GAME: Word of the Day (WOTD)

[Ghost]

• <strike>Brad brought up the idea of a ‘Word of the Day Bonus Point Challenge’ for Volleyball 2004. To earn the bonus point you must use the word of the day in you post prior to the posting the next day’s word (approximately 24 hours). The word will come from http://dictionary.reference.com/wordoftheday/.
  
  Word of the Day for Tuesday August 3, 2004
  
  providential \prov-uh-DEN(T)-shuhl\, adjective:
  
  1. Of or resulting from divine direction or superintendence.
  2. Occurring through or as if through divine intervention; peculiarly fortunate or appropriate.
  
  In the very first sentences of Mein Kampf, Adolf was to emphasize -- what became a Nazi stock-in-trade -- how providential it was that he had been born in Braunau am Inn, on the border of the two countries he saw it as his life's task to unite.
  
  
  /FYI - Schadenfreude was the Word of the Day for Wednesday May 10, 2000
  
  EDIT: I have to edit this thread title every time Brad turns this thread into a Game: . . . . thread</strike>

Edit by Brad:

As of 2009, this thread is now independant of the annual "Writer's Vollyball" game thread. It is open to any and all who wish to play. Simply use the daily word of the day (highlighted in boldface) in creative and amusing fashion. It's that easy. For examples of play, skip ahead to page 6 of this thread.

[Ghost]

Word of the Day for Wednesday August 4, 2004

conflate \kuhn-FLAYT\, transitive verb:
1. To bring together; to fuse together; to join or meld.
2. To combine (as two readings of a text) into one whole.

Scott Reynolds's creepy debut feature [film] conflates the present and the past with ingenious use of flashbacks.
--Anne Billson, "Bent beneath the weight of its own righteousness," Sunday Telegraph, March 1, 1998

Painting America as a drug-ridden society leads to bad policy -- as does the tendency in some quarters to conflate the various drug abuses into a single dreadful statistic.
--William Raspberry, "Not a Drug-Ridden Society," Washington Post, April 21, 2000

... lean and mobile military units that conflate the traditional categories of police officers, commandos, emergency-relief specialists, diplomats, and, of course, intelligence officers.
--Robert D. Kaplan, "The roles of the CIA and the military may merge," The Atlantic, February 1998

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Conflate is from Latin conflatus, past participle of conflare, "to blow together; to put together," from con-, "with, together" + flare, "to blow."

[MidasKnight]

I'm glad to see somebody else picked up the reins on this thread. I started it right before I went on hiatus.

[Darb]

I thought 'hiatus' was bad breath ... no wait, that's 'halitosis'. My bad

[MidasKnight]

I have that too

[Ghost]

Word of the Day for Thursday August 5, 2004

bloviate \BLOH-vee-ayt\, intransitive verb:
To speak or write at length in a pompous or boastful manner.

Anyone who has ever spent an idle morning watching the Washington talk shows has probably wondered: how did these people become entitled to earn six-figure salaries bloviating about the week's headlines?
--Robert Worth, "Quick! The Index!" New York Times, June 3, 2001

After five years as president and thirty years as a political figure, this colossal oaf is still unable to discipline his urge to . . . bloviate.
--R. Emmett Tyrrell, Jr., American Spectator, December 19, 1997

We follow him minute by minute through a day in his office -- bloviating amiably with colleagues on the telephone, letting his secretary rewrite his clumsy letters and worrying about the possible hatred of his subordinates.
--John Brooks, "Fiction of the Managerial Class," New York Times, April 8, 1984

/me forgot to post this morning - Bloviate sounds like volleyball posting to me

[Darb]

Sounds like a deviant form of oral sexuality to me

[Aunflin]

Sounds like a deviant form of oral sexuality to me

[Ghost]

Word of the Day for Friday August 6, 2004

sui generis \soo-eye-JEN-ur-us; soo-ee-\, adjective:
Being the only example of its kind; constituting a class of its own; unique.

This man, in fact, was sui generis, a true original.
--Ruth Lord, Henry F. du Pont and Winterthur

They're a special case, a category of their own, sui generis.
--Eric Kraft, Leaving Small's Hotel

In the degree of their alienation from their society and of their impact on it, the Russian intelligentsia of the nineteenth century were a phenomenon almost sui generis.
--Aileen M. Kelly, Toward Another Shore

William Randolph Hearst did not speak often of his father. He preferred to think of himself as sui generis and self-created, which in many ways he was.
--David Nasaw, The Chief

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Sui generis is from Latin, literally meaning "of its own kind": sui, "of its own" + generis, genitive form of genus, "kind."

[Ghost]

Word of the Day for Monday August 9, 2004

gamine \gam-EEN; GAM-een\, noun:
1. A girl who wanders about the streets; an urchin.
2. A playfully mischievous girl or young woman.

And the whole world is whacked out with fear of nuclear doom, except for Claire, a French gamine who is "living her own nightmare" and waking up in lots of strange places.
--Joe Brown, Washington Post, January 17, 1992

. . . the delectable young gamine employed as a waitress in a Montmartre cafe.
--Peter Bradshaw, "Jolie good show," The Guardian, October 5, 2001

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Gamine comes from the French. A boy who wanders about the street is a gamin (pronounced \GAM-in\).


Someone could have some fun with this one in Volleyball 2004

[Ghost]

Word of the Day for Tuesday August 10, 2004

senescence \sih-NEH-suhn(t)s\, noun:
The state of being old; the process of growing old; aging.

Our own bodies are simultaneously and subtly undergoing the same inexorable process that will lead eventually to senescence and death.
--Sherwin B. Nuland, How We Die

Is there a middle ground between an obsession with aging and an intelligent commitment to a healthier lifestyle? How much time, money, energy, and angst should we devote to the fight against senescence?
--Tony Schwartz, "In My Humble Opinion," Fast Company, November 1999

Trying to understand the factors that determine maximum possible lifespan is one of the most puzzling aspects of the overall study of senescence and death.
--William R. Clark, A Means to an End
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Senescence is from Latin senescere, "to grow old," from senex, "old." It is related to senile. The adjective form is senescent.

/aint we all -

[Ghost]

Word of the Day for Wednesday August 11, 2004

arcanum \ar-KAY-nuhm\, noun;
plural arcana \-nuh\:
1. A secret; a mystery.
2. Specialized or mysterious knowledge, language, or information that is not accessible to the average person (generally used in the plural).

Through the years, Usenet evolved into an international forum on thousands of topics, called Usenet news groups, from the arcana of programming languages to European travel tips.
--Katie Hafner, "James T. Ellis, 45, a Developer of Internet Discussion Network, Is Dead," New York Times, July 1, 2001

Here we must enter briefly into the technical arcana of employment law.
--Paul F. Campos, Jurismania The Madness of American Law

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Arcanum is from the Latin, from arcanus "closed, secret," from arca, "chest, box," from arcere, "to shut in."

/another good one

[Ghost]

Word of the Day for Thursday August 12, 2004

flaneur \flah-NUR\, noun:
One who strolls about aimlessly; a lounger; a loafer.

Burrows and Wallace show how New York embraced the idea of the flaneur -- of the disinterested, artistically inclined wanderer in the city, of what they call "city watching."
--Jed Perl, "The Adolescent City," New Republic, January 22, 2001

The restricted hotel lobby has replaced the square or piazza as a public meeting place, and our boulevards, such as they are, are not avenues for the parade and observation of personality, or for perusal by the flaneur, but conveyor belts to the stores, where we can buy everything but human understanding.
--Anatole Broyard, "In Praise of Contact," New York Times, June 27, 1982

Baudelaire saw the writer as a detached flaneur, a mocking dandy in the big-city crowd, alienated, isolated, anonymous, aristocratic, melancholic.
--Ian Buruma, "The Romance of Exile," New Republic, February 12, 2001
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Flaneur comes from French, from flâner, "to saunter; to stroll; to lounge about."

[Ghost]

Word of the Day for Friday August 13, 2004

presentiment \prih-ZEN-tuh-muhnt\, noun:
A sense that something will or is about to happen; a premonition.

He'd had a presentiment of this. Yes, he had known that this was precisely what would be said.
--Nina Berberova, Cape of Storms (translated by Marian Schwartz)

High ranking North Korean officers had "only the barest presentiment" of hostilities until the final orders were issued for the attack.
--Nicholas Eberstadt, The End of North Korea

Lituma pictured the blank faces and icy narrow eyes that the people in Naccos . . . would all turn toward him when he asked if they knew the whereabouts of this woman's husband, and he felt the same discouragement and helplessness he had experienced earlier when he tried to question them about the other men who were missing: heads shaking no, monosyllables, evasive glances, frowns, pursed lips, a presentiment of menace.
--Mario Vargas Llosa, Death in the Andes

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Presentiment derives from Latin praesentire, "to feel beforehand," from prae-, "before" + sentire, "to feel."


/me thought this was going to happen

[Ghost]

Word of the Day for Monday August 16, 2004

pervicacious \puhr-vih-KAY-shuhs\, adjective:
Refusing to change one's ideas, behavior, etc.; stubborn; obstinate.

In fact, I'm a word nerd. I get a kick out of tossing a few odd ones into my column, just to see if the pervicacious editors will weed them out.
--Michael Hawley, "Things That Matter: Waiting for Linguistic Viagra," Technology Review, June, 2001

One of the most pervicacious young creatures that ever was heard of.
--Samuel Richardson, Clarissa

The language of the bureaucrats and administrators must needs be recognized as an outgrowth of legal parlance. There is no other way to explain its pervading, pervicacious and pernicious meanderings.
--New York Law Journal, 1973

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Pervicacious is from Latin pervicax, pervicac-, "stubborn, headstrong," from root pervic- of pervincere, "to carry ones point, maintain ones opinion," from per-, "through, thoroughly" + vincere, "to conquer, prevail against" + the suffix -ious, "characterized by, full of."

/no me is not pervicacious

[Ghost]

Word of the Day for Tuesday August 17, 2004

foofaraw \FOO-fuh-raw\, noun:
1. Excessive or flashy ornamentation or decoration.
2. A fuss over a matter of little importance.

A somber, muted descending motif opens and closes the work, which is brief but effective. It provided much needed relief from the fanfares and foofaraw in which brass-going composers so often indulge.
--Philip Kennicott, "Brass Spectacular is a Spectacle of Special Sound," St. Louis Post-Dispatch, January 17, 1997

After working in the news business for a number of years, I've become a bit cynical about mass-media coverage of events like the Y2K foofaraw.
--Roy Clancy, "Ready for Y2K...," Calgary Sun, December 15, 1999

Making the Times best-seller list, or a movie, or all that other foofaraw is not necessarily proof of [a novel's] lasting significance.
--Roger K. Miller, "'Peyton Place' was remarkably good bad novel," Minneapolis Star Tribune, December 29, 1996

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Foofaraw is perhaps from Spanish fanfarrón, "a braggart."

/me thinks the soapbox is sometimes a foofaraw.

[Ghost]

Word of the Day for Wednesday August 18, 2004

Cockaigne \kah-KAYN\, noun:
An imaginary land of ease and luxury.

Outside, in the dark, a wobbly patch of life upon the blue snow, the deer perhaps browsed, her soft blob of a nose rapturously sunk in the chilly winter greenery, her modest brain-stem steeped in some dream of a Cockaigne for herbivores.
--John Updike, Toward the End of Time

Everyone was seeking renewal, a golden century, a Cockaigne of the spirit.
--Umberto Eco, Foucault's Pendulum
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Cockaigne comes from Middle English cokaygne, from Middle French (pais de) cocaigne "(land of) plenty," ultimately adapted or derived from a word meaning "cake."


/don't we wish to live in our own little cockaigne or maybe just a short visit to Brigadoon.

[Ghost]

Word of the Day for Thursday August 19, 2004

imprimatur \im-prih-MAH-tur; -MAY-\, noun:
1. Official license or approval to print or publish a book, paper, etc.; especially, such a license issued by the Roman Catholic episcopal authority.
2. Approval; sanction.
3. A mark of approval or distinction.

Vatican officials have overruled a 1994 decision by a bishop in England, ordering him to withdraw his imprimatur from a popular religious education text that had come under attack from conservatives.
--"Vatican orders bishop to remove imprimatur," National Catholic Reporter, February 27, 1998

His name was known and respected on both sides of the Atlantic; his imprimatur on a stock or bond offering could be worth millions to the firm doing the issue.
--H. W. Brands, Masters of Enterprise

But neither controversial phenomena nor potentially illuminating but statistically insignificant research has had the imprimatur of a peer-reviewed journal -- until now.
--Kaja Perina, "Probing folklore & fringe science," Psychology Today, July-August 2002

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Imprimatur is from New Latin imprimatur, "let it be printed," from imprimere, "to imprint," from Latin, from in- + premere, "to press."

[Ghost]

Word of the Day for Friday August 20, 2004

punctilio \punk-TIL-ee-oh\, noun:
1. A fine point of exactness in conduct, ceremony, or procedure.
2. Strictness or exactness in the observance of formalities; as, "the punctilios of a public ceremony."

His godmother, Mary Delany, however, while acknowledging Garret Wesley's musical talents, found him rather deficient in 'the punctilios of good breeding', and had consequently been much gratified when he announced that he was to marry Lady Louisa Augusta Lennox, daughter of the second Duke of Richmond.
--Christopher Hibbert, Wellington: A Personal History

The utmost in punctilio was observed as each side was retired scoreless for two innings.
--Red Smith, Red Smith on Baseball

Unbending on protocol and punctilio, the Emperor, in his public appearances, recalled the splendor and opulence of Suleiman the Magnificent or Louis XIV, with the difference that he lived and worked in a modern atmosphere and journeyed abroad in a commandeered Ethiopian Airlines plane.
--Alden Whitman, "Haile Selassie of Ethiopia Dies at 83," New York Times, August 28, 1975

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Punctilio comes from Obsolete Italian punctiglio, from Spanish puntillo, diminutive of punto, "point," from Latin punctum, from pungere, "to prick."

[mrdude]

Word of the Day for Saturday August 21, 2004

(ha ha I stole the word of the day for tomorrow even though tomorrow has not come yet, I will refrain from posting the word until morning)

(edited thanks to ghost's kind suggestions.)

[Aunflin]

Word of the Day for Friday August 21, 2004

(ha ha I stole the word of the day for tommorow eventhough tommorow has not come yet, I wont post the wond until morning)

Dude: It's Saturday August 21, 2004 tomorrow...

[Ghost]

I was going to let that go Aunflin, but since you opened up Pandora’s Box. mrdude is going to keep the Spelling Mistress very busy:

eventhough vs. even though

tomorrow vs. tommorow

word vs. wond


And in mrdude’s Sig:

controls vs. controlls


You better watch out mrdude she hits pretty hard with the ruler

/me would think you would get your sig spelled right

[laurie]

Ghostie smells political lies.......and I smell spelling errors


Bad MrDude

[mrdude]

Word of the Day for Saturday August 21, 2004

Fiat

Pronunciation: 'fE-&t, -"at, -"ät; 'fI-&t, -"at
Function: noun
Etymology: Latin, let it be done, 3d singular present subjunctive of fieri to become, be done -- more at BE
1 : a command or act of will that creates something without or as if without further effort
2 : an authoritative determination : DICTATE <a fiat of conscience>
3 : an authoritative or arbitrary order : DECREE <government by fiat>

He worked hard on the new world. He quickly understood the differences between military and civillian leadership, and governed by persuasion rather than fiat, and by working as hard as anyone at the tasks involved in setting up a self sustaining economy. - Orson Scott Card, Ender's Game

[laurie]

4: A GREAT CAR, as in "The Fiat convertible goes from 0 to 60 in 4.3 seconds."

VRRRRRRROOOOOOOOMMMMMMMM