the Latin word "augustus," meaning "consecrated" or "venerable," which in turn is related to the Latin "augur," meaning "consecrated by augury" or "auspicious." In 8 B.C. the Roman Senate honored Augustus Caesar, the first Roman emperor, by changing the name of their month "Sextilis" to "Augustus." Middle English speakers inherited the name of the month of August, but it wasn't until the mid-1600s that "august" came to be used generically in English, more or less as "augustus" was in Latin, to refer to someone with imperial qualities.
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