What's Your Word for the Day? Showing 951-1,000 of 3,049

[Debbie, sardonic princess of cheerfulness]

Dunno about sedimantary...definitely quite sedentary on Mondays

[Ruth]

If not sedimentary, at least then igneous or metamorphic.

[David]

Magmanimous? Techtono-pop?

Stop me. Before I pun again.

I don't know schist from Shinola.

[Ken, Moderator]

S'OK. We appreciate puns. This is one of the rare places where they are given their due.

[Tyler]

I like NE's "tacit." Something about that word just has the right ring to it. It has the right number of syllables, and the right combination of consonants. Anyone using that word gains instant respect from listeners.

---

My own WFTD keeps cropping up in a book I've been reading: Prehensile

It means "used for grasping." I kept seeing the word in reference to a greedy man's hands. This word I should have known long ago and finally looked up. If I had known it was such a serviceable word, why, I would have looked it up years ago. Why didn't anyone tell me?

[Debbie, sardonic princess of cheerfulness]

I always associate prehensile with things primitive...it just sounds primitive to me. And Tyler...you are right about 'tacit'....it is concise and crisp and pleasing to the tongue.

[Savvy]

I like the sound of the repeating esses.

sol⋅ip⋅sism   /ˈsɒlɪpˌsɪzəm/
Pronunciation [sol-ip-siz-uhm:]

–noun 1. Philosophy. the theory that only the self exists, or can be proved to exist.
2. extreme preoccupation with and indulgence of one's feelings, desires, etc.; egoistic self-absorption.

Origin:
1880–85; sol(i)- 1 + L ips(e) self + -ism

[Boreal Elizabeth]

chasing our tail?

[David]

My word for the day is "latitudinarian," meaning allowing room for variety in religion.

How come there's no word "longitudinarian"?

[Ken, Moderator]

Because people are short on allowing room for variety within their religion?

For some reason, your word reminded me of quotidian, a synonym for "daily" that I just learned. Only why would you say it instead of "daily"?

[David]

"Quotidian" has a connotation of ordinary, unremarkable.

It's also in a higher register, in short, a bit of s stuck-up sticky-beak word.

[David]

"This 'ere's the wattle
It's the symbol of our land,
You can put it in a bottle,
You can 'old it in your 'and."

[Debbie, sardonic princess of cheerfulness]

....daily quota.......
I think it sounds faintly prissy.

[David]

pristine precognition of the priapic

[Debbie, sardonic princess of cheerfulness]

Awesomely alliterative analogy....

[Stamatia]

Explosively explicit explanation
Hi there guys and gals
I missed you

[Ken, Moderator]

Greece is the word (Olivia Newton John told me so).

Are we going with quotidian quota, then?

[Stamatia]

Actually NE the word is HELLAS
I was swamped and didn't have the time to visit
I'm on a short vacation now. Heh, heh

[Debbie, sardonic princess of cheerfulness]

I wondered where you were but hey....you live in Greece! I wouldn't spend much time on the computer if I lived in Greece!! Good to see you back!

[Ken, Moderator]

I wouldn't spend much time on the computer is I lived in Hellas, either. I just love those Hellenic Isles!

[David]

I was accused of Anglophilia when I used "billingsgate" in a memorandum of law.

This term for foul invective comes from the name of a fish market in London. There are lots of words that come from place names:

Donnybrook [fair:]
bedlam
put [s.o.:] in Coventry
met his Waterloo
Armageddon
spartan
marathon

There must be many others.

[Savvy]

ABSQUATULATE-
(v): run away; usually includes taking something or somebody along
(v): run away quickly

This could be a fun word to use...

[Boreal Elizabeth]

it seems to be a combo of abscond and ambulate
i like it

[Ken, Moderator]

manifest

[David]

factoid

[Annie]

abibliophobia

The fear of running out of things to read.

[Debbie, sardonic princess of cheerfulness]

Ooooh!!! And here I was, smugly thinking I had NO phobias!!!!!

[Ruth]

Annie wrote: "abibliophobia

The fear of running out of things to read."

Heehee, I know it well.

[David]

Sitting in a doctor's office, and there's nothing but a 3-year-old golfing magazine to read (I don't adhere to the Church of the Dimpled Sphere).

I suppose I should be praying.

[David]

Oh. The word: abulia.

[Ruth]

David wrote: "Oh. The word: abulia."

So that's why I keep spinning in place?

[David]

I thought that was Rumpelstiltskin.

[Boreal Elizabeth]

somehow david
i have a feeling
there is enough amusing, arcane, interesting and slightly bizarre information between your two ears
to keep you amply occupied while waiting for even the slowest physician ;)

[David]

Yes, perhaps, but somebody tell me where I put my keys?

[Debbie, sardonic princess of cheerfulness]

Try the ignition?!

[Boreal Elizabeth]

hahaha
i'd look in the freezer if i were you

[Debbie, sardonic princess of cheerfulness]

Wassail!
Of recent times the word Wassail (from the Anglo-Saxon toast wæs þu hæl, "be thou hale" — i.e., "be in good health") has come to be synonymous with Christmas.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wassailing

[Leslie]

My favorite word is mellifluous. It means pleasant to hear: pleasant and soothing to listen to, and sweet or rich in tone, just like the word itself.

Doesn't it just flow off of your tongue? :)

[Boreal Elizabeth]

i love mellifluous
always have
and melodious
and prosaic

all for similar reasons
they conjure lovely images and thoughts and of course for the first two, sounds

[David]

Caesaropapism

State, and especially Imperial dominance over the Church.

[David]

A New Yawk woid--"gibbone"--a big clumsy oaf. From the Italian for "gibbon," a kind of ape, not the historian.

Cf. "jamoke," more or less the same thing.

[Lea]

I thought Stephen Colbert invented this word! Thanks for correcting my assumption.

Anna wrote: "truthiness- the truth that comes from the gut, not from books.
A student used this concept as the basis for a paper and I was ready to reject it, but low and behold, it is now a real word- Mirriam..."

[Ken, Moderator]

Cf.

I actually had a dream the other night and was panicked because I couldn't remember what the abbreviation stood for (or sat down for, for that matter). I kept seeing "Cf's" in my dream, would wake up, would fall back to sleep, and there it was again!

[Jess]

physiognomy:

Pronunciation:
\ˌfi-zē-ˈä(g)-nə-mē\
Function:
noun
Inflected Form(s):
plural phys·i·og·no·mies
Etymology:
Middle English phisonomie, from Anglo-French phisenomie, from Late Latin physiognomonia, physiognomia, from Greek physiognōmonia, from physiognōmōn judging character by the features, from physis nature, physique, appearance + gnōmōn interpreter — more at gnomon
Date:
14th century

1: the art of discovering temperament and character from outward appearance2: the facial features held to show qualities of mind or character by their configuration or expression3: external aspect ; also : inner character or quality revealed outwardly

http://www.merriam-webster.com/dictio...

The word is used quite often in "The Scarlet Letter" to reflect how the characters' inner personality is portrayed by their outer appearance. For example, Chillingworth's search for revenge is reflected in his hunched shoulders and otherwise attractive outwardly appearance.

[Ken, Moderator]

Ah, The Scarlet Letter -- that scourge of many a high schooler. Making it interesting must be a Herculean task!

It's interesting how old writers favor certain words like physiognomy. Poe, for instance, liked "rheumy" as in a "rheumy with a view."

Um, kidding. But not about the word. Rheum, rheumy -- glassy as in an eye under intoxication, I think.

[Debbie, sardonic princess of cheerfulness]

Main Entry: rheum
Pronunciation: \ˈrüm\
Function: noun
Etymology: Middle English reume, from Anglo-French, from Latin rheuma, from Greek, literally, flow, flux, from rhein to flow — more at stream
Date: 14th century
1: a watery discharge from the mucous membranes especially of the eyes or nose
2archaic : tears
— rheumy \ˈrü-mē\ adjective

I always heard rheumy applied as an adjective to describe the eyes of the elderly, rather than drunkards.

[Ken, Moderator]

See Poe's "The Cask of Amontillado." I think EAP uses it twice to describe the eyes of not-so-Fortunato, the drunk who gets walled in alive (gulp).

[Jess]

I love teaching The Scarlet Letter. Also, I have agree that rheumy is often used to mean the elderly (although sometimes I wonder if those older people where drinking too).

[Ken, Moderator]

Sometimes you just try to drink old age off. Either way, you forget a bit...

Go Muskies!

[David]

I just can't seem to drink you off of my mind . . .